writings of condemned authors, it is to be read with caution by all, and their names are never to be cited or referred to publicly or honourably; for which reason, to guard against error, as often as the name of any author occurs, of whose condemnation the reader doubts, he must have recourse to authors of the first class.' This intimation will be useful to us. The selected condemnatory list from the Index of this fruitful writer upon all subjects, pp. 719-721, is remarkable for an assemblage of the names of popes, to whom are attached epithets, and descriptions, not always the most honourable. This, in fact, is a very tender place in the pontifical system; and ingenuity, rising with the emergency, has settled the point, that no attainment of vice, and of heresy, (resolvable into hypocrisy, and therefore vice only,) is of force sufficient to bar the claim to doctrinal infallibility in matters of faith and morals. The subject was the finest possible for such an experiment; for, degraded as has been the character of the greater part of secular rulers, it would be hard, among them, to find a commensurate race, who should equal in profligacy and impiety of all descriptions the self denominated heads of Christendom, the successors of St. Peter, the vicars of Christ, the vicegerents of God, for about a millennium from the fifth or sixth century *. *It is worth observing, that even Joannes de la Casa, Poeta obscænus, It must have struck any examiner of this Index Expurgatorius that the works which occupy this larger portion are, in a great measure, of a secular description. But it will be recollected, that the more regular bodies of theologic heresy were disposed of, by the mass, in the prohibitory part of the volume. And to this our Censors kindly refer all their doubting readers, as we have just The former were works, likewise, with which scholars at least could not well, or patiently, dispense; and it was therefore necessary to make them as harmless as possible. seen. But there is another striking circumstance in the portions which have particularly been adduced. In all the lists selected from the Indexes of books, there is not a single reference to the place of the author preserved, as it doubtless stands in the original, by page, or volume and page, or other division. This, it may be said, would have been endless, and likewise useless. The truth of the assertion is not very apparent. Allowing the satisfaction of heretics, as hopeless, to be set aside; had the ultra-orthodox guardians of the Roman and Spanish faith no concern for their own people? Might not some of these be as inquisitive, and for good reasons, as the inquisitors themselves? Might could not be allowed to stand, although our Spanish censors could have no national feelings connected with that Italian. they not wish to have their own conviction of the accuracy of their guides confirmed, and themselves, by their own knowledge, to be qualified, either to defend themselves, or to confound, perhaps convert, heretical opposers? For suppose them, which is possible, to be committed in a discussion with an individual of this character, who, in all probability, will have the hardihood to assert that the sentences condemned in the Index are the ipsissima verba, or necessary sense, of the author referred to in the Index, what will they have to say in reply? If they attempt to silence their opponent by adducing the condemnation of the Expurgators as definitive, respecting the fidelity of the Index, do they not, or ought they not, to know, that heretics in general are so lost to reason and shame, that they pay no respect whatever to the simple affirmation of an inquisitor, or even of the pope himself? With what conscience, then, could these instructors leave their disciples in such a hopeless and uncomfortable dilemma? But, perhaps, after all, they had good reasons*. * I might have saved myself some trouble, and better instructed and pleased my reader, had I transcribed, as instances of the censures in the Index under examination, a large portion of an elaborate and able Review of this work in the PROTESTANT GUARDIAN, vol. i., pp. 118— 122, 147-154, 184-192, for the years 1827 and 1828. I cannot, however, deny myself the pleasure of communicating two extracts, where There is an Appendix called Prima, although there is none besides, which at the end bears the the reviewer is criticizing the very Index before us. The first is 'a specimen of treating an orthodox ignoramus, who, though full of sound doctrine, was apt to go astray in matters of fact.' 