SECTION II
If the head be corrupt, so also must be the members. If the Pope be
essentially Pagan, what else can be the character of his clergy? If they
derive their orders from a radically corrupted source, these orders must
partake of the corruption of the source from which they flow. This might
be inferred independently of any special evidence; but the evidence in
regard to the Pagan character of the Pope's clergy is as complete as
that in regard to the Pope himself. In whatever light the subject is
viewed, this will be very apparent.
There is a direct contrast between the character of the ministers of
Christ, and that of the Papal priesthood. When Christ commissioned His
servants, it was "to feed His sheep, to feed His lambs,"
and that with the Word of God, which testifies of Himself, and contains
the words of eternal life. When the Pope ordains his clergy, he takes
them bound to prohibit, except in special circumstances, the reading of
the Word of God "in the vulgar tongue," that is, in a
language which the people can understand. He gives them, indeed, a
commission; and what is it? It is couched in these astounding words: "Receive
the power of sacrificing for the living and the dead." * What
blasphemy could be worse than this? What more derogatory to the one
sacrifice of Christ, whereby "He hath perfected for ever them
that are sanctified"? (Heb. x. 14). This is the real
distinguishing function of the popish priesthood. At the remembrance
that this power, in these very words, had been conferred on him, when
ordained to the priesthood, Luther used, in after years, with a shudder,
to express his astonishment that "the earth had not opened its
mouth and swallowed up both him who uttered these words, and him to whom
they were addressed." * The sacrifice which the papal
priesthood are empowered to offer, as a "true propitiatory
sacrifice" for the sins of the living and the dead, is just
the "unbloody sacrifice" of the mass, which was
offered up in Babylon long before it was ever heard of in Rome.
Now, while Semiramis, the real original of the Chaldean Queen of
Heaven, to whom the "unbloody sacrifice" of the mass
was first offered, was in her own person, as we have already seen, the
very paragon of impurity, she at the same time affected the greatest
favour for that kind of sanctity which looks down with contempt on God's
holy ordinance of marriage. The Mysteries over which she presided were
scenes of the rankest pollution; and yet the higher orders of the
priesthood were bound to a life of celibacy, as a life of peculiar and
pre-eminent holiness. Strange though it may seem, yet the voice of
antiquity assigns to that abandoned queen the invention of clerical
celibacy, and that in the most stringent form. * In some countries, as
in Egypt, human nature asserted its rights, and though the general
system of Babylon was retained, the yoke of celibacy was abolished, and
the priesthood were permitted to marry. But every scholar knows that
when the worship of Cybele, the Babylonian goddess, was introduced into
Pagan Rome, it was introduced in its primitive form, with its celibate
clergy. * When the Pope appropriated to himself so much that was
peculiar to the worship of that goddess, from the very same source,
also, he introduced into the priesthood under his authority the binding
obligation of celibacy. The introduction of such a principle into the
Christian Church had been distinctly predicted as one grand mark of the
apostacy, when men should "depart from the faith, and speaking
lies in hypocrisy, having their consciences seared with a hot iron,
should forbid to marry." The effects of its introduction were
most disastrous. * The records of all nations where priestly celibacy
has been introduced have proved that, instead of ministering to the
purity of those condemned to it, it has only plunged them in the deepest
pollution. The history of Thibet, and China, and Japan, where the
Babylonian institute of priestly celibacy has prevailed from time
immemorial, bears testimony to the abominations that have flowed from
it. * The excesses committed by the celibate priests of Bacchus in Pagan
Rome in their secret Mysteries, were such that the Senate felt called
upon to expel them from the bounds of the Roman republic. * In Papal
Rome the same abominations have flowed from priestly celibacy, in
connection with the corrupt and corrupting system of the confessional,
insomuch that all men who have examined the subject have been compelled
to admire the amazing significance of the name divinely bestowed on it,
both in a literal and figurative sense, "Babylon the Great, THE
MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH." * Out of a
thousand facts of a similar kind, let one only be adduced, vouched for
by the distinguished Roman Catholic historian De Thou. When Pope Paul V.
meditated the suppression of the licensed brothels in the "Holy
City," the Roman Senate petitioned against his carrying his
design into effect, on the ground that the existence of such places was
the only means of hindering the priests from seducing their wives and
daughters!! *
These celibate priests have all a certain mark set upon them at their
ordination; and that is the clerical tonsure. The tonsure is the first
part of the ceremony of ordination; and it is held to be a most
important element in connection with the orders of the Romish clergy.
