The improved antidote, supposed to be more active in expelling poison, than a late invention, by the Rev. Sir Harcourt Lees, Bart. in which the Catholics are vindicated from his abuse, and their claims for unrestricted emancipation, consideredPhilodemus
Religion
The improved antidote, supposed to be more active in expelling poison, than a late invention, by the Rev. Sir Harcourt Lees, Bart. in which the Catholics are vindicated from his abuse, and their claims for unrestricted emancipation, considered
Lord Grey, Lord Grenville, the Whig party, even the members of the
opposition are collectively abused by this Author; Lord Grey and Lord
Grenville, however, together with many other individuals whom he severely
censures, are men of acknowledged talents and information, as is evident
from their general conduct, and the speeches they have delivered in
various Parliamentary debates; but they differ in opinion from his
Reverence, if however, every man, who thinks differently from the learned
Author, be a profligate or a blockhead, we suspect that, besides himself,
he will scarcely find a wise or a virtuous individual throughout the
great Empire.
He again resumes his attacks upon the Catholics, we shall, however, in
the first instance, notice three questions, one particle of which he so
confidently defies them to refute:
1st. “Does not a Papist kneel down before, pray and bow to images,
pictures, and pieces of old wood representing our Blessed Saviour, the
Virgin Mary, and many Saints, and does he not do this for the purpose
either of paying adoration to these identical pieces of wood, old sheets
of oil cloth, with faces smeared on them, almost as hideous as most
of those you will see at the Catholic Board, on reading one of Robert
Peele’s Anti-catholic speeches, or to their likenesses?”—In answer to
this question we beg leave to refer to the catechisms of the catholics,
in which occur the following questions and answers:—Is it lawful to
adore the blessed Virgin or the saints?—No: for by adoration is here
meant the honor due to God alone.—Do the commandments forbid us to honor
the Saints?—No: for the honor we give them is different from that which
we pay to God, we honor the Saints as friends and faithful servants
to God.—If it is forbid in Catholics to worship the Saints, can it
be supposed that they will pay adoration to their image, pictures or
representations?—Or, is it consistent with probability that the same
Church will direct them, in their riper years, to practise, what it has
taught them when pupils, to reject and avoid?—The council of Trent has,
without doubt, declared, that due honor and respect be given to images
of Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the other Saints;—and who can deny that
that degree of honor and respect, to which they are entitled, should be
paid these, or any other representations?—It is natural to be affected
at the Representation of a dear departed friend and benefactor; the
Catholics look upon them as their best of benefactors, they therefore
pay them a due degree of honor and respect, should they, however, exceed
this degree, they are not only culpable, but obnoxious likewise, to the
censures of their own Church:—the Protestants themselves regard King
William III. as their benefactor, of course they honor and drink to his
memory, some even have been so far inflamed with enthusiasm, as to drink
to his glorious and immortal memory on their bare knees, are not these
Protestants equally idolatrous with the Catholics?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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