LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
MR. GLA.DSTONE AND THE ROMAN CATHOLICS. [To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."1 SIR,—In an article contributed by me to the current number of the Contemporary Review, I have observed :—" Mr. Gladstone has laid it down dogmatically that Catholicism, being a religion of authority, is incompatible with freeilom of thought." It has been pointed out to me that this statement is incorrect and -unfair to Mr. Gladstone ; that he has never laid it down that authority is incompatible with freedom of thought, but has, in fact, maintained the contrary, both in the work criticised so severely forty-three years ago by Lord Macaulay, and in various subsequent publications. Might I, therefore, ask permission to explain through your columns that when I wrote the passage above quoted, I had in my mind the proposition asserted in the well-known pamphlet on the Vatican decrees :—" That no one can now become her convert [the canvert of the Catholic Church], without renouncing his moral and mental freedom" (p. 12), a proposition restated in a subsequent portion of the work, in the following terms, which the author judges more accurate :—" That the claim now made upon him by the authority which he solemnly and with the highest responsibility acknowledges, requires him to sur- render his moral and mental freedom." (p. 23.) Unfortunately, I had not Mr. Gladstone's pamphlet by me when I wrote, and in referring to it I trusted to my memory. Hence the inaccu- racy of my reference, which I much regret, and which I wish thus to correct. I observe, however, that apparently I am right in attributing to Mr. Gladstone the opinion that Catholicism is incompatible with freedom of thought, and this was all that was necessary for my argument ; and further, that he judges such incompatibility to proceed from the place which authority, as a living fact, fills in the Catholic system, although he does not hold (as my words, to which exception has been taken, might seem to imply) the abstract doctrine that a religion of authority is incompatible with freedom of thought,—I am, Sir, &c.,
W. S. LILLY.
St. George's Club, 2 Sarile Row, TV., February 15th.
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