Popery is ever at work, whilst
Protestantism is supine. A pretty church, indeed, the Protestant!
Why, it can't even work a miracle."
"Can your church work miracles?" I demanded.
"That was the very question," said the man in black, "which the
ancient British clergy asked of Austin Monk, after they had been
fools enough to acknowledge their own inability. 'We don't pretend
to work miracles; do you?' 'Oh! dear me, yes,' said Austin; 'we
find no difficulty in the matter. We can raise the dead, we can
make the blind see; and to convince you, I will give sight to the
blind. Here is this blind Saxon, whom you cannot cure, but on
whose eyes I will manifest my power, in order to show the
difference between the true and the false church;' and forthwith,
with the assistance of a handkerchief and a little hot water, he
opened the eyes of the barbarian. So we manage matters! A pretty
church, that old British church, which could not work miracles--
quite as helpless as the modern one. The fools! was birdlime so
scarce a thing amongst them?--and were the properties of warm water
so unknown to them, that they could not close a pair of eyes and
open them?"
"It's a pity," said I, "that the British clergy at that interview
with Austin, did not bring forward a blind Welshman, and ask the
monk to operate upon him.
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