On this last day of the year, there was a grand ceremony at the church of the Jesuits;—to sing out the old year—to offer up thanksgivings for all past blessings—and to solicit a renewal of them in the year to come. The crowd was immense, and the ceremony very impressive. There is a principle of equality in Catholic congregations, more consonant with the spirit of that religion which teaches that God is no respecter of persons, than the practice which prevails in our own church;—where the greatest distinction is made between the accommodations of the rich and the poor. The former are carefully separated from the contamination of the latter, into pews […] In the Catholic congregations there are no such invidious distinctions;—the rich and the poor kneel down together, on the same marble floor;—as children of the same Parent—to ask the same blessings, from their common Benefactor. All the congregation joined in the chant of thanksgiving, and I was deeply impressed by the touching solemnity of the ceremony. There is always something affecting in a large concourse of people participating in the same emotion; the feeling is heightened by the contagion of sympathy, and wound up to enthusiasm by the influence of numbers.