[211] Memoirs, ii. 418-21.

As to your arguments, they are unanswerable, and the three tracts do you the greatest possible credit; but the torrent cannot be stemmed, unless we can construct a body, I will not call it a party, upon a new and true principle of action, as you have set forth.  Certain questions are forced by the present conduct of government upon the mind of every observing and thinking person.  First and foremost, are we to have a national English Church, or is the Church of England to be regarded merely as a sect? and is the right to the Throne to be put on a new foundation?  Is the present ministry prepared for this, and all that must precede and follow it?  Is Ireland an integral and inseparable portion of the Empire or not?  If it be, I cannot listen to the argument in favour of endowing Romanism upon the ground of superiority of numbers.  The Romanists are not a majority in England and Ireland, taken, as they ought to be, together.  As to Scotland, it has its separate kirk by especial covenant.  Are the ministers prepared to alter fundamentally the basis of the Union between England and Ireland, and to construct a new one?  If they be, let them tell us so at once.  In short, they are involving themselves and the Nation in difficulties from which there is no escape—­for them at least none.  What I have seen of your letter to Lord John M——­ I like as well as your two former tracts, and I shall read it carefully at my first leisure moment.[212]

[212] Memoirs, ii. 151-2.

144. Of the ’Heresiarch of the Church of Rome.’

LETTER TO JOSEPH COTTLE, ESQ.

Rydal Mount, Dec. 6. 1845.

MY DEAR OLD FRIEND,

Now for your little tract, ‘Heresiarch Church of Rome.’  I have perused it carefully, and go the whole length with you in condemnation of Romanism, and probably much further, by reason of my having passed at least three years of life in countries where Romanism was the prevailing or exclusive religion; and if we are to trust the declaration ’By their fruits ye shall know them,’ I have stronger reasons, in the privilege I have named, for passing a severe condemnation upon leading parts of their faith, and courses of their practice, than others who have never been eye-witnesses of the evils to which I allude.  Your little publication is well timed, and will I trust have such an effect as you aimed at upon the minds of its readers.

And now let me bid you affectionately good bye, with assurance that I do and shall retain to the last a remembrance of your kindness, and of the many pleasant and happy hours which, at one of the most interesting periods of my life, I passed in your neighbourhood, and in your company.

Ever most faithfully yours,
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.[213]

[213] Memoirs, ii. 152-3.

145. Family Trials.