XXVI INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. will be with the spiritual powers lodged in the successor of "the prince of the apostles." The mundane honoursof the pope will be eclipsed in the spiritual glories of the personator of the Saviour. But just in proportion as these spiritual claims are advanced will his civil and political power be promoted; for we repeat it, and trust we have made it plain, it is in virtue of that same spiritual charac- ter that he challenges "all power in heaven and in earth." Let the pope be divested of all worldly dominion, let him be literally re- duced to the stateof the apostle whomhe affects to represent, when he said, "Silver and gold have I none," let him become a person- age as obscure and unpretending as M. Roothan, the General of the Society of Jesus, still he will be, like that official, the symbol of a sovereignty, all the more devotedly worshipped by its true devotees that it no longer boastsof earthly grandeur ; a sovereigntyat eternal variance with every other form of human power that will not bend to its will, - -a sovereignty essentially hostile to the British crown, and incompatible with the liberties of mankind. Popery, in fact, so far from being unchangeable, has not only often varied from itself, but has been undergoing a gradual process of in- ternal development, which seems only now approaching its comple- tion. This transmutation is indicated by thevarious stages through which the Papacy has passed. It has gone through its period of infancy, of childhood, and of maturity; and now it seems about to reach its grand climacteric. The pope began to rise by assuming superiority over his brother bishops. His next step was to usurp, as the vicar of Christ, the powers and prerogatives of the Head of the church. His next was to claim, in virtue of this vicariate, the mediatorial "power in heaven and in earth," or a right to interfere with every thing that might, in his judgment, conduce to the good of the church. There remained only one step more, that, namely, of challenging, as God, the supreme homage of mankind. And this stage has been now attained. Mediatorial honourswill no longer suit the insatiable ambition of the Roman pontiff: he must, "AS GOD, sit in the temple of God, showing himself that HE IS GOD I" This heaven-daring pretence, by which Rome has all along identified itself with " that Wicked " spoken of in holy Scripture (2 Thess. ii 3-8), a pretence always involved in the theory of the Papacy, often propounded in its schools, debated among its divines, and avowed more or less boldly by successive pontiffs, this truly blas- phemous claim, seems destined to be " revealed" more clearly and convincingly than ever, bybeing put forth in all its naked arrogance, and acknowledged in all its portentous magnitude.
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