{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_59364/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_59364","id":"gutenberg_59364","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/59364","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: History - European","Category: History - Modern (1750+)","Category: History - Religious","Category: Journals","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Catholic Church -- Periodicals"],"text":"Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at\nhttp://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images\ngenerously made available by The Internet Archive)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n THE\n\n CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n\n A\n\n MONTHLY MAGAZINE\n\n OF\n\n GENERAL LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.\n\n --------------\n\n VOL. XXVI.\n\n OCTOBER, 1877, TO MARCH, 1878.\n\n --------------\n\n NEW YORK:\n THE CATHOLIC PUBLICATION SOCIETY\n COMPANY,\n 9 Barclay Street.\n\n ---\n\n 1878.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n ----------------------------\n\n Copyrighted by\n I. T. HECKER,\n 1878.\n\n ----------------------------\n\n\n\n\n THE NATION PRESS, 27 ROSE STREET, NEW YORK.\n\n\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n CONTENTS.\n\n\n A Final Philosophy, 610\n\n A Glance at the Indian Question, 195\n\n A Great Bishop, 625\n\n A Legend of Dieppe, 264\n\n A Ramble after the Waits, 485\n\n A Silent Courtship, 39\n\n A Sweet Revenge, 179, 384\n\n Among the Translators, 309, 732\n\n Africa, Religion on the East Coast of, 411\n\n Catholic Circles for Working-men in France, 529\n\n Charles Lever at Home, 203\n\n Christianity as an Historical Religion, 434, 653\n\n Church of England, Confession in the, 590\n\n Compostella, St. James of, 163\n\n Confession in the Church of England, 590\n\n Criminals and their Treatment, 56\n\n Descent of Man, The, 496\n\n Dieppe, A Legend of, 264\n\n Dr. Draper and Evolution, 774\n\n Evolution, Dr. Draper and, 774\n\n Fortifications of Rome, _Civilt\u00e0 Cattolica_ on 403\n the,\n\n Free-Religionists, The, 145\n\n French Home Life, 759\n\n Froude on the \u201cRevival of Romanism,\u201d 289\n\n Froude on the Decline of Protestantism, 470\n\n German Element in the United States, 372\n\n Hedge-Poets, The Irish, 406\n\n Holy Cave of Manresa, The, 821\n\n How Steenwykerwold was Saved, 547\n\n Indian Policy, our New, and Religious Liberty, 90\n\n Indian Question, A Glance at the, 195\n\n Industrial Crisis, Character of the Present, 122\n\n Ireland in 1878, 721\n\n Irish Hedge-Poets, The, 406\n\n Isles of L\u00e9rins, The, 685\n\n Italy, The Outlook in, 1\n\n Jamaica, Religion in, 69\n\n L\u00e9rins, The Isles of, 685\n\n Lever at Home, 203\n\n Man, The Descent of, 496\n\n Manresa, The Holy Cave of, 821\n\n Marguerite, 73\n\n Marquette, Father James, Death of, and Discovery 267\n of his Remains,\n\n Michael the Sombre, 599, 791\n\n Mickey Casey\u2019s Christmas Dinner-Party, 512\n\n Mont St. Michel, The Last Pilgrimage to, 128\n\n Mormonism, The Two Prophets of, 227\n\n Mystery of the Old Organ, 356\n\n Organ, The Mystery of the Old, 356\n\n Our New Indian Policy and Religious Liberty, 90\n\n Papal Elections, 537, 811\n\n Philosophy, A Final, 610\n\n Pilgrimage, The Last, to Mont St. Michel, 128\n\n Pius the Ninth, 846\n\n Polemics and Irenics in Scholastic Philosophy, 337\n\n Preachers on the Rampage, 700\n\n Protestantism, Froude on the Decline of, 470\n\n Protestant Episcopal Convention and Congress, 395\n\n Religion in Jamaica, 69\n\n Religion on the East Coast of Africa, 411\n\n Roc Amadour, 23\n\n Romanism, Froude on the Revival of, 289\n\n Rome, The _Civilt\u00e0 Cattolica_ on the 403\n Fortifications of,\n\n Science, The God of \u201cAdvanced,\u201d 251\n\n Scholastic Philosophy, Recent Polemics and Irenics 337\n in,\n\n St. Hedwige, 108\n\n St. James of Compostella, 163\n\n The Character of the Present Industrial Crisis, 122\n\n The God of \u201cAdvanced\u201d Science, 251\n\n The Home-Rule Candidate, 669, 742\n\n The Late Dr. T. W. Marshall, 806\n\n The Little Chapel at Monamullin, 213, 322\n\n The Old Stone Jug, 638\n\n The Two Prophets of Mormonism, 227\n\n United States, The German Element in the, 372\n\n Waits, A Ramble after the, 485\n\n Wolf-Tower, The, 449\n\n Working-men in France, Catholic Circles for, 529\n\n Year of Our Lord 1877, The, 560\n\n Footnotes 860\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n POETRY.\n\n\n A Child-Beggar, 683\n After Castel-Fidardo, 789\n A Little Sermon, 713\n A Mountain Friend, 21\n At the Church-Door, 382\n\n Between the Years, 433\n Blessed Virgin, The, 731\n Brother and Sister, 652\n\n Ceadmon the Cow-Herd, 577\n\n Faber, To F. W., 305\n\n In Retreat, 699\n\n Order, 212\n Outside St. Peter\u2019s, 756\n\n Smoke-Bound, 161\n\n Sonnet, 405\n\n The Bells, 88\n The River\u2019s Voice, 535\n \u201cThere was no Room for Them in the Inn,\u201d 668\n To the Wood-Thrush, 250\n Tota Pulchra, 355\n\n Witch-Hazel, To the, 447\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n NEW PUBLICATIONS.\n\n\n A Life of Pius IX. down to the Episcopal Jubilee, 135\n\n Almanac, Catholic Family, 572\n\n Almanac and Treasury of Facts for the year 1878, 860\n\n Ancient History, 432\n\n Annals of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, 144\n\n Antar and Zara, 431\n\n Bible of Humanity, The, 143\n\n Bibliotheca Symbolica Ecclesi\u00e6 Universalis, 284\n\n Blanche Carey, 140\n\n Catacombs, A Visit to the Roman, 859\n\n Catechism of Christian Doctrine, 137\n\n Catholic Parents\u2019 Friend, The, 144\n\n Charles Sprague, Poetical and Prose Writings of, 143\n\n Christianity, The Beginnings of, 425\n\n De Deo Creante, 426\n\n Eternal Years, The, 575\n\n Evidences of Religion, 572\n\n God the Teacher of Mankind, 137\n\n Grammar-School Speller and Definer, The, 139\n\n Human Eye, Is the, Changing its form under the 860\n Influences of Modern Education?\n\n Iza, 575\n\n Jack, 143\n\n Knowledge of Mary, 715\n\n Letters of Rev. James Maher, D.D., 141\n\n Life of Marie Lataste, 134\n\n Life of Pope Pius IX., A Popular, 135\n\n Lotos-Flowers, 573\n\n Marie Lataste, The Life of, 134\n\n Mary, The Knowledge of, 715\n\n Materialism, 859\n\n McGee\u2019s Illustrated Weekly, 143\n\n Mirror of True Womanhood, 719\n\n Miscellanies, 281\n\n Missa de Beata Maria, 139\n\n Modern Philosophy, 428\n\n Mongrelism, 142\n\n Monotheism, 571\n\n Morning Offices of Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, and 858\n Good Friday,\n\n Nicholas Minturn, 575\n\n Records of a Quiet Life, 859\n\n Recueil de Lectures, 288\n\n Repertorium Oratoris Sacri, 574\n\n Roman Catacombs, A Visit to the, 858\n\n Sadlier\u2019s Elementary History of the U.S., 432\n\n School Hygiene, Report upon, 136\n\n Shakspeare\u2019s Home, 719\n\n Specialists and Specialties in Medicine, 142\n\n Standard Arithmetic. No. I., 287\n\n Standard Arithmetic. No. II., 288\n\n Sunday-School Teacher\u2019s Manual, 575\n\n Suppression of the Society of Jesus in the 429\n Portuguese Dominions, History of the,\n\n Surly Tim, 574\n\n The Beginnings of Christianity, 425\n\n The Fall of Rora, 431\n\n The Life of Pope Pius IX., 135\n\n Vesper Hymn-Book, The New, 573\n\n What Catholics Do Not Believe, 719\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n THE\n\n CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n\n VOL. XXVI., No. 151.\u2014OCTOBER, 1877.\n\n\n THE OUTLOOK IN ITALY.\n\n\n I.\u2014WHAT IS THE MEANING OF RECENT EVENTS IN ITALY?\n\nThe revolutionary movement in Italy headed by Victor Emanuel has, step\nby step, trampled under foot every principle of religion, morality, and\njustice that stood between it and its goal. No pretext of the welfare of\na people, even when based on truth, can ever make perfidy and treachery\nlawful, or furnish a covering of texture thick enough to hide from\nintelligent and upright minds so long and black a list of misdeeds as\nthe Piedmontese subjugation of Southern Italy contains. \u201cAll iniquity of\nnations is execrable.\u201d What is more, the catalogue of the crimes of this\nrevolution is by no means filled, and, what is worse, the future\nforebodes others which, in their enormity, will cast those of its\nbeginning into the shade. That the natural desire for unity among the\nItalian people might have been realized by proper and just means, had\nthe religious, intelligent, and influential classes exerted themselves\nas they were in duty bound to do, there is little room for reasonable\ndoubt. For it would be an unpleasant thing to admit that civilized\nsociety, after the action of nineteen centuries of Christianity, could\nfind no way to satisfy a legitimate aspiration, except by a process\ninvolving the violation and subversion of those principles of justice,\nright, and religion for the maintenance and security of which human\nsociety is organized and established. It is indeed strange to see the\nLatin races, which accepted so thoroughly and for so long a period the\ntrue Christian faith, now everywhere subject to violent and\nrevolutionary changes in their political condition. How is this to be\nreconciled with the fact that Christianity, in response to the primitive\ninstincts of human nature, and in consonance with the laws which govern\nthe whole universe, aims at, and actually brings about when followed,\nthe greatest happiness of man upon earth while securing his perfect\nbliss hereafter? For so runs the promise of the divine Founder of\nChristianity: \u201cA hundred-fold more in this life, and in the world to\ncome life everlasting.\u201d\n\nWhat has beguiled so large a number of the people of Italy, once so\nprofoundly Catholic, that now they should take up the false principles\nof revolution, should accept a pseudo-science, and unite with secret\natheistical societies? How has it come to pass that a people who poured\nout their blood as freely as water in testimony and defence of the\nCatholic religion, whose history has given innumerable examples of the\nhighest form of Christian heroism in ages past, now follows willingly,\nor at least submits tamely, to the dictation of leaders who are animated\nwith hatred to the Catholic Church, and are bent on the extermination of\nthe Christian faith, and with it of all religion?\n\nOnly those who can read in the seeds of time can tell whether such signs\nas these are to be interpreted as signifying the beginning of the\napostasy of the Latin races from Christianity and the disintegration and\nruin of Latin nations, or whether these events are to be looked upon as\nevidence of a latent capacity and a youthful but ill-regulated strength\npointing out a transition to a new and better order of things in the\nfuture.\n\nJudging from the antecedents of the men placed in political power by\nrecent elections in Italy, and their destructive course of legislation,\nthe former supposition, confining our thoughts to the immediate present,\nappears to be the more likely. It is not, therefore, a matter of\nsurprise that Catholics of an active faith and a deep sense of personal\nresponsibility feel uneasy at seeing things go from bad to worse in\nnations which they have been accustomed to look upon as pre-eminently\nCatholic. Nor is it in human nature for men of energetic wills and\nsincere feelings of patriotism to content themselves when they see the\ndemagogues of liberty and the conspirators of atheistical secret\nsocieties coming to the front and aiming at the destruction of all that\nmakes a country dear to honest men. Nowhere does the Catholic Church\nteach that the love of one\u2019s country is antagonistic to the love of God;\nnor does the light of her faith allure to an ignoble repose, or her\nspirit render her members slaves or cowards.\n\nSerious-minded men, before going into action, are wont to examine anew\ntheir first principles, in order to find out whether these be well\ngrounded, clearly defined, and firm, and also whether there may not be\nsome flaw in the deductions which they have been accustomed to draw from\nthem. An examination of this kind is a healthy and invigorating\nexercise, and not to be feared when one has in his favor truth and\nhonesty.\n\n Copyright: Rev. I. T. HECKER. 1877.\n\n\n II.\u2014THE UNITY OF ITALY.\n\nThe idea of unity responds to one of the noblest aspirations of the\nsoul, and wherever it exists free from all compulsion it gives birth to\njust hopes of true greatness. Would that the cry for unity were heard\nfrom the hearts of the inhabitants of the whole earth, and that the\ninward struggle which reigns in men\u2019s bosoms, and the outward discord\nwhich prevails between man and man, between nations and nations, and\nbetween races and races, had for ever passed away!\n\n\n \u201cWhen will the hundred summers die,\n And thought and time be born again,\n And newer knowledge, drawing nigh,\n Bring truth that sways the hearts of men?\u201d\n\n\nUnity is the essence of the Godhead and the animating principle of God\u2019s\nchurch; and wherever her spirit penetrates, there the natural desire for\nunity implanted in the human heart is intensified and universalized, and\nman seeks to give to it an adequate embodiment in every sphere of his\nactivity. It was this natural instinct for unity guided by the genius of\nCatholicity that formed the scattered tribes of Europe of former days\ninto nations, uniting them in a grand universal republic which was\nproperly called Christendom. Who knows but, as there reigned, by the\naction of an overruling Providence, a political unity in the ancient\nworld which paved the way for the introduction of Christianity, that so\nthere may be in preparation a more perfect political unity of peoples\nand nations in the modern world to open the way for the universal\ntriumph of Christianity?\n\nBut there is a wide difference between recognizing that political unity\nis favorable to the strength and greatness of nations and the spread and\nvictory of Christianity, and the acceptance of the errors of a class of\nits promoters, the approval of their injustice, or a compromise with\ntheir crimes.\n\n\n \u201cWhen devils will their blackest sins put on,\n They do suggest at first with heavenly shows.\u201d\n\n\nThe actual question, therefore, is not concerning the union of the\nItalian people in one nation, or whether their present unity will be\nlasting, or revoked, or by internal weakness be dissolved, or shaped in\nsome way for the better. But the actual and pressing question is, How\ncan Italy be withdrawn from the designing men who have managed to get\ncontrol over her political government under the cloak of Italian unity,\nand who are plainly leading her on towards a precipice like that of the\nFrench Revolution of 1789, to be followed by another of even more\natrocious notoriety\u2014that of 1871? He must be blind to the sure but\nstealthy march of events who does not see that, under the control of the\npresent party at the head of the legislative power, Italy is rapidly\napproaching such a catastrophe. A few thousand frenzied men held and\ntyrannized over France in 1789; a greater number in Italy\u2014which, like\nall Europe, is worm-eaten by secret societies\u2014are only waiting for the\nspark to produce a more destructive explosion, when the character of\ntheir leaders and the more inflammable materials they have to work upon\nare considered.\n\nThere is running through all things, both good and evil, an\nunconquerable law of logic. What is liberalism on Sunday becomes license\non Monday, revolutionism on Tuesday, internationalism on Wednesday,\nsocialism on Thursday, communism on Friday, and anarchy on Saturday. He\nwho only sees the battered stones made by the cannon fired against its\nwalls when the Piedmontese soldiers entered into Rome by Porta Pia, sees\nnaught. There are more notable signs than these to read for him who\nknows how to decipher them. In the invasion and seizure of the temporal\nprincipality of the head of Christ\u2019s church, which had stood for\ncenturies as the keystone of the Christian commonwealth, the\nindependence of nations was overthrown, international law trampled under\nfoot, and the sacred rights of religion sacrilegiously violated. It was\nthen\u2014let those who have ears to hear listen\u2014that rights consecrated\nthrough long ages, and recognized by 200,000,000 of Catholics to-day,\nwere broken in upon by the Piedmontese army; and yet men are found to\nwonder that the violation of these rights by the Italian revolutionary\nparty should fire with indignation the souls of the faithful in all\nlands. But revolution will take its course; and so sure as the\nPiedmontese entered by Porta Pia into Rome and took possession, and held\nit until the present hour, so sure is it that the conspirators of the\nsecret international societies will in turn get possession of Rome and\ndo their fell work in the Eternal City. \u201cThey that sow wind, shall reap\nthe whirlwind.\u201d\n\nWho foresaw, or anticipated, or even dreamed of the atrocities of the\nCommune in Paris of 1871? What happened at Paris in the reign of the\nCommune will pale in wickedness before the reign of the\ninternationalists in Rome. As Paris represents the theatre of\nworldliness, so Rome is the visible sanctuary of religion. _Corruptio\noptimi pessima._\n\nIs there a man so simple or so ignorant of the temper and designs of the\nconspirators against civilized society in Europe, as well as in our own\nfree country, who fancies that these desperate men will shrink from\nshaping their acts in accordance with their ulterior aims?\n\nNo one who witnessed the reception of Garibaldi in Rome in the winter of\n1875 can doubt as to who holds the place of leader among the most\nnumerous class of the population of Italy. The views of this man and the\nparty to which he belongs are no secret. \u201cThe fall of the Commune,\u201d he\nwrote in June, 1873, \u201cis a misfortune for the whole universe and a\ndefeat for ever to be regretted.... I belong to the internationals, and\nI declare that if I should see arise a society of demons having for its\nobject to combat sovereigns and priests, I would enroll myself in their\nranks.\u201d It is only the well-officered, strictly disciplined, and large\narmy of Victor Emanuel that hinders Garibaldi from hoisting the red flag\nof the Commune in Rome and declaring an agrarian republic in Italy. But\nhow long will the Italian army, with the present radicals at the head of\naffairs, remain intact and free from demoralization?\n\n\n \u201cThe heights infected, vales below\n Will soon with plague be rife.\u201d\n\n\nThe army is drawn from a population which the internationalists have\npenetrated and inoculated with their errors and designs, and their\nemissaries have been discovered tampering and fraternizing with the\ntroops.\n\nWho can tell how near is the hour when St. Peter\u2019s will be officially\ndeclared the pantheon of red-republican Italy, and the statue of\nGaribaldi will be placed on the high altar where now stands the image of\nthe Crucified God-Man? This will not be the end but the prelude to the\nfinal act of the present impending tragedy, when the black flag will be\nunfurled and the palaces of Rome, with St. Peter\u2019s and the Vatican, and\nall their records of the past and centuries of heaped-up treasures of\nart, will be reduced by petroleum and dynamite to a shapeless heap of\nruins. To those who can tell a hawk from a handsaw this is the hidden\nanimus and the logical sequence of the entrance of the Piedmontese army\ninto Rome. This is the real reading of the hand-writing on the walls of\nPorta Pia:\n\n \u201cBloody instructions, which, being taught, return To plague the\n inventor. This even-handed justice Commends the ingredients of\n our poisoned chalice To our own lips.\u201d\n\nBut is there not a sufficient number of conservatives in the present\nnational party of Italy to stop the men now at the head of affairs\nbefore they reach their ultimate designs? Perhaps so; it would be\npleasant to believe this. But the present aspect of affairs gives but\nlittle hope of this being true. These conservatives, who did not, or\ncould not, or would not stop the spoliation of the property of the\nchurch and the trampling upon her sacred rights; these conservatives,\nwho did not take measures to hinder the Italian radicals from possessing\nthemselves of the legislative power of the present government and\npursuing their criminal course\u2014these are not the men to build one\u2019s\nhopes upon in stemming the tide that is now sweeping Italy to her\ndestruction. The dictates of common sense teach us to look to some other\nquarter for hopes of success.\n\n\n III.\u2014THE MISSION OF THE LATIN RACE.\n\nHow much of the present condition of the Latin peoples, politically,\ncommercially, or socially considered, can be satisfactorily explained or\naccounted for on the score of climate, or on that of their\ncharacteristics as a race, or of the stage of their historical\ndevelopment, or of the change made in the channels of commerce in\nconsequence of new discoveries, it is not our purpose to stop here to\nexamine or attempt to estimate and decide. One declaration we have no\nhesitation in making at the outset, and that is: If the Latin nations\nare not in all respects at the present moment equal to others, it is due\nto one or more of the above-enumerated causes, and not owing, as some\npartisans and infidels would have the world believe, to the doctrines of\ntheir religious faith.\n\nThe Catholic Church affirms the natural order, upholds the value of\nhuman reason, and asserts the natural rights of man. Her doctrines teach\nthat reason is at the basis of revelation, that human nature is the\ngroundwork of divine grace, and that the aim of Christianity is not the\nrepression or obliteration of the capacities and instincts of man, but\ntheir elevation, expansion, and deification.\n\nThe Catholic Church not only affirms the natural order, but affirms the\nnatural order as divine. For she has ever held the Creator of the\nuniverse, of man, and the Author of revelation as one, and therefore\nwelcomed cheerfully whatever was found to be true, good, and beautiful\namong all the different races, peoples, nations, and tribes of mankind.\nIt is for this reason that she has merited from those who only see\nantagonism between God and man, between nature and grace, between\nrevelation and science\u2014who believe that \u201cthe heathen were devil-begotten\nand God-forsaken,\u201d and \u201cthis world a howling wilderness\u201d\u2014the charge of\nbeing superstitious, idolatrous, and pagan.\n\nThe special mission of the people of Israel by no manner of means sets\naside the idea of the directing care of divine Providence and the\nmission of other branches of the family of mankind. The heathens,\nso-called, were under, and are still under, the divine dispensation\ngiven to the patriarch Noe; and so that they live up to the light thus\nreceived, they are, if in good faith, in the way of salvation. The\nwritten law given by divine inspiration to Moses was the same as the\nunwritten law given to Noe and the patriarchs, and the patriarchal\ndispensation was the same as was received from God by Adam. There is no\none rational being ever born of the human race who is not in some sort\nin the covenanted graces of God. It is the glory of the Catholic Church\nthat she exists from the beginning, and embraces in her fold all the\nmembers of the human race; and of her alone it can be said with truth\nthat she is Catholic\u2014that is, universal both in time and space:\n_replevit orbem terrarum_.\n\nAffirming the natural order and upholding it as divine, the Catholic\nChurch did not hesitate to recognize the Roman Empire and the\nestablished governments of the world under paganism, and to inculcate\nthe duty, \u201cRender unto C\u00e6sar the things that are C\u00e6sar\u2019s.\u201d Hence she\nwillingly accepted alliance with the Roman state when Constantine became\na Christian, and approved, but with important ameliorations, the Roman\ncode of laws; and of every form of government, whether monarchic or\ndemocratic, established among the Gentile nations of the past or by\nnon-Christian peoples of the present, she acknowledges and maintains the\ndivine right.\n\nThe great theologians of the church, after having eliminated the errors\nand supplied the deficiencies of the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle,\naccepted and employed their systems, and the labors of these \u201cimmortal\nheathens\u201d have contributed no little to the glory of Christianity. It is\nto the labor of Christian monks that the world is indebted for what it\npossesses of the writings of the genius of the \u201cheathen\u201d poets,\nmoralists, and other authors. It was the church\u2019s custom to purify the\nheathen temples by her blessing, and transform their noble buildings,\nwithout altering their structure, into Christian temples. It was in the\nbosom of the Catholic populations of Italy that the revival of classical\nliterature and art took its rise in modern Europe. Notwithstanding the\nextravagance of some of its votaries, which called forth the righteous\nindignation and condemnation of Savonarola, its refining influence,\ncombined with the wealth due to industry and commerce, elevated the\nItalian cities to a height of civilization that has not been surpassed,\nif equalled, by the foremost nations of our day. When the ships of Spain\ncovered every sea with commerce, and its activity broke through the\nconfines of the known world and discovered, by the guiding genius of\nColumbus, a new continent; when it was said of Spain that the sun never\nset upon its realms; when Spain was most productive of great warriors,\ngreat statesmen, great artists, and great saints, it was then, and\nprecisely because of it, that Spain was most profoundly and devoutly\nCatholic.\n\nAll the joys that spring from the highest intellectual and artistic\nculture, the happiness derived from man\u2019s domestic and social\naffections, the gratification of the senses in the contemplation of the\nbeauty of all creation, and the pleasure drawn from the fruits of\nindustry and commerce\u2014all these, when pure, are not only consistent\nwith, but form a part of, the life and worship of the Catholic faith.\nThe very last accusation for an intelligent man to make against the\nCatholic Church is that she teaches a \u201cnon-human\u201d religion.\n\nNo political government, at least in modern times, has ventured to rely\nso far upon the natural ability of man to govern himself as that of the\nrepublic of the United States. It may be said that the government of\nthis republic is founded upon man\u2019s natural capacity to govern himself\nas a primary truth or maxim. It assumes the dignity of human nature,\npresupposes the value of man\u2019s reason, and affirms his natural and\ninalienable rights.\n\nThese were declarations of no new truths, for they spring from right\nreason and the primitive instincts of human nature, and belong,\ntherefore, to that natural order which had ever been asserted and\ndefended by the great theologians and general councils of the Catholic\nChurch. These truths underlie every form of political government founded\nin Catholic ages, correspond to the instincts of the people, and were\nonly opposed by despots, Protestant theologians, and the erroneous\ndoctrines concerning the natural order brought into vogue by the\nso-called Reformation.\n\nOur American institutions, in the first place, we owe to God, who made\nus what we are, and in the next place to the Catholic Church, which\nmaintained the natural order, man\u2019s ability in that order, and his free\nwill. Under God the founders of our institutions owed nothing to\nEnglishmen or Dutchmen as Protestants, but owed all to the self-evident\ntruths of reason, to man\u2019s native instincts of liberty, to the noble\ntraditions of the human race upheld by God\u2019s church and strengthened by\nthe conviction of these truths; their heroic bravery and their stout\narms did the rest.\n\nThis is why Catholics from the beginning took an integral part in the\nfoundation and permanent success of our republic. Among the most\ndistinguished names attached to the document which first declared our\nnational independence and affirmed the principles which underlie our\ninstitutions will be found one of the most intelligent, consistent, and\nfervent members of the Catholic Church. The priest who was first\nelevated to the episcopate of the Catholic hierarchy in the United\nStates took an active part in its early struggles, and was the intimate\nfriend of Benjamin Franklin and an associate of his on a mission to\nengage the Canadians to join in our efforts for independence.\n\nThe patriotism of Catholics will not suffer in comparison with their\nfellow-countrymen, as is witnessed by the public address of General\nWashington at Philadelphia immediately after the close of the war with\nEngland. And when they now come to our shores from other countries, it\nmatters not what may have been the form of their native governments,\nthey are at once at home and breathe freely the air of liberty.\n\nSincere Catholics are among our foremost patriotic citizens, and,\nwhatever may befall our country, they will not be found among those who\nwould divide her into factions, or who would contract her liberties, or\nseek to change the popular institutions inherited from our heroic\nforefathers. Catholic Americans have so learned their religion as to\nfind in it a faithful ally and a firm support of both political and\ncivil liberty.\n\nNowhere, on the other hand, does the Catholic Church reckon among her\nmembers more faithful, more fervent, and more devoted children than in\nthe citizens of our republic. Everywhere the Catholic Church appears at\nthe present moment under a cloud; there is only one spot in her horizon\nwhere there breaks through a bright ray of hope of a better future, and\nthat is in the direction of our free and youthful country. What better\ntest and proof of the Catholic Church\u2019s sanction of the entire natural\norder can be asked than her unexampled prosperity in the American\nrepublic of the United States?\n\nIf the Latin peoples are backward in things relating to their political\nor material or social prosperity, or in any other respect, in the\nnatural order, this is not to be laid to the charge of the Catholic\nfaith. If the races are not wanting to her, the church will never be\nwanting to the races.\n\nThe force which is at work in the actual turmoil in Italy we are firmly\nconvinced will renew the Catholic faith, and open up to its people\u2014let\nus hope without their passing through a catastrophe feared by many, and\nnot without grounds\u2014a new and better future.\n\n\n IV.\u2014THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.\n\nThey are blind to the lesson which every page of the history of the\nCatholic Church teaches who indulge in the fancy that the Christ laden\nand guided bark of Peter will not ride safely through the present\nworld-wide, threatening storm. As the fierce beating of the storm\nagainst the majestic oak fixes its roots more firmly in the soil and\nstrengthens and expands its limbs, so by the attacks of calumny the\nmilitant church of Christ is made better known, by persecution she is\nstrengthened, and the attempts at her overthrow prepare the way for new\nand more glorious triumphs.\n\nThe pages of history point out in other centuries dangers to the\nexistence of the church equal to those of the present crisis, through\nwhich she passed with safety and renewed strength. A master-pen in\nword-painting has given a picture of one of those critical periods, all\nthe more striking as the events which it portrays are within the memory\nof men still living, and also because the writer is famed for anything\nrather than Catholic leanings. \u201cIt is not strange,\u201d he says, \u201cthat in\nthe year 1799 even sagacious observers should have thought that at\nlength the hour of the Church of Rome was come, an infidel power\nascendant, the pope dying in captivity, the most illustrious prelates of\nFrance living in a foreign country on Protestant alms, the noblest\nedifices which the munificence of former ages have consecrated to the\nworship of God turned into temples of victory, or into banqueting houses\nfor political societies, or into theophilanthropic chapels. Such signs\nmight well be supposed to indicate the approaching end of that long\ndomination. But the end was not yet. Again doomed to death, the\nmilk-white hind was still fated not to die. Even before the funeral\nrites had been performed over the ashes of Pius VI. a great reaction had\ncommenced, which, after the lapse of more than forty years, appears to\nbe still in progress. Anarchy had had its day. A new order of things\nrose out of the confusion, new dynasties, new laws, new titles, and\namidst them emerged the ancient religion. The Arabs have a fable that\nthe Great Pyramid was built by antediluvian kings, and alone, of all the\nworks of men, bore the weight of the Flood. Such as this was the fate of\nthe Papacy: it had been buried under the great inundation, but its deep\nfoundations had remained unshaken; and when the waters had abated it\nappeared alone amid the ruins of a world which had passed away. The\nrepublic of Holland was gone, the empire of Germany, and the great\nCouncil of Venice, and the old Helvetian League, and the house of\nBourbon, and the parliaments and aristocracy of France. Europe was full\nof young creations\u2014a French Empire, a kingdom of Italy, a Confederation\nof the Rhine. Nor had the late events affected only territorial limits\nand political institutions. The distribution of property, the\ncomposition and spirit of society, had, through great part of Catholic\nEurope, undergone a complete change. _But the unchangeable church was\nstill there._\u201d[1]\n\nThree centuries of protests against the idea of the church and of her\ndivine authority have served to bring the question of the necessity of\nthe church and the claims of her authority squarely before the minds of\nall men who think on religious subjects. So general was the belief in\nthem before the rise of Protestantism that theological works, even the\n_Sum_ of St. Thomas, did not contain what is now never omitted by\ntheological writers: the \u201cTractatus de Ecclesia.\u201d The violent protests\nof heresy, joined with the persecutions of the despotic power of the\nstate, have ended in showing more clearly the divine institution of the\nchurch, and proving more conclusively her divine authority.\n\n\n \u201cIn poison there is physic.\u201d\n\n\nThe idea of the church is a divine conception, and the existence of the\nchurch is a divine creation. The church as a divine idea lies hid in\nGod, and was an essential part of his preconceived plan in the creation\nof the universe. Hence the error of those who consider the church as the\ncreation of \u201can assembly of individual Christian believers\u201d; or as the\nproduct of the state, as in Prussia, Russia, England, and other\ncountries; or as the effort of a race, as Dean Milman maintains in his\n_History of Latin Christianity_; or as \u201cthe conscious organization of\nthe moral and intellectual forces and resources of humanity for a higher\nlife than that which the state requires.\u201d Hence also the failure of all\nchurch-builders and inventors of new religions from the earliest ages\ndown to the Luthers, Calvins, Henry VIIIs., Wesleys, Charles Foxes,\nMother Ann Lees, Joe Smiths, D\u00f6llingers, and Loysons, _et hoc genus\nomne_. Poor weak-minded men! had they the slightest idea of what the\nchurch of God is, or had they not become blind to it, they would sooner\npretend to create a new universe than invent a new religion or start a\nnew church. The human is impotent to create the divine.\n\nChrist alone could replace the Jewish Church by his own, and that\nbecause he was God. And this substitution was accomplished, not by the\nway of a revolutionary protest, but in the fulfilment of the types and\nfigures of the Jewish Church and the realization of its divine\nprophecies and promises. The ideal church and the historical church\nwhich have existed upon earth from Adam until Noe, and from Noe until\nMoses, and from Moses until Christ, and from Christ until now, which is\nthe actual Catholic Church, are divine in their idea, are divine in\ntheir institution, are divine in their action, and their continuity is\none and unbroken. The church can suffer no breaks without annihilation.\n\nGod created man in his own image and likeness, and supplied from the\ninstant of his creation all the means required for man to become one\nwith himself. This was the end for which God called man into existence.\nThis commerce and union between God and man, with the means needed to\nelevate man to this intercourse and to perpetuate and perfect these\nrelations in an organic form, constitutes the church of God.\n\nThe great and unspeakable love of God for man led God, in the fulness of\ntime, to become man, in order to make the elevation of man to union with\nhimself easier and more perfect. To this end the God-Man, while upon\nearth, declared to his apostle Peter: \u201cI will build my church, and the\ngates of hell shall not prevail against it.\u201d\n\nThis places beyond all doubt or dispute the fact that Christ built a\nchurch, and therefore its institution was divine. Moreover, it is clear\nby these words, not that his church should be free from the attacks of\nevery species of error and wickedness which lead to hell\u2014they rather\nimply the contrary\u2014but that these attacks should never prevail against\nher, corrupt, overcome, or destroy her.\n\nHe added: \u201cLo! I am with you always, even to the consummation of the\nworld!\u201d This promise connects Christ\u2019s presence with his church\ninseparably and perpetually. Hence once the church, always the church.\nThe whole world may go to wreck and ruin sooner than Christ will desert\nhis church. \u201cHeaven and earth shall pass, but my words shall not pass.\u201d\nLet, then, attacks come from any quarter, let revolutions shake the\nfoundations of the world and conspirators overthrow human society, let\nanarchy reign and her foes fancy her destruction\u2014the Catholic Church\nwill stand with perfect faith upon this divine _Magna Charta_ of her\nFounder as upon an adamantine rock.\n\nBefore Christ\u2019s ascension he appointed the rulers in his church; he gave\n\u201csome apostles, and some prophets, and other some evangelists, and other\nsome pastors and doctors, for the perfecting of the saints, for the\nministry, for the edifying the body of Christ.\u201d He commanded them to\ntarry in Jerusalem until they should receive the Holy Ghost. When the\ndays of Pentecost were accomplished, the Holy Ghost descended upon them\nvisibly, \u201cand they were all filled with the Holy Ghost.\u201d That was the\nmoment when the divine institution of the church was completed, and then\nbegan her divine action upon men and society that never was to cease\nwhile the world lasts. The past dispensations of God were all fulfilled\nin Christ, and his church, which was to embrace all mankind in her fold\nand guide humanity to its divine destination, was divinely established.\n\nIt is quite natural that those races which, by God\u2019s providence, have\nbeen intimately connected with the church from her cradle should be\ninclined to think that the church is confined to their keeping and is\ninseparable from their existence. Christianity and the church are\nundoubtedly affected in their development by the peculiarities of the\nraces through which they are transmitted, and it is natural that they\nshould accentuate those truths and bring to the front those features of\norganization which commend themselves most to the genius, instincts, and\nwants of certain races. This is only stating a general law held as a\nmaxim among philosophers: _Whatever is received, is received according\nto the form of the recipient_. Thus, the contact of the church with the\nintellectual gifts of the Greeks was the providential occasion of the\nexplicit development and dogmatic definition of the sublimest mysteries\nof the Christian revelation. And through her connection with the Latins,\nwhose genius runs in the direction of organization and law, the church\nperfected her hierarchy and brought forth those regulations necessary to\nher existence and well-being known under the name of \u201cCanon Law.\u201d\n\nThe objective point of Christianity, the church of Christ, is to embrace\nin her fold all mankind; but she is, in her origin, essence, and\ninstitution, independent of any human being, or race of men, or state,\nor nation.\n\nThe Italians, the Spaniards, the French, or any other nation or nations,\nmay renounce the faith and abandon the church, as England and several\nnations did in the religious revolution of the sixteenth century, yet\nthe church exists and is none the less really and essentially Catholic.\nThe church has existed in all her divinity without including any one\nnationality or race, and, if it please God, can do so again. The sun\nwould give forth its light the same though there were no objects within\nthe reach of its rays, as when they are reflected from nature and\ndisplay all their hidden beauty; so the divinity of the Catholic Church\nwould exist in all its reality and power the same though there were no\nChristians to manifest it by their saintly lives, as at some future day\nwhen, after the victory over her enemies, she will unite in one the\nwhole human race, and all her hidden glory will be displayed.\n\nThis law also holds good and is applicable to her visible head, the\nsupreme pastor of the faithful. The pope, as pope, was no less the\nfather of the faithful and exercised his jurisdiction when driven into\nthe Catacombs, or violently taken by a despot and imprisoned at\nFontainebleau, or, as at present, forced by the action of a desperate\nfaction of Italians into retirement in the Vatican, than when his\nindependence and authority were recognized and sustained by the armies\nof the Emperor Constantine or defended by the sword of Charlemagne, the\ncrowned emperor of Christendom.\n\n\u201cThe pope,\u201d to adopt the words of Pius IX., \u201cwill always be the pope, no\nmatter where he may be, in his state as he was, to-day in the Vatican,\nperhaps one day in prison.\u201d\n\nThe perpetuity of the Catholic Church is placed above and beyond all\ndangers from any human or Satanic conspiracies or attacks in that\nDivinity which is inherently incorporated with her existence, and in\nthat invincible strength of conviction which this divine Presence\nimparts to the souls of all her faithful children. It is this indwelling\ndivine Presence of the Holy Spirit from the day of Pentecost which\nteaches and governs in her hierarchy, is communicated sacramentally to\nher members, and animates and pervades, in so far as not restricted by\nhuman defects, the whole church. Hawthorne caught a glimpse of this\ndivine internal principle of life of the Catholic Church and embodied it\nin the following passage: \u201cIf there were,\u201d he says, \u201cbut angels to work\nthe Catholic Church instead of the very different class of engineers who\nnow manage its cranks and safety-valves, the system would soon vindicate\nthe dignity and holiness of its origin.\u201d[2] This statement put in plain\nEnglish would run thus: The Catholic Church is the church of God\nactualized upon earth so far as this is possible, human nature being\nwhat it is. The indwelling divine Presence is the key to the Catholic\nposition, and they who cannot perceive and appreciate this, whatever may\nbe their grasp of intellect or the extent of their knowledge, will find\nthemselves baffled in attempting to explain her existence and history;\ntheir solution, whatever that may be, will tax the faculty of credulity\nof intelligent men beyond endurance; and at the end of all their efforts\nfor her overthrow these words from her Founder will always stare them in\nthe face: \u201cNon pr\u00e6valebunt\u201d\u2014\u201cthe gates of hell shall not prevail against\nher.\u201d If this language be not understood, perhaps it may be in its\npoetical translation:\n\n\n \u201cThe milk-white hind was fated not to die.\u201d\n\n\nThe radical party now in power in Italy may succeed in ruining their\nglorious country, but they may rest assured that this does not include,\nas her foes foolishly and stupidly imagine in every turn of her eventful\nhistory, the ruin of the Catholic Church. \u201cWhat God has made will never\nbe overturned by the hand of man.\u201d\n\n\n V.\u2014THE SYLLABUS.\n\nOne of the principal offices of the Catholic Church is to witness,\nguard, and interpret the revealed truths, written and unwritten, which\nwas imposed upon her by Christ when he said: \u201cGo and teach all nations\nwhatsoever I have commanded you.\u201d This duty she has fulfilled from age\nto age, in spite of every hindrance and in face of all dangers, with\nuncompromising firmness and unswerving fidelity, principally by the\naction of her chief bishop, whom Christ charged to \u201cfeed his sheep and\nlambs\u201d and \u201cto confirm his brethren.\u201d This Supreme Pastor, in watching\nover the sheep of Christ\u2019s flock, has never failed to feed them with the\ntruths of Christ, and, lest they should be led astray, he has pointed\nout and condemned the errors against these truths one by one as they\narose.\n\nWhatever some critics may have to say as to the form in which the\nSyllabus has been cast, or as to the technical language employed in its\ncomposition, this document nevertheless is all that it purports to\nbe,\u2014an authoritative and explicit condemnation of the most dangerous and\nsubversive errors of our epoch.\n\n\n \u201cThat last,\n Blown from our Zion of the Seven Hills,\n Was no uncertain blast!\u201d\n\n\nWere the Syllabus the product of the private cogitations of an Italian\ncitizen named John Mary Mastai Ferretti, promulgated and imposed upon\nthe unwilling consciences of Catholics by his personal authority,\nCatholics would indeed have reason to resist and complain. But the\nviolent opposition, the hostility and hatred, that the Syllabus has\nexcited among so many non-Catholics and leading minds is a cause of no\nlittle surprise.\n\n\n \u201cWhat\u2019s Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,\n That he should weep for her?