Untitled - Rore Sanctifica

126 1636 and 1806.
which checked its growth. His letters show
o
him to have been earnest in the great cause,
and to have unfolded it to many to whom it
was at first distasteful, with due caution, great
breadth of vision, and no common ability.
The cruel persecutions of Roman Catholics
by the State, however, turned out to be one
insurmountable barrier to the
acceptation and
extension of the Re-union idea. Not but that
the policy and principles of the Jesuits, after
wards condemned totidem verbis by Pope Cle
ment the Fourteenth, tended considerably to
,
bring about the passing of harsh statutes and
the shameful cruelties wiiich ensued. For
political considerations had been so entirely
mixed up with matters ecclesiastical, and the
crucial question of the succession and right to
the throne had been treated by several self-
expatriated Englishmen during Elizabeth s
reign in a tone and temper so unfortunate, so
one-sided, and so calculated to create mis
understanding, that penal laws had been framed
and put into operation with studied severity.
Yet for all
this, Father Leander, an English
man well-informed and impartial, owing, at one
and the same time, a duty to his ecclesiastical
superiors and owning a love for his country,
could report as follows concerning the state of
the Anglican Church in the early part of King
Charles reign :