The-papacy-its-history-dogmas-genius-and-prospects-wylie

454 INFLUENCE OF POPERY ON GOVERNMENT.lains, banded together in the name of religion, to rob andmurder their fellows. And while we have the Papacy, wemust have, in one shape or other, the Inquisition. Errorsso monstrous as those of Rome cannot be maintained butby coercion.Those who talk of separating between Poperyand her screws and racks would disjoin what the laws ofsuperstition have made eternally one. So long as the oneexists, both will continue, like substance and shadow, todarken the earth. When the papal government was temporarilysuspended in 1849 by the Roman Republic, the Inquisitionwas found in active operation, and it was restoredthe moment the Pope returned to Rome. The various horrorsof the place,—its iron rings, its subterranean cells,its skeletons built up in the wall, its trap-doors, its kiln forburning bodies, with parts of humanity remaining still unconsumed,—wereall exposed at the time. These partialdisclosures may convince us, perhaps, that it is better thatthe veil which conceals the full horrors of the Inquisitionshould remain unlifted till that day when the graves shallgive up their dead.In fine, as regards the influence of Popery on government,it were easy to demonstrate, that the Papacy delayed theadvent of representativethirteen centuries.and constitutional government forSuperstition is the mother of despotism;Christianity is the parent of liberty. There is no truthwhich the past history of the world more abundantly establishesthan this. It was through Christianity that the democraticelement first came into the world.That principlewas altogether unknown in the ancient governments, whichwere either autocracies, or, in a few instances, oligarchies.The people, as such, were excluded from all share and influencein the government. Christianity was the first toteach the essential equality of all men, and the first to erecta system of government inwliich the people were admittedto those rights, and to that share of influence, which are notonly their due, but which nearly concern the safety and stabilityof the state. The state began to model its govern-