\u201d\n\n\nSuppose things were as they dream them to be, the attitude of that\nvenerable Pontiff in the Vatican, powerless to do physical harm to any\none, even if he would, standing up in the sole strength of his\nconvictions, and, in spite of the clamors of fanatics, the rage of\nconspirators, and the threats of the prime ministers of powerful\nempires, proclaiming to them and the world that what they hold to be\ntruth is a lie, what they maintain to be right is wrong, and what they\ndesire as good is evil\u2014this presents the most august and sublime figure\nthe nineteenth century has witnessed. O noble old man! well dost thou\nmerit to be placed among the great men of the holy church, and as chief\npastor to be ranked on the pages of her history in the list of her\nheroic and saintly pontiffs, with her Leos and Gregories.\n\nBut read the Syllabus\u2014and few of its opponents have done this; take the\ntrouble to understand rightly what you have read\u2014and fewer still have\ntaken this pains\u2014and if you have not lost sight of the prime truths of\nreason, and have any faith left in the revealed truths of Christianity,\nyou must at least assent to its principal decisions and approve of its\ncensures. For its condemnations are chiefly aimed against pantheism,\natheism, materialism, internationalism, communism\u2014these and similar\nerrors subversive of man\u2019s dignity, society, civilization, Christianity,\nand all religion. What boots it that these distinctive errors are\ncloaked with the high-sounding and popular catch-words, \u201cintellectual\nculture,\u201d \u201cliberty of thought,\u201d \u201cmodern civilization,\u201d etc., etc.? They\nare none the less errors, and all the more dangerous on account of their\nattractive disguise.\n\nThe opposition of those who are not internationalists and atheists to\nthe condemnation and censures contained in the Syllabus, can be\nexplained, putting it in the mildest form, on the ground of their lack\nof the sense of the divine authority of the church and its office, and\nthe misapprehension or misinterpretation in great part of its language.\nFor at bottom the Syllabus is nothing else than the Christian thesis of\nthe nineteenth century, as against its antithesis set up by modern\nsophists and conspirators, who openly put forth their programme as in\nreligion atheism, in morals free-love, in philosophy materialism, in the\nstate absolute democracy, in society common property.\n\nThis, then, is the significance and the cause of the rage which it has\ncalled forth: the Supreme Pastor of Christ\u2019s flock, with his vigilant\neye, has detected the plots of those who would overthrow the family,\nsociety, and all religion, and, conscious of the high obligations of his\ncharge, would not in silence take his repose, but dared, in protection\nof his fold, to cry aloud and use his teeth upon these human wolves, and\nthus warn the faithful and the whole world of their impending danger.\nThis is the secret of the outcry against the Syllabus and Pius IX.\nHerein is the _Quare fremuerunt gentes_. But does not the Syllabus\ndeclare that there can be no reconciliation between the Catholic Church\nand modern civilization? O blind and slow of heart! do you not know that\nmodern civilization is the outcome of the Catholic Church? What was the\nanswer of Christ to Satan when he offered to him \u201call the kingdoms of\nthe world and the glory of them\u201d? \u201cBegone, Satan!\u201d Which means, What you\noffer is already mine, and not yours to give; away, hypocrite and\ndeceiver! So to-day, when the declared enemies of Christian civilization\ncome in disguise to the Catholic Church and insist upon her\nreconciliation with modern civilization, she replies with Christ:\nBegone, Satan; modern civilization is the product of the Catholic\nChurch, and not yours, and not under your protection or jurisdiction;\naway, hypocrites and conspirators!\n\nReconciliation with what these conspirators call \u201cmodern civilization\u201d?\nDo men who have their wits about them know what this means? This means\nthe overthrow of the great institutions of society, which have cost\nnineteen centuries of toil and struggle of the noblest men and women of\nthe race. And for what? Only for the tyranny of a commune of declared\natheists, the emancipation of the flesh, and the reign of Antichrist.\nThank God! there is one man who cannot be bought by bribes, or won by\nflattery, or made to stoop by fear; who dares meet face to face the foes\nof Christ and the enemies of mankind, open his mouth and lift up his\nvoice, and, in answer to these hypocritical invitations, speak out in\ntones that ring in the ears of the whole world and can never be\nforgotten: \u201cNon possumus.\u201d\n\nThe question is not whether the church will be reconciled with modern\ncivilization. The real question is whether modern society will follow\nthe principles of eternal justice and right, and reject these false\nteachers; whether it will legislate in accordance with the rules of\nright reason and the divine truths of Christianity, and turn its back\nupon revolution, anarchy, and atheism; whether it will act in harmony\nwith God\u2019s church in upholding modern civilization and in spreading\nGod\u2019s kingdom upon earth, or return to paganism, barbarism, and\nsavagery. The question, the real question which in the course of human\nevents has become at the present moment among the Latin race a national\nquestion, and particularly so in Italy, is this: \u201cChrist or Barabbas?\u201d\n\u201cNow, Barabbas was a robber.\u201d\n\nIt is because the Syllabus has placed this alternative in so clear and\nunmistakable a light that Satan has stirred up so spiteful and so\nwide-spread an opposition to it among his followers and those they can\ninfluence. Here is where the shoe pinches.\n\n\n VI.\u2014THE VATICAN COUNCIL.\n\nIt is folly to attempt to interpret any society without having first\ndiscovered its animating principle and fairly studied the nature and\nbearings of its organization. How great, then, is the folly of those who\nseem not to have even a suspicion that the greatest and grandest and the\nmost lasting of all societies and organizations that the world has ever\nknown\u2014the Catholic Church\u2014can be fathomed by a hasty glance! Yet there\nare men well known, and reckoned worthy of repute, who bestow more time\nand pay closer attention to gain knowledge of the structure and habits\nof the meanest bug than they deem requisite before sitting in judgment\non the church of the living God. There is in our day a great variety of\ndemagogues, and their number is very great, but a truly scientific man\nis a _rara avis_.\n\nThere are also men standing high in the public estimation, and some of\nthem deservedly so in other respects, who imagine that the decree of the\nVatican Council defining the prerogatives of the successor of St. Peter\nhas seriously altered the constitution of the Catholic Church, when it\nhas done nothing more or less than make the common law of the church,\nwhose binding force from universal usage and universal reception was\nadmitted, a statute law.\n\nStarting off from this serious mistake as their premise, they wax warm\nand become furious against the Vatican Council and its decree concerning\nthe Roman Pontiff. And the new-born pity with which they are seized for\nbenighted Catholics, would be worthy of all admiration, were there not\ngood grounds to question their common sense or suspect their sincerity.\nThey talk about \u201ca pontifical C\u00e6sar imposed upon the Catholic Church,\u201d\n\u201cpriestly domination carried to its highest point of development,\u201d \u201cthe\n_personal_ infallibility of the pope,\u201d \u201cthe Roman Church transformed\ninto an enlarged house of the Jesuit Order,\u201d \u201cthe incompatibility of the\nCatholic Church, with its _new_ constitution, with the state,\u201d etc.,\netc. Then follows a jeremiad over \u201cthe mental dependency of Catholics,\u201d\nand so forth. All this and much more has, according to their opinion,\nbeen accomplished by a single decree of the Vatican Council. Apparently\nthis class of men look upon the Catholic Church as a mere piece of\nmechanism, abandoned to the control and direction of a set of priests\nswayed by personal ambition and selfishness, and whose sole aim is to\nexercise an absolute tyranny over the consciences of their\nfellow-Christians; or as an institution still more absurd and vile, for\nheresy and infidelity have in some instances succeeded in so blinding\nmen\u2019s minds that they do not allow the good the church does as hers,\nand, stimulated by malice, heap upon her every conceivable vice and\nevil. Christ had to defend himself against the Jews, who accused him of\nbeing possessed by a devil; and is it a wonder that his church should\nhave to defend herself against the charge of misbelievers and\nunbelievers as being the synagogue of Satan? The servant is not greater\nthan his master.\n\nEven Goethe, in spite of his anti-Christian, or rather his\nanti-Protestant, instincts, would have saved these men from their\nfanatical blindness and their gross errors by imparting to their minds,\nif they were willing to receive it, a true insight into the real\ncharacter of the Catholic Church. \u201cLook,\u201d he says, after premising that\n\u201cpoems are like stained glasses\u2014\u201d\n\n\n \u201cLook into the church from the market square;\n Nothing but gloom and darkness there!\n Shrewd Sir Philistine sees things so:\n Well may he narrow and captious grow\n Who all his life on the outside passes.\n\n \u201cBut come, now, and inside we\u2019ll go!\n Now round the holy chapel gaze;\n \u2019Tis all one many-colored blaze;\n Story and emblem, a pictured maze,\n Flash by you:\u2014\u2019tis a noble show.\n Here, feel as sons of God baptized,\n With hearts exalted and surprised!\u201d[3]\n\n\nThe \u201cPhilistines\u201d we are speaking of infuse into the Catholic Church\ntheir own forensic spirit, and fancy that she is only a system of severe\ncommandments, arbitrary laws, and outward ceremonies enforced by an\nexternal and absolute authority which, like the old law, places all her\nchildren in a state of complete bondage. They are blind to the fact that\nthe Catholic Church confines her precepts, such is her respect for man\u2019s\nliberty, chiefly to the things necessary to salvation, leaving all the\nrest to be complied with by each individual Christian as moved by the\ninstinct of divine grace.[4]\n\nThe aim of the Catholic Church is not, as they foolishly fancy, to drill\nher children into a servile army of pr\u00e6torian guards, but to raise up\nfreemen in Christ, souls actuated by the Holy Spirit\u2014to create saints.\n\nThey are also ignorant of the nature and place, of the authority of the\nchurch, as they are of her spirit.\n\nIt is the birthright of every member of the Catholic Church freely to\nfollow the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and the office and aim of the\nauthority of the church is to secure, defend, and protect this\nChrist-given freedom.\n\nTo make more clear this relation of the divine external authority of the\nchurch with the divine internal guidance of the Holy Spirit in the soul,\na few words of explanation will suffice.\n\nIt is the privilege of every soul born to Christ in his holy church in\nthe waters of regeneration, to receive thereby the indwelling presence\nof the Holy Spirit. It is the bounden duty of every Christian soul to\nfollow with fidelity the promptings of the Holy Spirit. In order that\nthe soul may follow faithfully the indwelling Holy Spirit, it must be\nsecured against all mistakes and delusions and protected against all\nattacks from error. Every child of the church has therefore a claim in\njustice upon the authority of the church for this security and\nprotection. But it would be absurd and an intolerable indignity for the\nsoul to obey an authority that might lead it astray in a matter\nconcerning its divine life and future destiny; for in the future world\nno chance or liberty is left for a return to correct the mistakes into\nwhich the soul may have fallen. Therefore the claim is founded in right\nreason and justice that the supreme teaching and governing authority of\nthe church should be divine\u2014that is, unerring. And it is the intrusion\nof human authority in the shape of private judgment, or that of the\nstate, as supreme, in regard to the truths of divine revelation, that is\nthe radical motive of the resistance to Protestantism as Christianity on\nthe part of Catholics.\n\nNow, when the soul sees that the authority which governs is animated by\nthe same divine Spirit, with whose promptings it is its inmost desire to\ncomply, and appreciates that the aim of the commands of authority is to\nkeep it from straying from the guidance of the indwelling divine Spirit,\nthen obedience to authority becomes easy and light, and the fulfilment\nof its commands the source of increased joy and greater liberty, not an\nirksome task or a crushing burden. This spiritual insight springing from\nthe light of faith is the secret source of Catholic life, the inward\nprinciple which prompts the obedience of Catholics to the divine\nauthority of the holy church, and from which is born the consciousness\nof the soul\u2019s filiation with God, whence flow that perfect love and\nliberty which always accompany this divine Sonship.\n\nThe aim of the authority of the church and its exercise is the same as\nthat of all other authority\u2014secondary. The church herself, in this\nsense, is not an end, but a means to an end. The aim of the authority of\nthe church is the promotion and the safeguard of the divine action of\nthe indwelling Holy Spirit in the soul, and not a substitution of itself\nfor this.\n\nJust as the object of the authority of the state is to promote the\ncommon good and to protect the rights of its citizens, so the authority\nof the church has for its aim the common good of its members and the\nprotection of their rights. And is not the patriotic spirit that moves\nthe legislator to make the law for the common good and protection of his\nfellow-countrymen identically the same spirit which plants in their\nbosoms the sense of submission to the law? Consequently, to fix more\nfirmly and to define more accurately the divine authority of the church\nin its papal exercise, seen from the inside, is to increase individual\naction, to open the door to a larger sphere of liberty, and to raise man\nup to his true manhood in God.\n\nIt does, indeed, make all the difference in the world, as the poet\nGoethe has so well said, to \u201clook at the church\u201d with \u201cSir Philistine\u201d\nin a \u201cnarrow and captious\u201d spirit from \u201cthe market square\u201d stand-point,\nor to gaze on the church from the inside, where all her divine beauty is\ndisplayed and, in a free and lofty spirit, fully enjoyed.\n\n\n VII.\u2014THE VATICAN COUNCIL (_continued_).\n\nTo define the prerogatives of the papal authority, and its place and\nsphere of action in the divine autonomy of the church, was to prepare\nthe way for the faithful to follow with greater safety and freedom the\ninspirations of the Holy Spirit, and thus open the door wider for a\nfresh influx of divine life and a more vigorous activity. Thanks for\nthese great advantages to the persistent attacks of the foes of the\nchurch; for had they let her authority alone, this decree of the Vatican\nCouncil would not have been called for, and the prerogatives of the\npapal functions might have been exercised with sufficient force as the\nunwritten and common law, and never have passed into a dogmatic decree\nand become the statute law.\n\nThe work of the Vatican Council is not, however, finished. Other and\nimportant tasks are before it, to accomplish which it will be sooner or\nlater reassembled. Divine Providence appears to be shaping events in\nmany ways since the adjournment of the council, so as to render its\nfuture labors comparatively easy. There were special causes which made\nit reasonable that the occupant of St. Peter\u2019s chair at Rome should in\nmodern times be an Italian. Owing to the radical changes which have\ntaken place in Europe, these causes no longer have the force they once\nhad. The church is a universal, not a national society. The boundaries\nof nations have, to a great extent, been obliterated by the marvellous\ninventions of the age. The tendency of mankind is, even in spite of\nitself, to become more and more one family, and of nations to become\nparts of one great whole rather than separate entities. And even if the\nwheel of change should, as we devoutly hope, restore to the Pope the\npatrimony of the church, the claims of any distinct nationality to the\nChair of Peter will scarcely hold as they once held. The supreme Pastor\nof the whole flock of Christ, as befits the Catholic and cosmopolitan\nspirit of the church, may now, as in former days, be chosen solely in\nview of his capacity, fitness, and personal merits, without any regard\nto his nationality or race.\n\nIt must be added to the other great acts of the reigning Pontiff\u2014whom\nmay God preserve!\u2014that he has given to the cardinal senate of the church\na more representative character by choosing for its members a larger\nnumber of distinguished men from the different nations of which the\nfamily of the church is composed. This, it is to be hoped, is only a\npromise of the no distant day when the august senate of the universal\nchurch shall not only be open to men of merit of every Catholic nation\nof the earth, but also its members be chosen in proportion to the\nimportance of each community, according to the express desire of the\nholy \u0153cumenical Council of Trent. Such a representative body, composed\nof the _\u00e9lite_ of the entire human race, presided over by the common\nfather of all the faithful, would realize as nearly as possible that\nideal tribunal which enlightened statesmen are now looking for, whose\noffice it would be to act as the arbitrator between nation and nation,\nand between rulers and people.\n\nSince the close of the first session of the Vatican Council nearly all\nthe different nations of Europe have, of their own accord, broken the\nconcordats made with the church and virtually proclaimed a divorce\nbetween the state and the church. This conduct leaves the church\nentirely free in the choice of her bishops; which will tend to bring out\nmore clearly the spiritual and popular side of the church; to set at\nnaught the charge made against her prelates as meddling in purely\nsecular affairs; and to wipe out the stigma of their being involved in\nthe political intrigues of courts.\n\nModern inventions and improvements, such as telegraphs, railroads,\nsteamships, cheap postage, the press, have added time, increased\nefficiency, and lent an expansive power of action to men which poets, in\ntheir boldest flights of fancy, did not reach. These things have changed\nthe face of the material world and the ways of men in conducting their\nsecular business.\n\nPope Sixtus V. readjusted and improved in his day the outward\nadministration of the church\u2014a reform that was greatly needed\u2014and placed\nit by his practical genius, both for method and efficiency, far in\nadvance of his times. This same work might, in some respects, be done\nagain and with infinite advantage to the interests and prosperity of the\nwhole church of God.\n\nOne of the most, if not the most, important of the congregations of the\nchurch is that _De Propaganda Fide_. It is the centre of missionary\nenterprises throughout the whole extent of the world. No other object\ncan be of greater interest to every Catholic heart, no branch of the\nchurch\u2019s work calls for greater practical wisdom, more burning zeal, and\nmore energetic efficiency.\n\nThere is, perhaps, no position in the church, after that of the papal\nchair, so great in importance, so vast in its influence, so wide in its\naction, as the one occupied by the cardinal prefect of the Propaganda.\nCould it be placed on a footing so as to profit by all the agencies of\nour day, it would be better prepared to enter upon the new openings now\noffered to the missionary zeal of the church in different parts of the\nworld, and become, what it really aims to be, the right arm of the\nchurch in the propagation of the faith.\n\nWho can tell but that one of the results of the present crisis in Italy\nwill lead by an overruling Providence to an entire renewal of the\nchurch, not only in Italy, but throughout the whole world? Such a hope\nhas been frequently expressed by Pius IX., and to prepare the way for it\nwas one of the main purposes of assembling the Vatican Council.\n\n\n VIII.\u2014IMPENDING DANGER.\n\nScarcely any event is more deplorable to the sincere Christian and true\npatriot than when there arises a discord, whether real or apparent,\nbetween the religious convictions and the political aspirations of a\npeople. Such a discord divides them into separate and hostile camps, and\nit is not in the nature of things that in such a condition both religion\nand the state should not incur great danger. Every sacrifice except that\nof principle should be made, every material interest that does not\ninvolve independence and existence should be yielded up without\nreluctance or delay, in order to put an end to these conflicts, unless\none would risk on one hand apostasy and on the other anarchy.\n\nThe discord which has been sown between the state and the church by the\nrevolutionary movement in Italy has not only excited a violent struggle\nin the bosom of every Italian, but has created dissension between\nhusband and wife, parents and children, brother and brother, friend and\nfriend, neighbor and neighbor, and placed different classes of society\nin opposition to each other. The actual struggle going on in Italy is\nworking every moment untold mischief among the Italian people. Already\nsymptoms of apostasy and signs of anarchy are manifest. Every day these\ndangers are becoming more menacing. A way out of this dead-lock must be\nspeedily found.\n\nThe church has plainly shown in ages past that she can live and gain the\nempire over souls, even against the accumulated power of a hostile and\npersecuting state. She has shown in modern times, both in the United\nStates and in England and Ireland, that independent of the state, and of\nall other support than the voluntary offerings of her children, and with\nstinted freedom, she can maintain her independence, grow strong and\nprosperous. The church, relying solely upon God, conquered pagan Rome in\nall its pride of strength, and, if needs be, she can enter again into\nthe arena, and, stripped of all temporal support, face her adversaries\nand reconquer apostate Rome.\n\nBut who can contemplate without great pain a nation, and that nation the\nItalian, passing through apostasy and anarchy, even though this be\nnecessary, in the opinion of some, as a punishment and purification? Can\nthose who believe so drastic a potion is needed to cure a nation give\nthe assurance that it will not leave it in a feeble and chronic state,\nrendering a revival a work of centuries, and perhaps impossible? Every\nnoble impulse of religion and humanity should combine to avert so dire a\ncalamity, and with united voice cry out with the prophet: \u201cIs there no\nbalm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why, then, is not the wound\nof the daughter of my people healed?\u201d\n\nThe balm that will cure the present wound in Italy is not likely to be\nfound in a closer alliance of the church with the actual state. For the\nstate throughout Europe, with scarcely an exception, has placed itself\nin hostility to the church, and to expect help from this quarter would\nindeed be to hope in vain, and to rivet more closely the shackles which\nbind the free action of her members. Is it not the apparent complicity\nof the church with some of the governments of Europe, since they have\nthrown off the salutary restraints of her authority, that has been one\nof the principal causes of the loss to a fearful degree of her influence\nwith the more numerous class of society, giving a pretext to the tirades\nof the socialists, communists, and internationals against her? The\nchurch has been unjustly identified, in the minds of many, with thrones\nand dynasties whose acts and policy have been as inimical to her\ninterests as to those of the people.\n\nIn the present campaign it would be far from wise to rely for aid on\nstates, as states now are\u2014whether they be monarchies, or aristocracies,\nor republics, or democracies\u2014or upon contending dynasties; the help\nneeded in the actual crisis can come only from the Most High. \u201cSociety,\u201d\nas Pius IX. has observed, \u201chas been enclosed in a labyrinth, out of\nwhich it will never issue save by the hand of God.\u201d\n\nThe prime postulate of a sound Catholic is this: The church is divine,\nmoved by the instinct of the Holy Spirit in all her supreme and vital\nacts. The Catholic who does not hold this as a firm and immovable basis\nhas lost, or never had, the true conception of the church, and is in\nimmediate danger of becoming a rebel and a heretic, if he be not one\nalready. Whoso fails to recognize this permanent divine action in the\nchurch, the light of the Holy Spirit has departed from his soul, and he\nbecomes thereby external to the church. Of this truth De Lamennais,\nD\u00f6llinger, Loyson, are modern and sad examples. Instead of seeking a\ndeeper insight into the nature of the church, and drawing from thence\nthe light and the strength to labor for the renewal of Christianity and\nthe unity of Christendom, they have become blinded by passion and\ndeluded by personal conceits, and have fallen into heresy and\nsectarianism. For the divine Spirit embodied in the church and the\ndivine Spirit indwelling in every Christian soul are one and the same\ndivine Spirit, and they bear testimony to each other, and work together\nfor the same end.\n\nThe errors which menaced the truths of divine revelation and the peace\nof society are known and condemned by the supreme authority of the\nchurch. The same voice of the Chief Pastor called a general council to\nremove all evils from the church, \u201cthat our august religion and its\nsalutary doctrine might receive fresh life over all the earth.\u201d\n\nAgain and again he has exhorted the faithful to uphold and encourage the\nCatholic press in defence of religion as one of their important duties,\nand followed up his advice by his own personal example.\n\nEverywhere he has approved of the formation of societies for the\nadvancement of science, art, and education; for the protection and\namelioration of the working-classes; and the meeting of Catholic laymen\nfor the discussion and promotion of the interests of the church and\nsociety.\n\n\u201c_Prayer, Speech, and the Press_\u201d\u2014these are the watch-words of Pius IX.\nThese words, which have the impress of the seal of divine grace upon\nthem, have awakened the universal consciousness of the church. The\nchurch gained her first victories by prayer, by speech, and by writing,\nand these peaceful weapons are not antiquated, and, if earnestly\nemployed, are in our day more than a match for needle-guns, Krupp\ncannon, or the strongest iron-clads. Above all, when handled by\nCatholics they have the power of Almighty God to back them, and that\nstrength of conviction in Catholic souls which knows no conquerors.\n\nIf there be one thing more than any other that strikes dismay in the\ncamp of the foes of the church, it is the united action of Catholics in\ndefence of their faith. Let Italian Catholics act unitedly and, wherever\nand whenever they can, act politically, saving their faith and their\nobedience; uphold generously the Catholic press; let them speak out\nmanfully and fearlessly their convictions with all the force of their\nsouls; and for the rest, look up to God, and the enemies of God and of\nhis church and of their country will disappear \u201clike the dust which the\nwind driveth from the face of the earth.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is time, my brethren, to act with courage.\u201d[5]\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n A MOUNTAIN FRIEND.\n\n\n I.\u2014OUR BOND.\n\n\n I know not why with yon far, sombre height\n I hold so subtle friendship, why my heart\n Keeps it in one dear corner set apart;\n No rarer glory clothes it day and night\n Than find I otherwhere, yet, whensoe\u2019er\n Amid all wanderings wide by road or crest\n Mine eyes upon those simple outlines rest,\n My heart cries out as unto true friend near.\n Nor holds that half-forbidding strength of form\n Memories more dear than give so deep a grace\n To other heights, yet e\u2019er on yon dark face,\n Sun-lighted be it, or half-veiled in storm,\n I longing gaze with thoughts no words define,\n And feel the dumb rock-heart low-answering mine.\n\n\n II.\u2014NOON.\n\n\n I climb the rugged slopes that sweep with strength\n And lines, scarce broken, from the desert wide,\n Beneath whose shadow frailest flowers abide\n And sweetest waters trip their murmuring length;\n\n I stand upon the crown\u2014the autumn air\n Blows shivering out of scarcely cloud-flecked skies,\n While warm the sunshine on the gray moss lies\n And lights the crimson fires low leaves spread there.\n Beyond, hills mightier far are lifted, stern\n With ancient forest where wild crags break through,\n And, nobler still, far laid against the blue,\n Peaks, white with early snow, for heaven yearn\u2014\u2014\n Whose azure depths the quiet shadows wear\u2014\u2014\n Crowning my mountain with their distance fair.\n\n\n III.\u2014NIGHT.\n\n\n The strong uplifter of the wilderness,\n Holder of mighty silence voiceful made,\n With bird-song drifting from the spruces\u2019 shade,\n By quivering winds that murmur in distress,\n Proud stands my mountain, clothed with loneliness\n That awesome grows when darkness veileth all\n And south wind shroudeth with a misty pall\n Of hurrying clouds that ever onward press,\n As something seeking that doth e\u2019er elude,\n Flying like thing pursued that dare not rest,\n By some wild, haunting thought of fear possessed\u2014\u2014\n Not drearness all, the cloud-swept solitude:\u2014\u2014\n Through changing rifts the starlit blue gives sign\n Of mountain nearness unto things divine.\n\n\n IV.\u2014DAWN.\n\n\n Slow breaks the daily mystery of dawn\u2014\u2014\n In far-off skies gleams faint the unfolding light,\n Anear the patient hills wait with the night\n Whose shadow clings, nor hasteth to be gone.\n A passionate silence filleth all the earth\u2014\u2014\n No wind-swept pine to solemn anthem stirred,\n No distant chirp from matin-keeping bird,\n Nor any pattering sound of leafy mirth.\n And seems that waiting silence to enfold\n All mystery of life, all doubt and fear,\n All patient trusting through the darkness here,\n All perfect promise that the heavens hold.\n Lo! seems my mountain a high-altar stair\n Whereon I rest, in thought half-dream, half-prayer.\n\n\n V.\u2014ON FIRE.\n\n\n Scarce dead the echo of our evening song\n That o\u2019er the camp-fire\u2019s whirling blaze up-soared\n With wealth of hidden human sweetness stored\u2014\n Life-thoughts that thronged the spoken words along;\n Scarce lost our lingering footsteps on the moss,\n When the slow embers, that we fancied slept,\n With purpose sure and step unfaltering crept\n The sheltering mountain\u2019s unsmirched brow across.\n Alas! for straining eyes that through long days\n Of strong-breathed west wind saw the pale smoke-drift\n Its threat\u2019ning pennons in the distance lift,\n So setting discord in sweet notes of praise.\n Yet hath the wounded mountain in each thought\n Won dearer love for wrong, unwilling, wrought.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n ROC AMADOUR.\n\n\n La douce M\u00e8re du Cr\u00e9atour,\n A l\u2019\u00e9glise, \u00e0 Rochemadour,\n Fait tants miracles, tants hauts faits,\n C\u2019uns moultes biax livres en est faits.\n\n \u2014_Gauthier de Coinsy, of the thirteenth century._\n\n\nThere is not a place of pilgrimage in France without some special\nnatural attraction, from Mont St. Michel on the stormy northern coast to\nNotre Dame de la Garde overlooking the blue Mediterranean Sea; from\nNotre Dame de Buglose on a broad moor of the Landes to Notre Dame de la\nSalette among the wild Alps of Dauphin\u00e9; but not one of these has the\npeculiar charm of Notre Dame de Roc Amadour in Quercy, which stands on\nan almost inaccessible cliff overhanging a frightful ravine once known\nas the _Vall\u00e9e T\u00e9n\u00e9breuse_. And not only nature, but history, poetry,\nand the supernatural, all combine to render this one of the most\nextraordinary of the many holy sanctuaries of France. For this is the\nplace where, as hoary legends tell, the Zaccheus of the Scriptures ended\nhis days in a cave; where the peerless Roland hung up his redoubtable\nsword before the altar of the Virgin; where Henry II. of England, Louis\nIX. of France, and so many princes and knights of the middle ages came\nto pay their vows; where F\u00e9nelon, the celebrated Archbishop of Cambrai,\nwas consecrated to the Virgin in his infancy, and where he came in later\nlife to pray at his mother\u2019s tomb; and which has been sung by medi\u00e6val\npoets and rendered for ever glorious by countless miracles of divine\ngrace.\n\nOn a pleasant spring morning we left Albi to visit the ancient province\nof Quercy. From the fertile valley of the Tarn, overlooked by the fine\nchurch of Notre Dame de la Dr\u00e8che\u2014the tutelar Madonna of the\nAlbigeois\u2014we entered a dreary, stony region beyond Cahuzac, then came\ninto a charming country with wooded hills crowned with old towers and\nvillages, as at Najac, where the railway passes through a tunnel\ndirectly beneath the ancient castle in the centre of the town, and\ncrosses the Nexos on the other side of the hill, which we found merry\nwith peasant women washing their linen in the clear stream and hanging\nit on the rocks to bleach in the hot sun. The whole region is full of\nwild ravines kept fresh by capricious streams and the shadows of the\nnumerous hills. The wayside grows bright with scarlet poppies, the\ncherry-trees are snowy with blossoms, the low quince hedges are aflush\nwith their rosy blooms, and the pretty gardens at the stations are full\nof flowers and shrubbery. We pass Capdenac, supposed by M. de\nChampollion to be the ancient Uxellodunum whose siege is related by\nC\u00e6sar in his _Commentaries_, also on a high hill around which the river\nLot turns abruptly and goes winding on through a delicious valley, the\nwater as red as the soil, perhaps owing to the recent rains. Soon after\nthe country becomes rocky and desolate again, with stone walls instead\nof flowering hedges, and flocks of sheep here and there nibbling the\nscant herbage among the rocks, looking very much inclined, as well they\nmay, to give up trying to get a living. The whole region is flat, the\nearth is ghastly with the pale stones, everything is subdued in tone,\nthe horizon is bounded by low, dim hills, the sky becomes sombre and\nlowering. But there is something about all this desolation and silence\nand monotony that excites the imagination. Even our epicurean friends\nfelt the strange charm, for this is the region where truffles abound,\nscented out by the delicate organ of the animal sacred to St. Anthony\nthe Great!\n\nWe were now in Quercy, which comprises such a variety of soil and\ntemperature. In one part everything is verdant and flowery, the hills\nwreathed with vines and the trees covered with fruit-blossoms, and over\nall a radiant sun; perhaps a little beyond is a stunted vegetation, the\ntrees of a northern clime, and a country as rough and bleak as Scotland,\nwith long, desolate moors, arid and melancholy in the extreme.\n\nSome way this side of Roc Amadour we came upon the singular gap of\nPadirac, where St. Martin is said to have had a race with the devil.\nThey were both mounted on mules, St. Martin\u2019s a little the worse for\nwear, and, starting across the country, they flew over walls and\nprecipices and steep cliffs, without anything being able to arrest their\ncourse. Satan at length turned to the saint and laid a wager he could\nopen a gap in the earth no unaided mortal could pass. St. Martin laughed\nhim to scorn. The angel of darkness then stretched forth his hand, and,\nlaying on the ground his forefinger, which suddenly shot out to an\nenormous length, the earth instantaneously opened beneath it to the\ndepth of a hundred and fifty feet. \u201cIs that all?\u201d cried the undaunted\nsaint, as he spurred his beast. The mule sprang across the yawning gulf,\none hundred feet broad, leaving the impress of his hoofs in the solid\nrock, as is to be clearly seen at this day. One of these foot-prints\nturns out, because, we are told, St. Martin\u2019s mule was lame. This, of\ncourse, made his victory the more wonderful. After this feat the saint,\nin his turn, challenged the demon, and, resuming their race, St. Martin\nhastily thrust a cross of reeds into the fissure of a rock they came to,\nwhereupon Satan\u2019s mule reared and plunged and overthrew its rider, to\nthe everlasting glory of St. Martin and the triumph of the cross. A more\ndurable cross of stone now marks the spot where this great victory was\nwon over the foul fiend.\n\nRoc Amadour is in the diocese of Cahors, which is a picturesque old town\nbuilt on and around a cliff in a bend of the river Lot. It is quite\nworthy of a passing glance and has its historic memories. In ancient\ntimes it bore so imposing an appearance that one of its historians\npretends C\u00e6sar, when he came in sight of it, could not help exclaiming\nin his astonishment: \u201cBehold a second Rome!\u201d In the middle ages, if we\nare to believe Dante, it was notorious as a city of usurers. He ranks it\nwith Sodom; but perhaps this was owing to his strong Italian prejudices\nagainst the French popes, for at Cahors was born John XXII., whom he\nseverely consigns to ignominy. We are shown the castle where this pope\npassed his childhood, at one edge of the town. Passing by the\nuniversity, we are reminded by a statue of F\u00e9nelon, in the centre of a\nsquare called by his name, that he was once a student here. There is\nlikewise a street named after Clement Marot, whose version of the Psalms\nbecame so popular among the Huguenots. He was born at Cahors, and is now\nregarded as one of its chief celebrities, though not tolerated in the\nplace in the latter part of his life from a suspicion of heresy, then\nalmost synonymous with treason, which caused him to be imprisoned in the\nCh\u00e2telet. He thus protested against the accusation:\n\n\n \u201cPoint ne suis Lutheriste,\n Ne Zuinglien, et moins Anabaptiste,\n Bref, celui suis qui croit, honore et prise\n La saincte, vraye, et Catholique Eglise.\u201d[6]\n\n\nThough released, he was obliged to take refuge in Geneva on account of\nthe use of his paraphrase of the Psalms in the conventicles, but there\nhe was convicted of misdemeanors, and, by Calvin\u2019s orders, ridden on an\nass and sent out of the city. Neither fish nor flesh, he now sought an\nasylum in Italy\u2014\u201cthe inn of every grief,\u201d as Dante calls it\u2014and died at\nTurin in 1546.\n\nIn passing through Quercy we are struck by the constant succession of\nold castles bearing some historic name like that of Turenne. Among\nothers is Castelnau de Bretenoux, associated with Henry II. of England,\non a lofty eminence on the left shore of the Dordogne, overlooking one\nof the most beautiful valleys of France, which is said to have inspired\nF\u00e9nelon with his description of the island of Calypso. A few years since\nthis vast ch\u00e2teau was one of the finest specimens of feudal architecture\nin France. Its embattled walls and massive towers; the long gallery,\nwith its carvings and gildings, where the fair ladies of the time of\nLouis Treize used to promenade in their satins and rich Mechlin laces,\nadmiring themselves in the rare Venetian mirrors; the spacious cellars\nwith their arches; the vaulted stables, and the vast courts with their\nimmense wells, have been greatly injured by fire and now wear an aspect\nof desolation melancholy to behold. Galid de Genouilhac, a lord of this\nhouse, who was grand \u00e9cuyer in the time of Francis I., and would have\nsaved his royal master the defeat of Pavia had his advice been listened\nto, was disgraced for presuming to admire the queen, and, retiring to\nthis castle, he built a church, on which he graved the words still to be\nseen: _J\u2019aime fort une_.\n\n\u201cRoc Amadour!\u201d cried the guard, as he opened the door of our\ncompartment, disturbing our historic recollections. We looked out. There\nwas nothing to correspond with so poetical a name. No village; no\nchurch. Nothing but a forlorn station-house on a desolate plain. Behind\nit we found an omnibus waiting to catch up any stray pilgrim, and we\navailed ourselves of so opportune a vehicle, rude as it was. We could\nnot have asked for anything more penitential, so there was no occasion\nfor scruples. It leisurely took us a few miles to the west, and finally\ndropped us mercifully in the middle of the road before a rough wayside\ninn that had a huge leafy bough suspended over the door to proclaim that\npoor wine only needed the larger bush. We were not tempted to enter. The\ndriver pointed out the way, and left us to our instinct and the\npilgrim\u2019s staff. There was nothing to be seen but the same dreary\nexpanse. But we soon came to a chapel in the centre of a graveyard,\nwhere once stood a hospice with kind inmates to wash the bleeding feet\nof the pilgrim. Then we began to descend diagonally along the side of a\ntremendous chasm that suddenly opened before us, passing by a straggling\nline of poor rock-built huts, till we came to the archway of an old\ngate, once fortified, that stands at the entrance of a village. This was\nRoc Amadour.\n\nImagine a mountain suddenly cleft asunder, disclosing a frightful abyss\nseveral hundred feet in depth, lined with gray rocks that rise almost\nperpendicularly to the very clouds, and, far down at the bottom, a\nnarrow stream winding sullenly along, looking like one of the fabled\nrivers of the _abisso doloroso_ of the great Florentine. Half way up one\nside of this _Vall\u00e9e T\u00e9n\u00e9breuse_, as it was once called, hangs the\nvillage of Roc Amadour like a cluster of birds\u2019 nests along the edge of\na precipice, over which are suspended several churches, one above the\nother, that seem hewn out of the very cliff. These are the famous\nsanctuaries of Roc Amadour that have been frequented from time\nimmemorial.\n\nSeveral hundred feet above these churches, on the very summit of the\nmount, is the old castle of La Charette, with its ramparts overlooking\nthe whole country. This served in the frequent wars of the middle ages\nnot only for the defence of the sanctuary below, but of the town of Roc\nAmadour, which was then a post of strategic importance, and has its page\nin history, as every reader of Sir John Froissart knows.\n\nThe sight of this mountain, that looks as if rent asunder by some awful\nconvulsion of nature, with the castle on its summit; its rocky sides\nonce peopled with hermits, and still alive with the voice of prayer; the\nchurches that swell out of the cliff like the bastions of a fortress;\nthe village on the ledge below; and the dizzy ravine in the depths, is\ntruly astonishing.\n\nThe town looks as if the breath of modern progress had never reached it.\nIt is the only place in all Europe where we did not meet an Englishman\nor an American. One would think the bivalve in which it is lodged just\nopened after being closed hundreds of years. There is the Rue de la\nCouronnerie, where Henry Court-Mantel was crowned King of Aquitaine.\nThere are the remains of the house occupied by his father, Henry II. of\nEngland, with the huge well he caused to be dug, from which the\ninhabitants still draw water. And there are the remains of the four\nfortified gates ruined in the wars of the sixteenth century.\n\nWe stopped at the Grand Soleil\u2014a hostel of the ancient time, with an\nimmense kitchen that would have delighted Jan Steen, with beams black\nwith the smoke of a thousand fires, hung with smoked hams, and gourds,\nand strings of onions, and bright copper kettles\u2014the very place for\nroistering villagers such as he loved to paint. It looked ancient enough\nto have been frequented by King Henry\u2019s soldiers. It had a very cavern\nfor a fireplace, with seats at the yawning sides beneath the crook, with\nwhich M. Michelet says the sanctity of the fireside was identified in\nthe middle ages far more than with the hearth, and curious old andirons,\nsuch as are to be seen at Paris in the H\u00f4tel de Cluny, with a succession\nof hooks for the spits to rest on, and circular tops for braziers and\nchafing-dishes. Stairs led from the kitchen to the story above, well\nenough to mount, but perilous in descent, owing to their steepness.\nEverything is rather in the perpendicular style at Roc Amadour. An\ninvocation to _Marie con\u00e7ue sans p\u00e9ch\u00e9_ was pasted on the door of our\nchamber, and a statuette of the Blessed Virgin stood on the mantel. The\nwindows looked out on a little terrace dignified with the name of\nSquare, where children were playing around the great stone cross. At\ntable we found the sacrifice of Abraham and other sacred subjects\ndepicted on our plates, and a cross on the salt-cellar. Roast kid and\ngoat\u2019s milk were set before us with various adjuncts, after which\npatriarchal fare we issued forth to visit the celebrated chapel of Our\nLady of Roc Amadour. We found we had done well in fortifying the outer\nman for such an ascent, particularly as the day was far advanced, and\nthe morning supplies at Albi had been of the most unsubstantial nature.\nWe passed several houses with old archways of the thirteenth century,\nbut the most imposing house in the place is a seigneurial mansion of the\nsixteenth century, now occupied by the Brothers of the Christian\nDoctrine. We soon came to the foot of the staircase leading up the side\nof the cliff to the sanctuaries. It consists of about two hundred and\nforty steps, partly hewn out of the rock, and is generally ascended by\nthe devout pilgrim on his knees and with prayer\u2014an enterprise of no\ntrifling nature, as we are prepared to vouch. On great festivals this\nsacred ladder is crowded with people ascending and descending. Their\nmurmured prayer is a gradual Psalm indeed. The first flight of one\nhundred and forty steps leads to a platform around which stood formerly\nthe dwellings of the fourteen canons consecrated to the service of Mary.