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LETTER LII.

Blasphemous Conclusion of Mainauduc's Lectures.-The Effects which he produced explained.-Disappearance of the Imposture.

THE Conclusion of the extraordinary book from whence I have condensed the summary of this prodigious quackery, is even more extraordinary and more daring than the quackery itself. It may be transcribed without offence to religion, for every catholic will regard its atrocious impiety with due abhorrence.

"I flatter myself," says this man at the close of his lectures, " you are now convinced that this science is of too exalted

a nature to be trifled with or despised; and.

I fondly hope that even the superficial specimen which you have thus far received has given you room to suppose it, not a human device, held out for the sportive gratification of the idle moment, but a divine call from the affectionate creating Parent, inviting his rebellious children by every persuasive, by every tender motive, to renounce the destructive allurements of earthly influence, and to perform the duties which he sent his beloved Son into the world to inculcate, as the only and effectual conditions on which the deluded spirit in man should escape future punishment. The apostles received and accepted of those terms; disciples out of number embraced the doctrine, and by example, by discourse and by cures, influenced the minds of the unthinking multitude, absorbed in sin, and rioting in obstinate disobedience.Again the Almighty Father deigns to rouse his children from that indifference to their impending fate, into which the watchful enemy omits no opportunity of enticing

them. To lead our Saviour from his duty, the tempter showed and offered him all this world's grandeur;-so he daily in some degree does to us. Our Saviour spurned him with contempt, and so must we. Our blessed Saviour, whose spirit was a stranger to sin, cured by perfect spiritual and physical innocence, and by an uninterrupted dependence on his Great, Omnipotent, Spiritual Father. He never failed. His chosen apostles cured by relinquishing this world and following him. We have but one example, that I can recollect, of their having failed, and then Christ told them what was necessary to ensure success. The disciples and the followers of the apostles performed many cures, but how far they were checquered by failures I am not informed. Paracelsus, Sir Kenelm Digby, Sir Robert Fludd, and several others, experienced. sufficient power in themselves to verify the words of our Saviour; but were soon deprived of what was only lent to urge them to seek for the

great original cause. "Verily, verily," said Christ," the works which I do shall ye do also; and greater works than these shall ye do, for I go unto my Father." Valentine Greatrakes, by obeying the instructions imparted to him in visions, performed many cures ; but ceasing to look up to the source, and giving way to medical importunity, he administered drugs and could not expect success. Gasner, a moral and religious man, performed many cures; he was shut up in a convent, through the ignorance of his superiors, and the superstitious blindness of the age he lived in; thence his progress was trivial, though his dawnings seemed to promise much. Mesmer pillaged the subject from Sir Robert Fludd, and found to a certainty the existence of the power: undisposed to attend to our Saviour's information, he preferred loadstones and magnetic ideas to the service of the Great Author; and after performing several accidental cures, his magnetism and his errors shared the fate of his predecessors.

Doctor D' Eslon, his partner, though a man of strong reason and impartiality, ascribed the power which he experienced to the physical will of man; and after performing some cures, he fell asleep. At. length, after so many centuries of ignorance, it has graciously pleased the Almighty Father to draw aside the veil, and disclose his sacred mysteries to this favoured generation. And when I shall be called home, it will, I hope, appear, that for a bright and happy certainty of serving my God, and living with my Saviour, I pointed out to you, my brethren, the Almighty's real science, and that path to Heaven, which Christ, the only perfect and successful one of this list, left to mankind, as his last testament, and inestimable dying gift *."

*The translator thought the daring impiety of this whole extract so truly extraordinary, that he determined to seek for it in the original work, instead of retranslating it from D. Manuel's Spanish. With much difficulty he succeeded in finding the