Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

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But patience ! the times are ripening ; soon every question will be clearly defined, and truth, defended by its legitimate champions, will regain its empire over the minds of nations. Perhaps the struggle which is preparing will serve to convince Protestants of an essential truth, which I have already more than once dwelt upon, but on which I insist, because it appears ío me the only truth necessary to expedite the reunion of all Christian communities: it is that the only really free priest that exists is the Catholic priest. Everywhere else, except in the Catholic church, the priest is subjected to other laws and other lights than those of his conscience and his doctrine. One trembles on seeing the inconsistencies of the Church of England, as well as the abjectness of the Greek church at Petersburg: when hypocrisy ceases to triumph in England the greater part of the kingdom will again become Catholic. The church of Pome has alone saved the purity of faith by defending throughout the earth, with sublime generosity, with heroic patience, with inflexible conviction, the independence of sacerdotal power against the usurpations of temporal sovereignties. Where is the church which has not allowed itself to be lowered by the different governments of the earth to the rank of a pious police ? There is but one, one only — the Catholic church; and that liberty which she has preserved at the cost of the blood of her martyrs, is an

laughter of the schoolboys of past ages. I answered my critic by referring him to Bossuet. His exposition of Catholic doctrine, confirmed, approved, always praised and adopted by the court of Rome, sufficiently justifies my principles.