\nA Gothic portal, with a stout oaken door covered with fine old\nscroll-work of iron, leads by another flight of seventy-six steps to the\ncollegiate church of Saint-Sauveur, one of the six remaining\nsanctuaries. Formerly there were twelve chapels built among the rocks in\nhonor of the twelve apostles, but these all disappeared in the time of\nthe unsparing Huguenots. Twenty-five steps more, at the left, bring you\nto a terrace with the miraculous chapel of Our Lady on one side and that\nof St. Michael on the other. Between them, directly before you, is the\ncave-like recess in which Zaccheus is said to have ended his days, and\nwhere he still lies in effigy on his stone coffin. _Rupis amator_ he was\ncalled\u2014the lover of the rock\u2014whence St. Amateur, and St. Amadour, the\nname given him by the people. _Amadour quasi amator solitudinis_, say\nthe old chronicles. His body remained here from the time of his death,\nin the year of our Lord 70 (we adhere to the delightful old legend),\ntill 1166, when, according to Robert de Monte, who wrote in 1180, his\ntomb was opened at the request of a neighboring lord who was extremely\nill and felt an inward assurance he should be healed by the sacred\nrelics. His faith was rewarded. The body was found entire, and, on being\nexposed to public veneration, so numerous and extraordinary were the\nmiracles wrought that Henry II. of England, who was at Castelnau de\nBretenoux, came here to pay his devotions. It was now enshrined in the\nsubterranean church of St. Amadour, where it remained several ages so\nincorrupt as to give rise to a common proverb among the people: _Il est\nen chair et os, comme St. Amadour_. But when the country was overrun by\nthe Huguenots, his _ch\u00e2sse_ was stripped of its silver mountings, his\nbody broken to pieces with a hammer and cast into the fire. Only a small\npart of these venerable remains were snatched from the flames.\n\nThe terrace between the chapel of Our Lady and that of St. Michael is\ncalled in ancient documents the Platea S. Michaelis. Here all official\nacts relating to the abbey were formerly drawn up. The overhanging\ncliff, that rises above it to the height of two hundred and twenty feet,\ngives it the appearance of a cavern. Built into it, on the left, is the\nchapel of St. Michael, on the outer wall of which, suspended by an iron\nchain, is a long, rusty weapon popularly known as the sword of Roland.\nNot that it is the very blade with which the Pyrenees were once cleft\nasunder and so many kingdoms won. That shone as the sun in its golden\nhilt, the day the mighty Paladin came, on his way to Spain, to\nconsecrate it to the Virgin of Roc Amadour and then redeem it with its\nweight in silver; whereas this is as dim and uncouth as the veriest spit\nthat ever issued from a country forge. The wondrous Durandel, to be\nsure, was brought back after Roland\u2019s death and hung up before the altar\nof Notre Dame de Roc Amadour, to whom it had been vowed, where it\nremained till carried off by Henry Court-Mantel, who, adding sacrilege\nto hypocrisy, came here in 1183 on the pretext of a pilgrimage, and, in\norder to pay the soldiers who served him in his rebellion against his\nfather, pillaged the holy chapel so revered by King Henry. But his crime\ndid not remain unpunished. He was soon after seized with a fatal\nillness, and died, but not unabsolved, in the arms of Gerard III.,\nBishop of Cahors.\n\nOver Roland\u2019s sword hang the fetters of several Christians delivered\nfrom a terrible slavery on the coast of Barbary by Our Lady\u2019s might.\nAmong these was Guillaume Fulcheri of Montpellier, whose mother came to\nRoc Amadour on the eve of the Assumption to offer a cake of wax to burn\nbefore the image of Mary for the redemption of her son. That same night,\nwhile she was keeping vigil with prayers and tears before the altar of\nthe Virgin, his fetters were loosened in a mysterious manner, and he\nmade his escape. One of his first acts on his arrival in France was to\ncome to Roc Amadour with an offering of gratitude.\n\nSo, too, Guillaume R\u00e9mond of Albi, being unjustly confined in prison,\nwith no other hope of liberty but his trust in the power of the glorious\nVirgin of Roc Amadour, while he was persevering in prayer during the\nnight-watches his chains suddenly fell off about the ninth hour, to the\nutter amazement of the jailer, who became too powerless to hinder his\nescape. He took his fetters with him to hang up before the altar of his\npotent protectress.\n\nOn the pavement beneath these and other trophies of divine grace is an\nold chest with iron bands, fastened with a double lock of singular\nmechanism, in which pilgrims centuries ago deposited their offerings.\nJust beyond is a doorway over which is painted St. Michael holding the\nbalance of justice in which we must all be weighed. This door leads by a\nwinding stone staircase up to St. Michael\u2019s chapel, the oldest of the\nexisting edifices of Roc Amadour. This singular chapel is built against\nthe rough cliff which constitutes one side of it, as well as the vault.\nIt is chilly, and cave-like, and dripping with moisture. A niche at one\nend, like an arcosolium in the catacombs, is lined with faded old\nfrescos of Christ and the evangelists. The windows are low and narrow,\nlike the fissures of a cave, being barely wide enough for an angel in\neach\u2014Michael with his avenging sword, Gabriel and his _Ave_, and Raphael\nlooking protectingly down on Tobias with his fish. On one side is a\nspiral ascent to a balcony over the Platea S. Michaelis, from which the\nabbot of Roc Amadour used to bestow his solemn benediction on the crowd\non the great days of pardon.\n\nDescending to the Platea, we stop before the entrance to Our Lady\u2019s\nchapel to examine the half-effaced mural paintings of the great\nmysteries of her life around the door. Near these can be traced the\noutlines of a knight pursued by several spectres, popularly believed to\nbe the _ex-voto_ of a man who sought to be delivered from the ghosts of\nthose whose graves he had profaned. But the learned say this fresco\nrefers to the famous old _Lai des trois Morts et des trois Vifs_ of the\nthirteenth century, in which three young knights, gaily riding to the\nchase, with no thought but of love and pleasure, meet three phantoms,\nwho solemnly address them on the vanity of all earthly joys. This\npainting was a perpetual sermon to the pilgrims, enforced, moreover, by\nthe numerous tombs that surrounded the sanctuaries of Roc Amadour. For\nmany noble families of the province, as well as pilgrims from afar,\nwished to be buried near the altar where their souls had gotten grace.\nSo great was the number buried here in the middle ages that the monks\nbecame alarmed, and refused to allow any more to be brought from a\ndistance. But Pope Alexander III. issued a bull declaring this place of\nburial free to all except those under the ban of the church.\n\nIt is, then, with these thoughts of death and the great mysteries of\nreligion we enter the miraculous chapel around which we have so long\nlingered with awe. The season of pilgrimages has not yet fairly opened,\nand we find it quiet and unoccupied except by a stray peasant or two,\nand a few Sisters of Calvary with sweet, gentle faces. We hasten to drop\nour feeble round of prayer into the deep well fed by the devotion of\ncenturies. Over the altar is the famous statue of Our Lady of Roc\nAmadour in a golden niche\u2014black as ebony, perhaps from the smoke of the\ncandles and the incense of centuries, and dressed in a white muslin robe\nspangled with gold. It is by no means a work of high art. Perhaps it is\nas ancient as this place of pilgrimage. Tradition says it was executed\nby the pious hands of St. Amadour himself, who was doubtless incapable\nof expressing the devout sentiments that animated him. It is carved out\nof a single piece of wood, and is now greatly decayed. The Virgin is\nstiff in attitude. Her hair floats on her shoulders. Her hands rest on\nthe arms of the chair in which she is sitting, leaving the divine Child,\nenthroned on her knee, with no support but that of his inherent nature.\nA silver lamp, shaped like a fortress, with towers for the lights, hangs\nbefore her, and beneath is a blazing stand of candles. The profusion of\nlights in the chapels of popular devotion throughout France is truly\nremarkable. It was the same in the middle ages. The old chronicles tell\nus how the mother who sought the cure of a beloved child sometimes sent\nhis weight in wax to be burned before the powerful Virgin of Roc\nAmadour. Others brought candles of the size of the limb they wished to\nbe healed. And those who had already obtained some supernatural favor\ngenerally sent a candle once a year in token of gratitude. So numerous\nwere the lights formerly given to this chapel that there was scarcely\nroom for them. Poets even celebrated this profusion. Gauthier de Coinsy,\none of the most celebrated _cantadours_ of the thirteenth century, among\nother poems has left one entitled _Du cierge que Notre Dame de Roc\nAmadour envoya sur la vi\u00e8le du m\u00e9nestrel qui vi\u00e8lait et chantait devant\nsy image_, relating how our benign Lady accorded one of these votive\ncandles to a pious minstrel as he was singing her praises: Pierre de\nSygeland was in the habit of entering every church he passed to offer a\nprayer and sing a song of praise to the sound of his viol. One day, as\nhe was prolonging his pious exercises before the altar of Notre Dame de\nRoc Amadour, drawing every one in the church around him, both \u201c_clerc et\nlai_,\u201d by the melody of his voice, he raised his eyes to the sacred\nimage of Mary and thus sang: \u201cO sovereign Lady, _Dame de toute\ncourtoisie_, if my hymn and the sound of my viol be acceptable to thee,\nbe not offended at the guerdon I venture to implore: bestow on me, O\npeerless Lady! one of the many tapers that burn at thy sacred feet.\u201d\n\nHis prayer is heard. The candle descends in the presence of five hundred\npersons and rests upon his viol. Friar Gerard, the sacristan, accuses\nhim of using incantations, and, seizing the candle irefully, restores it\nto its place, taking good care to fasten it firmly down. Pierre\ncontinues to play. The candle descends anew. The good brother,\nsuspecting him of magic, is more vexed than before and replaces the\ncandle. The enraptured minstrel\u2014\n\n\n \u201c_En vi\u00e8lant soupire et pleure,\n La bouche chante et li cuers pleure_\u201d\n\n\n\u2014sighing and weeping, singing with his lips and weeping in\nheart\u2014continues sweetly to praise the Mother of God. The candle descends\nthe third time.\n\n\n \u201c_Rafaict le cierge le tiers saut._\u201d\n\n\nThe crowd, in its transport, cries: \u201cRing, ring the bells,\n\n\n _Plus biax miracle n\u2019avint jamais_\n\n\n\u2014greater miracle was never seen.\u201d The minstrel, with streaming eyes,\nreturns the candle to her who has so miraculously rewarded his devotion,\nand continues during the remainder of his life not only to sing the\npraises of Our Lady of Roc Amadour, but to offer her every year a candle\nstill larger than the one she so graciously bestowed on him.\n\nThe moral of this old poem dwells on the obligation of honoring God, not\nmerely with the lips, but with a sincere heart:\n\n\n \u201cAssez braient, et assez crient,\n Et leurs gorges assez estendent,\n Mais les cordes pas bien ne tendent.\n \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\n La bouche \u00e0 Dieu ment et discorde\n S\u2019a li li cuers ne se concorde\u201d\n\n\n\u2014that is, many bray, and scream, and distend their throats, but their\nheart-strings are not rightly attuned.... The mouth lies to God, and\nmakes a discord, if the heart be not in harmony therewith.\n\nOf the many miraculous chapels of the Virgin, consecrated by the\ndevotion of centuries, that of Roc Amadour is certainly one of the\noldest and most celebrated. Pope Pius II., in a bull of 1463,\nunhesitatingly declares \u201cit dates from the earliest ages of our holy\nmother the church.\u201d And Cardinal Baronius speaks of it as one of the\noldest in France. The original chapel, however, built by St. Amadour\nhimself in honor of his beloved Lady and Mistress, is no longer\nstanding. That was destroyed several centuries ago by a portion of the\nimpending cliff that had given way, but another was erected on the same\nspot in 1479 by Denys de Bar, bishop and lord of Tulle, whose arms are\nstill to be seen over the door. This chapel was devastated in 1562 by\nthe Huguenots, who swept over the country, destroying all that was most\nsacred in the eyes of Catholics. They gave not only a fatal blow to the\nprosperity of the town of Roc Amadour, but pillaged all the sanctuaries,\ncarrying off the valuable reliquaries, the tapestry, the sacred vessels\nand vestments, the fourteen silver lamps that burned before the Virgin,\nthe necklaces and earrings, and the pearls and diamonds, given by kings,\nprinces, and people of all ranks in token of some grace received. Their\nbooty amounted in value to fifteen thousand livres\u2014an enormous sum at\nthat period. They only left behind an old monstrance, a few battered\nreliquaries, and a processional cross of the twelfth century, carved out\nof wood and ornamented with silver, still to be seen. They mutilated the\nstatues, burned the wood-carvings, and of course destroyed the bells,\nwhich was one of their favorite amusements. The roofless walls were left\nstanding, however, and the venerated statue of Our Lady was saved, as\nwell as the sacrificial stone consecrated by St. Martial, and the\nmiraculous bell that rang without human hands whenever some far-off\nmariner, in peril on the high seas, was succored by Notre Dame de Roc\nAmadour.\n\nThe chapel has never fully recovered from this devastation. It was\nrepaired by the canons, but their diminished means did not allow them to\nrestore it to its former splendor. Not that it was ever of vast extent.\nOn the contrary, it is small, and the sanctuary occupies full one-half\nof it. It is now severe in aspect. The wall at one end, as well as part\nof the arch, is nothing but the unhewn cliff. The mouldings of the\ndoorways, some of the capitals, and the tracery of the low, flamboyant\nwindows are of good workmanship, but more or less defaced by the\nfanatics of the sixteenth century and the revolutionists of the\neighteenth, who could meet on the common ground of hatred of the church.\n\nSuspended beneath the lantern that rises in the middle of the chapel is\nthe celebrated miraculous bell, said to be the very one used by St.\nAmadour to call the neighboring people to prayer. It is undoubtedly of\ngreat antiquity. It is of wrought iron, rudely shaped into the form of a\ndish about three feet deep and a foot in diameter.\n\nThe P\u00e8re Odo de Gissey, of the Society of Jesus, in his history of Roc\nAmadour published in 1631, devotes several chapters to this\n_merveilleuse cloche_, in which he testifies that \u201cthough it has no\nbell-rope, it sometimes rings without being touched or jarred, as\nfrequently happens when people on the ocean, in danger from a tempest,\ninvoke the assistance of Our Lady of Roc Amadour, the star of the sea.\nSome persons,\u201d he goes on to say, \u201cmay find it difficult to believe\nthis; but if they could see and read what I have the six or seven times\nmy devotion has led me to Roc Amadour, they would change their opinion\nand admire the power manifested by the Mother of God.\u201d The first miracle\nhe relates is of the fourteenth century, but when he came to Roc Amadour\nthe archives had been destroyed by the Calvinists, and he could only\nglean a few facts here and there from papers they had overlooked. Most\nof the cases he relates had been attested before a magistrate with\nsolemn oath. We will briefly relate a few of them.\n\nOn the 10th of February, 1385, about ten o\u2019clock in the evening, the\nmiraculous bell was heard by a great number of persons, who testified\nthat it rang without the slightest assistance. Three days after it rang\nagain while the chaplain was celebrating Mass at Our Lady\u2019s altar, as\nwas solemnly sworn to by several priests and laymen before an apostolic\nnotary. One instance the p\u00e8re found written on the margin of an old\nmissal, to the effect that March 5, 1454, the bell rang in an\nastonishing manner to announce the rescue of some one who had invoked\nMary on the stormy sea. Not long after those who had been thus saved\nfrom imminent danger came here from a Spanish port to attest their\nmiraculous deliverance.\n\nIn 1551 the bell was heard ringing, but the positive cause long remained\nuncertain. It was not till a year after a person came from Nantes to\nfulfil the vow of a friend rescued from danger by Our Lady of Roc\nAmadour at the very time the bell rang.\n\nThe sailors of Bayonne and Brittany, especially, had great confidence in\nthe protection of Notre Dame de Roc Amadour, and many instances are\nrecorded of their coming with their votive offerings, sometimes of salt\nfish, after escaping from the perilous waves. The sailors of Brittany\nerected a chapel on their coast, to which they gave her name. It is of\nthe same style as that of Quercy, and the Madonna an exact copy of St.\nMary of Roc Amadour.\n\nIn those days, when the miraculous bell was heard the inhabitants of the\ntown used to come in procession to the chapel, and a solemn Mass of\nthanksgiving was sung by the canons amid the joyful ringing of the\nbells.\n\n\n \u201cThe tuneful bells kept ever ringing\n While they within were sweetly singing\n Of Her whose garments drop alway\n Myrrh, aloes, and sweet cassia.\u201d\n\n\nSt. Amadour\u2019s bell has not ceased to proclaim the power of Christ\u2019s holy\nMother. It is still heard now and then softly announcing the benefit of\nhaving recourse to her efficacious protection.\n\nTo many this may sound weird-like, and recall\n\n\n \u201cThe wondrous Michael Scott,\n A wizard of such dreaded fame\n That when, in Salamanca\u2019s cave,\n Him listed his magic wand to wave,\n The bells would ring in Notre Dame.\u201d\n\n\nWe leave such to fathom the mystery. Our part is only that of the\nhistorian. Blessed is he who finds therein something more than sounding\nbrass or tinkling cymbal!\n\nThe holy chapel is no longer adorned with the rich offerings of other\ntimes, but there are still many objects that attest the piety of the\npeople and the clemency of Mary. On the rough cliff that forms one end\nhang a great number of crutches and canes, and models of limbs, in token\nof miraculous cures. A glass case suspended on the side wall contains\nwatches, rings, bracelets, gold chains, lockets, etc., the memorials of\ngrateful piety. At the side of the altar stand immense Limoges vases, an\noffering from that city. And around the chapel are hung several votive\npaintings, of no value as works of art, but full of touching beauty to\nthe eye of faith.\n\nThe most interesting of these is one offered by M. and Mme. de Salignac\nde Lamothe F\u00e9nelon in gratitude for the restoration of their child to\nhealth. The little F\u00e9nelon lies with a head of preternatural size in a\nlong box-like cradle with no rockers. Beside him kneel his father and\nmother, the former with a long curled wig, a flowing scarlet robe, over\nwhich is turned a Shaksperian collar, lace at the wrists, his hands\ncrossed on his breast, and his face bent as if in awe before the Virgin.\nMme. F\u00e9nelon wears an amber-colored tunic over a scarlet petticoat, with\ndeep lace around the low-necked waist. Her hands are prayerfully folded\nand her face raised to the Virgin, who appears in the clouds holding in\nher arms the infant Jesus, who bends forward with one hand extended in\nblessing over the cradle\u2014almost ready to escape from his Mother\u2019s arms.\n\nMadame F\u00e9nelon always manifested a particular devotion to Notre Dame de\nRoc Amadour, and by her will of July 4, 1691, ordered her body to be\nburied in the holy chapel, to which she bequeathed the sum of three\nthousand livres, the rent of which continued to be paid till the\nRevolution. She is buried near the door that leads to the church of\nSaint-Sauveur.\n\nThe Ch\u00e2teau de Salignac, where F\u00e9nelon was born, and which had been in\nhis family from time immemorial, is not far from Roc Amadour. Old\ndocuments go so far as to assert that St. Martial, when he came to\nAquitaine to preach the Gospel in the first century, was hospitably\nreceived at this castle, and that St. Amadour, hearing of his arrival,\nwent there to see him.\n\nBeyond the miraculous chapel of Our Lady is the church of Saint-Sauveur,\nbuilt in the eleventh century for the use of the canons. It is a large\nedifice of a certain grandeur and severity of style in harmony with the\ncliff which forms one end. Two immense pillars stand in the middle of\nthe nave, each surrounded by six columns, and between them is a large\nantique crucifix quite worn by the kisses of the faithful who come here\nto end their pilgrimage at the feet of Christ Crucified.\n\nThis church presents a striking aspect on great solemnities, with its\ncrowded confessionals, the Holy Sacrifice constantly going on at the\ndifferent altars amid solemn chants or touching hymns, and the long\nlines of communicants moving devoutly to and from the table of the Lord.\nOver all is the divine Form of Christ depicted on the arches in the\nvarious mysteries of his earthly life, filling the church, as it were,\nwith his Presence. On the walls are the majestic figures of some of the\ngreatest pilgrims of the ages of faith. To mention a few of them: St.\nLouis, King of France, came here in 1245 in fulfilment of a vow, after\nrecovering from a severe illness, accompanied by Queen Blanche, his\nthree brothers, and Alphonse, Count of Boulogne-sur-Mer, afterwards King\nof Portugal. In 1324 came Charles-le-Bel and his queen, with King John\nof Bohemia. In September, 1344, came John, Duke of Normandy, eldest son\nof Philippe de Valois. In 1463 Louis XI., on his return from B\u00e9arn, paid\nhis devotions to Notre Dame de Roc Amadour on the 21st of July. St.\nEnglebert, Archbishop of Cologne, of illustrious birth, had such a\ntender love for the Blessed Virgin that for many years he fasted every\nWednesday in her honor, and twice during his episcopate he visited her\nchapel at Roc Amadour. Simon, Count de Montfort, came here in 1211 with\nhis German troops, who wished to pay their homage to the Mother of God\nbefore returning to their own country.\n\nTo come down to recent times: It was at the feet of the Virgin of Roc\nAmadour that M. Borie made his final choice of a missionary life that\nwon for him the glorious crown of martyrdom in Farther India at the age\nof thirty.\n\nThe mill where M. Borie was born stands solitary on the border of a\nstream, surrounded by chestnut-trees, in a deep, narrow, gloomy valley\nof La Corr\u00e8ze, near Roc Amadour\u2014a humble abode, but the sanctuary of\npeace, industry, and piety. When the news of his martyrdom came to this\nsequestered spot, his heroic mother was filled with joy, in spite of her\nanguish, and his youngest brother cried: \u201cI am going! God calls me to\nthe land where my brother died. Mother, give me your blessing. I am\ngoing to open heaven to my brother\u2019s murderers!\u201d He went; and we\nremember hearing a holy Jesuit Father relate how, like the knights of\nthe olden time, he made his vigil before the altar of Our Lady of Roc\nAmadour the night before he joined the sacred militia of the great\nLoyola.\n\nBeneath the church of Saint-Sauveur is the subterranean church of St.\nAmadour, with low, ponderous arches and massive columns to sustain the\nlarge edifice above. You go down into it as into a cellar. At each side\nas you enter are elaborate carvings in the wood, one representing\nZaccheus in the sycamore-tree, eager to behold our Saviour as he passed;\nthe other shows him standing in the door of his house to welcome the\ndivine Guest. On the arches is painted the whole legend of St. Amadour.\nThen there is Roland before the altar of the Virgin redeeming his sword\nwith its weight in silver, and beyond is a band of knights bringing it\nback from the fatal battle-field. In another place you see St. Martial\nof Limoges and St. Saturnin of Toulouse, coming together to visit St.\nAmadour in his cave. And yonder is St. Dominic, who, with Bertrand de\nGarrigue, one of his earliest disciples, passed the night in prayer\nbefore the altar of Our Lady in the year 1219.\n\nAll that remains of the body of St. Amadour is enshrined in this church\nbehind the high altar.\n\nA service for the dead was going on when we entered this crypt, with\nonly the priest and the beadle to sing it. Black candlesticks stood on\nthe altar, and yellow wax-lights around the bier. The church was full of\npeasants with grave, devout faces and lighted candles in their hands.\nThe funeral chant, the black pall, the motionless peasants with their\nlights, and this chill, tomb-like church of the eleventh century, all\nseemed in harmony.\n\nThe pilgrim, of course, visits the chapel of St. Ann overhanging the\ntown, and that of St. Blaise, with its Roman arches of the thirteenth\ncentury, built to receive the relics, brought by the Crusaders from the\nEast, of a holy solitary who lived many years in a cave of the\nwilderness, the wild beasts around as submissive to him as to Adam in\nParadise.\n\nThe chapel of St. John the Baptist was founded in 1516 by a powerful\nlord named Jean de Valon, who became a Knight of St. John of Jerusalem.\nOut of piety towards Our Lady of Roc Amadour, he built this chapel,\nauthorized by the pope, as the burial-place of himself and his family,\nand bequeathed the sum of five hundred livres to the prebends, as the\nfoundation for a Mass of requiem every Monday, and the Mass of Our Lady\nevery Saturday, for the remission of his sins and those of his friends\nand benefactors.\n\nThe family of Valon, which still exists, has always shown a remarkable\ndevotion to Notre Dame de Roc Amadour. We read of a Dame de Valon whose\npilgrimage to this chapel in the twelfth century was marked by a\nmiracle. This family owned considerable property in the neighborhood,\nand had a right to part of the revenues from the sale of the\n_sportulas_, or _sportellas_, which were medals of lead bearing the\nimage of Our Lady on one side and of St. Amadour on the other. Sir\nWalter Scott, in his _Quentin Durward_, deridingly depicts Louis XI.\nwith a number of leaden medals of like character in his hat. The pilgrim\nwho wore one needed no other safe-conduct in ancient times. His person\nwas so sacred he could even pass in safety through the enemy\u2019s camp. In\n1399, during the war between the French and English, the sanctuary of\nRoc Amadour was frequented by both parties, and both camps regarded the\npilgrim hither with so much respect that if taken prisoner he was set\nfree as soon as his quality was discovered. Three of these old\nalmond-shaped _sportellas_ are still to be seen in the H\u00f4tel de Cluny at\nParis.\n\nThe ancient standard of Our Lady of Roc Amadour was held in great\nveneration. It was not only carried in religious processions, but\nsometimes to the field of battle. Alberic, a monk of Trois Fonts,\nrelates that the Virgin appeared three Saturdays in succession to the\nsacristan of Roc Amadour, and ordered her standard to be carried to\nSpain, then engaged in a critical contest with the Moors. The prior, in\nconsequence, set forth with the sacred banner and arrived at the plain\nof Las Navas on the 16th of July, 1212. The Christians had refused to\ngive battle the day previous, because it was the Lord\u2019s day, but the\nfight began early Monday morning. The Templars and Knights of Calatrava\nhad been put to flight and the army partly routed. At the last moment,\nwhen all hope seemed lost, the prior of Roc Amadour unfurled the banner\nof the Virgin. At the sight of the holy image of Mary with the divine\nBabe every knee bent in reverence, fresh courage was infused into every\nbreast, the army rallied, and the fight was renewed to such purpose that\nthey smote the infidel hip and thigh. Sixty thousand of the enemy were\nslain and a greater number taken captive. The archbishops of Toledo and\nNarbonne, the bishop of Valencia, with many other prelates and a great\nnumber of priests, sang the _Te Deum_ on the field of battle. The King\nof Castile, Alfonso IX., had always shown a special devotion towards Our\nLady of Roc Amadour. In 1181 he consecrated to her service the lands of\nFornellos and Orbanella, in order, as he says in the charter, to solace\nthe souls of his parents and secure his own salvation. And, by way of\nintimidating the lawless freebooter of those rough times, he severely\nadds: \u201cAnd should any one trespass in the least on this gift or violate\nmy intentions, let him incur the full wrath of God, and, like the\ntraitor Judas, be delivered over to the torments of hell as the slave of\nthe devil. Meanwhile, let him pay into the royal treasury the sum of one\nthousand livres of pure gold, and restore twofold to the abbot of Roc\nAmadour.\u201d\n\nThis gift was afterwards confirmed by Ferdinand III., Ferdinand IV., and\nAlfonso XI.\n\nKing Alfonso was not the only royal benefactor of the miraculous chapel.\nSancho VII., King of Navarre, for the weal of his soul and the souls of\nhis parents, gave in 1202 certain rents amounting to forty-eight pieces\nof gold, to be employed in illuminating the church of St. Mary of Roc\nAmadour. A candle was to burn night and day before the blessed image on\nChristmas, Epiphany, Candlemas, Whitsunday, Trinity Sunday, the\nAssumption, and All Saints\u2019 day. And twenty-four candles, each weighing\nhalf a pound, were to be placed on the altar on those days. The\nremainder of the money was to be used for the incense.\n\nSancia, wife of Gaston V. of B\u00e9arn, and daughter of the King of Navarre,\nsent the chapel of Roc Amadour a rich piece of tapestry wrought by her\nown royal hands.\n\nCount Odo de la Marche in 1119, during the reign of Louis-le-Gros,\noffered the forest of Mount Salvy to God, the Blessed Mary of Roc\nAmadour, and St. Martin of Tulle, free from all tax or impost, adding:\n\u201cAnd should any one presume to alienate this gift, let him incur the\nanger of God and the saints, and remain for ever accursed with Dathan\nand Abiram.\u201d\n\nIn 1217 Erard de Brienne, lord of Rameru, allied by blood to the royal\nfamilies of Europe, and Philippine, his wife, daughter of Henry, Count\nof Troyes and King of Jerusalem, made an offering of two candles to burn\nnight and day before the image of Notre Dame de Roc Amadour for the\nredemption of their souls and the souls of their parents.\n\nAlfonso, Count of Toulouse, brother of St. Louis, presented a silver\nlamp to burn before the statue of Our Lady, and another was given by the\nCountess de Montpensier, a French princess.\n\nLetters are still extant by which Philip III., King of France, in 1276,\nratified the foundation of his uncle Alfonso, Count of Toulouse,\namounting to twenty livres of Touraine money, to be paid, one-half at\nthe Ascension and the other at All Saints, to keep a candle constantly\nburning before the Virgin of Roc Amadour.\n\nPope Clement V. bequeathed a legacy to this church in 1314 that a wax\ncandle might burn continually in Our Lady\u2019s chapel, in her honor and to\nobtain the redemption of his soul. It was to be honorably placed in a\nsilver basin or sconce.\n\nSavaric, Prince de Maul\u00e9on and lord of Tulle, celebrated for his\nfamiliarity with military science and the elegance of his poesy, among\nother gifts in 1218 gave the lands of L\u2019Isleau, exempt from all tax, to\nthe church of St. Mary of Roc Amadour.\n\nLouis of Anjou, afterwards King of Sicily, in 1365 ordered twenty livres\nto be given annually to this church from his domain of Rouergue, out of\nthe love he bore the holy Virgin.\n\nThe Vicomte de Turenne, in 1396, assigned a silver mark annually from\none of his _seigneuries_ as a contribution to the support of the\nmiraculous chapel.\n\nOn the 22d of June, 1444, the noble and puissant lord, Pierre, Count of\nBeaufort, moved by his devotion towards Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of\nthe world, and to Mary, his glorious Mother, and desirous of procuring\nhis own salvation and the solace of the suffering souls in purgatory,\nassigned to the monastery of Roc Amadour the sum of ten livres annually\nfrom the ferry over the Dordogne at Mount Valent, that a solemn Mass\nmight be sung every Thursday, at least in plain chant, with three\ncollects, one in honor of the Holy Ghost, another of the Blessed Virgin,\nand the third for the repose of the faithful departed. After Mass the\npriest, laying aside his chasuble, was to go daily, with all the clergy\nof the chapel, to sing before the statue of Our Lady either the _Salve\nRegina_ or the _Regina C\u0153li_, according to the season, with the _Libera_\nor the _De Profundis_, for the repose of his and his wife\u2019s souls and\nthe souls of his parents.\n\nWe could multiply these beautiful examples of devotion to the Blessed\nVirgin, but forbear, though it is not useless to recount the deeds of\nour forefathers in the faith. They have their lesson for those who know\nhow to read aright.\n\nAmong the glorious prerogatives with which the chapel of Notre Dame de\nRoc Amadour is favored is the Grand Pardon, accorded by several popes of\nthe middle ages, on the feast of _Corpus Christi_ whenever it coincides\nwith the nativity of St. John the Baptist. This frequently happened\nbefore the correction of the Calendar by Gregory XIII., but it now only\noccurs when Easter falls on St. Mark\u2019s day\u2014that is, the 25th of April.\nThe Grand Pardon comprises all the privileges of a solemn jubilee, and\nis gained by all who visit the miraculous chapel on the appointed day,\nreceive the sacraments with the proper dispositions, pray for concord\namong Christian princes, the extirpation of heresy, and the exaltation\nof our holy mother the church. So great was formerly the affluence of\nthe pilgrims on such occasions, as in the jubilee of 1546, the town\ncould not contain them, and tents were set up in the country round.\nPilgrimages to this ancient chapel are still common.\n\nA remnant of the old palace of the abbot of Roc Amadour is still\nstanding, but is used for the sale of objects of devotion. Here Arnaud\nAmalric, the papal legate, spent the whole winter of 1211, and many\nother eminent prelates received hospitality, as the holy martyr St.\nEnglebert, Archbishop of Cologne. Behind this building a narrow,\ndangerous path leads along the side of the cliff to an ancient hermitage\nthat now bears the title of _Maison \u00e0 Marie_, where people desirous of\nspending a few days in retreat can find an asylum. It hangs like a\nbird\u2019s nest on the edge of a fearful precipice, and must be a trying\nresidence to people of weak nerves. The Sisters of Calvary, who have\ncharge of it, look like doves in the clefts of the rocks. Still further\nalong the cliff is their convent.\n\nA winding stair of two hundred and thirty-six steps, hewn out of the\nlive rock, and lighted only by the fissures, leads from the sacristy of\nthe church up to the ancient castle, and a scarcely less remarkable\nascent has been constructed zigzag over the cliff. This castle, half\nruined, was bought by the P\u00e8re Caillau about forty years ago, and\nrepaired as a residence for the clergy who served the sanctuaries of Roc\nAmadour under his direction. The old ramparts remain, affording a fine\nview of the whole country around. Bending over them, you look straight\ndown on the group of churches below, and the village still further down,\nwhile in the very depths of the horrid abyss is a faint line marking the\ncourse of the Alzou along the bottom of the _Vall\u00e9e T\u00e9n\u00e9breuse_.\n\nA few years ago the ruined castle and crumbling churches below looked as\nif they belonged to the time of King Dagobert, but they have lost in a\nmeasure their air of charming antiquity in the necessary restorations,\nby no means complete. Nothing, however, can destroy the singular\ngrandeur and wild beauty of the site, or the thousand delightful\nassociations\u2014historic, religious, poetic, and legendary\u2014connected with\nthe place.\n\nWe close this imperfect sketch by echoing the sentiments that animated\nthe saintly P\u00e8re Caillau when he entered upon his duties as superior of\nRoc Amadour: \u201cWith what joy I ascended the mysterious stairs that lead,\nO Mary, to thy august sanctuary! With what fervor I celebrated the holy\nmysteries at thy altar! With what love and respect I kissed the sacred\nfeet of thy statue! With what impatience I awaited the hour for\nreturning! Happy the moments passed at thy feet! The world seemed as\nnothing in my eyes. What devotion, what profound silence there was in my\nsoul! What sweet transports of joy! My heart seemed consumed by a sacred\nfire. Why, why were such moments so short? May their remembrance, at\nleast, abide for ever! And may I never cease to chant thy praise and\nexalt thy wondrous mercy!\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A SILENT COURTSHIP.\n\nItalian hotels of the old kind are a very pleasant remembrance to\ntravellers from the north; they have the romance and the forlorn beauty\nwhich one expects to see, and few of the obtrusively modern arrangements\ncalled comforts. The new hotels that have arisen since the age of\nprogress are very different, and not nearly so pleasant, even to the\ntraveller with the most moderate expectations of the picturesque. The\nless-frequented towns inland have kept the old style of hostelry, as\ntravel does not increase enough in their neighborhood to warrant the\nbuilding of new-fashioned hotels; and though the palace floors and walls\nmay be cold and look cheerless on a damp winter day, there are a hundred\nchances to one that no foreigner will be there to note down such an\nexperience.\n\nBut Macchio, in the Umbrian Marches, once had a hotel more singular than\nalmost any other. It had no name, such as even the most unmistakable\npalazzo generally puts on to show its present destination; it was called\nafter the name of the old family whose stronghold it had once been; and\nas of this stronghold only one part was whole, the hotel was called\n\u201cTorre Carpeggio.\u201d It consisted, indeed, of a tower\u2014that is, only the\ntower was whole, furnished, and usable; among some ruins of the rest of\nthe building were a rude kitchen and stables, patched up with modern\nmasonry not half so solid as the original, and some servants slept in\nthe lofts above these apologies for \u201coffices,\u201d but the remarkable tower\nonly was in good repair. The owner, a native of the place, and whose\nfamily had been for generations in the service of the Carpeggios, was an\nunsophisticated countryman of the old school, not at all like the\nexasperating landlord of city hotels, who has just begun to wake up to\nthe dignity of his position and to experiment in his behavior towards\nhis foreign guests. He was the real owner, having paid good money down\nfor the castle; but he still called the last Carpeggio his young master,\nand loved him like his own son. This youth, like some of his remoter\nforefathers, was fond of learning, and, seeing no other means of\nsecuring an education and a start in life that should make something\nbetter out of him than a starveling noble of the Marches, had sold his\ninheritance to his old retainer, keeping back only one-third of the\nvintage produce as a small yearly income to fall back upon, and had gone\nto a German university, where even the most exacting of the professors\nconsidered him a modern Pico della Mirandola. The selling of his old\nruined castle had brought down upon him the anger and contempt of\nneighbors of his own class, but he was indifferent to local opinion and\ndespised the disguised meanness of too many of his neighbors. He had in\nreality passed through a severe struggle with his own prejudices before\nyielding to his better sense and parting with the shadow to pursue the\nsubstance.\n\nIf learning should ever bring him money, he meant to reclaim the old\nplace, which in the meanwhile could not be in safer hands; but on this\nhe did not reckon, and while he looked down on the sordid poverty that\nonly prompted his neighbors to sell butter and milk, and take toll from\nvisitors coming to see the faded frescos or old armor in their ruinous\ndwellings, he saw with very different eyes the probable future of\nanother kind of poverty before him: the pittance and privations of a\nstudent\u2019s lot, the obscure life of a professor or the uncertain one of a\ndiscoverer; but withal the glorious counterweight of intellectual life,\nthe wealth of vigor and progress, and stimulated, restless thought,\ndoubling and trebling his interests, and making akin to himself all the\nmental processes or achievements all over the world, which would come of\na few years\u2019 study and the sacrifice of his home. Far more patriotic and\nfar more proud was this youth who sold his inheritance than the\nindignant vegetators around him, who all felt the honor of their order\ninsulted by his unheard-of deed, and their country deprived of another\nson unworthy of her because he could see in Germany something more than\na barbarous, hereditary tyrant and enemy!\n\nSo it came about that the good Salviani kept a hotel in Carpeggio tower,\nthe walls of which had always been kept in good repair, and which was\neasily furnished, at no great expense, from the contents of various\nlumber-rooms and a little intelligent help from the local carpenter,\nwho, like most Italians, had an intuitive understanding of the artistic.\nTourists who had stopped here for a night or two; artists who had\nestablished their sketching headquarters here; Italians of some fortune\nwho passed here on their way to their inland _villeggiature_; anglers\nand peddlers, friars, and even commercial travellers of various nations\nwho had begun to experiment on the rural population hereabouts; pilgrims\nto the two neighboring shrines hardly known beyond twenty miles around,\nand yet the boast of the neighborhood for nearly four hundred years;\nwine merchants from the next cities\u2014these and many more could witness to\nthe satisfactory way in which Salviani kept the only hotel in Macchio.\nAnd of course his prices were moderate\u2014indeed, to a foreigner they\nseemed absolutely ridiculous; and he always made it a point to give an\nEnglishman or an American plenty of water, having found that by\nexperience a salve to the fault-finding spirit, and his young master\nhaving also accustomed his old attendant to it by requiring it himself\never since his boyhood. Foreigners with a \u201cturn\u201d for antique furniture\nspent more time roaming the old chambers than they did eating at the\nlandlord\u2019s excellent, if strictly national, table (for Salviani, knowing\nthat he was ignorant of foreign dishes, never attempted to drive away\nhis guests by bad imitations). The tower was very high and uncommonly\nlarge in proportion; in fact, it reminded you rather of two Cecilia\nMetella tombs raised one above the other than of an ordinary tower; and\nit was oddly distributed within. A staircase wound in the centre of the\nbuilding, communicating with the rooms on each tier by a circular\ncorridor on which the doors opened; but from the third floor this\nstaircase ceased, and from that to the fourth there was no access except\nfrom a winding stair within the thickness of the outer wall. The great\nstairs were of stone and uncarpeted, and in the corridor on which the\ndoors of the rooms opened were placed at intervals pieces of furniture,\nsuch as chairs, tables, stands, bronzes, vases, marble cornices, things\npicturesque, but not always available for use, and many sadly injured\nand mutilated, yet forming such a collection as sent a thrill of envy to\nthe heart of a few stray connoisseurs who had come across it and never\nbeen able to bring away even a specimen. Old Salviani had his\nsuperstitions, but, unlike his countrymen in general, he felt that these\nforbade him to sell anything belonging to the old family seat,\nespecially to a foreigner.\n\nOne day two travellers stopped at the hotel, a mother and\ndaughter\u2014\u201cEnglish, of course,\u201d said the landlord with a smile, as he saw\ntheir costume and independent air. The daughter was, equally of course,\nin evident and irrepressible raptures about everything she saw in the\nplace, from the ruinous outhouses to the museum-like interior. Their own\nrooms on the first floor, large, marble-paved, and scantily but\nartistically furnished with the best preserved of the antique things,\nsatisfied them only for a short time; they wanted to be shown over the\nwhole house. The bedrooms were not quite in such good taste, they\nthought; and indeed, as Salviani was not perfect, here the \u201ccloven foot\u201d\n_did_ appear, for a peddler had once beguiled him into buying some\nNottingham lace curtains with which he disfigured one of the third-story\nrooms, and some cheap chintzes which he had made into curtains for some\nof the patched-up bedsteads. But as the two strangers went up through\neach corridor, looking down at the tier below and at the various\nbeautiful things beside them, they forgot these blemishes in their\ndelight at a sight so unusual as this large, inhabited, well-preserved\ntower. They had seen nothing like it and could never have imagined it.\nIt had an air of dignity, of grandeur, of repose, and yet of connection\nwith the present to which one is more accustomed in old English\ncountry-houses than in Italian palaces.