'We,' say the reviewers, 'have never been privileged to see the "Consideraciones sobre los Evangelios de la Quaresme" of F. HERNANDO DE SANTIAGO; and as the greater part of the five folio pages devoted to the revision of his work are occupied in directing that certain passages, pointed out by their beginning and end, shall be expunged, we do not gain much acquaintance with the writer, or learn what nine-tenths of his blunders were. But it is very curious to see how the careful censor follows to set him right. We could fancy that we saw him with the book in his hand, and heard him say, "Not Abimelech, my good brother; to be sure, the names are much alike, though the persons were quite different-you mean Melchisedek; and here, too, where you speak of Pelagians, you mean Socinians; and, just lend me your pencil, I will alter Persia into Assyria, and Anna, the sister of Moses, into Mirium, and Tamar, his sister, into Dinah; and, dear me! it is well I happened to look here-instead of saying books of chivalry, you should say, books of the Maccabees." Pp. 149, 150. The other extract is longer; and, as relating to a subject interesting in itself, and not made very prominent in the present work, independently of its intrinsic merit, it will be read with pleasure by the inquirer into Papal curiosities. 'If, however, the petty jealousy of the Church of Rome was manifested in such expurgations as these, a still more despicable fear and meanness was shewn in the careful erasure not only of every thing complimentary or civil to Protestants, but even of their very names, when mentioned in the works of either Protestants or Roman Catholics. We could fill page after page with such expurgations, and perhaps it would not be too much to say, that the single Index, to which we have more particularly alluded, contains enough on this one point to form a moderate volume. Let the following, taken at random from an infinite multitude, serve as a specimen. From Gesner's Historiæ Animalium : "In Indice Auctorum cui titulus est Clarorum virorum deque nobis in hoc opere, &c. In ipso titulo dele clarorum et que, Deinde ibi Achilles Pyrminius Gasserus, &c. dele præstantissimus, Georgius Fabricius, &c. dele illustris, Gulielmus Turnerus, &c. dele eximius, Hieronymus Massarius, &c. dele præclarus, Huldricus Hugualdus, &c. dele date of 1614. It is preceded by a mandate of the same inquisitorial editor, breathing the same doctissimus, Joan. Caius Anglus, &c. dele clarissimus, Joan. Hospinianus, &c. dele disertissimus, Joan. Parckhurstus, &c. dele Theologus et elegantissimus, Joan. Ribittus, &c. dele sacrarum literarum professor fidellissimus, Petrus Stuibius, &c. dele verbi minister et diaconis vigilantissimus, Theodorus Beza, &c. dele totum §."-"Præterea expurgantur quatuor epigrammata, tria priora Joannis Parkhursti, et quartum Philologi cujusdam, quæ sunt in laudem operis et auctoris." With regard to the Bibliotheca of the same author, the direction is "Ex Indice Auctorum qui operi præfigitur, expungantur nomina Hæresiarcharum, videlicet, &c.;" then follows a list of seventeen names, including Beza, Bucer, Calvin, Huss, Luther, Melancthon, &c. The feeling which dictated this mode of proceeding is almost avowed in the notice of Zuinger's Theatrum Vita Humanæ, where the reader is informed that the work is chiefly a compilation from the writings of those who were heretics, "whose names ought by no means to be publicly mentioned with respect." This will account for such expurgations as the following, of which there are hundreds, but we take these at random: -"Teste Dn. Oldendorssio dele Dn. et quia sæpius hic autor (Spiegelius), citans Oldendorssium in hoc opere, præmittit ei Dn. delendum ubique elogium istud honoris Dn." " dele clarissimi et substitue auctoris damnati,” "Leunclavius feliciter emendavit, dele feliciter." Hundreds, we say, of such passages might be quoted, and indeed, in many cases, it is the chief business of the censor to weed out these obnoxious expressions. For instance, twenty-five erasures are directed in the Glossarium Græco-barbarum of Meursius, of which fifteen at least (for it does not clearly appear what some are) consist merely in expunging "V. C., eruditus," and the like, from before the names of Junius and other learned men. Nay, so far was it from beiug lawful to call a Protestant learned or illustrious, that it was forbidden even to call the persons pretending to holy orders theologians. We say nothing of the English "Pseudoepiscopi," who figure in the prohibitory Index', because it is obvious that the Church of Rome always did 1 'Our countrymen make a very respectable appearance in the Prohibitory Index, but it might not always occur to a hasty reader that he had fallen in with an old friend. "Parcharus," for instance, might have passed for some heretical Monk, if he had not had the addition of "Pseudo archiepiscopus Cantuariensis." As to "Reginaldus PERO K. Anglus," we are at no loss to be sure, because one naturally expects to find honourable |