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truly be said they had earned the respect and confidence of all. Notwithstanding the apparent absence of danger, it became my duty to ask and to obtain certain guarantees on two points: Education and Representation,—for which measures, supposed to be adequate, were adopted.
The status thus created might, I think, have lasted for generations, had it not been for the extraordinary claims recently advanced by the Roman Catholic Hierarchy of Quebec, based as they allege upon the authority of the Vatican Decrees and the celebrated Syllabus, though unsupported by Archbishop Lynch, of Ontario, and certainly unclaimed by His Eminence Cardinal Manning, in his recent controversy with Mr. Gladstone. These claims, I confess, filled my mind with uneasiness many months ago; they pointed to the extinction of all free thought and action on the part of our Roman Catholic fellow subjects, and ultimately tended to the neutralization of the safeguards held by the Protestants, especially in the matter of Representation. So much was I disturbed by these reflections that in May last, immediately after the publication of Monseigneur Bishop Bourget's pastoral, and before the Quebec elections, I addressed the following letter to the Hon. Mr. Robertson, then Treasurer of Quebec:—
My Dear ROBERTSON,
On my return from the West, I am much concerned to observe the attitude taken by the Ultramontane Party, not only towards liberal Roman Catho-