\n\nOne of the rooms on the fourth tier was almost unfurnished, having only\ntwo dilapidated bedsteads, one very large and promiscuously heaped with\nbed-quilts of equal dilapidation, while the other, in the form of a cot,\nor child\u2019s bed, was also much larger than such beds are made now. On\nthis was thrown an old-fashioned but almost new black mantle trimmed\nwith silk ribbon. This was the room afflicted with the Nottingham lace\ncurtains, which were cleaner than seemed natural in such a room. The\nview hence was beautiful, and the young Englishwoman was moved to\nsuggest that they should change their plans a little and stay here a few\nweeks, when she would endeavor to learn the language and would make a\nstudy of this tower-nest with the fine view. It would be so out of the\nway, and a few antique chairs and a table would be enough furniture to\nreplace the beds, which could be put into the next room. The mother\nsmiled; she was used to these sudden schemes growing up full-fledged out\nof any pleasant and suggestive-looking circumstances, but the landlord,\nseriously entering into the proposal, said he feared the other room was\ntoo small to hold the beds\u2014certainly the big one, which could not be got\nthrough the door, and, in fact, did not take to pieces. This set the\nyoung girl to examining the bed, and suddenly she called her companions\nto notice a panel in the tall head-board, which reached nearly to the\nceiling. It seemed movable, she said, and might she not try to find the\nspring? Did the signor know anything about it? Salviani turned rather\npale and hastily crossed himself, muttering something in Italian; then,\nin bad French, attempted to explain to his guest that there was a story\nof a former Carpeggio who was said to have lived alone on this top story\nand to have been a wizard, but how long ago he could not tell, nor if\nthe bed had been there then. The young girl insisted on getting to the\nbottom of the secret of the panel, which at last yielded, and revealed a\nspace between itself and another room of which only a corner was\nvisible, and a very small grated window high up in the wall. She\nscrambled through the panel opening, out into a lot of rubbish which\nfilled the intervening space and covered the sloping floor several\ninches deep. The door into the other room was gone, or else there had\nnever been one, and there were large hooks on either side of the gap, as\nif curtains might once have hung there. The floor was sunk much lower\nthan this level\u2014quite three feet\u2014giving one the impression of a shallow\nwell, so that there must have once been some movable way of descent. An\nold press or chest, with two drawers at the bottom, filled one corner,\nand on it was a faded piece of green silk, looking unmistakably part of\na woman\u2019s dress, and a beautiful, delicate ivory desk lying open, with\nmany thin plates folding together like the leaves of a portfolio. The\ncurious girl handled it with a sort of dread, yet eagerly and closely\ninspected it, leaving it afterwards in just the position in which she\nhad found it. As she turned from it she gave a cry of surprise; a chair\nstood in the corner, half hidden by the press, and across the back of it\nhung a long lock of hair, brown and silky, now fluttering in the\nunaccustomed draught from the open panel. Suddenly the intruder was\naware that the walls were covered with books but they were hidden behind\na close, thin green wire netting, which had at first looked like the\npattern of the wall. She eagerly called for a chair to stand on to\nexamine them; the landlord handed her one through the door, and then for\nthe first time, fascinated yet afraid, gazed into the room. Many were\nthe voluble and simple exclamations he uttered; but he was evidently\nmore concerned as to the risk of touching such uncanny things than\npleased at the discovery of the energetic stranger. Meanwhile, she\nlooked at the books, which filled up two sides of the room from floor to\nceiling\u2014they were a treasure, as she knew: old Italian and German books\non theological and philosophical subjects; translations into Italian of\nsome Elizabethan authors\u2014these, perhaps, unique of their kind, and rarer\nthan originals in either English or Italian; Italian translations of\nmore modern English books; poetry, science, illuminated manuscripts,\nfirst editions of sixteenth-century printed books\u2014the Italian ones, even\nthose in black-letter, perfectly clear and legible to a tyro, while a\nfew English books of a century later were not half so decipherable; a\ngood many Greek and Latin books, but not so many as of the Italian and\nGerman; and a few Oriental manuscripts, chiefly Hebrew, Arabic, and\nSyriac. In two places on the wall, which showed traces of a rough kind\nof painting as a background, were hung unframed Chinese landscapes on\nwood, and in other parts of the room old engravings, some plainly\nframed, some not, but pasted on to boards, and one or two unfinished\netchings. The most interesting purported to be a head of St. Peter\u2014not a\nconventional one, but a copy from some old painting, itself copied from\na Byzantine fresco, and claiming to be\u2014so said the quotation at the foot\nof the etching\u2014a portrait of the apostle as he really was. The pedigree\nof the portrait, however, was the really interesting point, and this was\nminutely traced in the foot-note, added by one signing himself Andrea\nC., to the unfinished etching of the artist, who, it seems, had died\nwhile engaged on this work.\n\nAnd here ends the part the strangers took in the affair; for they\ncontinued their journey to Ancona, and often in after-years, in their\nquiet English home between lake and rocky fell, wondered what became of\nthe books of Torre Carpeggio. But the faithful Salviani had written to\nhis young master at once, and Carpeggio returned a joyous answer, full\nof excitement and curiosity, promising a visit as soon as his means and\nhis studies combined would allow of it. It was a year before he was able\nto come\u2014a year during which he had changed and ripened, but which had\nleft the old tower, and, indeed, the sleepy, beautiful old city, as\nunchanged as anything can be where human beings are being born, married,\nand buried in due season. Even this inevitable change, however, was\nneutralized by the firmly-grooved life which, as each generation grew\nup, it placidly inherited from the last and religiously carried out,\nundreaming of any other possibilities and ignorant even of its own\ndormant energies. This was before the commotions of the last twenty\nyears, and there was not even a political ferment, much less an\nintellectual one, to disturb the even flow of things. One or two of the\ncathedral clergy had the reputation of being great scholars, and,\nindeed, had the right to be so looked upon, if by scholarship we\nunderstand the kind of knowledge which made the men of the Medici days\nfully the equals of the Oxford dons of only one generation ago; but that\nsort of scholarship harmonized well with the air of serene drowsiness\nthat covered the picturesque and half-deserted old city. The old canons\nkept much to themselves, and studied in a dainty, desultory, solitary\nway, not extending the daintiness to dress or furniture, but keeping up\nan unconscious kind of picturesqueness which they chiefly owed to such\ndetails as velvet skull-caps and bits of stray carving, or an old and\nprecious ivory crucifix or Cellini relic-case\u2014things prized by them for\ntheir meaning rather than for their art-value.\n\nTo this quaint, quiet city Emilio Carpeggio came back, after a two\nyears\u2019 absence, a youth still\u2014for he was only twenty\u2014but a phenomenon,\nif any one had known what was passing in his brain. He found the state\nof things more deplorable than ever, now that he had had experience of a\ndifferent lot; he had thought it hopeless enough before. Practical and\nfar-seeing, he did not find a panacea in reckless political\ndisturbances, and in impossible strivings to make citizens and statesmen\nout of his easy-going neighbors, so he was saved the loss of time that\nclogged the efforts of so many well-meaning men of his acquaintance\nabroad; individual mental activity was what he looked forward to as the\nthin edge of the wedge that should break up this spell of what he could\nnot help looking upon as lamentable stagnation, however beautiful the\ndisguise it wore.\n\nHis three months\u2019 holiday came to an end, and he disappeared again,\ncarrying off his treasures with him to Germany, where they became the\nwonder and envy of the professors. But such luck, after all, was only\ndue, said the kindly old men, to one who had done so much to win\nknowledge.\n\nThere was one of these men, not nearly so old as the rest, the special\nteacher to whom Carpeggio had attached himself, who was the young man\u2019s\nbest friend. To him only the dreams and hopes and resolves of this\nconcentrated young mind were made freely known; for, though young as\nregards most of the professors, Schlichter was like a father to the\nItalian student. He was only forty-two, and already had a European\nreputation in his own line\u2014mining engineering. A year after Carpeggio\ncame back from his visit to Italy his master received an invitation from\na scientific society in England to give a course of lectures in London\nduring the summer. He proposed to the young man to accompany him,\ntelling him that there was no knowing what practical advantages might\nresult from his visit to a country where you needed only energy to grasp\nsuccess.\n\n\u201cBut you forget the Mammon-worship of the English,\u201d said Emilio, \u201cof\nwhich you yourself have so scornfully told me, and that obscure young\nforeigners without interest are not likely to have a chance of showing\noff their energy. I think I had better stay and study here another year\nor two, instead of deliberately exposing myself to the vertigo of\nLondon.\u201d\n\n\u201cNonsense!\u201d said Schlichter impatiently. \u201cSociety is not likely to\ndazzle us, or, indeed, take much notice of us; they know how to keep the\nstreams separate, even if the fine ladies do play at a little pretty\nenthusiasm for science now and then. A lecture nowadays is only another\nexcuse for a pretty toilette, a change from the breakfast and morning\nconcert or the afternoon kettle-drum; but that does not imply a real,\npersonal notice of the lecturer, or, indeed, of any other working-bee.\nBut, seriously, I know some men in London who might help you, if they\nhad a mind to do it. You know how many surveys and plans there\nare\u2014always some new expedition to far-away places\u2014and young men of\nbrains are always useful, especially single men, who can leave home\nwithout regret or difficulty. You speak English and other useful modern\nlanguages, and you have every chance, I tell you, if you will only keep\nyour eyes open. As for study, a man need never say he can find no time\nfor it, however busy he is. If my evil genius had made me a merchant, I\nshould have found time for study, and so will you, just as well as if\nyou stayed at home. It is settled, is it not?\u201d\n\nSo they went, and the lectures were given, and the little world of\nlearned men which is the leaven of England met the two strangers\nheartily; but, as Schlichter had foretold, nothing very remarkable or\nvery dazzling occurred to them, though, to be sure, the elder man kept a\njealous eye on his young friend, as if he had fears or expectations of\nsomething happening. But Emilio calmly came and went, studied and saw\nsights, went to quiet family gatherings or to large parties which the\nuninitiated could not have distinguished from those of the charmed\nuppermost circle, and yet no one of the many girls he saw seemed to\ndwell in his thoughts more than courtesy required while he was in their\npresence. One day Schlichter told him that a friend of his had\nrecommended him to a mine-owner as general overseer and agent of his\nunderground property, and that he probably would have nothing to do but\nto step into the place. \u201cYou would rather have been tacked on at the\ntail of some South American expedition or Central African survey, I dare\nsay,\u201d he said; \u201cbut you had better take this and be thankful, Carpeggio.\nThe country is wild and picturesque, I believe\u2014Monmouthshire, just on\nthe Welsh border\u2014and you will be pretty much your own master. It only\ndepends on you to go up higher; but still I would not have you forget\nthe practical altogether. One must live, even if one does not run after\nmoney for its own sake, which you, at all events, are not likely to do.\u201d\n\nSo Emilio was left alone in England, in a responsible if not very\nbrilliant position, and faithfully did his work so as to gain his\nemployer\u2019s whole confidence and respect. The local society decidedly\nflattered the grave young overseer, whose title had over women the vague\ncharm it always awakens in romantic or speculating Englishwomen, and was\neven not obnoxious to the men, whose practical minds forgave the\n\u201cforeign bosh\u201d for the sake of the man\u2019s good English and modest,\nhard-working life. He was popular among the miners, and altogether, in\nhis little sphere, supreme. But parties and picnics sadly wearied him,\nand he feared he was growing misanthropic (so he wrote to Schlichter),\nwhen his employer took a new turn and began to court the notice of\nguests for one of his newest mines, of which he made a pet and a show.\nWhenever he had people to see him he arranged a party for going to see\nthe mine and its new improvements; it was to be a model, the machinery\nwas carefully chosen on improved principles\u2014in fact, the place became a\nlocal show. Strangers came, and the country people began to take pride\nin it, so that Carpeggio often had to escort fat dowagers, experienced\nflirts, fast young men, and statesmen on a short holiday, down the mine.\nThe contrast between this and his old home among the vineyards of Umbria\noften made itself felt with strange vividness as he sat by these people\nin the large cage or basket, swinging up or down between the dark, damp,\nunfragrant walls of the shaft, he shouting one steady word to the men\nwho held the ropes, and then quieting the half-sham tremors of a young\nlady, or smiling at the equally assumed carelessness of another whose\npart in the play was the reverse of the old-fashioned ing\u00e9nue.[7]\n\nIt was the contrast between his old life in Germany, so true and still,\nand this English one, so full of froth and shifting scenes, that kept\nhim from feeling the fascination of his new surroundings. Graver and\ngraver he grew, as the wonder in his mind grew also, concerning the\neffect that all this whirl of unreality must have, in its different\ndegrees, upon its victims. Were they all willing or passive ones? Did no\none ever rebel against the mould? Did no woman\u2019s heart and woman\u2019s hopes\nstrive against those worldly calculations which seemed to hedge in every\nfamily, from that of the half-starving village solicitor, and even that\nof the hard-working vicar, to that of his employer, and no doubt also of\nthe squires and the marquis, whose two daughters had just been presented\nat court? Report said that one of these was very beautiful; it also\nadded, wilful. But that probably meant only a spoilt child, not a woman\nwith an individuality of her own.\n\nOne day Emilio was in the mine, making a sketch by the light of a\nlantern for an improvement that had just occurred to him, when he heard\na noise not far off, and knew it to be the basket coming down the shaft.\nHe was putting his papers together to go and see who had come, when he\nwas met by one of the men smiling covertly, who told him that two young\nladies had insisted on coming down with him as he returned from an\nascent with a load of ore. They were alone, he said, and wore gray\nwaterproof cloaks and rubber boots, which they said they had put on on\npurpose, meaning to go down the mine. He had begged them to wait till he\nbrought the overseer to do them the honors. \u201cAs pretty as pictures,\u201d\nsaid the man as Carpeggio moved off, \u201cbut evidently strangers to the\nplace.\u201d A solution at once darted to the young man\u2019s mind, but he said\nnothing, and, when he got to the opening, he saw before him the great,\ndirty basket, and two laughing, fresh faces still inside, as the girls\nclung with ungloved hands to the ropes and peered out into the darkness\nbeyond them.\n\n\u201cAllow me,\u201d he said, as he offered one of them his hand. \u201cI am afraid\nyou will be disappointed in the very little there is to see, but I shall\nbe happy to show you over the place.\u201d The two girls seemed suddenly\nconfused and answered only by letting him help them down. He led them\non, and here and there explained something which was Greek to them.\nPresently one whispered to the other: \u201cWhy, Kate! he is a gentleman.\u201d\n\u201cHush,\u201d said the other in sudden alarm: \u201che will hear you.\u201d And she\nimmediately asked a question of their guide. When she found out that\nthere was a lower level than the one they were on, she asked to go down\nat once, but Carpeggio gravely declined, on the plea of their being\nalone and his not wishing to take the responsibility if they should get\nwet through.\n\n\u201cNo one need know,\u201d said one of them. \u201cWe ran away on purpose, and there\nis just time to go down and get home for tea. Luncheon does not matter.\u201d\n\n\u201cForgive me, madam,\u201d said the young man with a smile, \u201cbut I would\nrather not, and you can easily come again, with any one authorized to\nlet you have your own way. I cannot in conscience allow it while you are\nalone.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is no fun coming with a lot of old fogies, and in a carriage, and\none\u2019s best behavior, and so on,\u201d said the spokeswoman; \u201cis it, Kate?\u201d\nThe other blushed and hesitated, and at last said she thought it was\nbest to give up the lower level and go home; yet she seemed just as full\nof life and fun as her companion, and had evidently enjoyed the escapade\njust as much. Carpeggio looked at her for a moment and led the way\ntowards the basket. He went up with them and courteously bade them\ngood-by at the mouth of the shaft. The younger one held out her hand and\nsaid: \u201cYou will tell us whom we have to thank, I hope?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh!\u201d he said confusedly, glancing at the other and only seeing the\noutstretched hand just in time not to seem rude, \u201cI am only the\noverseer.\u201d\n\nThe other girl suddenly looked up and held out her hand to him, saying:\n\u201cThank you; I am sure you were right about going further down. And now\nwe must say good-by.\u201d\n\nCarpeggio went down again to his interrupted drawing, but the face and\nname of \u201cKate\u201d came between him and his work. He saw neither of the\ngirls again for weeks, and carefully forbore to make any inquiries; the\ngossip of the men did not reach the society which might have twitted him\nwith the visit of those unexpected explorers, and he kept his surmises\nto himself.\n\nYet the door had been opened, and he was no longer the same, though to\noutsiders no change was visible. Two months later there was a public\nball in the county town\u2014an occasion on which many persons meet\nofficially on terms that are hardly kept up all the year round, but\nwhich yet offer opportunities of social glorification \u201cwarranted to\nkeep\u201d till the same time next year. This ball was to be followed the\nnext night by another, given by the regiment; and though this was \u201cby\ninvitation,\u201d it was practically nearly as public as the other. These\ngayeties greatly excited the small world of the mining district, and for\nthe first time became of interest to Emilio, though he was angry and\nashamed to acknowledge it to himself. His work was the only thing that\ndid not suffer; as to his studies, they were interrupted, and even his\ncalm gravity became absent-mindedness. He was one of the earliest guests\npresent at the county ball, and watched the door eagerly for an hour at\nleast before he was rewarded. Then came a large party, to whom the\nappointed ushers paid unusual attention, though the head of it seemed\nbut a kindly middle-aged man, remarkable only for his geniality. Every\none, however, knew the marquis by sight; Carpeggio, who did not, felt it\nwas he before even the deference paid to him told him so. By his side\nwere the two girls he had first seen in the mine-basket, now dressed in\nwhite ball-dresses, airy and commonplace, just the same society uniform\nas the three co-heiresses, the daughters of his own employer, but to him\nhow different, how tender, how sacred! That is to say, Lady Katharine\u2019s;\nfor her pretty sister seemed an ordinary woman beside her.\n\nAnd now began all the sweet, old-fashioned, foolish tumult of which\nbards and romancers weave their webs; the trembling and fear and joy and\njealousy which Carpeggio had read of, but thought impossible in this\ncentury of sham excitements and masqueraded lives. He thought that she\nlooked much more beautiful in her gray cloak and drooping black hat; but\nstill \u201cKate\u201d in any dress was a vision of heaven rather than a common\nmortal. As she came into the room, she looked anxiously around and saw\nhim at once. She had expected to meet him here, then\u2014both were conscious\nof it in that one look, and it seemed as if this blissful understanding\nbetween them were enough. The youth turned to do his duty by his\nemployer\u2019s three daughters and all the rest of his acquaintances, to\nwhom, in the character of a \u201cdancing man\u201d as well as a good match, he\nwas interesting; he spun off little courteous speeches, not untrue but\ncommonplace, until he felt that he had satisfied natural expectations,\nand then he allowed himself a respite and gazed at the marquis\u2019 youngest\ndaughter. Towards supper time Carpeggio\u2019s employer, proud of the great\nman\u2019s courteous notice of him, suddenly bethought himself that an\n\u201cItalian nobleman\u201d in his wake might make the marquis respect his\nall-powerful purse the more, so he introduced his young overseer to the\nmarquis with a flourish very unpleasant to the former and rather amusing\nto the latter. Emilio was struck with dumbness or confusion; his new\nacquaintance took compassion on him and led him up to his daughters,\nwhose eyes had been for some time fixed upon him with breathless\ninterest. As he shook hands with them the second time he was in an\nawkward bewilderment whether or no to allude to their former meeting; in\nfact, his usual indifference was wholly upset. Lady Katharine was\nequally silent; whether she shared his embarrassment he could not tell;\nbut the other, Lady Anne, skilfully and with a latent, suppressed gleam\nof mischief in her eye, talked so as to cover his confusion and clear\naway the thorns that seemed to grow up between him and her sister. At\nlast he had the courage to ask each of the girls for a dance, and this,\ntogether with a word in the cloak-room as he escorted them to their\ncarriage, and the certainty of meeting them again at the military ball\nnext night, was all that happened to feed the flame of a feeling he knew\nto be already beyond the bounds of reason.\n\nYet he did nothing to check this feeling; are not all lovers fatalists\nfor the time being? Of course it was hopeless, insane, impossible\u2014he\ncould see it with the eyes of the world; but he also knew that it was\ntrue love, the ideal and pure love of Arcadia, the one thing which,\nwhether realized or not, lifts men above conventional life and turns\ngold to dross. He also fancied that this love might be returned, and did\nnot care to inquire further just now, when to be blind to details was to\nbe happy. Besides, these were the first girls he had seen that had not\nlost their naturalness, and he wanted to watch and see if they could\nkeep it in the atmosphere in which they lived. This was not quite an\nexcuse; for the young cynic had really got to be a sharp observer of\nhuman nature, and had, like most such observers when young, hastily\nconcocted one or two theories which he was now becoming anxious to test.\n\nNothing happened at the military ball more than the most uninterested\nspectator might see at any ball; and yet much happened, for Carpeggio\nmet Kate and danced with her, and both, as if by mutual understanding,\nwere very silent. Her sister, however, made up for this by chattering in\nthe most meaningly meaningless way, and delighting the lovers by her\ntacit abetment of anything they might choose to think, say, or do. After\nthese balls there was for a long time no more opportunity for meetings,\nand Emilio chafed against his fate, using the leisure time he had before\nspent in study for long walks to the marquis\u2019 house\u2014that is, as near as\nhe dared go without danger of trespassing. Once or twice he was lucky\nenough to meet the girls on the highroad outside the park, and this he\nenjoyed indeed; the progress was quicker, though as silent as in the\nball-room. Then once he met them out driving with their father, and on\nanother occasion came upon them at a neighboring squire\u2019s, where they\nwere on a state visit. But all this made little outward difference,\nthough he felt as if he no longer needed anything but a solemn pledge to\nchange the inner certainty into an acknowledged fact. Lady Anne was\nevidently a thorough partisan, and her sister\u2019s silence and looks told\nhim all he wanted to know; yet he refrained from saying the word, and\nknew that she understood why he did so. The fact was, he trusted to\nProvidence and his own power of shaping any opportunity sent him. The\nwhole thing seemed to him wonderful and mysterious; and as it had begun,\nso doubtless would it be guided to a happy end.\n\nOne day his employer told him with much importance that he was going to\nbring a \u201cvery distinguished\u201d party to see the mine, and afterwards to go\nthrough the works and see the melted ore pouring out from the furnaces,\n\u201cas that always amused young people so.\u201d The marquis was coming with his\ndaughters and his only son from Eton, and a young friend, a cousin of\nhis, Lord Ashley; then he would have one or two of the \u201cbest people\u201d\nfrom the immediate neighborhood, and his own daughters, besides the son\nof a friend out in Australia, a Mr. Lawrence, whom Carpeggio had heard\nrumor speak of as a not unwelcome son-in-law in the eyes of the rich\nmine-owner. He wondered whether Lord Ashley might be destined by her\nfather as a suitor for Kate; but the elder daughter would be more likely\nto be thought of first, besides being the prettier.\n\nThe day came, and with it the party, who arrived in the afternoon,\npicnicked in the adjoining woods, and then sauntered over to the shaft,\nwhere Emilio met them. Kate wore the same gray-water proof, and, as he\ntook her hand to help her into the basket, he gave it the slightest\npressure, with a look that spoke volumes. She was almost as grave as\nhimself. I cannot describe all that went on during the inspection, which\nto all, save Mr. Lawrence and the marquis, was a pleasure party in\ndisguise; for the former knew something of the subject from Australian\nexperiences, and the latter was considering the question of renting, or\nhimself working, a mine lately found on his own property. Technical\nquestions, explanations, and discussions, between these two visitors and\nthe owner and overseer took up the time, while the young ladies, Lord\nAshley, and the jolly Eton boy, who was a counterpart of his livelier\nsister, laughed and joked like a mixed school in play-time. Carpeggio,\nhowever, kept his eye on Kate the whole time, and was comforted; for\nthere was no fear of that nature being spoiled, though he thought with\nsorrow that it might be bruised and crushed. Suddenly, in the midst of a\ndiscussion, his ear caught an unaccustomed sound, and he turned pale for\na moment, then bent forward composedly and whispered in his employer\u2019s\near. The latter, after an almost imperceptible start, said briskly to\nhis guests: \u201cAs it is near the hour for the furnaces to show off at\ntheir best, I think we had better be moving,\u201d and led the way rather\nquickly to the shaft. Carpeggio contrived to get near Kate, whose\nsilence showed how glad she was of the companionship, but he was\npreoccupied and anxious and spoke a few words absently. A loud noise was\nheard, seemingly not far away, and the visitors asked, \u201cWhat is that?\u201d\nwhile the master hurriedly said, \u201cOh! it is only a blast, but we must\nnot be late for the furnaces; come,\u201d and tried to marshal his guests\nclosely together. Instinctively they obeyed and hurried forward; the\nmarquis looked round for his children. Anne and the boy were near him,\nbut Kate not to be seen. There was a corner to be turned, and she was\njust behind it, when another noise overhead was heard and Carpeggio\nrushed like the wind from behind the angle, carrying the girl in his\narms. It was the work of a second; for as he set her on her feet by her\nfather\u2019s side, and almost against the basket, down came a huge fragment\nand all but blocked up the gallery behind them, falling on the spot\nwhere she might have been had she lingered another moment. Whether or\nnot she had heard his passionate whisper, \u201cMy own,\u201d as he gathered her\nsuddenly in his arms and took that breathless rush, he could hardly\ntell, for she was dazed and half-unconscious when he set her down again.\nHer father thanked him by an emphatic shake of the hand and a look he\ntreasured up in his soul; but there was no time for more, as the basket\nwas hastily loaded with the girls and drawn up. As the signal came down\nthat they were safe, the owner\u2019s tongue was loosed, and he explained\nrapidly that something had happened on the second level (they were on\nthe third) and shaken the rock below; he trusted nothing more would\nhappen, but he must beg his guests to visit the works alone, as he must\nstop to see to the damage.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the overseer, \u201cthink of your daughters\u2019 anxiety, my dear sir;\nthere is probably nothing very serious, and it is nearly time for the\nmen to come up. I shall do very well alone.\u201d\n\nThe marquis looked at him admiringly; he could not advise him to leave\nwithout doing his duty, yet he felt suddenly loath to have anything\nhappen to the preserver of his daughter. After a short altercation the\nmaster consented to go up, provided Carpeggio would send for him, if\nnecessary; and the basket came down again. As they reached the next\nlevel, where the overseer got out, they heard uncomfortable rumblings at\nintervals; and when they got out at the mouth of the shaft, where they\nmet a good many of the men who had come up by another opening, they were\nvery unlike a gala party. Kate was still there; they had wanted her,\nsaid the girls, to go in and rest in a cottage near by, but she insisted\non waiting; and when she saw all but Carpeggio she only turned away in a\nhopeless, silent way that concerned her sister, who alone knew the\ncause. Anne immediately put questions that brought out the facts of the\ncase; and as their host tried hard to put the party at their ease again\nby hastening to the furnaces under the sheds, she whispered: \u201cKate, do\nkeep up, or there will be such a fuss.\u201d\n\n\u201cNever fear,\u201d said the girl; \u201cand try and make them stay till we hear\nwhat has happened, Anne; I do not want to go home without knowing.\u201d\n\nIt was nervous work for the master and the men who were tending the\nmolten ore to conceal their anxiety. The beautiful white iron, flowing\nlike etherealized lava, rushing out from the dark, oven-like furnaces\nand spreading into the little canals made ready for it, gave one a\nbetter idea of pure light than anything could do. The heat was intense,\nand the men opened the doors with immense long poles tipped with iron;\nthe gradual darkening of the evening threw shadows about the place, and\nthe streams of living light, that looked as the atmosphere of God\u2019s\nthrone might look, settled into their moulds, hardening and darkening\ninto long, heavy, unlovely bars. A suppressed excitement was at work;\ngroups of men came up every minute with contradictory reports as to the\naccident; women and children met them with wild questions or equally\nwild recognition; and the master repeatedly sent messages to the mouth\nof the shaft. At last, throwing by all pretence, he begged his guests to\nwait for news, and with Lawrence went back to the mine. More men were\ncoming up\u2014the last but five, he was told\u2014and Mr. Carpeggio had said he\nthought he and his four mates could do all that was needed and come up\nbefore any mischief happened to them. The soil was loosening under the\naction of water, and to save the ore accumulated below, and which could\nnot be hauled up in time, they had built a sort of wall across the\ngallery as well as the circumstances and the time would allow; Mr.\nCarpeggio had sent the men away as fast as he could spare them, and kept\nonly four with him to finish, which was the most dangerous part of the\nbusiness, as the water threatened them more and more.\n\n\u201cHe sent all the married men up first, and asked the rest to volunteer\nas to who among them should stay, as he only wanted four,\u201d said one of\nthe men; \u201cand I thought they would all have insisted upon staying, but\nhe grew angry and said there was no time; so they agreed to draw lots.\u201d\n\nAnother quarter of an hour\u2019s suspense, and then a low, muttering sound\nthat spread horror among the whispering multitude gathered at the mouth\nof the shaft. Some men went down to the first level, and soon came up\nwith blank faces and whispered to the master: no sound but that of water\nwas to be heard below, and fears for the safety of the workers were too\nconfidently expressed. Nothing remained but to give orders for affording\nrelief; the only comfort was that there had been no sign of the air\nbecoming vitiated. Here the master\u2019s experience was at fault, and he had\nto rely on that of some of the older men. \u201cIf Carpeggio had been here,\nhe would have got the men out in two hours,\u201d he asserted confidently;\n\u201cbut he must go and get himself mewed up there, and leave me no one to\ndirect things\u2014though I believe he can get himself out as quick as any of\nus can dig him out,\u201d he said, with a half-laugh; and one of the men\nwhispered to his neighbor:\n\n\u201cI do not wonder he sets such store by him; I had rather be down there\nmyself than have him killed.\u201d\n\nAt last it became certain, by signs which this faithful chronicler is\nnot competent to explain technically, that the five men had been cut off\nbehind a mass of rock and ore, and that it would take two days or more\nto get them out. Work was vigorously begun at once; relays of men went\ndown to search, by making calls and rapping on the echoing walls, in\nwhich direction lay the least impenetrable of the obstacles between them\nand the sufferers; the pumps were set going and every one worked with a\nwill. The news was received by the party at the works in a silence that\nmarked their interest well, and the young men eagerly asked their host\nif they could be made of any service personally, while the marquis\noffered to send down some of his men to help, if more were wanted, and\npromised to send all he and his daughters could think of as useful to\nthe imprisoned men when they should be brought out of their dangerous\npredicament. But as this accident refers only, so far as our tale is\nconcerned, to the links between Emilio and Kate, we must pass over the\nhourly exciting work, the reports, the surmises, the visits and\ninspections of newspaper men and others, the telegrams and sympathy of\npeople in high places, the details which accompany all such accidents,\nand which it takes a skilled hand to describe in words that would only\nmake the expert laugh at the ambitious story-teller. Space also, and\nmercy on the feelings of practised novel-readers, make us hesitate to do\nmore than hint at the state of mind of the girl whose dream of love and\nhappiness hung in the balance for nearly five days. Only her sister\nguessed the whole, and skilfully managed to shield her from inconvenient\nnotice and inquiry; and, indeed, the excitement of the time helped her\nin her work. The fifth day, towards evening, a messenger on horseback\nbrought word of the safety of the men\u2014all but one, who had died of\nexhaustion and hunger. Carpeggio and the rest had narrowly escaped\ndrowning as well as starvation, but had nevertheless managed to help on\nhis deliverers by working on his own side of the bed of earth and\nclearing away no small part (considering his disadvantages) of the\nembankment. The men had declared that but for him and his indomitable\nspirit, their suspense, and even their danger, would have increased\ntenfold; and, besides, he had contrived, by his efforts previous to the\nfinal falling in of earth and rushing in of water, to save a large\nportion of valuable ore which must otherwise have been either lost or\nmuch spoilt. He had been taken to his employer\u2019s house, where the\ngreatest care was bestowed on him, and the other men to their respective\nhomes. The marquis resolved to go over the next day and inquire after\nhim, and showed the greatest interest and anxiety about him; but Lady\nAnne shook her head as she said to her sister:\n\n\u201cHe will do anything, Kate, for Mr. Carpeggio\u201d (the young man had\ntacitly dropped his proper title for the time being), \u201cexcept the one\nthing you want; and you know that, with me, the wish is far from being\nfather to the thought in this matter.\u201d\n\nThere was nothing to do but to wait, and then came the overseer\u2019s\nrecovery and first visit to the house of his love as a cherished guest,\nhis silent look of longing and uncertainty, the gradual and still silent\nknitting together of a new and happier understanding than before, and\nfinally the offer of the father to make him manager and part owner of\nthe new mine on his own estate. The ownership he at once refused; but,\nas he could well manage the overseeing of the marquis\u2019 colliery without\nprejudice to his first employer\u2019s interests, he joyfully accepted the\nfirst part of the proposal. Then a cottage was pressed upon him, and\nthis also he accepted, provided it was understood to form part of his\nsalary. The old man was both pleased and nettled at his stiff\nindependence; but when Anne reminded him that the circumstances of the\ncase made this the only proper course, he forgot his vexation and\nheartily praised the manliness of his new _employ\u00e9_.\n\nCarpeggio was often at the house, and in fact grew to be as familiar a\npresence there as that of the inmates themselves, and still the silent\nbond went on, seemingly no nearer an outward solution, though the\nmarquis\u2019 favor visibly increased. The colliery prospered and brought in\nmoney, and the overseer carefully put by his salary and studied hard at\nnight, till his name got to be first known, then respected, in the\nscientific world; and one day an official intimation was made to him\nthat the third place on a mining survey expedition to South America was\nat his disposal. He had written to Schlichter constantly, and at last\nhad made a clean breast of what he called his unspoken but not the less\nsealed engagement. The two girls had gone through two London seasons;\nLord Ashley and Mr. Lawrence had become brothers-in-law by each marrying\none of the trio who had so long expected to make a conquest of the\noverseer himself; and Carpeggio had enough to buy a large share in the\nconcern of either of his two employers. Such was the state of affairs\nwhen the proposal of an American trip was made to him; if the survey was\nsatisfactory, and a company formed in consequence, he would be out at\nleast three years, with the chance of a permanent settlement as director\nof the works and sharer in the company. Both pecuniarily and\nscientifically a career was open to him, while at home there was success\nin all but love\u2014nearly as certain. Schlichter strongly advised him to\ngo; the marquis himself saw the thing as a thorough Englishman, and was\nwilling to lose his right-hand man, as he called him, for the sake of\nthis opening; Carpeggio saw the alluring chance of travel, adventure,\nthe prestige of his possible return in a different character, the\nenlarged field which he could not help looking on as more tempting than\nsuccess\u2014equally solid, perhaps, but more humdrum\u2014at his very elbow, and\nthe glorious southern climate, like to, and yet more radiant than, the\nold home one to which he had been used as a boy among the vineyards of\nUmbria. He knew that Kate would follow him there gladly, as she would\nhad he gone to the North Pole; but there was _the_ intangible yet\nterribly real barrier. In everything but the weighty affair of mating he\nwas held as Kate\u2019s equal, and the equal of all whom he met at the\nmarquis\u2019 house; even in London, where he had once stayed with them a\nweek, and gone into that society which was \u201ctheir world,\u201d he had been\nreceived in a way unexceptionally satisfactory; he was put on more than\nan equal footing with young Englishmen of good standing, but he knew\nthat he shared with them the cruel, tacit exclusion from competition for\nfirst-class prizes. He was good enough to dance with, ride with, flirt\nwith, and escort to her carriage the daughter of a duke; so were the\nmany young fellows who made the bulk of the young society of the day;\nbut there were preserves within preserves. The second sons, the young\nlawyers, the men in \u201cmarching\u201d regiments, the naval cadets, the\ngovernment clerks, and even the sons of admirals, clergymen, and men who\nhad made their mark in the literary and scientific as well as the social\nworld\u2014all these were tacitly, courteously, but inexorably tabooed as\nregards marriage with their partners, friends, and entertainers. In\nfact, society had bound these youths over to \u201ckeep the peace,\u201d while it\nencouraged every intimacy that was likely to lead to a breach of it.\nCarpeggio had lived long enough in England to be quite aware of this and\nto \u201cknow his own place\u201d in the world; but he trusted to time and Kate\u2019s\nfaithfulness. He at last made up his mind to go to South America, and\nthat without saying anything that would weigh Kate down with the\nknowledge of a secret to be withheld from her father; but he had\nlikewise made up his mind to speak to the marquis on his return. He\nwould be true to his employer, but could not afford to be false to\nhimself; his own rights as a man were as present to his mind as the\nposition and prejudices which he appreciated and tolerated in the person\nof a man so thoroughly gentlemanlike as his patron; and this compromise\nof a three years\u2019 absence and silence seemed to him to honorably fulfil\nall the expectations that could be formed of him. He said good-by to the\ngirls together in their father\u2019s library, and the old man blessed him\nand bade him Godspeed in the heartiest fashion, almost with tears in his\neyes; but of more tender and definite speech there was none. Who is\nthere, however, but knows the delicate, intangible farewell, the firm\npromise conveyed by a pressure of the hand, and one long, frank, brave\nlook, and all that true love knows how to say without breaking any other\nallegiance and without incurring the blame of secrecy?\n\nSo Emilio Carpeggio went and prospered, while Kate remained a beauty and\na moderate heiress (she had half of her mother\u2019s small fortune), courted\nand loved, and going through the weary old treadmill of London seasons\nand country \u201cparties.\u201d People wondered why she did not marry. Her sister\ndid, and made a love-match, though there was no violent obstacle in the\nway, and the lover was perfectly acceptable as to station and fortune.\nShe was lucky, also, in loving a man who had some brains to boast of.\nThis unknown brother-in-law in after-times became a powerful lever in\nfavor of Carpeggio\u2019s suit; but long before the young engineer came back\nthe kind, tender-hearted old marquis had found out his daughter\u2019s\nsecret, and after some time overcame his natural prejudices, and as\ngenerously agreed to Kate\u2019s hopes as he had before vigorously opposed\nthem. And yet all this was done while hardly a word was spoken; for if\nany courtship was emphatically a silent one, it was this. Everything\ncame to be tacitly understood, and a few hand-pressures, a kiss, a\nsmile, or a long look expressed the changes and chances of this simple\nlove-story. At the end of three years the young man came home on a\nholiday, which he meant to employ in determining his fate. He had\npromised the new company to go back permanently and take charge of their\ninterests as a resident, and many of the native members had shown\nthemselves willing and eager to make him a countryman and a son-in-law.\nHe went home, and saw the marquis the first evening of his stay, two\nhours after he got off the train. To his surprise, he found his request\ngranted before he made it and his road made plain before him. The old\nman did not even ask him not to return to America. It is of little use\nto descant on his meeting with Kate and on his (literally) first spoken\nwords of love. They told each other the truth\u2014that is, that the moment\nthey met in the mine, five years before, was the beginning of their\nlove. They were married with all the pretty pastoral-feudal accessories\nof a country wedding in England, and spent their honeymoon in the old\ntower of Carpeggio, where the bride explored the library-room with great\ncuriosity, and was charmed with the old-fashioned figures of the\nprincipal people of the town, whom she entertained in what was now again\nher husband\u2019s own house.