Page:An Index of Prohibited Books (1840).djvu/171

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

87

to have been made with some policy, particularly as Britain, and other heretical states, are concerned; for in them the attempt to restrain the Papal residents from the perusal of all the works of the country would only serve to make disappointment more certain, and put to hazard even a partial obedience. A discreet relaxation of claim is often the best game which ambition can play. Thus, when a Popish government cannot get the control of National Education directly, it will attempt the thing by appointment of schoolmasters. If that scheme fail, then inspection will be tried for; and so on, till defeated, if defeated at last.

Still further to shew the application and importance of the bull in question, or the particular section with which we are concerned, to the subject immediately in view, it is to be recollected, that its provisions, or decisions, are made the groundwork of all the popular books instructing and directing Confessors, in what way they should perform their peculiar duty. This, at least, is the character of the Spanish manuals which I have consulted. The bull Cænæ Domini is expressly referred to as the rule. And I believe it is so in all other manuals for the same purpose, circulated by