considerably reduce their numbers: no large body of men will ever again sincerely adopt an ascetical spirit in their common life. And the Belgian province will be healthier and happier for the remainder of its days if it can rid itself of all its malades imaginaires, lazy pietists, crass sensualists, and ambitious office-seekers.
Belgium is claimed to be a Roman Catholic country, and it may be interesting to discuss the extent and nature of its fidelity to Rome in the light of my inquiries and observations. I had many and intimate opportunities of studying it, and I availed myself of them carefully; not only because I took a speculative interest in the question, but on account of the frequent disparaging references I heard to my own heretical country. Moreover, when I noticed in the list of Peter’s-pence offerings that Belgium had collected for his Holiness only 200,000 lire, and England 1,200,000, I felt that there was occasion for careful inquiry.
Politics and religion are so confused in Belgium that the religious status of the country has been revealed roughly at every general election. For many years there has been a fierce struggle between Liberalism and Catholicism, in which the orthodox party has been frequently overpowered; and Liberalism, as is well known, is the anti-clerical, free-thought party. It is, roughly speaking, the bourgeoisie of Belgium (with a sprinkling of the higher and of the industrial class) permeated with Voltaireanism and
