Page:Guatimala or the United Provinces of Central America in 1827-8.pdf/144

Rh. Considered ss seed which may one day produce an abundant harvest, its general circulation is however, highly important. These neglected copies may lie like so many trains of combustible matter among the rubbish by which they are surrounded, apparently inefficient and harmless, till some second Luther shall do in the new world, what his predecessor did in the old, boldly apply the torch, and kindle a flame at once purifying and enlightening, whose blaze shall never be extinguished.

December 10. Nothing can exceed the vapidness of the remarks the priests make on the vital truths of the Gospel; they speak of them as of subjects which have to be acknowledged, but may at the same time be despised with impunity.

December 20. Padre complaining of being obliged by his duties to read the service of the mass twice a day—he seems determined however to get through it as carelessly as possible, reading it aloud before us, and smiling and laughing at the same time. He had the assurance to insist at dinner to-day, that God had said in the Gospel that the clergy were the darlings of his eye, and that were they ever so wicked, the laity had nothing to do with it: this he positively asserted to be a literal quotation from Scripture, and his hearers humbly acknowledged the orthodoxy of his doctrine.