\n\nSignor Salviani had built a pretty, villa-like hotel half a mile\nfurther, and was as proud on the day when his young master again took\npossession of the old tower as the bridegroom himself. From there\nCarpeggio went to his German friends, presented the famous Schlichter to\nhis wife, and got his rough and fatherly congratulations on his choice,\nhis perseverance, and his success. In three months the young couple set\nsail for their new home, where Carpeggio had sent the last orders needed\nto set up quickly the nest he had half-prepared already in anticipation\nof his visit to England. When they arrived, Kate found a lovely,\nfragile-looking, cool house, half-southern, half-northern, covered with\nvines which the natives still looked upon with distrust, but beautiful\nand luxuriant beyond measure (this was the oldest part of the house, the\noriginal lodge which the overseer had lived in when he first came), some\nrooms with white tile floors, and some partially covered with fancy mats\nof grass, while one or two rejoiced in small Turkey rugs, suggestive of\nhome, yet not oppressively hot to look at. All his wife\u2019s tastes had\nbeen remembered and gratified, and Carpeggio was rewarded by her telling\nhim that if she had built and furnished the house herself, she could not\nhave satisfied her own liking so thoroughly as he had done. One room was\nfitted up as their _den_ (or, as the world called it, the library), and\nwas as much as possible the exact counterpart of the room in Torre\nCarpeggio where the books and curiosities had been found. Of course the\ncollection had been carefully transferred here. Years afterwards this\nplace was the rallying-point of English and American society; travellers\ncame to see it and its owners; its hospitality was the most perfect,\ngenerous, and delicate for a hundred miles around; no jealousies arose\nbetween its household and those of the natives; the mining company\nprospered, Carpeggio grew to be an authority even in German scientific\ncircles, and a sort of paradise was once more realized. True, this kind\nof thing only happens once or twice in a century; but then it really\ndoes, so it is pardonable for a story-teller to choose the\nthousand-and-first couple for the hero and heroine of his tale.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n CRIMINALS AND THEIR TREATMENT.[8]\n\nThe judicious management of the criminal classes is a question which has\nlong occupied the serious consideration of legislators and social\nreformers throughout the civilized world; and though much of what has\nbeen said and written on the matter is visionary and based on imperfect\ndata, the agitation of the question cannot but be productive of\nadvantageous results. In pagan times penal laws were enacted chiefly\nwith a view to the punishment of crime, and but little account was taken\nof the criminal. The Julian law and the Justinian Code and Pandects\ninherited this cruel and unchristian character, which attached itself to\nthem for centuries even after the birth of our Saviour. The influence of\nChristianity was long powerless to mitigate the horrors of barbarous\nlegislation. In vain did the bishops of the church protest against the\natrocities which were everywhere practised on prisoners. So far from\nlistening to these humane appeals, hard-hearted rulers exhausted their\ningenuity in devising new modes of penal torture, while for the wretched\nculprit not a pitiful word went forth from royal or baronial legislative\nhalls. Among the Romans treason was punished by crucifixion, the most\ncruel of deaths. The parricide was cast into the sea enclosed in a sack,\nwith a cock, a viper, a dog, and a monkey as companions. The incendiary,\nby a sort of poetic retribution, was cast into the flames, while the\nperjurer was flung from the heights of Tarpeia\u2019s rock. But the treatment\nof prisoners for debt was still more barbarous and quite out of\nproportion to the magnitude of the offence. The unfortunate being who\ncould not meet the demands of his creditors was compelled to languish in\na filthy dungeon for sixty days, during which time he was fed upon\ntwelve ounces of rice daily and had to drag a fifteen-pound chain at\nevery step. If, at the expiration of that time, the claim against him\nwas still unsatisfied, he was delivered over to his obstinate and\nunrelenting creditors to be torn limb from limb as a symbol of the\npartition of his goods.\n\nThe severity of these provisions was somewhat softened in later times,\nbut throughout the middle ages, and, indeed, down to the latter half of\nthe eighteenth century, the same fierce and Draconian spirit pervaded\nall laws having reference to the punishment of crime. Vast numbers of\nprisoners, without distinction of age, sex, rank, or character of crime,\nused to be huddled together in wretched pens, where they rotted to death\namid blasphemous and despairing shrieks. Spiritual comfort and advice\nwere withheld from them; for it was a feature of these miserable laws to\npursue their victims beyond the grave by a clause which stipulated that\nthey should die \u201cwithout benefit of clergy.\u201d\n\nIndividual efforts here and there were not wanting to alleviate the\nsufferings of prisoners, and many a bright page of the martyrology grows\nbrighter still with a recital of the noble sacrifices made by the saints\nof the church to ameliorate the condition of captives. St. Vincent de\nPaul, a voluntary inmate of the _bagnes_ of Paris, teaching and\nencouraging his fellow-prisoners, was the prototype of Goldsmith\u2019s\nkind-hearted Dr. Primrose, with the exception that the saint outdid in\nreality what the poet\u2019s fancy merely pictured. Other saints, when\nprevented from offering relief at home, sold themselves into foreign\nservitude; and we read of their noble efforts to render at least\nendurable the acute sufferings of captives in Barbary, Tripoli, and\nTunis.\n\nBut these spasmodic and unsystematic endeavors to better the condition\nof criminals were attended with no lasting good, and not till the\nserious labors of the noble Howard invited attention to the importance\nof the matter was public attention fully awakened. His visits to the\nprisons of the Continent of Europe, and his frequent appeals to the\ngovernments to introduce much-needed reforms and to redress palpable\nwrongs, enlisted the active sympathies of the wise and good. Then for\nthe first time the doctrine which Montesquieu and Beccaria had so often\nadmirably set forth in their writings was adopted in practice, and\nlegislators and governments assumed as the basis of prison reform the\nprinciple that all punishment out of proportion to the crime is a wrong\ninflicted on the criminal. Advances at first were exceedingly slow, but\nthe true impetus to prison reform was given and a new and higher social\nlode was struck.\n\nWhile John Howard was yet engaged in the effort to solve the problem he\nhad set before himself, a new science was springing into existence which\nwas to lend to his labors the full promise of success. The value of\nstatistics was but little understood and appreciated till the latter\nportion of the last century, and so imperfect in this respect had been\nthe records of town, provincial, and national communities that history\nhas keenly felt the loss of this important adjunct to her labors, and\nhas been compelled to grope in darkness because the light of statistical\ninformation could not be had. Since this century set in, however,\nstatistics have risen to the dignity of a science, and the truly\nvaluable information they afford, the floods of light they have shed on\nall social matters, the service they have lent to medical science, to\nhygiene, to sanitary reforms, and above all to the prevalence of crime\nwith its grades and surroundings, fully attest the sufficiency of its\ntitle.\n\nThrough statistics, then, we are placed in possession of the facts\nrelating to crime and criminals, and facts alone can give the color of\nreason and good sense to all measures of reform, to all projects looking\nto the suppression of crime and the elevation of the criminal classes.\nStatisticians, therefore, whatever may be their theories, whatever their\npet views about crime and criminals, deserve well of the community; for\nwithout their close and painstaking work the most ingenious theorist and\nthe best-inclined philanthropist would be utterly at sea; for as Phidias\ncould not have chiselled his unrivalled Zeus without the marble, neither\ncan the most zealous reformer advance a foot without clear and\nwell-tabulated statistics.\n\nFor this reason we bid especial welcome to the interesting monogram of\nMr. Dugdale, which is a monument of patient and laborious exploration in\na field of limited extent. It is evident that he did not set about his\nwork in a _dilettante_ spirit, but spared no effort and avoided no\ninconvenience\u2014and his inconveniences must have been many\u2014to ascertain\nthe utmost minuti\u00e6 bearing on his topic. He has not contented himself\nwith adhering to the methods of inquiry usually in vogue, but has added\nto the law of averages, which ordinary statistics supply, individual\nenvironments and histories which may be considered causative of general\nresults, and as such are the key to common statistics.\n\n \u201cStatistics,\u201d he says, \u201ccumulate facts which have some prominent\n feature in common into categories that only display their static\n conditions or their relative proportions to other facts. Its\n reasoning on these is largely inferential. To be made complete\n it must be complemented by a parallel study of individual\n careers, tracing, link by link, the essential and the accidental\n elements of social movement which result in the sequence of\n social phenomena, the distribution of social growth and decay,\n and the tendency and direction of social differentiation. To\n socio-statics must be allied socio-dynamics. Among the notable\n objections to pure statistics in the present connection is the\n danger of mistaking coincidences for correlations and the\n grouping of causes which are not distributive.\u201d\n\nThus, Mr. Dugdale recognizes as underlying the testimony of mere figures\na variety of factors essentially modifying the inferences which the\nformer, exclusively viewed, would justify us in drawing, and endeavors\nto catch the ever-shifting influences of individual temperament, age,\nand environment. Heredity and sex, being fixed, are covered by the\nordinary methods of statistical compilation. But as environment is the\nmost potent of the varying factors which determine a career of honesty\nor crime, so heredity may be regarded among the fixed causes as the most\ncontributive of effect in the same direction. \u201cHeredity and environment,\nthen, are the parallels between which the whole question of crime and\nits treatment stretches, and the objective point is to determine how\nmuch of crime results from heredity, how much from environment.\u201d It is\nto the solution of this rather complicated problem that Mr. Dugdale\naddresses himself; and when we say it is complicated we do not\nexaggerate, so that we may be pardoned if, at times, in the course of\nthe sinuous meanderings the question must necessarily take, we find\nourselves at variance with some of his conclusions. Heredity is of two\nsorts: 1, that which results from cognate traits transmitted by both\nparents; and, 2, that which exhibits the modification dependent on the\ninfusion of strange blood. This distinction is important as bearing on\nthe question of heredity in its tendency to perpetuate propensities. If\nconsanguineous unions intensify and transmit types of character with any\ndegree of constancy and uniformity, we are justified in conceding that\nheredity is a criminal factor quite independent of environments, and\nthat its relation to the solution of the problem why crime is so\nprevalent cannot be ignored. Now, the test furnished by the infusion of\nstrange blood will enable us to judge whether constancy and uniformity\nof types are confined to consanguineous unions or not; for if, the\nenvironments remaining the same, a change of type is induced by\nnon-consanguinity, then to the admixture of fresh blood alone can we\nattribute change of type, and so we must again admit the importance of\nheredity in the study of the case, but only to the extent and within the\nlimits we shall hereafter point out. Mr. Dugdale is of opinion that both\nheredity and environment play a very important part in the career of the\ncriminal, and it is with the design of sustaining his opinion that he\nhas given us the history of the \u201cJukes.\u201d Before we deal further with his\nconclusions we will here present a brief summary of the facts as related\nby him.\n\nThe term \u201cJukes\u201d is a sort of pseudonym very considerately intended to\ncloak the identity of members of the family who may now be engaged in\nhonest pursuits. The family had its origin in the northern part of the\nState of New York, and has rendered the place notorious by the unbroken\nchain of crime which, link after link, binds the jail-bird of to-day\nwith the jolly and easy-living \u201cMax\u201d of a century ago, who drank well,\nhunted well, and ended his days in the quiet enjoyment of animal peace.\nHe certainly was more intent on hospitable cares and the gratification\nof his passing desires than on the welfare of his progeny; for no man\never left behind him a more serried array of criminal descendants whose\nname has become the synonym of every iniquity the tongue can utter or\nthe mind conceive. This man had two sons, married to two out of six\nsisters whose reputation before marriage was bad. The eldest of the\nsisters is called \u201cAda Juke\u201d for convenience\u2019 sake, though in the county\nwhere the family lived her memory is unpleasantly embalmed as \u201cMargaret,\nthe mother of criminals.\u201d Ada had given birth before her marriage to a\nmale child, who was the father, grandfather, and great-grandfather of\nthe distinctively criminal line of descendants. She afterwards married,\nand thus commingled in her person two generations exhibiting\ncharacteristics essentially peculiar to each, though they often bear\nleading features of resemblance. The sisters \u201cDelia\u201d and \u201cEffie\u201d married\nthe two sons of Max, and in this way, though somewhat obscurely, Mr.\nDugdale connects Max with the most criminal branch of the Jukes. We say\nsomewhat obscurely; for the reader is first inclined to believe that Ada\nwas married to one of Max\u2019s sons, till on chart No. iv., page 49, he\nquite casually lights on the remark \u201cEffie Juke married X\u2014\u2014, brother to\nthe man who married Delia Juke, and son of Max.\u201d While acknowledging the\ninherent difficulty of a lucid arrangement of facts so complicated and\nbearing such manifold relations, we believe that a little more fulness\nof statement would lead to at least an easier understanding of Mr.\nDugdale\u2019s work. \u201cEffie\u201d became, through her marriage with the second son\nof Max, the ancestress of one of the distinctively pauperized branches\nof the family. The progeny of Delia inclined more to crime, and Ada thus\nbecame the parent stem whence both the criminal and pauperized army of\nthe \u201cJukes\u201d mainly sprang; for it is a circumstance deserving notice\nthat, whereas the offspring of \u201cAda\u201d before marriage founded the\ncriminal line of the family, her offspring after marriage inclined\nrather to pauperism than to crime. So likewise in the case of \u201cEffie,\u201d\nwhose known offspring was the result of marriage; we find few criminals,\nbut nearly all paupers, among her descendants.\n\nIn the first chart Mr. Dugdale exhibits a detailed history of the\nillegitimate posterity of \u201cAda\u201d throughout seven generations. The first\nlegitimate consanguineous union in the family took place between the\nillegitimate son of \u201cAda\u201d and a daughter of \u201cBell,\u201d from which six\nchildren resulted. The branch is considered illegitimate, as far as\n\u201cAda\u201d is concerned, so that Mr. Dugdale sets down each collateral branch\nas either legitimate or illegitimate, according to the legitimacy or\nillegitimacy of that child of the five sisters which stands at the head\nof the list. Now, glancing along the column of the third generation, or\nthat exhibiting the six legitimate children of the illegitimate son of\n\u201cAda\u201d and a legitimate daughter of \u201cBell,\u201d we find their history to be\nas follows: The first, a male, lived to the age of seventy-five; was a\nman of bad character, though inclined at times to be industrious, and\ndepended on out-door relief for the last twenty years of his life. The\nsisters and brothers of this man strongly resembled him in character,\nbeing all noted for their longevity, their propensity to steal, and\ntheir habitual licentiousness. They were, moreover, exceedingly\nindolent, with one exception, and were a constant burden on the\ntownship. It is unnecessary to trace out the history of these or of\ntheir descendants, except to present a few typical cases which will\nenable us to understand the conclusion arrived at by Mr. Dugdale.\n\nThe first son of \u201cAda,\u201d just mentioned, married a non-relative of bad\nrepute, by whom he had nine children. This woman died of syphilis; and\nit is well to note at what an early period this poisonous strain showed\nitself in this the illegitimate branch of \u201cAda\u2019s\u201d descendants. These\nnine children surpassed their father, their uncles, and their aunts in\ncriminal propensity. They were especially more violent, were frequently\nimprisoned for assault and battery, and, though no more licentious than\ntheir father, were especially addicted to licentiousness in its grosser\nforms. They inherited the constitutional disease of which their mother\ndied, and with it the penalty of an early death, the oldest having died\nat the age of fifty-one and the youngest at twenty-four. It will be\nobserved that they were not so constantly dependent on out-door relief\nas the generation immediately preceding them; this fact being\nattributable to the greater violence of their temper, which induced them\nto acquire by robbery and theft the means of livelihood, while the\nothers preferred to beg. One aunt of these nine\u2014viz., the second sister\nof their father and fourth from him in birth\u2014never married, but had four\nchildren by a non-relative; and, for a purpose soon to be understood, we\nwill compare their career with that of their nine cousins, who, it must\nbe remembered, were born in wedlock. These four were illegitimate all\nthe way back to their grandmother, \u201cAda\u201d; and if there be any force in\nthe statement that prolonged illegitimacy has an influence in the\nformation of character, we here have an opportunity of verifying it. The\nfirst of these, a male, was arrested at the age of ten; was arraigned\nfor burglary soon after, but acquitted; was indicted for murder in 1870,\nand, though believed to be guilty, was again acquitted; was in the\ncounty jail in 1870, and in 1874 was depending upon out-door relief. The\nsecond, a female, began to lead a loose life at an early age, which\nrapidly developed into a criminal one. The third, a male, was guilty of\nnearly every known crime, and at last accounts was undergoing a term of\ntwenty years\u2019 imprisonment in Sing Sing for burglary in the first\ndegree. The fourth, also a male, died at the age of nineteen, after\nhaving spent three and a half years in Albany penitentiary. Thus, though\nthe record of the nine cousins is not very flattering, the vicious\nproclivities of these four illegitimates are manifestly more marked and\ndecided.\n\nIf we now turn to the chart exhibiting the posterity of the legitimate\nchildren of Ada Juke, we will find an order of things entirely\ndifferent. The husband of \u201cAda\u201d was lazy, while her paramour, on the\ncontrary, was always industrious. Syphilis likewise showed itself at a\nstill earlier period than in the illegitimate branch; for whereas this\ndisease first appeared in the generation of the illegitimate line, Ada\u2019s\nfirst child by marriage became a victim to it at an early age, and her\ntwo legitimate daughters are set down as harlots at an equally early\nage. Ada\u2019s first child, a son, married after the poisoned taint had got\ninto his blood, and transmitted the loathsome heritage to his eight\nchildren. The immediate descendants of these eight were for the most\npart blind, idiotic, and impotent, and those who were not so became the\nprogenitors of a line of syphilitics down to the sixth generation.\nMoreover, the intermarriages between cousins were much more frequent\nalong this line than in the illegitimate branch. It is a noteworthy fact\nthat in this chart one of the \u201cJuke\u201d blood is, for the first and only\ntime, set down as being a Catholic\u2014the only time, indeed, that reference\nis made to the question of religion. Mr. Dugdale allows us to infer from\nthis exceptional allusion that he found but one Catholic in this\nedifying family. We would recommend this fact to the consideration of\nour rural friends who think that chiefly in the metropolis abound the\ncriminals, _quorum pars maxima_ they believe to be Catholics. The first\ntime these unco-pious people had the fierce light that beats upon a town\nturned upon themselves, the spectacle thus revealed is not\nover-pleasant. This _en passant_. Were we to examine the other\nstatistical exhibits of Mr. Dugdale, we would find pretty nearly the\nsame result made clear. Without, therefore, entering into details that\nare painful in character and difficult to keep constantly in view, we\nwill give a summary of the conclusions which the detailment of facts\nseems to justify:\n\n1. The lines of intermarriage of the Juke blood show a minimum of crime.\n\n2. In the main, crime begins in the progeny where the Juke blood has\nmarried into X\u2014\u2014 (non-Juke blood).\n\n3. The illegitimate branches have chiefly married into X\u2014\u2014.\n\n4. The illegitimate branches produced a preponderance of crime.\n\n5. The intermarried branches show a preponderance of pauperism.\n\n6. The intermarried branches show a preponderance of females.\n\n7. The illegitimate branches produced a preponderance of males.\n\n8. The apparent anomaly presents itself that the illegitimate criminal\nbranches show collateral branches which are honest and industrious.\n\nWe here find a most curious and interesting history and an epitome of\nconclusions which challenges serious consideration. That the family of\nthe \u201cJukes\u201d was more vicious than their neighbors whose surroundings\nwere similar cannot be disputed, and the question arises, What was there\npeculiar and exceptional in their case that made the fact to be such?\nThe habits of life of the immediate descendants of Max were bad in the\nextreme, but partly forced upon them by environments. These people dwelt\nin mud-built cabins, with but one apartment, which served all the\npurpose of a tenement. Here they slept and ate, and of course privacy\nwas rendered entirely impossible. Decency and modesty were out of the\nquestion, and the anomaly of whole families utterly bereft of all regard\nfor domestic morals began to exhibit itself. We will now lay down a\nfundamental principle, by the light of which we hope to be able to solve\nthe knotty question of this intense perversity of a series of\nblood-related generations, and Mr. Dugdale himself will furnish the\nproofs.\n\nEarly impurity beyond all other causes warps the moral sense, blunts the\ndelicacy of womanly modesty, dims the perception of the difference\nbetween right and wrong\u2014in a word, is quickest to sear the conscience.\nCrimes of violence, crimes of any sort, which are not traceable to this\norigin are outbursts of momentary distemper; but impurity of the sort\nmentioned lays the foundation of an habitual aptitude to commit the\nworst crimes, as though the tendency to do so were inborn and natural.\nLet us examine the facts as exhibited in the history of the Jukes\nfamily. Throughout the six generations studied by Mr. Dugdale he found\n162 marriageable women, including, as facts required him to do, some of\nvery tender years. Of these 84 had lapsed from virtue at some time or\nother. This is an enormous percentage compared with the police returns\nof our most crowded seaboard cities. Among the Jukes women 52.40 per\ncent. were fallen women. In New York, London, Paris, and Liverpool the\nhighest calculation does not exceed 1.80. If such was the moral _status_\nof the female portion of the family, it is not difficult to conceive\nwhat a low ebb morals among the males must have reached. The more\nclosely we look into the facts recorded by Mr. Dugdale, the more\nirresistible becomes the conclusion that these moral pariahs yielded\nthemselves up without restraint to every excess from the moment sexual\nlife dawned upon them, and blushed not to commit crimes which do not\nbear mention. In the record of their lives we meet at every line\nexpressions which brand these people as the modern representatives of\nthe wicked ones who 3,700 years ago shrivelled in the fire of God\u2019s\nanger on the plains of the Dead Sea. Indeed, the fact that the infamous\npractices which made the \u201cJukes\u201d family notorious are the beginning of\nan utter loss of conscience has been long recognized by Catholic\ntheologians, who, while admitting that loss of faith is a more serious\nloss than that of purity, contend that the latter is more degrading,\nmore profoundly disturbs the moral nature of man, and speedily blinds\nhim to the perception of every virtue. Many more facts might be adduced\nin support of this proposition, both from the pages of Mr. Dugdale and\nthe various reports of our reformatory and punitive institutions, but\nwhat has been said will no doubt be deemed sufficient.\n\nIf, then, it be admitted that a corrupt life begun in early youth and\ncontinued for a long time is the broadest highroad to crime, it is\ninteresting to enquire how far so-called criminal heredity is influenced\nby the transmission of impure propensities. It has become the fashion of\nlate days to allow to hereditary influence a vast importance in the\ndiscussion and management of crime, so that there is danger even that\nthe criminal will be led to look upon himself as naturally, and\nconsequently unavoidably, vicious, and that society ought not to visit\nupon him the penalty of his misdeeds any more than it should punish the\nfreaks of a madman. Dr. Henry Maudsley, in his recent work entitled\n_Responsibility in Mental Disease_, holds language startling enough to\nmake every inmate of Sing Sing to-day regard himself as one against whom\nthe grossest injustice had been done. He says:\n\n \u201cIt is certain, however, that lunatics and criminals are as much\n manufactured articles as are steam-engines and calico-printing\n machines, only the processes of the organic manufactory are so\n complete that we are not able to follow them. They are neither\n accidents nor anomalies in the world, in the universe, but come\n by law and testify to causality; and it is the business of\n science to find out what the causes are and by what laws they\n work. There is nothing accidental, nothing supernatural, in the\n impulse to do right or in the impulse to do wrong\u2014both come by\n inheritance or by education; and science can no more rest\n content with the explanation which attributes one to the grace\n of heaven and the other to the malice of the devil than it could\n rest content with the explanation of insanity as a possession by\n the devil. The few and imperfect investigations of the personal\n and family histories of criminals which have yet been made are\n sufficient to excite some serious reflections. One fact which is\n brought strongly out by these inquiries is that crime is often\n hereditary; that just as a man may inherit the stamp of the\n bodily features and characters of his parents, so he may also\n inherit the impress of their evil passions and propensities; of\n the true thief, as of the true poet, it may indeed be said that\n he is born, not made. That is what observation of the phenomena\n of hereditary [_sic_] would lead us to expect; and although\n certain theologians, who are prone to square the order of nature\n to their notions of what it should be, may repel such doctrine\n as the heritage of an immoral in place of a moral sense, they\n will in the end find it impossible in this matter, as they have\n done in other matters, to contend against facts.\u201d\n\nWe have quoted the words of Dr. Maudsley at some length, in order to\nshow to what unjustifiable lengths the recent advocates of heredity are\ninclined to go.\n\nThe argument employed by Dr. Maudsley is very weak\u2014happily so, indeed;\nfor were his conclusions correct man\u2019s misdeeds would be neither\npunishable nor corrigible, any more than the blast of the tempest which\nstrews the shore with wrecks and desolation. They would be the necessary\noutcome of his constitution. The trouble is that Dr. Maudsley pushes to\nexcess a doctrine which has in it much that is true. We do not deny the\ndoctrine of hereditary impulses; we know that some are more prone to\nevil than others, that the moral lineaments are often transmitted from\nparent to child to no less an extent than physical traits and\nresemblances; but we know that free will remains throughout, and that,\nno matter how strong the impulse to do a certain act may be, the power\nto resist is unquestionable. Habit and association may render the will\npractically powerless, but, unless a man has lost the attributes of his\nrace, he never becomes absolutely irreclaimable. The allusion to grace\nand diabolical temptation is, to say the least, stupid. Dr. Maudsley\nknows as much about the matter, to all appearances, as the inhabitants\nof Patagonia. No theologian deserving the name ever asserted that man is\nswayed to good by grace alone, or equally moved to evil by the spirit of\ndarkness, without any will-activity. The doctrine would be just as\nsubversive of free-will and moral order as Dr. Maudsley\u2019s, and\nconsequently as absurd. The truth is that man\u2019s will has been weakened\nby his fall (_labefactata ac debilitata_), is weaker in some than in\nothers, but never becomes extinct, unless where the abnormal condition\nof insanity occurs. We regret that Mr. Dugdale accepts Dr. Maudsley as\nan authority and quotes approvingly the following words:\n\n \u201cInstead of mind being a wondrous entity, the independent source\n of power and self-sufficient cause of causes, an honest\n observation proves incontestably that it is the most dependent\n of all natural forces. It is the highest development of force,\n and to its existence all the lower natural forces are\n indispensably prerequisite.\u201d\n\nThis is simply scientific jargon. It conveys no meaning, and in reality\nsubstitutes new and more obscure terms for old and well-understood ones.\nWe are told to reject the \u201cwondrous entity\u201d mind, and to consider\ninstead all so-called mental operations as the outcome of force. In a\nprevious article[9] we pointed out the great diversity of meanings\nannexed to the word force, and proved that none of those who so glibly\nuse it have a clear conception of what it signifies. Mr. Dugdale further\naccepts the recent materialistic doctrine of Hammond, Vogel, and the\nso-called modern school of physiologists, who make will a mere matter of\ncerebral activity and cell-development.\n\nHis system of psychology is exceedingly brief and meaningless, and\ninvites the social reformer to deal with the criminal as the watchmaker\nwould deal with a chronometer out of repair, or as a ship-calker would\nattend to a vessel that had felt and suffered from the hard buffets of\nthe ocean. Now, while we utterly repudiate the doctrine which views the\ncriminal as a mere machine, we do not wish to reject any doctrine or\ntheory which facts sustain, and we accept the doctrine of heredity in\nthe sense we shall shortly mention, and contend that the facts justify\nits acceptance to no further extent.\n\nIn the first place, most people of good sense will admit that\nenvironment is a far more potent criminal factor than heredity, and that\nthe constant similarity of environments where heredity exists\ndisqualifies the observer for ascertaining the exact extent to which the\nlatter operates. The children of the vicious for the most part grow up\namid the surroundings which made their parents bad, and no child born of\nthe most depraved mother will fail to respond to healthful influences\nearly brought into play, unless an obviously abnormal condition exists.\nThe advocates of heredity in the ordinary sense point to the vast army\nof criminals propagated from one stock, and claim this to be an\nincontestable proof of their doctrine. But right in the way of this\nargument is the fact that it ignores similarity of environment, and that\nit overlooks the diversity of crimes. If the law of heredity were\nstrictly as stated by many writers, then the burglar would beget\nchildren with burglarious instincts, the pickpocket ditto, and so\nthroughout the whole range of crime. But nothing of this sort is the\ncase. The vicious descendant of a sneak-thief is as likely to be a\nhighwayman or a housebreaker as to follow the safer paternal pursuits.\nNo special propensities to commit crime are transmitted, but appetites\nare transmitted, and appetites beget tendencies and habits. Now, the two\nappetites which prove to be of most frequent transmission are the erotic\nand the alcoholic. The erotic precedes the alcoholic, and, indeed,\nexcites it to action. Mr. Dugdale says (p. 37): \u201cThe law shadowed forth\nby this scanty evidence is that licentiousness has preceded the use of\nardent spirits, and caused a physical exhaustion that made stimulants\ngrateful. In other words, that intemperance itself is only a secondary\ncause.\u201d And again: \u201cIf this view should prove correct, one of the great\npoints in the training of pauper and criminal children will be to pay\nspecial attention to sexual training.\u201d\n\nIt would appear, then, from this that heredity chiefly affects the\nerotic appetite, and through it the entire character. The impure beget\nthe impure, subject to improvement through grace and will-power, and,\ndespite of changed environments, the diseased appetite of the progenitor\nis apt to assert itself in the descendant, though it is not, of course,\nso apparent in the matter of the erotic passion as in the alcoholic.\nThese are the facts so far as they justify the view of crime as a\nneurosis. This conclusion, while harmonizing with the data of\nobservation, renders the solution of the question, What shall we do with\ncriminals? comparatively easy, and points to the best mode of treatment.\nUntil society holds that the virtue of purity is at the bottom of public\nmorality, and that the custom to look indulgently on the wicked courses\nof young men is essentially pernicious, we cannot hope to begin the work\nof reform on a sound basis. _Corrumpere et corrumpi s\u0153clum vocatur_ is\nas true to-day as eighteen hundred years ago, only now we call it\n\u201csowing wild oats.\u201d And how is this change to be wrought? By education?\nYes, by education, which develops man\u2019s moral character\u2014by that\neducation which gives to the community a Christian scholar, and not a\nmere intellectual machine. Mr. Richard Vaux, ex-mayor of Philadelphia,\nwho is a believer in Maudsley, and consequently an unsuspected\nauthority, speaks in these significant terms:\n\n \u201cWithout attempting to discuss the value of popular\n instruction for the youth, or to criticise any system of\n public or private education, we venture to assert that there\n are crimes which arise directly out of these influences, and\n which require knowledge so obtained to perpetrate. If the\n former suggestion be true, that the compression of the social\n forces induces to crime, then those offences which come from\n education are only the more easily forced into society by the\n possessed ability to commit such crimes. _If facts warrant\n this suggestion, then education\u2014meaning that instruction\n imparted by school-training\u2014is an agent in developing\n crime-cause...._ It is worthy of notice that a far larger\n number of offenders are recorded as having attended \u2018public\n schools\u2019 than those who \u2018never went to school.\u2019\u201d[10]\n\nThis is a startling exhibit, upheld, it seems, by undeniable figures. Is\nit possible that the state is engaged in \u201cdeveloping crime-cause,\u201d and\nthat it is for this purpose oppressive school-taxes are imposed? Alas!\nit is too true. The majority of those who get a knowledge of the three\n\u201cRs\u201d in our public schools come forth with no other knowledge. God is to\nthem a distant echo, morality a sham, and they finish their education by\ngloating over the blood-curdling adventures of pirates and cracksmen in\nthe pages of our weekly papers. Mr. Dugdale proposes some excellent\nmeans for the reclamation and reformation of the criminal, but they come\ntainted, and consequently much impaired, by his peculiar psychical\ntheories. On page 48 he says:\n\n \u201cNow, this line of facts points to two main lessons: the value\n of labor as an element of reform, especially when we consider\n that the majority of the individuals of the Juke blood, when\n they work at all, are given to intermittent industries. The\n element of continuity is lacking in their character; enforced\n labor, in some cases, seems to have the effect of supplying this\n deficiency. But the fact, which is quite as important but less\n obvious, is that crime and honesty run in the lines of greatest\n vitality, and that the qualities which make contrivers of crime\n are substantially the same as will make men successful in honest\n pursuits.\u201d\n\nThese remarks are full of significance and point unmistakably to the\nnecessity of supplying work to the vicious. Hard work is the panacea for\ncrime where healthful moral restraints are absent. The laborer expends\nwill-force and muscular force on his work, and has no inclination for\ndeeds of violence or criminal cunning. But how absurd it is to suppose\nthat, as an educational process, its whole effect consists in the\nchanged development of cerebral cells, and not, as is obviously true, in\nthe fatigue which it engenders! Mr. Dugdale thus sets forth the\nphilosophy of his educational scheme for the reformation of the criminal\n(p. 49):\n\n \u201cIt must be clearly understood, and practically accepted, that\n the whole question of crime, vice, and pauperism rests strictly\n and fundamentally upon a physiological basis, and not upon a\n sentimental or a metaphysical one. These phenomena take place,\n not because there is any aberration in the laws of nature, but\n in consequence of the operation of these laws; because disease,\n because unsanitary conditions, because educational neglects,\n produce arrest of cerebral development at some point, so that\n the individual fails to meet the exigencies of civilization in\n which he finds himself placed, and that the cure for unbalanced\n lives is a training which will affect the cerebral tissue,\n producing a corresponding change of career.\u201d\n\nThis is downright materialism, and is the result of Mr. Dugdale\u2019s hasty\nacceptance of certain views put forward by a school of physiologists who\nimagine that their science is the measure of man in his totality. We\nadmit that crime is closely connected with cerebral conditions, that the\nbrain is the organ of manifestation which the mind employs, and that\nthose manifestations are modified to a considerable extent by the\ncondition of the organ. But this does not interfere with the character\nof the mind viewed as a distinct entity; indeed, it rather harmonizes\nwith the facts as admitted by the universal sentiment of mankind. Mr.\nDugdale makes a fatal mistake when he supposes that a changed cerebral\nstate may be accompanied by a change in the moral character; for it is\npossible that a chemist may one day discover some substance or\ncombination of substances which might supply the missing cells or\nstimulate the arrested growth. Man is not a machine; neither is he a\nmere physiological being. He is a rational animal, consisting of a soul\nand a body, two distinct substances hypostatically united; and until\nthis truth is recognized no reform can be wrought in the ranks of the\ncriminal classes by even greater men than Mr. Dugdale. If the \u201cwhole\nprocess of education is the building up of cerebral cells,\u201d admonitions,\ninstructions, and example are thrown away on the vicious. There is\nnaught to do but to \u201cbuild up cells\u201d and stimulate \u201carrested cerebral\ndevelopment.\u201d How false is this daily experience proves; for we know\nthat a salutary change of prison discipline often converts brutal and\nhardened criminals into comparatively good men. Take as an instance what\noccurred in the _Maison de Correction de N\u00eemes_ in 1839. This prison was\nin charge of certain political favorites who were fitter to be inmates\nthan officials. Mismanagement reigned supreme, and the excesses\ncommitted by the prisoners can scarcely be believed. The most revolting\ncrimes were done in broad daylight, not only with the connivance but at\nthe instigation of the keepers. At last things had come to such a pass\nthat the government was compelled to interfere, and, having expelled the\nunworthy men in charge, substituted for them a small band of Christian\nBrothers under the control of the late venerable Brother Facile, when an\namazing change soon ensued. There was no question with the brothers of\nstudying the increase of cerebral cells or stimulating arrested\ndevelopment. They changed the dietary for the better; they separated the\nmost depraved from those younger in crime; they punished with\ndiscrimination; they encouraged good conduct by rewards; they set before\nthe convict the example of self-sacrificing, laborious, and mortified\nlives; and in three weeks they converted this pandemonium into the model\nprison of France.\n\nCan these facts be made to accord with the statement that the whole\nprocess of education is \u201cbuilding up of cerebral cells\u201d? If Mr. Dugdale\nwould substitute the term \u201cmoral faculties\u201d for \u201ccerebral cells,\u201d he\nwould theorize much more correctly and to better practical effect.\nSpeaking of subjecting the growing criminal to a system of instruction\nresembling the _Kindergarten_, he says:\n\n \u201cThe advantage of the _Kindergarten_ rests in this: that it\n coherently trains the sense and awakens the spirit of\n accountability, building up cerebral tissue. It thus organizes\n new channels of activity through which vitality may spread\n itself for the advantage of the individual and the benefit of\n society, and concurrently endows each individual with a\n governing will.\u201d\n\nWe agree with Mr. Dugdale that such a system of training is well\ncalculated to bring about these results, but certainly not in the manner\nhe indicates. Let us translate his language into that which correctly\ndescribes the process of improvement in the criminal, and we find it to\nbe as follows:\n\nLet the subject on whom we are to try the system of training in question\nbe a boy of fourteen rescued from the purlieus of a large city. His\neducation must be very elementary indeed. His intellectual faculties are\nto be treated according to their natural vigor or feebleness, but his\nmoral faculties are especially to be moulded with care and watchfulness.\nHe has been accustomed to gratify his evil passions and to yield to\nevery propensity. The will, therefore, is the weakest of his faculties,\nand constant efforts must be made to strengthen it. With this view he\nshould be frequently required to do things that are distasteful to him,\nbeginning, of course, with what is easy and what might entail no\ndiscomfort on the ordinary boy. The will is thus gradually strengthened,\nboth by this direct exercise and by the reaction upon it of the\nintellect, which is undergoing a concurrent training.\n\nThis is all that Mr. Dugdale means to convey when his words are\ntranslated into ordinary language. When he dismounts from his scientific\nhobby, however, he imparts counsel for the treatment of criminals which\nwe heartily endorse. Thus, in speaking of industrial training, he says\n(p. 54): \u201cThe direct effect, therefore, of industrial training is to\ncurb licentiousness, the secondary effect to decrease the craving for\nalcoholic stimulants and reduce the number of illegitimate children who\nwill grow up uncared for.\u201d He tells us that with the disappearance of\nlog-huts and hovels\u2014and, we might add, the reeking tenements of our\ncities\u2014lubricity will also disappear. This is true to a great extent,\nbut surely it is not all that is required. We might cultivate the\n\u00e6sthetic tastes to the utmost, we might have a population dwelling in\npalaces and lounging in luxurious booths, and be no better morally than\nthose who, while enjoying those privileges, tolerated the mysteries of\nthe _Bona Dea_ and assisted at the abominations which have made the city\nof Paphos the synonym of every iniquity. All attempts at the reformation\nof our criminal classes without the instrumentality of religion will\nprove unavailing. You may \u201cmake clean the outside of the cup and of the\ndish, but within you are full of rapine and uncleanliness.\u201d These words\nwill for ever hold true of those who inculcate and pretend to practise\nmorality without religion. The attempt has often been made, and has as\noften signally failed, so that we regard the presentation of proof here\nsuperfluous. The student of the history of social philosophy is well\naware of the truth of this principle, and none but the purblind or the\nunwilling fail to perceive it. Religion is the basis of morality, and\nmorality the pivot of reform. Let the friends of the criminals recognize\nthese fundamental truths, and they may then hope to make some progress\nin their work. Then it will be time to defend and demonstrate the merits\nof the congregate system of imprisonment; then we might with profit\ninsist upon the proper classification of prisoners, the necessity of\nproportioning penalty to offence, and not blasting the lives of mere\nboys by sending them for twenty years to Sing Sing for a first offence,\nthus compelling them to consort with ruffians of the most hardened\ndescription during the period which should be the brightest of their\nlives. Then all those reforms which philanthropists are ever planning\nmight be wisely introduced, but not till then can we hope for the\nmillennium of true reform to dawn upon us.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n RELIGION IN JAMAICA.\n\nThe population of Jamaica numbers about half a million, of whom nearly\nfour-fifths are blacks, one hundred thousand colored people, and only\nthirteen thousand Europeans. In addition to these there are several\nthousand Cubans and Haytians, who have been driven from their homes by\npolitical troubles, some thousands of Indian coolies, and a few Chinese\nand Madeira Portuguese.