The writer was born and educated as a Protestant but as his letter will show, is not very prejudiced. Two years before the war and for several years after, the business of the writer called him to Natchez, Mississippi, where his attention was called to Catholicity by a slight acquaintance with Bishop William Henry Elder of that diocese. Upon seeing the heroic sanctity of the Bishop, the writer was almost persuaded to become a Catholic. When his churches were burned, his clergy driven away and his people scattered, and when he himself was in want, this saintly Bishop has been known to take two little waifs from the street and place them in a home. The writer has seen so much of good and virtue in Bishop Elder that he reached the conclusion that a Church producing such a man as Elder cannot be a bad church. Under these feelings he took up the study of Catholic doctrine when he came North two years ago. His readings included "Pope and Maguire," "Hughes and Breckenridge," and "Campbell and Purcell." These writings astounded him as to the force of the arguments which could be used on the Catholic side of the controversy. The one point however, which the writer cannot understand is the doctrine of Papal Infallibility. In 1834 in his controversy with Campbell, Archbishop John Baptist Purcell explicitly declared that he does not believe in Papal Infallibility and that he knows of none of the clergy who do. Then in 1875, Purcell told Pope Pius IX that there was no one who believed the doctrine more fully than himself. Father John Hughes, not yet consecrated a Bishop, in his controversy with Breckenridge, says that the seat of infallibility is not definitely lodged whether in the Pope, a council, or in the whole Church. In his controversy with Pope, Maguire calls one of the Popes a great scoundrel because he threw the body of his predecessor into the Tiber. There are two main difficulties still bothering the writer. The first is: if the doctrine of Papal Infallibility was not believed in 1834 as an article of faith, how can it be any more necessary in 1875? The second is: how can Pope Stephen, who was called a scoundrel, be infallible, for how can a bad man be a good priest? The influence of Bishop Elder first led the writer to think on this subject. He does not believe that another man in the Catholic Church can compare with the saintly Elder and could relate some facts about him which poor human nature would not be expected to be capable of. :: I-2-c A.L.S. 4pp. 8vo.