When, after long contendings, the Picts were at last brought to submit
to the Bishop of Rome, the acceptance of this tonsure as the tonsure of
St. Peter on the part of the clergy was the visible symbol of that
submission. Naitan, the Pictish king, having assembled the nobles of his
court and the pastors of his church, thus addressed them: "I
recommend all the clergy of my kingdom to receive the tonsure." Then,
without delay, as Bede informs us, this important revolution was
accomplished by royal authority. * He sent agents into every province,
and caused all the ministers and monks to receive the circular tonsure,
according to the Roman fashion, and thus to submit to Peter,
"the most blessed Prince of the apostles." * "It was the
mark," says Merle D'Aubigne, "that Popes stamped not
on the forehead, but on the crown. A royal proclamation, and a few clips
of the scissors, placed the Scotch, like a flock of sheep, beneath the
crook of the shepherd of the Tiber." * Now, as Rome set so
much importance on this tonsure, let it be asked what was the meaning of
it? It was the visible inauguration of those who submitted to it as the
priests of Bacchus. This tonsure cannot have the slightest pretence to
Christian authority. It was indeed the "tonsure of Peter,"
but not of the Peter of Galilee, but of the Chaldean "Peter"
of the Mysteries. He was a tonsured priest, for so was the god whose
Mysteries he revealed. Centuries before the Christian era, thus spoke
Herodotus of the Babylonian tonsure: "The Arabians acknowledge
no other gods than Bacchus and Urania [i.e., the Queen of Heaven], and
they say that their hair was cut in the same manner as Bacchus's is cut;
now, they cut it in a circular form, shaving it around the
temples." * What, then, could have led to this tonsure of
Bacchus? Everything in his history was mystically or hieroglyphically
represented, and that in such a way as none but the initiated could
understand. One of the things that occupied the most important place in
the Mysteries was the mutilation to which he was subjected when he was
put to death. In memory of that, he was lamented with bitter weeping
every year, as "Rosh-Gheza," "the mutilated
Prince." But "Rosh-Gheza" * also signified
the "clipped or shaved head." Therefore he was
himself represented either with the one or the other form of tonsure;
and his priests, for the same reason, at their ordination had their
heads either clipped or shaven. Over all the world, where the traces of
the Chaldean system are found, this tonsure or shaving of the head is
always found along with it. The priests of Osiris, the Egyptian Bacchus,
were always distinguished by the shaving of their heads. * In Pagan
Rome, * in India, and even in China, the distinguishing mark of the
Babylonian priesthood was the shaven head. Thus Gautama Buddha, who
lived at least 540 years before Christ, when setting up the sect of
Buddhism in India which spread to the remotest regions of the East,
first shaved his own head, in obedience, as he pretended, to a Divine
command, and then set to work to get others to imitate his example. One
of the very titles by which he was called was that of the "Shaved-head."
* "The shaved-head," says one of the Purans, "that
he might perform the orders of Vishnu, formed a number of disciples, and
of shaved-heads like himself." The high antiquity of this
tonsure may be seen from the enactment in the Mosaic law against it. The
Jewish priests were expressly forbidden to make any baldness upon their
heads (Lev. xxi. 5), which sufficiently shows that, even so early as the
time of Moses, the "shaved-head" had been already
introduced. In the Church of Rome the heads of the ordinary priests are
only clipped, the heads of the monks or regular clergy are shaven, but
both alike, at their consecration, receive the circular tonsure, thereby
identifying them, beyond all possibility of doubt, with Bacchus, "the
mutilated Prince." * Now, if the priests of Rome take away the
key of knowledge, and lock up the Bible from the people; if they are
ordained to offer the Chaldean sacrifice in honour of the Pagan Queen of
Heaven; if they are bound by the Chaldean law of celibacy, that plunges
them in profligacy; if, in short, they are all marked at their
consecration with the distinguishing mark of the priests of the Chaldean
Bacchus, what right, what possible right, can they have to be called
ministers of Christ?