\n\nOf this motley population only a few thousand are Catholics. The greater\npart of the English belong to the Church of England, which, however, has\nbeen disestablished in Jamaica for some years. These enjoy the full\nbenefit of the usual High Church and Low Church party warfare. One of\nthe leading clergy of this denomination has started a monthly paper in\nJamaica, called the _Truth-Seeker_. It is to be hoped that he may be\nsuccessful in his search. The last number which the writer saw contained\narguments in favor of spiritualism, hom\u0153opathy, and Extreme Unction. The\neditor is a vegetarian and teetotaler, and is said to have employed in\nthe communion service, as a substitute for wine, the juice of a few\ngrapes squeezed into a tumbler of water. When the bishop was asked about\nit he made a wry face and expressed a hope that he might never receive\nthe communion in his teetotal friend\u2019s church again. This reminds us of\nan incident related by a Church of England parson. He arrived at\nKingston by the mail steamer from England on a Sunday morning, and duly\nbetook himself to a church. It happened to be communion Sunday, and he\n\u201cstayed.\u201d He noticed that most of the white people went up to receive\nfirst, and that the few who neglected to do so, and who communicated\nwith the negroes, came back to their seats screwing up very wry faces.\nOur friend solved the mystery when, going up nearly last, he found that\nhis black friends\u2019 lips had imparted such a flavor to the cup that he\ndid not lose the taste of it for hours!\n\nBut the most popular sect amongst the blacks is the Baptist. The Baptist\nministers are credited with having been the cause of the insurrection a\ndozen years ago, which was attended with so much bloodshed. Their great\nrecommendation to the people appears to consist in their teaching\nvirtually that the country belongs to the black man, and that the whites\nendeavor to defraud them of their rights by giving them insufficient\nwages and by other means. The consequence is that the negroes frequently\ndefraud their employers by theft, shirking work, injuring their\nproperty, and so forth.\n\nThe Wesleyans and Presbyterians have large followings. There are also\nsome Moravian stations. After a certain term of years the Moravian\nmissionary is judged worthy to be rewarded with connubial bliss, and a\nspouse is selected by the authorities in Europe and sent out to him. The\nJews are numerous and opulent, a great part of the commerce of the\ncountry being in their hands. But they are said to be very indifferent\nas to their religion, Jewish ladies often marrying people of other\nreligions and ending by professing none at all.\n\nIt is pleasant to turn from these conflicting sects to consider the\nCatholic Church. Kingston, the capital of Jamaica, contains forty\nthousand people, and of these seven thousand are Catholics. The Jamaica\nmission is in the hands of the Jesuits. They do not number more than\nhalf a score, and are consequently hardly worked. They have a convenient\nhouse, popularly called the \u201cFrench College,\u201d though there is only one\nFrench priest there. Attached to it is a small college for the education\nof Catholic youths, but several Protestants are permitted to benefit by\nthe instruction there given. In the little chapel at the back of the\nhouse the Blessed Sacrament is reserved. Among the priests is a\nvenerable man whose tall, ascetic figure commands universal respect. He\nwas formerly a Protestant clergyman, a fellow of his college at Oxford,\nand one of that remarkable band of men who founded the Oxford or\nTractarian party. His quiet, instructive sermons are of a very high\norder, simple, admirably expressed, and pregnant with matter. Equally\nbeloved is a white-headed French priest who has labored in Kingston for\nthirty years, and who endeared himself to all by his indefatigable\ndevotion to the sick and dying during a terrible epidemic of yellow\nfever which raged there some years ago. He is well acquainted with, and\nsympathizes in, the joys and sorrows of all the congregation, and, in\nspite of a strong French accent which renders his conversation nearly\nunintelligible to a stranger, all seem to understand him perfectly.\nThere are several younger priests who conduct the college, and one\ndevotes his energies especially to work amongst the Cubans. There is\nalso an excellent lay brother, a convert from Protestantism, who\npresides over a school for the children of poor Catholics. The church,\ndedicated to the Holy Trinity, is a plain brick structure, like all the\nchurches and chapels in Kingston, but it is distinguished from the\nothers by crosses on the gable ends. There are two side altars in\naddition to the high altar. The latter is handsomely adorned, and above\nit is a rose-window of stained glass. There is a good attendance at the\ndaily Masses, which are said from five to half-past six, the\ncongregation consisting mainly of black or colored people.\n\nBesides the large church there is a smaller one dedicated to St. Martin,\nand commonly called the \u201cCuban Chapel,\u201d because it is employed\nespecially for their use. Spanish sermons are preached there at the\neight o\u2019clock Mass on Sundays. At the commencement of the month of May a\nhandsome new altar was built and High Mass celebrated, the church being\ncrowded with devout worshippers.\n\nNear the large church is a convent with a private chapel, the nuns\ndevoting themselves to the education of a number of young ladies, mostly\nHaytians, who reside with them.\n\nA mile from the town is the camp of the First West India Regiment, a\ncorps of Black Zouaves. Some of them being Catholics, Mass is said there\non Sundays by a priest from Kingston. Another goes on alternate Sundays\nto Port Royal, a few miles from Kingston, where the guard-ship, the\n_Aboukir_, is stationed, and says Mass for the Catholic seamen.\n\nThe whole of the remainder of the island is served by three priests, who\nlead a most arduous life, constantly riding or driving from one station\nto another. Newcastle, a beautiful place in the Port Royal mountains\nnearly four thousand feet above the sea, is the station of the\nThirty-fifth Regiment of the Line, and Mass is said here on alternate\nSundays by a young priest who has just arrived from England, and\nreplaced a stalwart father who was formerly senior captain in his\nregiment. Another extensive district is served by a worthy Belgian\nfather with venerable beard and simple manners. This apostolic man rides\nlong distances, often having to ford dangerously swollen torrents, and\nfrequently having no lodging but the sacristy of a rural chapel, and no\nfood but a little yam and salt fish.\n\nBut the most experienced missionary in the island is the superior of the\nJesuits, who is vicar-apostolic. He has travelled about Jamaica on\nmissionary journeys for sixteen years, and boasts that he knows every\nroad and track in the country. He is generally beloved by Catholic,\nProtestant, and Jew alike, his genial manners and cheerful conversation\nmaking him a welcome guest everywhere, and his medical skill (for he was\na physician before he joined the Society of Jesus) having enabled him to\nconfer material benefits on many suffering persons. He has always led an\nactive life, and is especially fond of relating his reminiscences of the\nsiege of Sebastopol, where he was senior Catholic chaplain to the\nBritish forces. He drives about in a buggy, with spare horses following\nunder the charge of his servant, or \u201cboy,\u201d who rides on horseback. The\nJamaica horses are small, poor-looking animals, costing little, and very\nhardy and inexpensive, but they are capable of a great deal of trying\nwork.\n\nTo reach Kingston for the confirmation on Pentecost Sunday, the good\nfather had to drive for some miles over a road on which the water had\nrisen from a neighboring river to such an extent that it was as high as\nthe axles, and sometimes even came into the buggy. Fording swollen\nstreams on horseback in the rainy season is often very dangerous work.\nThis father having one day with difficulty crossed such a stream, a\nnegro, who had been watching him all the time, told him that he was the\nfirst person who had succeeded in crossing there for some days, three\nmen who had attempted it having been drowned.\n\n\u201cWhy didn\u2019t you tell me, then?\u201d asked the priest.\n\n\u201cMy sweet minister, me want to see what you do.\u201d\n\nNot that the man bore him any malice, but these people seem to be\ntotally reckless of human life.\n\nIf he can be said to have any home, the vicar-apostolic lives in a\npretty little house on the northwest coast. It is about a mile from the\nsea, but some hundreds of feet above it, and commands a magnificent view\nof the well-wooded hills, the sea, and the numerous small islands\ncovered with mangroves. Near the house is a small oratory, built as a\ncoach-house. It is very plain, and yet unpaved, the congregation\nkneeling on small pieces of board placed on the earth. Attached to the\nhouse is a pen, or grazing farm, of about seven hundred acres. It is for\nthe most part overgrown with bush, the property having been much\nneglected; but strenuous efforts are being made to set it in good order,\nand not without success. It is hoped that it will eventually realize\nsufficient to support four or five missionary priests, which will be a\ngreat advantage to the church in Jamaica, as the mission there is very\npoor. The property was left to the church by a Catholic gentleman who\nresided on it and died some few years ago. It now supports about one\nhundred head of cattle, besides which it is planted with a number of\npimento, lime, and cocoanut trees, the fruits of which are of value.\n\nA private chapel, which stands in the grounds of a gentleman who resides\non one of the most beautiful pens in the island, is well worthy of\nmention. This gentleman is a convert and has done much for the church.\nHis chapel is the most charming little rustic oratory imaginable, the\nchancel screen and other wood-work being made of rough twisted branches\nof trees, and the staircase to the gallery consisting of the trunk of a\npine tree with steps cut in it. On the Sundays when Mass is said here\nthe Catholics from eight or ten miles round drive or ride in, and the\nchapel is sometimes nearly filled. After Mass they take their dinner,\nwhich they have brought with them, and walk about and admire the\nbeautiful garden, the hospitable proprietor and the ladies of the family\nsaying kind words of welcome to their humbler friends. An hour after\nMass there is rosary and benediction, after which the people return to\ntheir distant homes.\n\nBut not always can a church be had for Mass. In some places a room in a\nprivate house is all that can be obtained, and the Catholics of the\nneighborhood, having been warned by letter of the intended service,\nassemble at the appointed hour. The priest will sit in one room to hear\nconfessions, whilst the people wait in an adjacent one, where a\nsideboard or table is prepared as an altar. After Mass will often follow\nbaptisms, marriages, or confirmations. But the great work before the\nchurch in Jamaica now is to form stations with churches where Mass may\nbe celebrated at stated times. Several such are already established, and\nthings are better than formerly, when the Holy Sacrifice had often to be\noffered up in the houses of Protestants. But much has yet to be done,\nand there is good reason to hope that the time will come when the small\nJamaica church will develop into a flourishing diocese. In spite of the\nprevalent indifference as to religion, some of the Protestants are\nbeginning to see that truth is not to be obtained in their conflicting\nsects, and they are turning their eyes Romeward in search of peace.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n MARGUERITE.\n\n\u201cFrogs, fresh frogs! Buy a few frogs!\u201d cried a sweet girl\u2019s voice, which\nblended strangely with the other sounds and voices round about the\nlittle booth near Fulton Market. \u201cFrogs, fresh frogs!\u201d\n\n\u201cRide up, gentlemen, ride up!\u201d\n\n\u201cMove on quick, move on!\u201d\n\n\u201cLook out, mister, or I\u2019ll run over you!\u201d\n\nAnd on the \u2019buses and drays and express-wagons rumbled and rolled, and\nthe policeman screamed himself hoarse trying to keep the great\nthoroughfare clear; the mud, which was knee-deep, flew in all\ndirections, the jaded horses floundered and fell in the grimy slough,\nand \u2019twas Pandemonium indeed just here where pretty Marguerite\u2019s\nfrog-stand stood. But the girl, who was used to the bustle and din, went\non quietly knitting a stocking and calling out, \u201cFrogs, fresh frogs! Buy\na few frogs!\u201d while her words, like a strain of sweet music, floated\naway upon the muggy April air, heavy with oaths and villanous cries.\n\nWe have called our heroine pretty; yet this was not strictly true. Many\na young woman passed through the market with more beautiful features\nthan she had. Her nose was of no particular shape\u2014we might term it a\nneutral nose\u2014and her mouth was decidedly broad; while the tall, white\ncap she wore gave her a quaint, outlandish appearance that made not a\nfew people stare and smile. But Marguerite\u2019s eyes redeemed, ay, more\nthan redeemed, whatever was faulty in the rest of her countenance. Oh!\nwhat eyes she had\u2014so large and black and lustrous. Like two precious\nstones they seemed; and when she turned them wistfully upon you, you\nwere fascinated and rooted to the spot, and if the girl ever sold any\nfrogs it was thanks to those wonderful eyes.\n\nPoor thing! at the age of seventeen to be left an orphan, alone and\nfriendless in the big city of New York. Poor thing! From the Battery up\nto Murray Hill, and across from river to river, not a solitary being\nknew or cared about her; and had she died\u2014died even a violent,\nsensational death\u2014the coroner\u2019s inquest would have taken up scarce three\nlines in the daily papers, after which, like a drop of water falling\ninto the ocean, she would have passed out of sight and mind for ever.\n\nBut no, we are wrong; there was one who did care for Marguerite\u2014one who\nhad known her parents when they first came over from France, and had\ndone everything she could to help them. But, alas! down in the whirlpool\nof poverty husband and wife had disappeared and died, and many a pang\nshot across Mother Catherine\u2019s breast as she thought of the child left\nnow to shift for herself like so many other waifs.\n\nThe girl\u2019s home was in a tenement-house, and the room where she slept\nwas shared by three other women, who would have made it a filthy,\ndisorderly place indeed except for Marguerite. Every morning she swept\nthe floor, opened the window to let in fresh air, and imparted a cosey\nlook to what would otherwise have been the most squalid chamber in the\nbuilding. By her mattress hung a crucifix, a gift from Mother Catherine,\nand near the crucifix was a piece of old looking-glass which Marguerite\nhad found in a dust-barrel. Before this she would daily spend a quarter\nof an hour making her toilet. Her dark hair was neatly gathered up\nbeneath her Norman cap\u2014only one little tress peeping out; across her\nbosom was pinned a clean white kerchief; the mud-spots were carefully\nbrushed off her tattered gown; then, after lingering a moment to admire\nherself, she would sally forth, the envy of all the slatterns in the\nneighborhood, and the boys would wink to one another and say: \u201cWhat a\nnice-looking gal!\u201d\n\nMarguerite often wished that she had a better class of admirers than\nthese. \u201cBut, alas!\u201d she would sigh, \u201cI am poor. Poverty like a mountain\npresses me down. If I could sell more frogs and get a new dress, then\nreal gentlemen might notice me. But, alas! I must be thankful I have\nthis old calico thing to cover me. But even this is falling in rags, and\nI may soon be without shoes to my feet.\u201d\n\nOne day, while she was thus inwardly bemoaning her hard lot and crying\nout: \u201cFrogs, fresh frogs! Buy a few frogs!\u201d without having anybody come\nto buy even a dime\u2019s worth, her attention was drawn to a middle-aged\nman, dressed in a faded suit of black, who had paused on his way up the\nstreet, and seemed to be listening with wonder to her cry.\n\nHe was not at all handsome, yet there was something very striking about\nhim, and you would have marked him out in a crowd as one who did not\nfollow in the beaten ways of other men.\n\nWhen he first halted, his thin, wan face had assumed an air of surprise;\nbut presently, advancing nearer to the booth, this changed to an\nexpression of melancholy which caused the girl to feel pity for him.\n\n\u201cAre you selling frogs, miss\u2014frogs?\u201d he said, fixing his deep, sunken\neyes upon her.\n\n\u201cYes, sir. Would you like a few?\u201d replied Marguerite, her heart\nfluttering with hope.\n\n\u201cWell, now, I thought I had eaten almost everything that is eatable; but\nupon my word this does go a little beyond my experience,\u201d said Abel Day,\nas he bent down to examine the delicate white frogs\u2019 legs, which were\nranged in rows, tastefully fringed with a border of parsley leaves. \u201cBut\nare you sure they are what you say they are? No toads among them?\u201d\n\n\u201cWe don\u2019t eat toads in France, sir,\u201d returned Marguerite, the blood\nmounting to her cheeks.\n\n\u201cIn France! Why, are you from France?\u201d\n\n\u201cI am. _O la belle France!_ And father and mother used to keep a\nfrog-stand in Rouen; and they had a fine mushroom garden there, too. But\nfolks here don\u2019t know what is good to eat. Oh! I wish my parents had\nnever come to America; and so did they wish it before they died.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, what sort of a place is France?\u201d inquired the other, who began to\nfeel interested in the girl.\n\n\u201cI was very young, sir, when I left it; therefore I cannot describe it\nto you. But I know France is a beautiful country. It must be beautiful;\nno country in all the world can compare with it. Father and mother used\nto drink wine in France.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, people here drink wine, too, sometimes.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo they? All those I know drink nasty water or else horrid whiskey,\u201d\nsaid Marguerite, making a wry mouth.\n\n\u201cHumph! you are the first I ever met who didn\u2019t like America,\u201d pursued\nAbel Day. \u201cHowever, I\u2019ll not let this set me against you; so what is the\nprice of your frogs?\u201d\n\n\u201cHow many do you wish?\u201d inquired Marguerite, who hardly expected him to\ntake over a quarter of a dollar\u2019s worth at most.\n\n\u201cLet me have the whole lot.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, will four dollars be too much?\u201d she said hesitatingly.\n\n\u201cHere is your money,\u201d answered Abel, drawing forth the sum. \u201cAnd now,\nwhile you are wrapping up these funny-looking creatures\u2014verily, I might\ntake \u2019em for little pigmies just ready for a swim\u2014please tell me how\nbusiness is.\u201d\n\n\u201cBad, sir. It always is with me; and I sometimes think of giving it up.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd trying something else? Well, now, take my advice\u2014don\u2019t. This\nbusiness can be made to pay as well as any other. All that\u2019s wanted is\nto know how to go about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! I\u2019d be only too thankful if you\u2019d tell me what to do,\u201d exclaimed\nMarguerite. \u201cToo thankful; for I\u2019m almost in despair.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, then, open your ears, and I\u2019ll give you a \u2018wrinkle\u2019 that\u2019ll set\nyou on the highroad to prosperity.\u201d Here Abel lifted his forefinger;\nthen, after clearing his throat, \u201cMy young friend,\u201d he went on, \u201cyou\nmust know that the world is largely composed of fools. Of course it\nwouldn\u2019t do to tell \u2019em so; nevertheless, it\u2019s the truth, though they\nare not to be blamed for it\u2014not a bit. We are born what we are; we don\u2019t\nmake ourselves. A pumpkin can be nothing but a pumpkin; a genius is a\ngenius. And this makes the world all the more interesting, at least to\nme. Why, what a dull place \u2019twould be if we were all alike! Oh! I do\nlove to look down upon the broad pumpkin-field of humanity, and feel how\nfar, far above it some few men are elevated\u2014some very few.\u201d\n\n\u201cLike yourself,\u201d interposed Marguerite, with an air of seriousness, only\nbelied by a laughing gleam in her eyes.\n\n\u201cPlease let that pass; no digressions,\u201d said Abel, waving his hand. \u201cBut\ncome back now to where we started from\u2014namely, how to make the frog\nbusiness pay.\u201d Here he gave another cough. \u201cIn the first place, my young\nfriend, this booth is altogether too small. It not only doesn\u2019t allow\nyour frogs half a chance to be seen, but you yourself are almost hidden\ninside of it. And, speaking of yourself, do not be offended if I observe\nthat you have wonderfully attractive eyes, and a charming voice, and\nspirits which keep bright and cheerful no matter how cloudy the sky is.\nYes, this much I know, though I never met you before. Well, now, here is\nthe advice I give: Hire a small store close by; then have an immense\nsign-board hung over the entrance, with Frog Emporium painted on it in\ntwelve-inch letters, and let every letter be of a different color, so\nthat people will be attracted by it when they are a good block off. Then\nbeneath the words Frog Emporium, and on the left-hand side, you must\npaint a fat, contented old mother frog, squatting, at the edge of a\npond, watching a lot of merry tadpoles swimming about. This will\nrepresent maternal felicity. At the other end of the sign you may paint\na hungry-looking man with mouth wide open, and Mr. Bullfrog taking a\nheader down his throat, and screeching out as he goes down, \u2018This fellow\nknows what\u2019s good!\u2019 You should likewise get a cooking-stove, so as to\nhave a dainty dish of frogs all prepared for anybody who may come in and\nwish to taste them. There, now, is my plan; I submit it to your\nconsideration. Carry it out, and you\u2019ll soon find it difficult to supply\nall your customers.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, indeed, sir,\u201d answered Marguerite, \u201cI thank you from the bottom\nof my heart for the interest you take in me. But, alas! I am too poor to\npay the rent of ever so small a store; why, I couldn\u2019t even pay for such\na sign-board as you describe. In fact, if you knew how very narrow my\nmeans are, you would wonder that I can manage to keep alive.\u201d\n\n\u201cIs that so?\u201d said Abel, in a tone of compassion. \u201cWell, then, leave the\nsign to me; I will order it this very day, and the moment it is ready it\nshall be brought to you. I\u2019ll also go security for your rent.\u201d\n\nAt these words Marguerite\u2019s eyes filled with tears, glad tears, and,\nclasping one of his hands, she pressed it warmly; while Abel thought to\nhimself, \u201cHow full of sentiment she is! Poor creature!\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! what a blessed thing it is to be rich,\u201d exclaimed the girl\npresently. \u201cBut all rich people, sir, are not like you\u2014no, indeed.\u201d\n\n\u201cNever mind my wealth,\u201d said Abel; \u201cwe\u2019ll talk about that some other\ntime. Go ahead, now, and carry out my notion; put implicit trust in me.\nEverything will come out right in the end.\u201d\n\nAgain Marguerite pressed his hand\u2014her heart was too full for words\u2014after\nwhich Abel Day went away, promising to return before the week was ended\nto see how she was getting on. The girl followed him with her eyes until\nhe was lost to view, wondering who he could be. \u201cWell, whoever he is,\u201d\nshe thought to herself, \u201che is a real gentleman. True, his clothes are\nrather worn; but we cannot judge a man by his clothes. Yes, he is a real\ngentleman, and different from any other that I have ever seen. He didn\u2019t\nbeat me down in my price; no, he bought all my frogs and paid me what I\nasked. Anybody else would have forced me to take three dollars and a\nhalf or three dollars. I might even have let them go for two and a half.\nBut no, he isn\u2019t like other rich persons. And, oh! may God bless him and\nmake him happy; for I am sure from his looks there is something weighing\non his heart.\u201d\n\nDuring the next few days Marguerite\u2019s thoughts constantly turned upon\nher strange friend, who had evidently been in downright earnest and kept\nhis word; for the sign-board was promptly sent to her, and she could not\ncontain her delight when she saw it hanging above the doorway of the\nlittle store which she hired.\n\nTrue to his promise, Abel Day came soon again to visit Marguerite,\nbringing money wherewith to pay her month\u2019s rent in advance. It seemed\nto do him good to talk to her, and his face brightened when she told him\nhow many people had already entered the Frog Emporium. \u201cAnd every one,\nsir, who eats a plate of my frogs declares they are better than an\noyster-stew. And they say, too, that the sign-board makes them roar with\nlaughter and entices them in whether they will or no. O sir! how can I\nthank you enough for what you have done for me?\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t speak any thanks,\u201d replied Abel. \u201cNo, don\u2019t speak any; but show\nyour thanks by being good and virtuous. \u2019Tis getting down in the world\nleads so many to the bad. Ay, misery is the devil\u2019s best friend.\nTherefore, my dear girl, improve your condition as fast as you can. Put\nmoney in the savings-bank; then when you meet any poor wretch hard up,\nand you have the means to help him, do it.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! indeed I will,\u201d said Marguerite. \u201cBut now please, kind sir, let me\nknow the name of my benefactor. I wish to know it, that I may tell it to\nthe only other friend I have on earth\u2014Mother Catherine. She\u2019ll be sure\nto ask me who you are.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy name is Abel Day,\u201d he replied.\n\n\u201cAnd you live\u2014? Well, perhaps I shouldn\u2019t ask that, sir. Though if I did\nknow your address, I\u2019d slip into your kitchen some morning bright and\nearly, and cook you a nice mess of frogs for breakfast.\u201d Then, arching\nher pretty eyebrows: \u201cYou live in Fifth Avenue\u2014beautiful Fifth Avenue?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do, and yet I don\u2019t,\u201d answered Abel. \u201cI often see myself there,\ndwelling in a marble mansion; \u2019tis sure to happen\u2014so sure that I may\nconsider myself already in Fifth Avenue.\u201d Here, observing a puzzled look\nupon Marguerite\u2019s face, \u201cAh!\u201d he added, \u201cyou do not understand me. Well,\nnobody else does, either. But never mind. The world will wake up some\nfine morning and find the name of Abel Day on every lip. And \u2019tis all\ncoming out of here\u2014here.\u201d At these words he tapped his forehead. \u201cMy\nfortune will not be built on other men\u2019s misfortunes; \u2019twill not come\nthrough gambling in stocks, through swindling, through falsehood,\nthrough dishonor. But out of my brain the great thing is slowly but\nsurely taking shape and form which ere long will astound the world.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, truly, sir, I believe you. Oh! I do,\u201d exclaimed Marguerite, who\nfelt herself carried away by his own enthusiasm. \u201cI knew from the first\nmoment I laid eyes on you that you were an extraordinary man.\u201d\n\n\u201c\u2019Tis often thus,\u201d pursued Abel musingly. \u201cGenius is not seldom\nrecognized by the humble ones of earth, when those who dwell in high\nplaces, with ears and eyes stuffed and blinded by prosperity, have only\nfleers and gibes to give.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd would it be showing too much curiosity,\u201d inquired Marguerite, \u201cif I\nwere to ask what is this wonderful thing which I doubt not will bring\nyou in riches and renown? And certainly no one deserves these more than\nyourself; for but for you, oh! I shudder to think what might have become\nof me. My future was dark\u2014dark\u2014dark.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I have brightened it a little. Yet what is what I have done\ncompared with what remains to be done!\u201d said Abel, speaking like one who\nthinks aloud. \u201cO mystery of life! Why is there so much misery around\nme?\u201d Then, addressing Marguerite: \u201cWell, if you like, I will be here at\nfour o\u2019clock this afternoon, when I shall make clear to you what now you\ndo not comprehend. But, remember, it must be a profound secret; no other\nhuman being except yourself must know what I am inventing\u2014no other human\nbeing.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou will find, sir, that I can keep a secret,\u201d said Marguerite. \u201cSo\nplease come at the hour you mention.\u201d\n\nPunctual to the minute Abel Day was at the Frog Emporium, which was so\nthronged with customers that he had to wait half an hour for the girl.\nBut at length, the last frog being sold, off they went together; and as\nthey took their way along the streets Marguerite wondered whither he\nwould lead her. Would it be to some fashionable quarter of the city\u2014to\nsome place where quiet, well-mannered people dwelt? And as her companion\ndid not open his lips, she was left to her own hopes and conjectures,\nand kept wondering and wondering, until by and by she found herself,\nwith a slight pang of disappointment, in Tompkins Square. A few minutes\nlater the girl was following Abel Day into a third-class boarding-house,\nand, observing several scrawny females making big eyes at her as she\nmounted up to his room, which was on the top story, he whispered: \u201cThey\nare jealous of you, my dear; but pay no attention to them, and above all\ndo not reveal to any of these Paul Prys what I am going to show you.\u201d\n\nPresently they reached the door of his chamber, which he hastily\nunlocked, saying to Marguerite: \u201cPass in quick\u2014pass in quick\u201d; for Abel\nfancied he heard footsteps and voices close behind him.\n\nMarguerite obeyed and made haste into the room; then, while Abel was\nstuffing paper into the keyhole, she threw her eyes about her in utter\nastonishment.\n\nThe apartment was barely half the size of her own at the tenement\nbuilding; nor could it compare with it for order and neatness. Indeed,\n\u2019twas in the greatest disorder. Numberless slips of paper were strewn\nover the floor, with queer pencil-marks upon them, and the wall was\ncovered by the same odd drawings, especially near the bed, as though\nAbel did most of his brain-work after he retired for the night and\nbefore he arose in the morning. On a shelf by the window lay a\ndust-covered manuscript, and beside it a cigar-box half full of buttons,\ndimly visible through a spider\u2019s web.\n\nBut where was the wonderful machine he had told her about?\n\n\u201cHere it is,\u201d spoke Abel in a semi-whisper and drawing something out\nfrom under the bed.\n\n\u201cReally! Oh! do let me see,\u201d cried Marguerite, flying towards him.\n\n\u201cIt is almost finished,\u201d added Abel. \u201cBut pray lower your voice, for\nthere are listeners outside\u2014vile eavesdroppers.\u201d\n\nHe now went on to explain what this curious object was, which looked\nlike nothing so much as a big toy; for all the girl could perceive was a\nstuffed chicken sitting in a box, gaudily painted red, white, and blue.\n\n\u201cYou must know,\u201d said Abel, \u201cthat every time a hen lays an egg the very\nfirst thing she does is to turn and look at it, as if to make sure it is\nreally laid. Well, now, this machine which you behold is the Magic Hen\u2019s\nNest. There is a spring bottom to it, so that the instant the egg is\ndropped it will disappear. Then, when the fowl turns to see if it is\nthere\u2014lo! she\u2019ll find it isn\u2019t there. Whereupon, concluding she must\nhave made a mistake, like a good creature she\u2019ll sit down again, and\npresently out\u2019ll come egg number two, which will likewise vanish through\nthe trap. And so on and on and on, until\u2014well, really, I can\u2019t tell what\nmay happen in the end, for of course there is a limit to all good\nthings: the hen may lose her wits. But if she doesn\u2019t\u2014if she keeps her\nsenses, and if I can force her to continue laying and laying\u2014why, my\nfortune is made sure, and I\u2019d not change places with old Howe and his\nsewing-machine\u2014no, indeed I wouldn\u2019t.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, I declare!\u201d ejaculated Marguerite when Abel was through with the\nexplanation. \u201cThis is certainly a grand idea. Why, one hen will do the\nwork of a score of hens.\u201d\n\n\u201cOf five hundred,\u201d said Abel solemnly. \u201cAnd I wrote some time ago to a\ncouple of my acquaintances on Long Island, advising them to sell off\nevery hen on their farm except one. But they are not willing to follow\nmy advice; and, what\u2019s more, they both came here last week when I was\nout, and asked all kinds of questions about my health. The fools! But\nnever mind; it\u2019s all the worse for them, for just as soon as I get out\nmy patent down will go the price of hens to zero.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, upon my word, this is wonderful, wonderful!\u201d said Marguerite,\nkneeling and stroking the back of the stuffed chicken.\n\n\u201cAy, and I am filled with wonder at myself for having invented such a\nthing,\u201d continued Abel. \u201cBut it only shows what the brain of man can do.\nAnd yet what man is able to accomplish now is nothing compared with what\nhe will accomplish in the ages to come.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, what is needed, sir, to make this Magic Nest perfect? It seems to\nme to be in good working order.\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing remains to be done but to get a live hen and put it to the\nproof; though I have no more doubt of its success than I have of my own\nexistence.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, do let me be present when you make the trial. Will you?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, you may come, for you do not laugh and jeer at me like the rest of\nthe world; and, moreover, there is something soothing in your presence.\nOh! I believe if I had had you always by my side this Magic Nest would\nhave been ready long ago.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd when I come again,\u201d said Marguerite a little timidly, \u201cI\u2019ll put the\nroom in order\u2014may I?\u201d\n\nHere Abel\u2019s brow lowered; but quickly the dark look passed away, for she\nwas gazing so sweetly at him, and he said: \u201cYou perceive, then, that it\nis not in order? Well, you are right. I live all by myself and have no\ntime to sweep and dust\u2014no time.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll by yourself!\u201d repeated Marguerite compassionately.\n\n\u201cYes; and when evening comes round I light my candle and play at\nsolitaire, and listen to the cats caterwauling on the roof.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow lonely!\u201d exclaimed the girl.\n\n\u201cPerhaps it may be. Yet in solitude one hears and sees strange things. I\nlove solitude.\u201d\n\n\u201cReally?\u201d\n\n\u201cI do; nevertheless, I own \u2019twould be better in some respects not to\ndwell so much by myself. Therefore I give you leave to come here\nwhenever you please; yes, come and sweep and rummage and turn things\ntopsy-turvy, if you like.\u201d\n\nAt this Marguerite burst into a laugh.\n\n\u201cHa! probably you think my apartment is already topsy-turvy? Well, it\nonly seems so to you; to my eye there is perfect order in all this\nchaos.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd the buttons, sir, in yonder cigar-box\u2014\u201d\n\nMarguerite did not end the phrase; she hoped he would understand her,\nand Abel did.\n\n\u201cHumph! you have discovered those buttons, eh? Well, they came off my\nclothes. And here let me observe, my young friend, the next important\nthing to invent is a suit of clothes without any buttons.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, until you invent one, please allow me to sew those buttons on\nagain. Will you?\u201d\n\n\u201cAlas!\u201d replied Abel, \u201cthe shirts and coats and trousers to which they\nonce belonged are long since worn out; and now I have no clothes left\nbut the clothes I have on.\u201d\n\n\u201cThis was a very fine suit once,\u201d said Marguerite. \u201cThe cloth is\nexcellent.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, I had it made by a fashionable tailor; for I intended to wear it\nwhen I went to visit influential people, and try and interest them in\nmy\u2014in my\u2014\u201d\n\nHere Abel heaved a sigh, while a look of deeper gloom shadowed his face\nthan the girl had yet observed upon it.\n\n\u201cPray tell me what troubles you,\u201d said Marguerite. \u201cDo tell me. Perhaps\nI may be able to comfort you.\u201d Then, as he made no response, she went\non: \u201cHave those of whom you sought aid turned a cold shoulder upon you?\nHave they refused to help you with this Magic Hen\u2019s Nest? Why, I\nthought, sir, \u2019twas a profound secret; that you had told nobody about\nit.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no; I don\u2019t allude to this, but to something else\u2014to something\nwhich I cannot think of without an agony of mind I hope God may spare\nyou from ever suffering. I had forgotten all about it; I had not thought\nof it for ever so long, till our conversation brought it back to me. Oh!\ndo let me forget it\u2014forget it for ever.\u201d\n\n\u201cI guessed when I first saw you, poor dear man, that there was a heavy\nburden on your heart,\u201d spoke Marguerite inwardly. \u201cNow your own lips\nhave confessed it to me. Oh! if I only knew you better, I might be able\nto console you.\u201d\n\nShe refrained, however, from asking again what his cross was; but little\ndoubting that \u2019twas connected in some way with another invention, she\ndetermined on a future occasion to ask him to tell her the history of\nhis life. \u201cAnd who knows but I may find the means of bringing back the\nsmiles to his mournful visage. If I do, \u2019twill be a slight return for\nall the kindness he has shown me.\u201d\n\nHere Marguerite cast another glance about the forlorn-looking chamber,\nand wondered how he had been able to pay the first quarter\u2019s rent of her\nstore. \u201cHe must have pinched himself to do it,\u201d she thought to herself.\n\u201cOh! what other man in New York with only one suit of clothes would have\nbeen so generous?\u201d\n\nAnd now, ere she withdrew, her feelings got the better of her judgment,\nand she burst into a fervent expression of thanks for his great\nbenevolence and sympathy, and hoped that for her sake he had not\ndeprived himself of money which he really needed. But Abel sharply\ninterrupted her.\n\n\u201cDo not talk thus,\u201d he said, \u201cif you have true faith in my Magic Nest.\nPoor I may seem, but I consider myself rich\u2014ever so rich; a mountain of\ngold is within my reach. You ought to be convinced of it, yet still you\ndoubt.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! no, no; I don\u2019t doubt it for one moment,\u201d answered Marguerite, very\nmuch confused. \u201cPray, sir, be not offended at my words\u2014I forgot\u201d; then,\nlooking up in his face, \u201cBut I cannot help speaking what is in my heart.\nO sir! you are the dearest person to me in all the wide world.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, come here some evening and play at solitaire with me,\u201d said Abel\nin a milder tone. \u201cBut no, it won\u2019t be solitaire with you\u2014it will be\ntwo-handed euchre.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! I\u2019ll come most willingly. True, I know nothing about cards, but you\ncan teach me.\u201d\n\nThe girl now bade him adieu, and his parting words to her were:\n\n\u201cI will inform you when I am ready to experiment with the live hen. But,\nremember, breathe not a syllable of it to any human being.\u201d\n\nDuring the week which followed this visit to Abel Day\u2019s den\u2014as the other\nboarders called his room\u2014Marguerite did not see her benefactor. But\ndaily she looked for him, and he was seldom absent from her thoughts. He\nwas so vastly unlike other people\u2014the selfish, deceitful herd around\nher; loving solitude, yet evidently glad to have her with him; poor, yet\ncalling himself rich; full of bright hopes, yet a prey to melancholy.\nHis very singularities possessed a charm for the girl and made her long\nfor his coming.\n\n\u201cHe brings me into quite another world,\u201d she said; and while she was\nselling frogs (business at the Frog Emporium was increasing rapidly)\nMarguerite would indulge in pleasing reveries about good Abel Day. She\nalmost hoped that his fortune might not come too soon.\n\n\u201cYes, I should like him to stay awhile longer in his humble home, so\nthat I might have a chance to make it snug and cosey for him. We might\npass happy days there together\u2014happy days.\u201d\n\nAnd every morning and evening she knelt before her crucifix and prayed\nfor Abel.\n\nBut if Marguerite often thought of Abel Day, he did not think of her;\nno, not once during these seven days. Her presence had indeed flashed a\nray of light into the darkness of his soul; but it was like the coming\nand going of a meteor, and the instant she left him he relapsed into his\nsombre mood. The paper remained stuffed in the keyhole; ever and anon he\nwould utter a word to himself, but \u2019twas in a whisper; and thus from\nmorning till night, solitary and silent, he passed the time, seated on a\nbench with his hollow eyes fixed upon the Magic Nest\u2014inventing,\ninventing, inventing; for, although Abel had not told Marguerite, there\nwas still one little thing wanting to make the invention absolutely\nperfect.\n\nThen, when dusk approached and the first cat began to caterwaul, he\nwould get into bed, and there rack his brain for hours longer and until\nthe candle went out. People wondered how he managed to live without\neating; but a few crusts of bread sufficed to keep Abel alive, and \u2019twas\none of his odd fancies that we might in time bring ourselves to live\nwithout nourishment.\n\n\u201cOh! he is thinner than ever, poor dear man,\u201d exclaimed Marguerite, when\nshe saw Abel entering her store the next Monday afternoon; and he was\ncarrying a hen under his arm. Then, after the first warm greeting was\nover, she made haste to prepare a nice dish of frogs, which she invited\nhim to partake of. But Abel shook his head, and it was not until she had\nalmost gone on her knees that he finally placed the hen in her\nsafekeeping and sat down to the savory repast.\n\n\u201cOh! I\u2019m so glad you relish my frogs; everybody declares I cook so\nwell,\u201d said the girl, as she stood watching him.\n\n\u201cThe world thinks far too much about eating,\u201d returned Abel. \u201cIt is the\ngrossest act humanity can perform; and I believe if we tried we might\nexist without food.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, I hope that day is far off,\u201d said Marguerite; \u201cfor when it\narrives I\u2019ll have to close my business.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! true, I didn\u2019t think of that,\u201d said Abel, rising up from the table.\n\u201cBut now are you ready to accompany me and witness the triumph of my\nMagic Nest?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, indeed I am; I wouldn\u2019t miss it for anything,\u201d answered\nMarguerite; and so, telling a customer, who appeared just at this\nmoment, that the last Emporium frog was sold, not a single one left, she\nclosed the store and they departed.\n\n\u201cYou are happy to-day,\u201d observed the girl when they had gone half-way to\nTompkins Square, and hearing Abel give a laugh. \u201cOh! I\u2019m so glad. Let us\nalways try to be happy.\u201d But even as she spoke his countenance settled\nonce more into the old look, and, bending down (for Abel was rather\ntall), \u201cLearn this truth, my young friend,\u201d he said: \u201cNothing lies like\na laugh.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! no, no,\u201d exclaimed Marguerite, making bold to disagree with him;\n\u201cpeople only laugh when they feel happy. Laughter always tells the\ntruth. And since I have known you, sir, I laugh ever so much; for I have\nnow a good thick pair of shoes, and the water cannot soak in and wet my\nfeet. And don\u2019t you see, too, I have a new dress? And I am already\nlaying by money in the savings-bank; and it all comes from your\nbrilliant idea of setting up a Frog Emporium. Oh! yes, yes, I laugh a\ngreat deal now\u2014a very great deal.\u201d\n\nThen, as he made no response, she went on: \u201cYou are a genius, sir, a\ngenius!\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! you recognize in me the divine spark?\u201d murmured Abel, his visage\nfaintly brightening. \u201cWell, you are the first who has done so\u2014the very\nfirst\u2014and you shall share in my triumph; ay, half the gold-mine shall be\nyours.\u201d Then, after a pause, \u201cDo you know,\u201d he added, \u201cyou may ere long\nbe dwelling in Fifth Avenue and wearing diamonds and silks; though, if\nyou follow my advice, you will always dress plainly and never change\nyour pretty French cap for a fashionable hat full of feathers and\nribbons.\u201d\n\n\u201cReally!\u201d cried Marguerite, whose faith in Abel Day was unbounded.\n\u201cLiving in Fifth Avenue, beautiful Fifth Avenue!\u201d And she clapped her\nhands and skipped merrily along in front of him.\n\nBut presently from Abel\u2019s lips burst another laugh, and this time there\nwas something strange and wild about it which caused Marguerite to pause\nand look around; then, taking his hand, they walked on side by side in\nsilence, and oh! how much she wished that he might not appear so\nunhappy.