PREFACE.

The United States is Rome's favorite missionary field. The extent of our territory, the fertility of our soil, and the freedom of our institutions, offer such strong inducements that our country has been flooded with hordes of foreigners, many of whom are uneducated Roman Catholics, and who, from infancy, have yielded implicit obedience to the Pope. The Jesuits have been expelled from nearly every country in Europe, and they are now turning their eyes to the western hemisphere, and are exerting might and main to take possession of the United States, as the following bold declarations will testify.

At the Centenary Celebration of the Catholic Church in the United States, Archbishop Ireland declared: "The great work, which in God's providence the Catholics in the United States are called to do within the coming century, is, to make America Catholic, and to solve for the Church Universal the all-absorbing problem with which the age confronts her."

At the Baltimore Catholic Congress, Henry F. Brownson, LL.D., said: "The American system is also anti-Protestant, and must either reject Protestantism, or be overthrown by it."

At the dedication of the Roman Catholic University at Washington, Father Fidelis asserted: "Either the Catholic Church is God's agency set in operation and maintained by Him for the salvation of mankind, or else there is no hope from God. Protestantism has had its day, and is passing, as all human systems of philosophy or religion must surely pass."

W. F. Markoe, Secretary of the Catholic Truth Society, said, at the World's Columbian Catholic Congress: "The American State recognizes only the Catholic religion. A nation whose

mottoes are 'In God we trust' and 'E pluribus unum,' must soon recognize the necessity of unity in religion, and when that day comes Catholicity will dawn like a new revelation on the American mind."

Says Pope Leo XIII., in his encyclical of January 29, 1895: "The church would bring forth more abundant fruits, if, in addition to liberty, she enjoyed the favor of the laws and the patronage of public authority."

In these bold declarations and avowed intentions, Rome is either right or wrong. As Cardinal Manning has put it: "The Catholic Church is either the masterpiece of Satan, or the kingdom of the Son of God." Or to use the words of Cardinal Newman: "Either the Church of Rome is the house of God, or the house of Satan; there is no middle ground between them." If the Church of Rome is the Church of God, we ought to know it. If the Pope is infallible, we ought to know it. If

Rome's presence in our country and the objects she has determined to accomplish are for the highest good, the sooner we are convinced of this, the better. On the other hand, if the Church of Rome is the house of Satan, if the Pope is the Antichrist, if her doctrines are the commandments of men, if she is the enemy of our liberties, then our people ought to know it. It is the purpose of this book to assist in settling these questions, and to furnish knowledge that will awaken sympathy and prepare for wise action. I have quoted, at great length, from Rome's highest authorities on the various subjects discussed; for out of her own mouth she must stand condemned or acquitted, and from her own history she must stand approved or disapproved.

There are those who may not see the need of another book upon this subject; I would ask such to reserve their judgment until they have carefully studied the question; until they have read the encyclicals, decrees, catechisms, theologies, and authoritative utterances of this hierarchy; until they have read an account of some of Rome's dogmas, practices and intrigues as depicted by those who have made the subject a lifelong study. Our country is a paradise for Rome. She has, without being disputed, introduced into our beautiful and fair land, many dogmas, founded upon pretended visions and fabulous tales, more fit for pagan darkness than for evangelical light; she has burdened millions of our people with masses, auricular confessions, priestly celibacy, and fears of purgatory; she has attacked our public schools; she has

denounced our Bible; she has favored the union of church and state; she has thrust her hand into our treasury; she has monopolized the funds donated to the religious bodies for Indian education; she controls our telegraphic system; she censures and subsidizes the public press; she manipulates many of our political conventions; she rules many of our large cities; she has put eighty men, out of every hundred, at work in the public department at Washington; she has put officers in charge of our army and navy; she has put judges upon the bench: she has muzzled the mouths of many of our ablest statesmen, editors and ministers; she has plotted to destroy our Government; she has made her subjects swear allegiance to a foreign power, and Archbishop Ireland says: "She has the power to speak; she has an organization by which her laws may be enforced. She is the sole living and

enduring Christian authority."

These things being true, is it not time to watch. this cunning enemy? Is it not time to arouse sleepy Protestants? Is it not time to call a halt? Have we not had enough bloodshed, Tammany rings, anarchism and Jesuitism? The preservation of American liberties is no small consideration, for without these liberties, an American is without a home.

At the very outset I desire to state that there are many good Catholic men and women identified with the Roman Catholic Church, but there is a broad line of distinction between the unsuspecting confidence of the laity and the deliberate scheming of