5. From treason’s rent, from murder’s stain,
Guard thou its folds till Peace shall reign;
Till fort and field, till shore and sea,
Join our loud anthem,—Praise to Thee!
LXXXVII.—THE ROMAN PONTIFFS.
ARCHBISHOP SPALDING.
M. J. Spalding, D. D. Archbishop of Baltimore, is a native of Kentucky. He is a man of great learning and ability, and of untiring industry. He is the author of a very valuable “History of the Protestant Reformation,” and of several volumes of Essays and Lectures. The following is from his brilliant Introduction to the “History of the Church,” by Darras.
1. Take them all in all, the two hundred and fifty Popes and more, who have successively occupied the Chair of Peter, constitute the most respectable and venerable body of men whose deeds are recorded on the pages of history. Nearly all of them were highly respectable men, learned, enlightened, and pious, far beyond their age; very many of them were venerable for their personal sanctity. Seventy-nine of them—nearly a third of the entire number—were so remarkable for their holiness of character as to merit being inscribed on the Calendar of Saints; and this number includes thirty-three who willingly laid down their lives for Christ and His Church.
2. A very large proportion of the others were men of blameless life, and of indefatigable[585] zeal for the propagation[586] of the faith, while not a few of them were possessed of great learning and capacity. Such, for instance, were Innocent III., Innocent IV., Boniface VIII., and Benedict XIV.,—not to name a host of others in the earlier ages of the Church.