\n\nAt length they reached Abel\u2019s home; and if Abel\u2019s fellow-boarders had\nstared with astonishment the first time they saw him mounting to his\nroom accompanied by a strange young woman, they made bigger eyes now as\nhe ascended the stairway with a hen under his arm; nor was it easy for\nMarguerite to keep a grave countenance when presently the chicken began\nto cackle; and the cackling of the chicken and the giggling of the\ninquisitive females, who were following at a proper distance, made a\nvery queer chorus.\n\n\u201cLet \u2019em laugh,\u201d growled Abel after he had entered his chamber and\nfastened the door\u2014\u201clet \u2019em laugh; my day of triumph is nigh, and then\nthey\u2019ll be the veriest sycophants at my feet. But I\u2019ll spurn them all;\nlet \u2019em laugh.\u201d\n\nAnd now began the trial of the Magic Nest; Abel first cautioning\nMarguerite to speak in an undertone, if she had anything to say. Gently,\nas tenderly as a mother might handle her baby, the fowl was placed in\nthe box; and forthwith she ceased to cackle, while the others ceased\neven to whisper. Then, motioning the girl to sit down on the bench, Abel\nstood beside her, awaiting with intense excitement the laying of the\nfirst egg. In a couple of minutes his brow was wet with perspiration,\nthen his whole face became moistened; and when, by and by, after what\nseemed an age\u2014\u2019twas only a quarter of an hour\u2014the hen did lay an egg,\nthen rose up to look at it, Abel trembled so violently that Marguerite\ninquired if he were ill. But without heeding her question he went on\ntrembling and saying, \u201cThe egg has vanished, vanished! and she can\u2019t\nbelieve her eyes\u2014she can\u2019t believe her eyes!\u201d And now for about a minute\nand a half it did really seem as if the hen, concluding she had made a\nmistake, was going to proceed and lay another egg, when, lo! she coolly\nstepped out of the box, and, after shaking her feathers, commenced\npecking the bits of paper scattered over the floor.\n\nWhen Abel Day perceived this his head swam a moment; then clenching his\nfists, and his cavernous eyes flashing fire, he sprang towards the\nchicken, and, forgetting all about eavesdroppers, he screamed loud\nenough to be heard from cellar to garret: \u201cI\u2019ll force you to do your\nduty! I will, I will!\u201d\n\nBut, as ill-luck would have it, the window was open, and out of it flew\nthe hen, so hotly pursued by Abel that he came within an ace of passing\nthrough it too; which had he done, his neck would certainly have been\nbroken, for Abel had no wings.\n\nThen, as if to make sport of him, the perverse creature perched herself\non a neighboring chimney, where she set up a loud cackling.\n\n\u201cHark, they are mocking me again! Hear them, hear them!\u201d groaned Abel\nDay, clapping his hands to his head. \u201cAnd the horror, too, is coming\nover me again: it always comes with those jeering voices.\u201d\n\n\u201cI hear nobody. Oh! I beg you to be calm,\u201d said Marguerite, now\nthoroughly alarmed on Abel\u2019s account. Then, leading him to the bench,\n\u201cWhat agitates you so, dear friend? Oh! do, do calm yourself and tell me\nwhat you fear.\u201d\n\nAbel sank down on the bench, and, after groaning once more, \u201cHark! hark!\nThey are mocking me,\u201d did not utter another word, hard though she urged\nhim to speak; but, with eyes glued to the Magic Nest, he remained dumb\nand motionless.\n\nThen by and by evening came, and the twilight deepened into night, yet\nstill Abel moved not, nor opened his lips, unless occasionally to heave\na sigh. Then the moon rose, and as its pale rays streamed into the room\nand fell upon the sufferer\u2019s face, it assumed an expression so unearthly\nthat Marguerite was filled with awe.\n\nAnd now a dreadful, startling thought occurred to her: her dear friend\nmight be mad! What a pang this gave her tender heart! What bright,\nnew-born hopes became suddenly blasted. How many fair castles in the air\ncrumbled away into ghostly ruins at the thought that Abel Day was mad!\n\n\u201cIs it possible,\u201d she asked herself, \u201cthat this good man\u2014he who has been\nso kind to me, whom I looked up to as one far, far above the cold,\nheartless world\u2014is it possible that he is bereft of reason?\u201d And even as\nMarguerite breathed these words she for the first time grew conscious of\nsomething glowing in her bosom more ardent than friendship for Abel Day.\n\n\u201cI love him,\u201d she murmured\u2014\u201cI love him. And no matter what people may\nthink of me, I\u2019ll stay by him and nurse him; I\u2019ll be his servant and\ntruest friend as long as he lives.\u201d\n\nTrying indeed was this night for Marguerite\u2014oh! very, very. It seemed as\nif it never would end. Nor did day bring any relief to her anxiety. The\nblessed, life-giving sunshine shimmered in; the chimney-swallows\ntwittered by the window; a stray bee, blown away by the morning breeze\nfrom his far-off hive, flew in and buzzed about the chamber; still Abel\nremained like one turned into stone, except for the deep-drawn sighs\nwhich ever and anon escaped his lips.\n\nAnd so this day passed, and so day followed day, without bringing any\nchange in his mysterious condition.\n\nOf course Marguerite was not with him the whole time. But she took care\nwhenever she quitted the room to lock the door; then she would hasten\nwith winged feet to the Frog Emporium, where she would spend four or\nfive hours; then back Marguerite hurried, hoping and praying that no ill\nhad befallen Abel during her absence. But while she was with the poor\nman she did more than simply watch him. The ugly pencil-marks were\nrubbed off the wall; the floor was thoroughly swept; the cobwebs were\nbrushed out of the corners; and many another thing which only woman\u2019s\nhand can do Marguerite did. On a little table, too (the only piece of\nfurniture besides the bench and bed), was spread a good, substantial\nmeal for Abel to eat the moment he felt hungry; and it amazed her to see\nhim fasting so long.\n\nWe need not say that everybody in the house had his curiosity now raised\nto the highest pitch; and the gossiping, prying females shook their\nvirtuous heads and muttered no complimentary things of Abel\u2019s faithful\nnurse.\n\n\u201cWell, they may say of me whatever they like,\u201d said the brave girl. \u201cMy\nconscience doesn\u2019t reproach me; it tells me I am doing right. When I was\ndown Abel Day helped me, and now, when he is down, I\u2019ll help him.\u201d\n\nAt length, one afternoon, weary of the long, unbroken silence of the\nchamber, Marguerite began to sing. The song was one she had learnt from\nher mother, and was called \u201cNormandie, ch\u00e8re Normandie.\u201d She had a rich\ncontralto voice, and the effect which the melody wrought upon Abel was\nsomething perfectly marvellous; and as her face happened to be turned\ntowards his, she noticed the change at once, and her eyes filled with\nglad tears.\n\n\u201cGlory! glory! I am escaping from the infernal regions; the darkness and\nthe voices are leaving me. Thank God! thank God!\u201d he cried. And\nMarguerite, only too happy to rouse him out of his lethargy, continued\nsinging for well-nigh half an hour. Then, placing herself beside him on\nthe bench, she gave way to her joy in laughter and merry talk, while\nAbel\u2019s countenance wore an expression almost radiant, and, resting one\nof his hands on her head as a father might have done, \u201cAll is blue sky\nat last,\u201d he said. \u201cI feel as I have not felt in many a day. Oh! had I\nhad you always with me, the demons would never have shrieked in my ears;\nyour angelic songs would have driven them away.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, you can\u2019t imagine,\u201d returned Marguerite, \u201chow happy it makes me\nto make you happy.\u201d Then, after a pause: \u201cBut now, dear friend, I have a\nfavor to ask: I wish you to tell me the history of your life; for there\nis a mystery in it\u2014I am sure there is. Do tell it to me. Not that I am\ncurious, but I firmly believe \u2019twill do you good to let me carry a part\nof the burden which has almost crushed you down.\u201d\n\n\u201cFool, fool that I was to live all by myself so many years!\u201d spoke Abel\nin a musing tone, and paying no heed to her request. \u201cThe mocking voices\ncannot abide cheerful company; it frightens them off.\u201d Then, turning to\nMarguerite: \u201cYou\u2019ll not let them come back, will you?\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are dreaming,\u201d answered the girl, patting his hand. \u201cWhy, this room\nwas still as the tomb until I began to sing.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no, it wasn\u2019t; I heard them all the while.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, don\u2019t fear them any more. I\u2019ll stay with you; I\u2019ll be your\ncanary, your nightingale, your musical box,\u201d she said with a merry\nlaugh. \u201cSo pray begin and give me a little of your past history; for the\nsooner you begin the sooner you\u2019ll end, and then I\u2019ll sing another\nsong.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, well, to please you I\u2019ll do anything. Therefore learn that I was\nborn in Massachusetts. But of my early years I need say very little. My\nfather died when I was a child; at the age of fourteen I had to shift\nfor myself, and from that time on it was a hard struggle against\npoverty. Somehow I didn\u2019t succeed in anything I put my hand to. I tried\nthis thing and that; I tried everything almost, but was always\nunfortunate. And, do you know, I believe in luck. Oh! I do. Some are\nborn with it, others are not; and these last will turn out failures, be\nthey ever so honest and hard-working. Well, undoubtedly I belong to the\nunlucky ones; and, what\u2019s more, I verily believe there is such a thing\nas having too much brains. Why, many a pumpkin-headed fellow I used to\nknow is to-day a millionaire\u2014can\u2019t explain it, but there\u2019s the fact;\nwhile I am\u2014well, you see what I am, and I have reached middle life; and\nmy miserable home\u201d\u2014here he threw a glance around the room; then,\nclasping his hands: \u201cBut dear me, what has happened? Is this my den?\nWhy, how changed it looks!\u201d\n\n\u201cI have been turning things topsy-turvy,\u201d answered Marguerite, with a\ntwinkle in her eye. \u201cBut pray don\u2019t stop to admire the change. Please go\non; I am so interested.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, finally, after trying everything,\u201d continued Abel, \u201cand, as I\nhave observed, failing in everything I tried, I one day bethought myself\nof turning inventor. And the more I thought about it the more confident\nI felt that I should succeed; indeed, I passed a whole week in a\ndelightful reverie, wherein I saw myself wealthy and famous, and all\nfrom one single invention. Then, when this dreamy, happy week was gone\nby, I set about inventing a Patent Log\u2014a thing very much needed by\nmariners; for the present method of determining the speed of a vessel is\nboth clumsy and unreliable. \u2019Twas here in this chamber, on this bench, I\nbegan my brain labor, and for a while I made excellent progress. But\nafter a couple of months I got tired of sitting up and took to my bed,\nwhere I used to lie inventing\u2014inventing all day long, and even all night\ntoo. I seemed to be able to do without sleep; until one evening\u2014oh! I\u2019ll\nnever forget it\u201d\u2014here he paused and shuddered\u2014\u201cone evening the room\nbecame suddenly full of voices. From under the bed, through the keyhole\nand window, down the chimney, on every side of me these horrible voices\nwere yelling and screeching, \u2018He\u2019ll never succeed\u2014never succeed\u2019; \u2018Born\nto ill-luck\u2019; \u2018All time wasted\u2019; \u2018He\u2019ll go to the dogs and hang\nhimself!\u2019 What happened after this terrible moment I can\u2019t say; I must\nhave gone off into a fever. I remember nothing. All I know is that one\nday\u2014but how long afterwards I cannot tell\u2014I became, as it were, alive\nagain, and found myself inventing quite a different thing\u2014namely, the\nMagic Nest, which, as you know, has once more proved that I am born to\nfail in whatever I undertake. And now, alas! I don\u2019t see how I\u2019ll be\nable to earn a living; to confess the truth, I have not one dollar left\nin the world.\u201d\n\n\u201cBah! Don\u2019t be down-hearted on that account,\u201d said Marguerite. \u201cMy Frog\nEmporium is a little gold-mine, and you shall need for nothing. Why, as\nI have already remarked more than once, I\u2019d have been ere now in a\nwretched plight but for you. You stretched out a helping hand; and\nwhatever the world may think of you, and whatever you think of\nyourself\u2014I\u2014I call you a genius.\u201d\n\nWhen Marguerite had delivered this speech, so full of balm to poor\nheart-broken Abel, she rose from the bench and flew to the old,\nneglected manuscript. A bright idea had flashed upon her\u2014\u2019twas an\ninspiration. She had already turned over its pages and found them\ncovered with drawings as unintelligible to her as Egyptian\nhieroglyphics; but she remembered that in one place, written in pencil,\nwere the words, \u201cThis is Abel Day\u2019s Patent Log.\u201d\n\nIn a moment she was back at Abel\u2019s side, and, holding up the manuscript\nbefore him, \u201cI do believe,\u201d she said, \u201chad I been with you when you were\nlaboring on this invention, that you would not have fallen ill, for I\nshould not have let you overtask your brain; and by this time \u2019twould\nhave been quite finished, and you\u2019d have been in the eyes of the whole\nworld what I know you to be\u2014a great, great, great man.\u201d\n\nBut Abel, instead of replying, put his hands to his ears and shivered as\nif he were stricken with cold.\n\n\u201cO dear friend! what is the matter now?\u201d exclaimed Marguerite.\n\n\u201cThe very sight of that manuscript makes me dread the voices\u2014the horrid\nvoices. Hark! one is beginning to yell again. It says I must hang myself\nin the end. Hark! Don\u2019t you hear it?\u201d\n\n\u201cListen to me, and not to the voice,\u201d said Marguerite, still holding\nbefore his eyes the page whereon was written, \u201cThis is Abel Day\u2019s Patent\nLog.\u201d \u201cTake courage and look bolder at this manuscript, while I sing for\nyou.\u201d\n\nIt was a cheery, jovial song she sang. She threw her whole soul into it,\nand it wrought upon Abel the happy effect she hoped it would. When the\nsong was ended, he bowed his head and murmured: \u201cO my blessing! my good\nangel! How much sunshine you bring to me! Already the voice is gone. You\nhave indeed power to drive the fiend away.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, now, Abel,\u201d answered Marguerite, \u201cyou whom\u2014whom I\u2014I\u2014\u201d Here her\ntongue faltered.\n\nBut as mother earth cannot restrain the crystal waters murmuring within\nher bosom, so it was impossible for the girl to hold back the words\nwhich were bubbling up from the pure fountain of her heart; and\npresently, with a blushing rose on each cheek, she spoke out and said:\n\u201cYou whom I love, let me ask you to kneel with me and offer thanks to\nAlmighty God that I am able to drive away your melancholy. Yes, let us\nsay a prayer of thanksgiving.\u201d\n\nAbel did as she wished, and they knelt and prayed together.\n\nThen, when they had risen from their knees, \u201cAnd now,\u201d added Marguerite,\n\u201cI hope you will set courageously to work at this Patent Log, and while\nyou are thus engaged I\u2019ll play the nightingale and sing my very best;\nwill you?\u201d\n\nAbel\u2019s eyes were swimming with tears, and, taking her hand in his, \u201cYou\nlove me?\u201d he said in tremulous accents. \u201cOh! how kind, how good it is in\nyou to love me. I have been alone since my boyhood\u2014all alone. Nobody\nsince the far-off day when I parted from my mother ever spoke to me as\nyou do. The world appeared like a desert to me. I cared very little for\nlife. All was a barren waste on every side of me until this hour. But\nnow I would not die for anything. I wish to live because you live; and,\nO Marguerite! my heart would stop beating if you were to leave me.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut I never will leave you.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, don\u2019t. Let us live together, Marguerite, always together; be my\nwife.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, now,\u201d answered Marguerite, her heart overflowing, yet at the same\ntime speaking with firmness and decision, \u201cyou must set immediately to\nwork; a quarter of an hour will be enough for to-day. To-morrow you may\nlabor half an hour, and perhaps next day an hour, until this invention\nis completed; and, remember, all the while you are inventing I\u2019ll play\nthe lark, the canary, or whatever you choose to call me.\u201d\n\nAbel listened to her words, and, albeit weak and hardly in a state to\nuse his brain, he actually made a little progress with his invention\nduring the brief space she allowed him to work. What unspeakable joy it\ngave Marguerite to think that she might be able to restore him to full\nmental health! \u201cAnd when he does become entirely himself\u2014oh! then\u2014then\u2014\u201d\nHere her song waxed louder and more melodious; for her heart was\nthrilling with a rapture which only the voice of music can express.\n\nYes, Marguerite, \u2019twas verily an inspiration that caused you to direct\nAbel\u2019s mind anew to the Patent Log; for this is a sane and wholesome\nobject whereupon to exert his faculties, and not a madman\u2019s dream like\nthe Magic Hen\u2019s Nest.\n\nDay by day Abel gained in health; his appetite and sleep returned; he\nlaughed as merrily as Marguerite; and people could scarcely believe he\nwas the same man. But the girl never relaxed her vigilance. So passed\naway the spring and summer; and when autumn came round not the fairest\ncastle in the air which Marguerite had built for herself did surpass the\nbright reality which opened before her vision. For, lo! the Patent Log\nwas patented, and its success went beyond Abel\u2019s most extravagant hopes.\nA mass-meeting of ship-owners and merchants was held at the Cooper\nInstitute to do him honor; the press lauded him to the skies; the tongue\nof Fame was chiming his name far and wide. But, better than all, a\ncataract of gold was rolling into his pocket.\n\nOf course before long our friend changed his quarters; and, in his new\nand elegant home, right above the bed Marguerite hung the crucifix which\nMother Catherine had given her; then she and her betrothed went to the\nConvent of Mercy to visit the good nun, who wept glad tears when she\nheard their story.\n\n\u201cWell, I lean upon her as much as she leans upon me; we love and help\neach other in all things,\u201d spoke Abel.\n\n\u201cAnd always, always will,\u201d continued Marguerite.\n\n\u201cGod bless you, my children!\u201d said Mother Catherine.\n\nA fortnight later the happy couple were married; after which they sailed\non their wedding tour across the sea to Normandy. And one day, as they\nwere leaving the beautiful church of Saint-Ouen, whither they had gone\nto give thanks to God for their great happiness, Marguerite spoke and\nsaid: \u201cI once thought there was no country in all the world like France;\nbut now, my dear husband, I love America more.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd I,\u201d returned Abel, \u201clove France as much as I do America; for,\nalthough I believe good wives may be found everywhere, it was this sunny\nland which gave me my pretty Marguerite.\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE BELLS.\n\n\n I stand by Giotto\u2019s gleaming tower,\n In gloom of the cathedral\u2019s wing,\n And hear, in the soft sunset hour,\n The bells to benediction ring.\n That Duomo boasts: \u201cStone upon stone,\n Eternally I rise and rise;\n So, pace by pace, zone over zone,\n I am uprounded to the skies.\u201d\n But simpler effort, as direct\n As that of palm or pine, impels\n This wonder of the architect\n To strike heaven\u2019s blue with clash of bells.\n\n Etrurian Athens! long ago\n Thy sister of the Violet Crown,\n In colonnades like carven snow\u2014\n All crumbled now, and bare, and brown\n With ashes of dead sunshine\u2014sate\n Among her gods, and had no voice\n Potential as their high estate\n To summon to the sacrifice.\n Worth even the Phidian Jove sublime,\n Chryselephantine, and all else\n Of the lost forms of olden time,\n Fair Florence! are thy living bells.\n\n O bells! O bells! when angels sang,\n Surely\u2014though no Evangelist\n Has told\u2014a silvery peal first rang,\n And Christian chimes came in with Christ.\n For bells! O bells! not brazen horn,\n Nor sistrum, sackbut, cymbals, gong,\n Harsh dissonance of creeds forlorn,\n But your sweet tongues to Him belong.\n Crowning with music as ye swing\n This lily in stone, this lamp of grace,\n Wherever Christ the Lord is King,\n Ye have commission and a place.\n\n This tower stands square to winds that smite,\n Nor fears the thunders to impale.\n Prince of the Powers of Air! by rite\n Of baptism shall the bells prevail.\n Shine, _Stella Maris_! and O song\n Of _Ave Mary_, and Vesper bells,\n Be drowned not in the city\u2019s throng!\n For\u2014sad and sweet as Dante tells\u2014\n Comes, strangely here, the sense to me\n Of parting for some unknown clime,\n A sense of silence and the sea,\n Charmed by the tryst of star and chime.\n\n O bells! O bells! the worlds are buoyed,\n Like beacon-bells, on waves profound,\n In all no silence as no void\u2014\n The very flowers are cups of sound.\n We dream\u2014and dreaming we rejoice\u2014\n That we, when great Death draws us nigh,\n Hearing, may understand the Voice\n Which rocks a bluebell or the sky;\n And, with new senses finely strung\n In grander Eden\u2019s blossoming,\n May see a golden planet swung,\n Yet hear the silver lilies ring!\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n OUR NEW INDIAN POLICY AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY.\n\n \u201cWhile it cannot be denied that the government of the United\n States, in the general terms and temper of its legislation, has\n evinced a desire to deal generously with the Indians, it must be\n admitted that the actual treatment they have received has been\n _unjust and iniquitous beyond the power of words to express_.\n Taught by the government that they had rights entitled to\n respect, when these rights have been assailed by the rapacity of\n the white man the arm which should have been raised to protect\n them has been ever ready to sustain the aggressor. The history\n of the government connections with the Indians is _a shameful\n record of broken treaties and unfulfilled promises_.\u201d\n\nWe take the above sentences from the first report of the Board of Indian\nCommissioners appointed by President Grant under the act of Congress of\nApril 10, 1869. The commissioners, nine in number, were gentlemen\nselected for their presumed piety, philanthropy, and practical business\nqualities. None of them was a Catholic; in taking their testimony not\nonly with respect to the general treatment of the Indians, but in regard\nto the religious interests of some of the tribes, we shall not be\nsuspected of summoning witnesses who are prejudiced in favor of the\nCatholic Church. One of the commissioners, indeed, Mr. Felix R. Brunot,\nof Pittsburgh, the chairman of the board, appears to have been inspired\nat times with a lively fear and hatred of the church; his\ncolleagues\u2014Messrs. Robert Campbell, of St. Louis; Nathan Bishop, of New\nYork; William E. Dodge, of New York; John V. Farwell, of Chicago; George\nH. Stuart, of Philadelphia; Edward S. Tobey, of Boston; John D. Lang, of\nMaine; and Vincent Colyer, of New York\u2014are gentlemen quite free from any\npredilection in favor of Catholicity. The passage we have taken from\ntheir first report relates only to the worldly affairs of the Indians.\nBut a perusal of the various annual reports of this board, of the\nCommissioners of Indian Affairs, and of the Indian agents, from 1869\nuntil 1876, has convinced us that the injuries inflicted upon the\nIndians have been by no means confined to those caused by the avarice\nand rapacity of the whites. Sectarian fanaticism, Protestant bigotry,\nand anti-Christian hatred have been called into play, and the arm of the\ngovernment has been made the instrument for the restriction, and even\nthe abolition, of religious freedom among many of the Indian tribes.\n\nWe are confident that such treatment is not in consonance with the\nwishes of the American people. Have we not been taught, from our youth\nup, that the two chief glories of our country were the equality of all\nits citizens before the law and their absolute freedom in all religious\nmatters? True, the Indians are not citizens, but we have undertaken the\ntask of acting as their guardians, with the hope of ultimately fitting\nthem, or as many of them as may be tough enough to endure the process,\nfor the duties of citizenship. To begin this task by teaching our pupils\nthat religion is not a matter of conscience\u2014that the government has a\nright to force upon a people a form of Christianity against which their\nconsciences revolt\u2014and to punish them for attempting to adhere to the\nchurch whose priests first taught them to know and to fear God, is not\nmerely a moral wrong; it is a crime.\n\nThe whole number of Indians in the United States and Territories,\naccording to the very careful and systematic census contained in the\nreport of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs for 1875, was 279,333,\nexclusive of those in Alaska. It is not a very large number; the\npopulation of the city of New York exceeds it nearly fourfold. The\nIndian Bureau classifies these people under four heads:\n\nI. 98,108 Indians who \u201care wild and scarcely tractable to any extent\nbeyond that of coming near enough to the government agent to receive\nrations and blankets.\u201d\n\nII. 52,113 Indians \u201cwho are thoroughly convinced of the necessity of\nlabor, and are actually undertaking it, and with more or less readiness\naccept the direction and assistance of government agents to this end.\u201d\n\nIII. 115,385 Indians \u201cwho have come into possession of allotted lands\nand other property in stock and implements belonging to a landed\nestate.\u201d\n\nIV. 13,727 Indians who are described as \u201croamers and vagrants,\u201d and of\nwhom the commissioner, the Hon. Edward P. Smith, speaks in the following\nChristian and statesman-like language:\n\n \u201cThey are generally as harmless as vagrants and vagabonds can be\n in a civilized country. They are found in all stages of\n degradation produced by licentiousness, intemperance, idleness,\n and poverty. Without land, unwilling to leave their haunts for a\n homestead upon a reservation, and scarcely in any way related\n to, or recognized by, the government, they drag out a miserable\n life. Themselves corrupted and the source of corruption, they\n seem to serve by their continued existence but a single useful\n purpose\u2014that of affording a living illustration of the tendency\n and effect of barbarism allowed to expand itself uncured,\u201d\n\n\u2014or, perhaps, of \u201caffording a living illustration\u201d of the wisdom and\nmercy of a policy which, neglecting these poor wretches \u201cwithout land,\u201d\ncomes down upon other tribes, living peaceably and thrivingly upon\nreservations \u201csolemnly secured to them for ever,\u201d takes from them their\nhomes and farms, and drives them forth to a new and desolate land; or,\nif they resist, exasperates them into a war that ends by adding them to\nthe number of \u201croamers and vagabonds.\u201d The sanguinary conflict which, as\nwe write, is still being waged between a portion of the Nez-Perc\u00e9s\nIndians and the troops under command of that eminent \u201cChristian\nsoldier,\u201d General Howard, is a flagrant instance of the manner in which\nIndians of the first and second classes enumerated by the commissioner\nare driven into the category of \u201croamers and vagabonds.\u201d We cannot pause\nto trace the history of this our last and most needless Indian war; we\npass it by with the remark that one of the indirect causes of it,\naccording to the report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs for 1874,\nappears to have been the action of the \u201cAmerican Board of Commissioners\nfor Foreign Missions,\u201d a Presbyterian organization, in selling to a\nspeculator certain lands within the reservation which did not belong to\nthe board, but to the Indians themselves.\n\nThe report of the commissioner for 1876\u2014the Hon. J. Q. Smith\u2014contains a\nnumber of statistical tables, an analysis of which will aid us in\nforming a correct conception of the present condition of the Indians\nembraced in the commissioner\u2019s third class, as well as a portion of\nthose in his second class. According to these tables\u2014which contain the\nlatest _official_ returns from all the agencies\u2014the whole number of\nIndians, exclusive of those in Alaska, and of the \u201croamers and\nvagrants,\u201d is put down at 266,151, of whom 40,639 are of mixed blood.\nThe latter are for the most part the children of Indian mothers and of\nFrench, Spanish, and American fathers. No less than 153,000 of the whole\nnumber \u201ccome directly under the civilizing influences of the government\nagencies,\u201d and of these 104,818 \u201cwear citizen\u2019s dress.\u201d The abandonment\nof the picturesque blanket for the civilizing coat, the embroidered\nbuckskin leggings for the plain pantaloons, and the gay plume of\ngorgeous feathers for the hideous hat, is certainly a mark of progress.\nBut when the wigwam is torn down, and the log, frame, or stone house is\nerected in its stead, a still more decided step towards civilization has\nbeen taken; and it may be with surprise that some of our readers will\nlearn that our \u201csavages\u201d have built for themselves, or have had built\nfor them, 55,717 houses, of which 1,702 were erected during last year.\n\nThe progress of education is a still further test of the condition of\nthese people. There are 367 school buildings upon the reservations; and\nin these are conducted 63 boarding-schools and 281 day-schools, 23 of\nthe school buildings, apparently, being unoccupied. The number of\nteachers is 437, and of pupils 11,328, of which number 6,028 are males.\nThe amount of money expended for education during the year was $362,496,\nan average of $32 per pupil. The number of Indians who can read is\n25,622, of whom 980 acquired that useful accomplishment during the year.\nThe number of births (exclusive of those in the five civilized tribes in\nthe Indian Territory) was 2,401, and of deaths 2,215. The religious\nstatistics in this table are evidently incorrect in at least one\nparticular. The number of church buildings on the Indian reservations is\n177; the number of missionaries \u201cnot included under teachers\u201d is 122;\nand \u201cthe amount contributed by religious societies during the year for\neducation and other purposes\u201d was $62,076.\n\nThese figures we do not call in question, but the \u201cnumber of Indians who\nare church members\u201d is put down at only 27,215. It is to be desired that\nthe compiler of the statistics had furnished us with a definition of\nwhat he understands by the words \u201cchurch members.\u201d He sets down for the\nPueblo agency, in New Mexico, for example: \u201cNumber of Indians, 8,400;\nnumber of church buildings, 19; number of church members, _none_!\u201d The\ntruth is that all, or nearly all, of these Pueblo Indians are Roman\nCatholics, as their fathers were before them for more than three\ncenturies; and that the 19 \u201cchurch buildings\u201d on their reservation are\nCatholic churches, in which the Indians are baptized, shriven, married,\nand receive the Holy Communion; but in the opinion of the honorable\ncommissioner none of the Pueblos are \u201cchurch members.\u201d So with the\nPapago Indians in Arizona, who are 5,900 in number, who have a Catholic\nschool, four Catholic teachers, and a Catholic church, but none of whom,\nin the eyes of the commissioner, are \u201cchurch members.\u201d In the seven\nreservations of which the religious control has been assigned to the\nCatholic Church there is a population of 24,094 souls and 32 churches,\nbut the commissioner\u2019s tables admit only 7,010 \u201cchurch members\u201d among\nthis population. The truth is, as we shall show, the number of Catholic\nIndians alone is more than thrice as large as the whole number of\n\u201cchurch members\u201d accounted for by the commissioner\u2019s tables. When a\nhuman being has received the Catholic rite of baptism he becomes a\nmember of the Catholic Church; and from that moment it is the duty and\nthe privilege of the church to watch over and protect the soul thus\nregenerated. It is because the church has wished to discharge this duty\nto her Indian children that certain of the sects have cried out against\nher, and even the commissioner (Hon. E. P. Smith), in his report for\n1875, has not been ashamed to reproach her.\n\n \u201cAt the seven agencies assigned to the care of the Catholics,\u201d\n he remarks, \u201cno restriction has been placed upon their system\n and methods of education, and no other religious body, so far as\n I am aware, has in any way attempted to interfere. I regret to\n say that this is not true, so far as the Catholics are\n concerned, of some of the agencies assigned to other religious\n bodies, and in some instances the interference has been a\n material hindrance to the efforts of this office to bring\n Indians under control and to enforce rules looking toward\n civilization.\u201d\n\n_We_ regret to say that while, on the one hand, the Catholic Church has\nsought only to continue her ministrations to those of her children who\nwere dwelling upon reservations \u201cassigned to other religious bodies\u201d\u2014a\nduty which she could not neglect nor permit to remain unfulfilled\u2014on the\nother hand, the most cruel, persistent, and petty persecution has been\nwaged against Catholic Indians under the charge of Protestant agents,\nfor the reason that they were Catholics, and the most unwarrantable\ninterference, opposition, and maltreatment have been in many instances\nmanifested in cases where Catholic priests were merely exercising the\nrights they possessed as American citizens, and discharging the duties\nimposed on them as Christian teachers.\n\nBut before we enter upon the proof of these unpleasant facts let us\nreturn to the statistics of the commissioner\u2019s report, for the purpose\nof completing our review of the condition of the semi-civilized and\ncivilized tribes. The whole number of acres of land comprised in the\nIndian reservations as they now exist is 159,287,778, of which, however,\nonly a very small portion (9,107,244 acres, or 14,230 square miles) is\n\u201ctillable\u201d\u2014that is, land fitted for agricultural pursuits, and on which\ncrops can be raised. Now, from these figures, which are official, a very\nimportant truth may be deduced. The policy of the government, as\nexplained by the commissioners in successive reports, is to gather all\nthe Indians upon these reservations (or upon a few of them), to wean\nthem from their life of hunting and fishing, and to teach them to\nsupport themselves and their families by purely agricultural pursuits.\nThe idea may perhaps be a good one; but care should have been taken to\nprovide ample means for its execution. There are, as we have seen,\n266,151 Indians, exclusive of those in Alaska and of the \u201croamers and\nvagrants.\u201d All these, if the present policy of the government be\nsuccessful, will be finally planted upon this region of 14,230 square\nmiles of tillable land, and bidden to live there, they and their\nchildren, for ever, earning their bread by the sweat of their brow in\ncultivating the soil. Now, 14,230 square miles of land is equal only to\n28,460 farms of 320 acres each, or to 56,920 farms of 160 acres each.\nThe tradition established by the government, by its original surveys of\nthe public lands, by its Homestead Law, and by its Land Bounty Acts, is\nthat 160 acres of land is the normal quantity for an ordinary farm;\ngeneral experience has shown that this is none too much. But if the\nattempt were made to arrange the 266,151 Indians into families of 4\npersons each, and to allot to each family a farm of 160 acres, there\nwould not be tillable land enough \u201cto go round\u201d; 9,617 families would be\nleft out of the distribution. We do not mean to say that a farm of\nsomething less than 160 acres may not be found sufficient for the\nmaintenance of a family of four persons; but we do wish to call\nattention to the fact that the Indian reservations have been now reduced\nso far that only 56,920 farms, of 160 acres each, of \u201ctillable land\u201d\nremain in them. There is the more necessity for accentuating this fact\nsince even in the last report of the commissioner is repeated the\nsuggestion that the reservations are still too large, and that a few\nmore treaties might be broken and a few more sanguinary wars provoked\nwith advantage, in order to reduce further the area set apart for Indian\noccupation. This suggestion is made plausible by the device of calling\nattention to the whole area of the reservations\u2014159,287,778 acres, or\n248,886 square miles\u2014while hiding away in very small type, and at the\nend of an intricate table of figures, the fact that 150,180,534 acres,\nor 234,656 square miles, of these lands are wholly unfitted for tillage,\nand can never be made available for agricultural purposes.\n\nThe number of acres of land cultivated by the Indians during the year\ncovered by the last report of the commissioner was 318,194, and 28,253\nother acres were broken by them during the year. No less than 26,873\nfull-blood male Indians were laboring in civilized pursuits, exclusive\nof those belonging to the five civilized tribes in the Indian Territory.\nThese people are not savages; they worship God\u2014many of them enjoying the\nlight of Catholic truth; they educate themselves and their children;\nthey live in houses and wear decent clothes; they toil and are producers\nof valuable articles. Let us see, now, what is said about these and the\nother Indians less advanced in civilization, by their rulers, the\nsuccessive Commissioners of Indian Affairs and their subordinates, the\nagents. When we remark that we select our quotations from nine volumes\nof official reports, the reader will understand that we lay before him\nonly a very few out of the numberless proofs of two facts:\n\n1. That the commissioners, while repeatedly confessing that the Indians\nhave been most cruelly and unwisely wronged in the past, are of the\nopinion that it would be a kind and wise thing to wrong them a little\nmore in the future.\n\n2. That the Indians are perfectly well aware of their wrongs; are quite\nable to formulate them; are often hopeless, from long and painful\nexperience, of any effectual redress for them; and very frequently\ndisplay a remarkable degree of Christian forbearance and forgiveness in\nresisting the wanton provocations to revolt offered to them.\n\n \u201cThe traditionary belief which largely prevails,\u201d writes the\n Hon. J. Q. Smith, in his report for 1876, \u201cthat the Indian\n service throughout its whole history has been tainted with\n fraud, arises not only from the fact that frauds have been\n committed, but also because, from the nature of the service\n itself, peculiar opportunities for fraud may be found.\u201d\n\nAfter an exposition of the duties of an Indian agent he thus proceeds:\n\n \u201cThe great want of the Indian service has always been thoroughly\n competent agents. The President has sought to secure proper\n persons for these important offices by inviting the several\n religious organizations, through their constituted authorities,\n to nominate to him men for whose ability, character, and conduct\n they are willing to vouch. I believe the churches have\n endeavored to perform this duty faithfully, and to a fair degree\n have succeeded; but they experience great difficulty in inducing\n persons possessed of the requisite qualifications to accept\n these positions. When it is considered that these men must take\n their families far into the wilderness, cut themselves off from\n civilization with its comforts and attractions, deprive their\n children of the advantages of education, live lives of anxiety\n and toil, give bonds for great sums of money, be held\n responsible in some instances for the expenditure of hundreds of\n thousands of dollars a year, and subject themselves to\n ever-ready suspicion, detraction, and calumny, for a\n compensation less than that paid to a third-class clerk in\n Washington or to a village postmaster, it is not strange that\n able, upright, thoroughly competent men hesitate, and decline to\n accept the position of an Indian agent, or, if they accept,\n resign the position after a short trial. In my judgment the\n welfare of the public service imperatively requires that the\n compensation offered an Indian agent should be somewhat in\n proportion to the capacity required in the office, and to the\n responsibility and labor of the duties to be performed.\u201d\n\nIt is impossible to avoid making the remark, in this place, that there\nis a class of men who have no \u201cfamilies\u201d; who are ever ready to renounce\nthe \u201ccomforts and attractions of civilization\u201d; who are accustomed to\n\u201clive lives of anxiety and toil\u201d; and who are impervious to \u201csuspicion,\ndetraction, and calumny,\u201d while at the same time they are \u201cable,\nupright, and thoroughly competent.\u201d If the government, when it\ninaugurated its plan of filling the Indian agencies with men nominated\nby \u201cthe churches,\u201d had allowed our bishops to nominate agents in\nproportion to the number of Catholic Indians, the chances are that the\nright men would have been forthcoming, and the commissioner would not\nnow be complaining that, in order to keep an Indian agent from stealing,\nhe must be paid $3,000 a year.\n\n \u201cRelief had been so long delayed,\u201d says the same officer in the\n same report, \u201cthat supplies failed to reach the agencies until\n the Indians were in almost a starving condition, and until the\n apparent intention of the government to abandon them to\n starvation had induced large numbers to join the hostile bands\n under Sitting Bull.\u201d\n\nTwo other instances of the same kind are mentioned; and a third is\nrecorded, in which, owing to the failure of Congress to provide money\npromised by a treaty, \u201chundreds of Pawnees had been compelled to abandon\ntheir agency, to live by begging and stealing in southern Kansas.\u201d \u201cIn\nnumerous other instances,\u201d adds the commissioner pathetically, \u201cthe\nfunds at the disposal of this office have been so limited as to make it\na matter of the utmost difficulty to keep the Indians from starving\u201d\u2014and\nthis, too, when the same Indians had large sums of money standing to\ntheir credit held \u201cin trust\u201d for them in the treasury of the United\nStates. A long discussion advocating the removal of all the Indians to a\nfew reservations\u2014although this could not be done without violations of\nthe most solemn treaties\u2014is clinched with the cynical remark that \u201cthere\nis a very general and growing opinion that observance of the strict\nletter of treaties with Indians is in many cases at variance both with\ntheir own best interests and with sound public policy.\u201d\n\nAnd these words are from the official report of the chief of a great\nbureau in the most important department of our government! Did we know\nwhat we were about when we made these treaties? If \u201cno,\u201d we were fools;\nif \u201cyes,\u201d then we are knaves now to violate them without the consent of\nthe other, the helpless party. \u201cThe Indians claim,\u201d says the\ncommissioner, \u201cthat they hold their lands by sanctions so solemn that it\nwould be a gross breach of faith on the part of the government to take\naway any portion of it without their consent, and that consent they\npropose to withhold.\u201d Still, let us do it, cries the commissioner;\n\u201cpublic necessity must ultimately become supreme law.\u201d \u201cPublic\nnecessity\u201d\u2014which in this case means private rapacity\u2014\u201cpublic necessity,\u201d\nand not truth, good faith, and justice, must rule. Many tribes are\nliving peaceably and doing well, on lands solemnly promised to them for\never, in various parts of the West; the civilized and semi-civilized\ntribes in the Indian Territory are living peaceably and doing well on\nlands solemnly promised to them for their own exclusive use for ever,\nand in some cases bought with their own money. But it would be more\nconvenient for us to have them all together; so let us tear up the\ntreaties, and drive all the Indians into the one territory.\n\nFrom the same report we take this paragraph, which is only one of very\nmany like it:\n\n \u201cThe Alsea agency, in Oregon, has been abolished, but inadequate\n appropriations have worked hardship and injustice to the\n Indians. They are required to leave their homes and cultivated\n fields\u201d (for no other reason than that white men covet them)\n \u201cand remove to Siletz, but no means are furnished to defray\n expense of such removal or to assist in their establishment in\n their new home.\u201d\n\nThe Board of Indian Commissioners, in their third annual report (1871),\nin view of the continued violation of treaties by the government in\ncompelling tribes to remove from the reservations assigned to them,\nfound themselves constrained to say:\n\n \u201cThe removal of partially civilized tribes already making fair\n progress and attached to their homes on existing reservations is\n earnestly deprecated. Where such reservations are thought to be\n unreasonably large, their owners will themselves see the\n propriety of selling off the surplus for educational purposes.\n The government meanwhile owes them the protection of their\n rights to which it is solemnly pledged by treaty, and which it\n cannot fail to give without dishonor.