And what a bungling attempt is the usage of penance to purchase heaven! Papists tell us, that confession to a priest is of infinite value, and amounts to an exchange, which God allows, of the temporal punishments we have deserved by sin, into these small penitential works. Yet, it is to be feared, say they, that the penance enjoined is seldom sufficient to take away all the punishment due to God’s justice on account of our sins. The balance of the account remains unpaid, and must be settled in purgatory. After confession, the penitent is ordered to say, ‘I beg pardon of God, and penance and absolution from you, my ghostly father.’ The priest then gives the absolution, and adds, ‘May the passion of the Lord Jesus Christ, the merits of the blessed Virgin Mary, and of all the saints, and whatsoever good thou shalt do, and whatsoever evil thou shalt suffer, be to thee unto the remission of thy sins, and the increase of grace.’ In conformity with this piece of priestly 225fraud, many poor creatures have submitted to miserable hardships; some have worn hair shirts, having given themselves a certain number of stripes; others have taken long and painful pilgrimages; and in Spain and Italy these woeful travellers are frequently observed, almost naked, loaded with chains, and groaning at every step. But of all the proofs which may be adduced to discover the true character of this base and fallen Church, her persecuting spirit is the most conclusive. This has always been seen. The friends to the Reformation were anathematized and excommunicated; and the life of Luther was often in danger, though at last he died on the bed of peace. Innumerable schemes were resorted to for the purpose of overthrowing the Reformed Church, and wars were waged with that view. The invincible Spanish Armada, as it was vainly called, had this end in view. The Inquisition, which was established in the twelfth century, was a dreadful weapon. Terrible persecutions were carried on in various parts of Germany, and even in Bohemia, which continued thirty years; and the blood of the saints was said to flow like the waters of a river. Poland, Lithuania, and Hungary were similarly visited. In Holland and the Low Countries the most amazing cruelties were exercised under the merciless and unrelenting hands of the Spaniards, to whom the inhabitants of that part of the world were then in subjection. Father Paul states, that the Belgian martyrs amounted to fifty thousand; but Grotius observes, that at least twice that number suffered by the hand of the executioner. 226 THE MARTYRDOM OF RIDLEY.