But Rome has not only her ordinary secular clergy, as they are
called; she has also, as every one knows, other religious orders of a
different kind. She has innumerable armies of monks and nuns all engaged
in her service. Where can there be shown the least warrant for such an
institution in Scripture? In the religion of the Babylonian Messiah
their institution was from the earliest times. In that system there were
monks and nuns in abundance. In Thibet and Japan, where the Chaldean
system was early introduced, monasteries are still to be found, and with
the same disastrous results to morals as in Papal Europe. * In
Scandinavia, the priestesses of Freya, who were generally kings'
daughters, whose duty it was to watch the sacred fire, and who were
bound to perpetual virginity, were just an order of nuns. * In Athens
there were virgins maintained at the public expense, who were strictly
bound to single life. * In Pagan Rome, the Vestal virgins, who had the
same duty to perform as the priestesses of Freya, occupied a similar
position. Even in Peru, during the reign of the Incas, the same system
prevailed, and showed so remarkable an analogy, as to indicate that the
Vestals of Rome, the nuns of the Papacy, and the Holy Virgins of Peru,
must have sprung from a common origin. Thus does Prescott refer to the
Peruvian nunneries: "Another singular analogy with Roman
Catholic institutions is presented by the virgins of the sun, the elect,
as they were called. These were young maidens dedicated to the service
of the deity, who at a tender age were taken from their homes, and
introduced into convents, where they were placed under the care of
certain elderly matrons, mamaconas, * who had grown grey within their
walls. It was their duty to watch over the sacred fire obtained at the
festival of Raymi. From the moment they entered the establishment they
were cut off from all communication with the world, even with their own
family and friends.... Woe to the unhappy maiden who was detected in an
intrigue! By the stern law of the Incas she was to be buried
alive." This was precisely the fate of the Roman Vestal who
was proved to have violated her vow. Neither in Peru, however, nor in
Pagan Rome was the obligation to virginity so stringent as in the
Papacy. It was not perpetual, and therefore not so exceedingly
demoralising. After a time, the nuns might be delivered from their
confinement, and marry; from all hopes of which they are absolutely cut
off in the Church of Rome. In all these cases, however, it is plain that
the principle on which these institutions were founded was originally
the same. "One is astonished," adds Prescott, "to
find so close a resemblance between the institutions of the American
Indian, the ancient Roman, and the modern Catholic." *
Prescott finds it difficult to account for this resemblance; but the
little sentence from the prophet Jeremiah, which was quoted at the
commencement of this inquiry, accounts for it completely: "Babylon
hath been a golden cup in the Lord's hand, that hath made ALL THE EARTH
drunken" (Jer. li. 7). This is the Rosetta stone that has
helped already to bring to light so much of the secret iniquity of the
Papacy, and that is destined still further to decipher the dark
mysteries of every system of heathen mythology that either has been or
that is. The statement of this text can be proved to be a literal fact.
It can be proved that the idolatry of the whole earth is one, that the
sacred language of all nations is radically Chaldean--that the GREAT
GODS of every country and clime are called by Babylonian names--and that
all the Paganisms of the human race are only a wicked and deliberate,
but yet most instructive corruption of the primeval gospel first
preached in Eden, and through Noah, afterwards conveyed to all mankind.
The system, first concocted in Babylon, and thence conveyed to the ends
of the earth, has been modified and diluted in different ages and
countries. In Papal Rome only is it now found nearly pure and entire.
But yet, amid all the seeming variety of heathenism, there is an
astonishing oneness and identity, bearing testimony to the truth of
God's Word. The overthrow of all idolatry cannot now be distant. But
before the idols of the heathen shall be finally cast to the moles and
to the bats, I am persuaded that they will be made to fall down and
worship "the Lord the king," to bear testimony to His
glorious truth, and with one loud and united acclaim, ascribe salvation,
and glory, and honour, and power unto Him that sitteth upon the throne,
and to the Lamb, for ever and ever.
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