\u201d\n\nBut it _has_ failed to give this protection in numberless instances, and\nit seems to rest very easily under the stigma of dishonor thus\nincurred\u2014as, for instance, in the case of the Osages, of whom their\nagent, in a report dated Oct. 1, 1870, thus speaks:\n\n \u201cThis tribe of Indians are richly endowed by nature, physically\n and morally. A finer-looking body of men, with more grace and\n dignity, or better intellectual development, could hardly be\n found on this globe. They were once the most numerous and\n warlike nation on this continent, with a domain extending from\n the Gulf to the Missouri River and from the Mississippi to the\n Rocky Mountains; but they have been shorn of their territory\n piece by piece, until at last they have not a settled and\n undisputed claim to a single foot of earth. It is strictly true\n that one great cause of their decline has been fidelity to their\n pledges. More than sixty years ago they pledged themselves by\n treaty to perpetuate peace with the white man. That promise has\n been nobly kept\u2014kept in spite of great and continual\n provocation. White men have committed upon them almost every\n form of outrage and wrong, unchecked by the government and\n unpunished. Every aggressive movement of the whites tending to\n the absorption of their territory has ultimately been\n legalized.\u201d\n\nThese Osages are nearly all Catholics, and the agent who thus writes of\nthem is Mr. Isaac T. Gibson, a Quaker, or an \u201cOrthodox Friend.\u201d Would it\nbe believed that three years afterwards the kind and sympathizing Friend\nGibson was busily engaged in inflicting upon the people for whose wrongs\nhe was so indignant an injury greater than any they had yet suffered?\n\u201cEnterprising scoundrels\u201d of whom he wrote in his report had robbed the\nOsages of everything save their faith; and good Friend Gibson tried to\nrob them of that. How he set about the task, and how he fared in it,\nwill be told later.\n\nIf this be not enough, look at the picture of a model Indian reservation\ndrawn by a lawyer of California, and addressed to J. V. Farwell, one of\nthe members of the Board of Indian Commissioners. He is describing the\nHoopa Valley reservation:\n\n \u201cI found the Indians thoughtful, docile, and apparently eager to\n enter into any project for their good, if they could only\n believe it would be carried out in good faith, but utterly\n wanting in confidence in the agent, the government, or the white\n man. Lethargy, starvation, and disease were leading them to the\n grave. I found, in fact, that the reservation was a rehash of a\n negro plantation; the agent an absolute dictator, restrained by\n no law and no compact known to the Indians. During my stay the\n superintendent visited the valley. He stayed but a few days. We\n had drinking and feasting during this time, but no grave\n attention to Indian affairs; no extended investigation of what\n had been done or should be done. The _status quo_ was accepted\n as the _ne plus ultra_ of Indian policy. He, too, appears to\n think that annihilation is the consummation of Indian\n management. If the reservation was a plantation, the Indians\n were the most degraded of slaves. I found them poor, miserable,\n vicious, degraded, dirty, naked, diseased, and ill-fed. They had\n no motive to action. Man, woman, and child, without reference to\n age, sex, or condition, received the same five pounds of flour\n per week, and almost nothing more. They attended every Monday to\n get this, making a day\u2019s work of it for most of them. The oldest\n men, or stout, middle-aged fathers of families, were spoken to\n just as children or slaves. They know no law but the will of the\n agent; no effort has been made to teach them any, and, where it\n does not conflict with this dictation, they follow the old forms\n of life\u2014polygamy, buying and selling of women, and compounding\n crime with money _ad libitum_. The tribal system, with all its\n absurd domination and duty, is still retained. The Indian woman\n has no charge of her own person or virtue, but her father,\n brother, chief, or nearest male relative may sell her for a\n moment or for life. I was impressed that really nothing had been\n done by any agent, or even attempted, to wean these people from\n savage life to civilization, but only to subject them to\n plantation slavery.\u201d\n\nThe official volumes from which we are taking our information contain\nthe successive annual reports of the various Indian agents and\nsuperintendents, who are 88 in number, and the reports of many councils\nheld between the Indians and the Board of Indian Commissioners, agents,\narmy officers, and special commissioners. The Hon. Felix R. Brunot,\nchairman of the Board of Indian Commissioners, is the Mercurius in many\nof these councils. He does nearly all the talking on the side of the\ngovernment, and before he talks he always prays. Thus: \u201cGen. Smith\nannounced that Mr. Brunot would speak to the Great Spirit before the\ncouncil began. Mr. Brunot offered a prayer.\u201d In the interests of\nreligion it is to be regretted that councils thus begun sometimes\nappeared to have been designed for the purpose of inflicting new wrongs\nupon the Indians. But we mention the councils here only for the purpose\nof taking from the reports of their proceedings, as well as from the\nannual reports of the agents, a very few of the remarks made by the\nIndian chiefs concerning themselves, the government, the agents, and the\nwhites generally. The limits of our space compel us to string these\ntogether without further introduction:\n\n RED CLOUD: God raised us Indians. I am trying to live peaceably.\n All I ask for is my land\u2014the little spot I have left. My people\n have done nothing wrong. I have consulted the Great Spirit, and\n he told me to keep my little spot of land. My friends, have pity\n on me, if you would have me live long. My people have been\n cheated so often they will not believe.\n\n BUFFALO GOOD.: If you are going to do anything for us, do it\n quick. I saw the Commissioner of Indian Affairs at Washington,\n and he told me he was going to fix it up, but I have heard that\n so often I am afraid it is not true. I have been disappointed,\n and I think Washington is not so much of a chief after all.\n Because we do not fight, he takes away our lands and gives them\n to the tribes who are fighting the whites all the time.\n\n HOWLISH-WAMPO (\u201cthe Cayuse chief, a Catholic Indian, in dress,\n personal appearance, and bearing superior to the average\n American farmer\u201d): When you told me you believed in God, I\n thought that was good. But you came to ask us for our land. We\n will not let you have it. This reservation is marked out for us.\n We see it with our eyes and our hearts; we all hold it with our\n bodies and our souls. Here are my father and mother, and\n brothers and sisters and children, all buried; I am guarding\n their graves. This small piece of land we all look upon as our\n mother, as if she were raising us. On the outside of the\n reservation I see your houses; they have windows, they are good.\n Why do you wish my land? My friend, you must not talk too strong\n about getting my land; I will not let it go.\n\n HOMLI (chief of the Walla-Wallas): My cattle and stock are\n running on this reservation, and they need it all. It is not the\n white man who has helped me: I have made all the improvements on\n my own land myself.\n\n WENAP-SNOOT (chief of the Umatillas): When my father and mother\n died, they gave me rules and gave me their land to live on. They\n left me to take care of them after they were buried. I was to\n watch over their graves. I will not part from them. I cultivate\n my land and I love it.\n\n PIERRE (a young chief): I do not wish money for my land; I am\n here, and I will stay here. I will not part with lands, and if\n you come again I will say the same thing.\n\n WAL-CHE-TE-MA-NE (another Catholic chief, as, indeed, were the\n three last named): You white chiefs listen to me: you, Father\n Vermeerch, are the one who rules my heart. I am old now, and I\n want to die where my father and mother and children have died. I\n see the church there; I am glad to see it; I will stay beside it\n and die by the teachings of the father. I love my church, my\n mills, my farm, the graves of my parents and children. I do not\n wish to leave them. (Happily, the firmness of these Catholic\n Indians, the Umatilla, Cayuse, and Walla-Walla tribes, carried\n the day, and they were permitted to remain on their little\n reservation).\n\n TENALE TEMANE (another Catholic Indian): We cannot cheat our own\n bodies and our own souls. If we deceive ourselves we shall be\n miserable; _only from the truth can we grow ourselves, and make\n our children grow_. Of all that was promised to me by Gov.\n Stevens I have seen nothing; _it must have been lost_.\n\n THE YOUNG CHIEF: What you promised was not done; it was as if\n you had taken the treaty as soon as it was made, and torn it up.\n The treaties made with the Indians on all the reservations have\n never been kept; _they have all been broken_. I do not want to\n teach you anything about God; you are wise and know all about\n him. (The irony of this is exquisite.)\n\n TASENICK (a Wascoe chief): The people who are put over me teach\n me worse things than I knew before. You can see what we were\n promised by the treaty: we have never got anything; all we have\n we bought with our own money. Our Great Father may have sent the\n things promised, but they never got here.\n\n CHINOOK: When we made the treaty they promised us schoolmasters\n and a great many other things, but they forget them. We never\n had any of them. They told us we were to have $8,000 a year; we\n never saw a cent of it.\n\n MACK (a Deschutes chief): It is not right to starve us; it is\n better to kill us.\n\n JANCUST: I cannot look you in the face; I am ashamed: white men\n have carried away our women. What do you think? White men do\n these things and say it is right.\n\n NAPOLEON (a Catholic chief of the Tulalip reservation, who \u201ccame\n forward with much dignity and laid before Mr. Brunot a bunch of\n split sticks\u201d): These represent the number of my people killed\n by the whites during the year, and yet nothing has been done to\n punish them. The whites now scare all the Indians, and we look\n now wondering when all the Indians will be killed.\n\n JOHNNY ENGLISH: We like Father Chirouse very well, because he\n tries to do what is right; when he begins to work he does one\n thing at a time.\n\n HENRY (a Catholic on the Lumni reservation): I have been a\n Christian for many years. We have some children at school with\n Father Chirouse; we want our lands for them to live on when we\n are dead.\n\n DAVID CROCKETT (a Catholic chief): I ought to have a better\n house in which to receive my friends. But we want most an altar\n built in our church and a belfry on it; this work we cannot do\n ourselves.\n\n SPAR (a young chief): All the agents think of is to steal; that\n is all every agent has done. When they get the money, where does\n it go to? When I ask about it they say they will punish me. I\n thought the President did not send them for that.\n\n PETER CONNOYER (of the Grande Rondes): About religion\u2014I am a\n Catholic; so are all of my family. All the children are\n Catholics. We want the sisters to come and teach the girls. The\n priest lives here; he does not get any pay. He teaches us to\n pray night and morning. We must teach the little girls. I am\n getting old. I may go to a race and bet a little, but I don\u2019t\n want my children to learn it; it is bad.\n\n TOM CURL: We want to get good blankets, not paper blankets. I\n don\u2019t know what our boots are made of; if we hit anything they\n break in pieces.\n\nWhen, in 1870, President Grant announced the inauguration of his new\nIndian policy, the sects saw in it an opportunity of carrying on their\npropaganda among the Indians with little or no cost to themselves, and\nof interfering with, and probably compelling the total cessation of, the\nwork of the Catholic Church among many of the tribes. To begin with,\nhere were 72 places in which they could install the same number of their\nministers, or laymen devoted to their interests, with salaries paid by\nthe general government. Once installed as Indian agents, these men would\nhave autocratic power over the affairs of the tribes entrusted to them;\nand they could make life so uncomfortable for the Catholic missionaries\nalready at work there that they would probably retire. If they\ndisregarded petty persecutions, the agent could compel them to depart,\nsince it is held by the Indian Bureau that an agent has power to exclude\nfrom a reservation any white man whose presence he chooses to consider\nas inconvenient, as well as to prevent the Indians from leaving the\nreservation for any purpose whatever. There were, it was known, many\nIndian agencies at which the Catholic Church had had missions for many\nyears, and where all, or nearly all, the Indians were Catholics. If\nthese agencies could be assigned to the care of the sects, how easily\ncould the work of converting the Indian Catholics into Methodists,\nBaptists, Presbyterians, Quakers, or Unitarians be accomplished! The\npriests could be driven away and forbidden to return; the sectarian\npreachers would have full play; and the Indian appetite for Protestant\ntruth could be sharpened by judicious bribery and intimidation. On the\nborders of the reservation there might be\u2014as there are\u2014Catholic churches\nand Catholic priests; but the Catholic Indians on the reservation might\nbe\u2014as they have been\u2014forbidden to cross the line in order to visit their\npriests and to receive the sacraments.\n\nThe new Indian policy which furnished this opportunity was probably not\noriginal with President Grant, and we are not disposed to call in\nquestion the purity and kindness of his motives in adopting it. At the\ntime of its inauguration, however, he was surrounded by influences\ndecidedly hostile to the Catholic Church; and it is probable that from\nthe beginning the men \u201cbehind the throne\u201d had a clear conception of the\nmanner in which the new policy could be worked for the benefit of the\nsects. It was based upon an idea plausible to non-Catholics, but which\nno Catholic can ever accept\u2014the idea that one religion is as good as\nanother, and that, for example, it does not make much difference whether\na man believes that Jesus Christ is God, or that he was simply a\ntolerably good but rather weak and vain man. This idea has been carried\nout in practice-for even to the \u201cUnitarians\u201d have been given two Indian\nagencies: those of the Los Pinos and White River in Colorado, whose\nentire religious education for 1876, as reported by the agents,\nconsisted in \u201ca sort of Shaker service of singing and dancing held for\ntwo or three days.\u201d The chairman of the Board of Indian Commissioners,\nMr. Brunot, appears to have been anxious to spread abroad the doctrine\nof indifferentism among the Catholic Indians. Whenever, in his numerous\n\u201ccouncils,\u201d he found himself in company with such Indians, he undertook\nto enlighten them after this fashion:\n\n \u201cA chief said yesterday: \u2018I don\u2019t know about religion, because\n they tell so many different things.\u2019 Religion is like the roads;\n they all go one way; all to the one good place; so take any one\n good road and keep in it, and it will bring you out right at\n last.\u201d ... \u201cI heard an Indian say that the white man has two\n religions. In one way it looks so; but if you will understand\n you will see it is only one.\u201d ... \u201cIt is not two kinds of\n religion, but it is as two roads that both go the same way.\u201d\n\nWe scarcely think it is within the province of the federal government to\npay a gentleman for preaching this kind of doctrine to Catholic Indians.\nBut what was the new Indian policy? It was explained by President Grant,\nin his message of December 5, 1870, in these words:\n\n \u201cIndian agents being civil officers, I determined to give all\n the agencies to such religious denominations as had heretofore\n established missionaries among the Indians, and perhaps to some\n other denominations who would undertake the work on the same\n terms\u2014that is, as missionary work.\u201d\n\nThere is an undesirable lack of exactness in these words\u2014for, as they\nstand, they might be understood as promising the agency of a tribe to a\nsect which had established on its territory a missionary station years\nago, and had subsequently abandoned it. This, however, was certainly not\nthe intention of the President; if he intended to act in good faith in\nthe matter, he proposed, doubtless, to assign the agencies to churches\nthat had established _successful_ missions\u2014missions actually existing,\nhaving churches, schools, and converts. It is impossible to believe that\nit was the intention of the executive to transfer tribes of Catholic\nIndians to Protestant sects, under the pretence that the sects, at some\nremote period, had made feeble and fruitless attempts to establish\nmissions among them. This, however, has been the construction placed\nupon the President\u2019s policy by the sects; and, strange to say, they have\nexperienced no difficulty in persuading successive Commissioners of\nIndian Affairs to agree with them in this interpretation, and to carry\nit out in a manner productive of the most wanton cruelty and injustice.\n\nThere are seventy-two Indian agencies: three in Arizona, three in\nCalifornia, two in Colorado, fifteen in Dakota, eight in the Indian\nTerritory, one in Iowa, two in Kansas, one in Michigan, three in\nMinnesota, four in Montana, five in Nebraska, five in New Mexico, one in\nNew York, two in Nevada, six in Oregon, one in Utah, seven in Washington\nTerritory, two in Wisconsin, and one in Wyoming. According to any fair\nconstruction of the new policy, no less than forty of these agencies\nshould have been assigned to the Catholic Church. In all of them the\nchurch had had missions for many years; in many of them all of the\nChristian Indians, or the great majority of them, were Catholics; in\nsome of them the Indians had been Catholics for centuries, and their\ncivilization was wholly due to the instruction they had received from\nCatholic priests. The following is a list of these agencies, with their\nlocation and the number of Indians embraced in each:\n\n\n Name of Agency. No. of\n Location. Indians.\n\n Yakima Washington 3,000\n\n Fort Hall Idaho 1,500\n\n Tulalip Washington 3,950\n\n Puyallup Washington 577\n\n Skokomish Washington 875\n\n Chehalis Washington 600\n\n Neah Bay Washington 604\n\n Colville Washington 3,349\n\n La Point Wisconsin 646\n\n Pottawattomie Indian 1,336\n Territory\n\n Flatheads Montana 1,821\n\n Blackfeet Montana 14,630\n\n Papagoes Arizona 6,000\n\n Round Valley California 1,112\n\n North California \u2014\u2014\n California\n\n Mission Indians California 5,000\n\n Pueblos New Mexico 7,879\n\n Osages Indian 2,823\n Territory\n\n C\u0153ur d\u2019Alenes Idaho 700\n\n Quapams Indian 235\n Territory\n\n Was, Peorias, Indian 217\n etc. Territory\n\n Hoopa Valley California 725\n\n Pimas and Arizona 4,326\n Mariscopas\n\n Moquis Arizona 1,700\n\n Warm Spring Oregon 626\n\n Grande Ronde Oregon 924\n\n Siletz Oregon 1,058\n\n Umatilla Oregon 837\n\n Alsea Oregon 343\n\n Malheur Oregon 1,200\n\n Nez-Perc\u00e9s Idaho 2,807\n\n Navajoes New Mexico 9,114\n\n Mescaleros New Mexico 1,895\n\n Milk River Montana 10,625\n\n Crows Montana 4,200\n\n Green Bay Wisconsin 1,480\n\n Chippewas Minnesota 1,322\n\n Mackinac Michigan 10,260\n\n Grand River Dakota 6,269\n\n Devil\u2019s Lake Dakota 1,020\n\n \u2014\u2014\u2014\n\n Total 117,585\n\nWithin the jurisdiction of these agencies there are 52 Catholic\nchurches, 18 Catholic day-schools, and 10 Catholic boarding industrial\nschools. The Catholic priests and teachers employed among the Indians\nduring the year 1875 numbered 117; while for the same year the\nProtestant sects had only 64 missionaries employed in all the agencies\nunder their control. Would it not have been supposed that a fair\ninterpretation of the new policy of President Grant\u2014nay, that the only\nfair interpretation of it\u2014would have awarded these 40 agencies to the\nCatholic Church? The missions of the church, in 1870, were in almost\nuncontested possession of these fields of labor. Her priests had borne\nthe labor and the heat of the day; asking and expecting no aid from the\nstate, and receiving very little from any other source, they had given\nthemselves to the work of Christianizing these Indians; and while the\nsects had from time to time made spasmodic and desultory attempts at\nIndian missions, our priests and their coadjutors, the sisters of the\nteaching orders, had remained steadfast in their self-denying and\narduous labor. But the sects were now inspired with a new and sudden\nzeal for the salvation of the Indians. They were not content with the 32\nagencies in which, although there were many Catholic Indians, the church\nhad not been able to establish permanent missions. They set up claims to\nthe agencies we have enumerated, and it was observed that the fervor\nwith which these demands were pressed was in exact proportion to the\nrichness of the reservation and its desirableness as a future home for a\nmissionary with a large family and with a numerous corps of needy\nrelations. So fierce was their onslaught, and so rapidly were their\ndemands conceded by the then commissioner, that, almost before the\nauthorities of the church had been informed of what was going on, no\nless than 32 of the 40 agencies which, by any fair interpretation of the\nPresident\u2019s policy, should have been assigned to Catholic care, were\ndivided among the sects. Fourteen of the agencies, with 54,253 Indians,\nfell to the Methodists, the sect then, and perhaps now, most in favor\nwith the administration; five, with 21,321 Indians, went to the\nPresbyterians; the same number, with 5,311 Indians, were awarded to the\nQuakers; the Congregationalists received three, with 2,056 Indians; the\nReformed Dutch Church were given two, with 6,026 Indians; the \u201cAmerican\nMissionary Association\u201d (a Congregational society) obtained two, with\n2,126 Indians; and the Protestant Episcopal Church was gratified with\none agency, the Chippewas of Missouri, 1,322 in number, who had been\nCatholics all their lives. There remained eight of the agencies to which\nthe Catholic Church possessed a claim, and these were left in her\npossession, not, however, without a threat that they also would be taken\nfrom her\u2014a threat already carried into execution in one case, the\nPapagoes, a tribe of 6,000, residing in Arizona, having been kindly\ntransferred to the care of a sect called the \u201cReformed Church.\u201d The\nagent of this tribe, in his last report, says:\n\n \u201cThere is no school at present taught among these Indians. The\n intellectual and moral training of the young has been, for a\n long time, in the hands of the Roman Catholics, and the school\n hitherto kept by the sisters of the Order of St. Joseph.\u201d\n\nThe school is now closed, it appears; and the \u201cReformed Church\u201d\nseemingly does not intend to open another, as their agent remarks that\n\u201cthere is, perhaps, but little use to establish schools, or look for any\nconsiderable advance in education among them.\u201d\n\nThe seven agencies still left to the care of the church are those of\nTulalip and Colville, in Washington Territory; Grande Ronde and\nUmatilla, in Oregon; Flathead, in Montana; and Standing Rock (or Grand\nRiver) and Devil\u2019s Lake, in Dakota. These agencies, according to the\nlast report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, have a population of\n12,819 Indians. No less than 7,034 of these wear \u201ccitizen\u2019s dress\u201d; they\nhave 825 frame or log houses; they have six boarding-schools and three\nday-schools, taught by 19 teachers; 382 of the adults can read; they\nhave 12 churches, and 7,510, or more than half the whole number, are\n\u201cchurch members.\u201d Nothing like this can be shown at any of the agencies\nunder Protestant control, save the five civilized tribes in the Indian\nTerritory. The whole of the Indians on the Grande Ronde reservation\u2014755\nin number\u2014are so far civilized that all of them wear citizen\u2019s dress.\nThey have 375 houses, and 690 of them are \u201cchurch members.\u201d Their agent\nspeaks of them in glowing terms; last year, without receiving a penny of\nthe sums due them by the government, they not only supported themselves\nin comfort, but were able \u201cof their charity\u201d to relieve the necessities\nof two neighboring tribes, the Salmon River and Nestucca Indians, who\nwere starving to death \u201cin consequence of the failure of the government\nto fulfil the promises made by the honorable Commissioner Simpson.\u201d The\nparsimony of the government compelled them to dispense with the services\nof their regular physician; but, writes the agent, \u201cwe have been\nfortunate in securing the services of a sister, who has, in addition to\nher duties as a teacher, kindly dispensed medicines with the most\ngratifying success.\u201d \u201cThe school,\u201d he adds, \u201cis in a very prosperous\ncondition under the efficient management of Sister Mary, superior, and\nthree assistants.\u201d\n\nThe Indians on the Tulalip reservation, 3,250 in number, are equally\nwell advanced; the whole of them wear citizen\u2019s dress; they have 2\nboarding-schools, with 6 teachers, and 2,260 of them are \u201cchurch\nmembers.\u201d We look in vain for statistics like these among the agencies\nunder Protestant control; when there is anything like it, it is found in\nthe reports from the tribes which have been civilized and Christianized\nby the Catholic Church and then stolen away by the sects.\n\nIn addition to the 33 agencies which belonged by right to the church,\nbut were distributed among the sects, 30 others were portioned out among\nthem, so that, according to the last report of the commissioner, while\nthe church, entitled to 40 agencies, has but 7, the Quakers have 16; the\nMethodists 14; the Baptists 2; the Presbyterianscc 7; the\nCongregationalists 6; the \u201cReformed\u201d 4; the Protestant Episcopalians 9;\nthe Unitarians 2; the \u201cFree-will Baptists\u201d 1; the \u201cUnited\nPresbyterians,\u201d who seem to be disunited from the other Presbyterians,\n1; and the \u201cChristian Union,\u201d which is not in union with any of the\nother sects, 1. If our space permitted, we should point out the\nmiserable results after a seven years\u2019 possession of these agencies. The\nfour agencies under the care of the \u201cReformed\u201d body, for example,\nembrace 14 tribes, numbering 17,049 souls. Among these are the Papagoes,\n5,900 in number, already tolerably well-civilized by Catholic\ninstruction, and all of whom wear citizen\u2019s dress. With the exception of\nthese, the \u201cReformers,\u201d after seven years\u2019 labor, have 50 Indians who\nwear citizen\u2019s dress, 2 schools, 1 church building, and 4 church\nmembers! As they have not thought it worth while to send out any\nmissionaries, one wonders what they do with their church building, but\nit is probably used as a store-house by the \u201cReformed\u201d agent.\n\nThe Hicksite Quakers have 5 agencies in Nebraska, with 4,098 Indians.\nThey have 392 \u201cchurch members,\u201d but 348 of these belong to a civilized\ntribe\u2014the Santee Sioux, who are 793 strong. After seven years of labor\nthe Quakers have got only 44 out of the other 3,300 Indians under their\ncare to call themselves \u201cchurch members.\u201d In the Hoopa Valley\nreservation, given to the Methodists, there is a \u201cschool building,\u201d but\nno school, no teacher, and no pupils; there is a \u201cchurch building,\u201d but\nno missionary and no \u201cchurch members.\u201d The poor mission Indians in\nCalifornia, the children of Catholic parents for many generations, also\nunder the tender care of the Methodists, have neither houses, nor\nschool, nor church, nor missionary. The 6,000 Indians on the Red Cloud\nagency in Dakota, under the charge of the Protestant Episcopalians, have\na \u201cschool building,\u201d but no teacher, no scholars, no church, no\nmissionary, and no \u201cchurch members.\u201d The 3,992 Cheyennes and Arapahoes\nin the Indian Territory, in charge of the Quakers, have a school-house,\nbut no church, no missionary, and no \u201cchurch members,\u201d and so with the\nrest.\n\nIn selecting a few typical illustrations of the injustice perpetrated by\nthe assignment of tribes of Catholic Indians to non-Catholic sects, we\nare embarrassed by the richness and plenitude of our facts. We mention\nonly two\u2014the Chippewas of Lake Superior, and the Osages.\n\nThe agency of the Chippewas of Lake Superior became vacant early in\n1873, and General Ewing, on the 19th of March of that year, addressed a\nletter to the Secretary of the Interior, submitting \u201cthat, under the\nIndian policy of President Grant, this agency should be assigned to the\nCatholic Church.\u201d He accompanied his letter with a brief of the facts on\nwhich he thus claimed the agency for the church. The Chippewas number\n4,551, and 3,696 of them wear citizen\u2019s dress; they have six schools and\nthree churches. More than 200 years ago the Catholic fathers Dablon and\nMarquette established the mission of St. Mary among the Chippewas, and\nthe church has ever since looked upon them as her children. The Catholic\nmissions, first permanently established among them in 1668, continued in\na flourishing manner until the year 1800; they were revived after a\nlapse of 30 years; and for the past 47 years they have been continuously\nattended by Catholic priests\u2014one being assigned exclusively and\ncontinuously to the religious instruction, education, and care of the\nIndians. The Indians at their own expense have built three Catholic\nchurches, at Bayfield, La Pointe, and Bad River. The successive reports\nof the Commissioners of Indian Affairs from 1868 to 1872 set forth these\nfacts. Praise is given in 1868 to Father Chebal for the good result of\nhis labors; the agent, writing in 1870, says: \u201cThe religious instruction\nhas been almost entirely under Catholic missionaries; 99 out of 100 of\nthem are Catholics, and Father Chebal has labored industriously and\nsuccessfully among them.\u201d The agent, writing in 1871, again says: \u201cMost\nof these people are members of the Roman Catholic Church. Their pastor\nhas been a missionary among them for many years, and has labored with\nthe zeal for which his church is proverbial to secure converts. He has\naccomplished much good.\u201d The report of the agent for 1868 likewise\nmentions that the \u201cRev. L. H. Wheeler and his most estimable lady\u201d had\nbeen conducting a Protestant mission there \u201cunder the control of the A.\nB. C. F. M. Society,\u201d but that \u201c_this society having almost withdrawn\ntheir support, and further for the purpose of educating their own\nchildren, Rev. Mr. Wheeler has abandoned his mission_.\u201d The agent in\n1869, Lt.-Col. Knight, of the army, thus writes:\n\n \u201cThe Chippewas of Lake Superior generally have abandoned the\n heathen faith of their fathers. If they have not all been made\n intelligent Christians, they have abandoned heathenism. The\n Catholic missionaries are the most assiduous workers among them,\n and the largest portion of them have espoused that religious\n faith; yet the Protestant religion has its adherents among them.\n Father Chebal, of the Catholic faith, is untiring and devoted in\n his labors with them. The Protestant religion is without a\n missionary representative, which is unfortunate,\u201d etc.\n\nThe case, it will be seen, was plain. The Catholic missions were shown\nto be the oldest and the _only successful_ missions among the Chippewas,\nand \u201cthe right of the Catholic Church, under the policy of the\nadministration, to the agency\u201d was incontestable. But the agency had\nalready been given to the Congregationalists, who had never before\nattempted to establish a mission among the Chippewas, and whose minister\nknew nothing about the tribe. Pressed hard by General Ewing, the\nsecretary referred the matter to our pious friend Mr. Brunot, who, in an\nelaborate and most disingenuous opinion, decided that, although the\nassignment of the agency to the Congregationalists might have been\nerroneous, now that it was made it ought not to be changed\u2014and this,\ntoo, although the department had made similar changes in other\ninstances, taking, for example, the Nez-Perc\u00e9s agency from the\nCatholics, to whom it had been assigned, and giving it to the Methodists\nin 1870. General Ewing, unwilling to submit to this palpable injustice,\nagain addressed the Secretary of the Interior, reviewing the whole\nquestion and incontestably proving the justice of his claim. But all was\nin vain; the agency remains in the hands of the Congregationalists, and\nthe Catholic Chippewas and their priests are at the mercy of men who\nhave no sympathy or bond of common feeling with either.\n\nThe Osages, now in the Indian Territory, are and long have been almost\nwholly Catholic. But they were assigned to the Quakers, and good Friend\nGibson, whose pathetic lament over the worldly sufferings of his\n_proteg\u00e9s_ we have already given, had not been long in charge of them\nere he issued an edict forbidding Catholic priests or teachers to remain\non the reservation. Accustomed to oppression and maltreatment of every\nkind, the Indians felt that this last blow was too hard to bear without\nremonstrance, and in June, 1873, they drew up and signed a memorial to\nthe President, asking that \u201ctheir former Catholic missionaries and\nschool-teachers be restored to them and allowed to again locate in the\nOsage nation.\u201d No response was given to this petition, and on the 31st\nof March in the next year a delegation of the tribe, with the governor\nof the nation at their head, arrived at Washington, and, without\nassistance or suggestions, drew up and presented to the Assistant\nSecretary of the Interior a memorial which it is impossible to read\nwithout emotion. After setting forth that the signers of the memorial\nare \u201cthe governor, chiefs, and councillors of the Great and Little Osage\nnation of Indians, and all duly-constituted delegates of said nations,\u201d\nthey recount the story of their former petition, and say:\n\n \u201c... In the name of our people, therefore, we beg leave to renew\n our said petition, and to ask that our former Catholic\n missionary, Father Shoemaker, and those connected with him in\n his missionary and educational labors among our people previous\n to the late war, be permitted to again locate among us. We think\n that this request is reasonable and just. Catholic missionaries\n have been among our people for several generations. Our people\n are familiar with their religion. The great majority of them are\n of the Catholic faith, and believe it is right. Our children\n have grown up in this faith. Many of our people have been\n educated by the Catholic missionaries, and our people are\n indebted to them for all the blessings of Christianity and\n civilization that they now enjoy, and have for them a grateful\n remembrance. Since the missionaries have been taken away from\n us, we have done but little good and have made poor advancement\n in civilization and education. Our whole nation has grieved ever\n since these missionaries have been taken away from us, and we\n have prayed continuously that the Great Spirit might move upon\n the heart of our great father, the President, and cause him to\n return these missionaries to us. We trust he will do so, because\n in 1865, when we signed the treaty of that date, the\n commissioners who made it promised _that if we signed it we\n should again have our missionaries_.\u201d\n\nThe assistant secretary received the memorial, promising to present it\nto the President at once and to obtain for the delegation a reply: but\non the next day Mr. Gibson, who had followed them to Washington in a\nstate of great alarm, hurried them away from the capital to\nPhiladelphia, and thence homewards, not permitting them to return.\nImmediately after their departure the petition they had filed in the\ndepartment was missing, and its loss was only supplied by General Ewing,\nwho had a printed copy with the certificate of the secretary placed on\nfile. Simultaneously with the mysterious disappearance of this petition\nthe Commissioner of Indian Affairs received a paper purporting to come\nfrom the Osages at home. We dislike to use the phrase, but the proof is\nclear that this document was a forgery. It purported to be signed by\ntwenty-eight chiefs and braves, with their \u201cmark\u201d; but, as General Ewing\nsays, \u201cit was evidently got up by interested white men and the names of\nthe Indians signed without their knowledge.\u201d The substance of it was\nthat the delegation which had gone to Washington was not to be regarded.\nUpon their return home the delegation met their people in council, and\nthe result of this conference is related in a letter to General Ewing,\nsigned by Joseph Paw-ne-no-posh, governor of the nation; Alexander\nBezett, president of the council; T. L. Rogers, secretary; and the\neighteen councillors. The letter is too long to be given here. In\npresenting it to the Secretary of the Interior, with a full account of\nthe whole transaction, General Ewing used some very strong, but not too\nstrong, language. \u201cTheir petitions,\u201d said he, \u201chave not been heard, and\nnow, through me as the representative of the Catholic Indian missions,\nthey make a final appeal. The petition of a defenceless people for\nsimple justice at the hands of a great government is the strongest\nappeal that my head or heart can conceive; and it is of course\nunnecessary for me to urge it upon you. It is as plain and open as the\nday; and if you can decline (which I cannot believe) to comply with the\nrepeated petitions of this people, it is useless for me to urge you to\nit. You must give this agency to the Catholic Church, or you publish the\nannouncement that President Grant has changed his policy, and that he\nnow intends to _force_ that form of Christianity on each Indian tribe\nthat _he_ may think is best for each.\u201d\n\nBut it was all in vain. Friend Gibson carried his point, and, although\nhe has since been compelled to retire from the agency, it is still in\nthe hands of the Quaker organization. The population of the reservation,\naccording to the last report, was 2,679; very nearly the whole of these\nare good and faithful Catholic Christians; but the agent reports:\n\u201cChurch members, none; churches, none; missionaries, none!\u201d The Quakers\nhave driven away the Catholic priests, and have not even taken the\ntrouble to send a missionary of their own to fill their place.\n\nBut we must make an end, although we have only, as it were, touched the\nskirt of our subject. Time and space would fail us to tell of the priest\nin California who was thrown into prison, brutally beaten, and expelled\nfrom his flock, for the offence of coming to his old mission after the\nagency had been assigned to a Protestant sect; of the bishops who have\nbeen denied permission to build churches and schools on reservations for\nthe use of Catholic Indians; of the frauds committed by Protestant\nagents on Catholic tribes; of the mingled tyranny and temptation with\nwhich the Protestant agents have repeatedly assailed our poor Indian\nbrethren, making their apostasy the condition of their rescue from\nstarvation. Are not all these things written in the reports of the\nIndian Bureau, in the annals of the Catholic Indian missions, and in the\nletters of our bishops and priests published from time to time?\n\nThe duty of the Catholic laity throughout the United States in this\nbusiness is clear. Happily, the way for the discharge of this duty has\nbeen made easy. It is simply to provide generously for the support and\nincrease of the work of the Bureau of Catholic Missions at Washington.\nThis bureau was established in January, 1873; it is composed of a\ncommissioner, appointed by the Archbishop of Baltimore, with the\nconcurrence in council of the archbishops of the United States; a\ntreasurer and director; and a Board of Control, of five members,\nappointed in like manner. The commissioner is a layman; he is recognized\nby the government as the representative of the church in all matters\namong the Indians. The treasurer and director must be a priest; the\npresident of the Board of Control must be a priest; the other four\nmembers are laymen. The salaries of the commissioner and of the Board of\nControl are\u2014nothing. Their work, like that of the directors in the\ncouncils of the Propaganda, is given in charity. \u201cGeneral Charles Ewing,\nthe commissioner,\u201d says Father Brouillet, \u201chas for over four years\ngenerously given to the work of the bureau his legal services and a\nlarge portion of his valuable time gratuitously. He never made any\ncharge nor received any pay for his services, and on more than one\noccasion he has advanced his own money to keep up the work.\u201d The\ndirector and treasurer and two clerks are the only persons connected\nwith the bureau who are paid, and their united salaries are only $1,000\na year. The whole expenditures of the bureau, for salaries, printing,\nstationery, postage, rent, and travelling, have not exceeded $1,600 a\nyear during the four years of its existence\u2014all the balance of its funds\ngoing directly to the benefit of the missions. The business of the\nbureau is to defend Catholic Indian missions against the organized\nassault which has been made upon them. For those desirous of aiding so\ngood a work we add the information that \u201call remittances to the\ntreasurer of the Catholic Indian mission fund should be by draft on New\nYork or by post-office order, and should be addressed to lock-box 60,\nWashington, D. C.\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n ST. HEDWIGE.[11]\n\nThe bulwark of Christendom is the title which Poland long claimed and\nwell deserved, even when the country now known as that of Sobieski and\nKosciusko was itself half-barbarous, and, instead of being a brilliant,\nmany-provinced kingdom, was a disunited confederation of sovereigns.\nAmong the many medi\u00e6val heroes who fought the invading Tartars on the\neast, and the aggressive heathen Prussians on the west, and looked upon\ntheir victories as triumphs of the cross and their death as a kind of\nmartyrdom, were two Henrys, \u201cthe Bearded\u201d and \u201cthe Pious,\u201d the husband\nand the son of the holy Princess Hedwige, Duchess of Silesia and Poland\nduring the first half of the thirteenth century. Her life, chiefly\nthrough her connection with other princely houses, was an eventful and\nsorrowful one, and, towards the last years of it, personally a checkered\none. If God chastises those whom he loves, the mark of grace was surely\nset upon St. Hedwige of Andechs, the aunt of St. Elizabeth of Hungary,\nand second daughter of a Bavarian sovereign whose titles and possessions\nincluded parts of Istria, Croatia and Dalmatia, Swabia, and the Tyrol.\nThe life and customs of the thirteenth century, the magnificence on\nstate occasions, and the simplicity, not to say rudeness, of domestic\nlife at ordinary times; the difficulty of communication, and\nconsequently the long separations between friends and kindred; the\nprominent part of religion in all the good works and public improvements\nof the day; the tales and legends that grew up among the people; the\ntraditions which there was no one to investigate or contradict, and\nwhich did duty then for newspaper and magazine gossip; the personal\nconnection between the sovereign and his people, and the primitive ideal\nof charity unclouded by doubts and theories, experiments and\n\u201ccommissions\u201d; the summary processes of justice, tempered only by the\npleadings of generous and tender women; government in a chaotic state,\nthe profession of arms the dominant one, private wars at every turn, and\nindividual acts of heroism, barbarity, and charity all alike received as\na matter of course\u2014all this is well known, and is equally true of all\nChristian and civilized lands of that day.\n\nBut as you went eastward through Europe confusion increased and manners\ngrew rougher; primitive standards of right and wrong existed under the\nname of the law of the strongest; and whatever generosity human nature\ndisplayed was an untutored impulse, a half-heathen quality guided by a\nnatural sense of honor rather than by fixed rules of morality. The\nSlavs, the Czechs, and the Magyars were magnificent barbarians, as the\nFranks and Teutons of four centuries earlier had been\u2014Christians,\nindeed, and as fiercely so as Clovis when he drew his sword at the first\nrecital of the Passion and exclaimed, \u201cWould to God I and my Franks had\nbeen there\u201d; but unrestrained and wild, more generous than obedient\ntowards the church, which they would rather endow and defend than curb\ntheir passions in accordance with its teachings\u2014splendid material, but\nan unwrought mine. Bishops and priests had fallen into loose ways among\nthem and lost the respect of the people; vassals of the great lords,\nthey stood on much the same level as the secular clergy at present do in\nRussia, and the popes had long striven in vain to make them give up\nmarriage when they took Holy Orders. The parish clergy were mostly\nignorant men, often employed in common labor to support their families,\nwhile of teaching monasteries or any places where learning was imparted\nand respected there were very few.\n\nHedwige came from a well-regulated country, where church dignitaries\nwere the equals of civil ones, where the Roman standard was paramount,\nand churchmen were looked upon as powerful and learned men. Monasteries\nfor both sexes abounded; Hedwige herself had been brought up by the\nBenedictines at Kitzingen, where her special friend and teacher,\nPetrussa, many years afterwards, followed her into Silesia and became\nthe first abbess of the monastery of Trebnitz, near Breslau. Hedwige,\nwhose mind was from her earliest years in advance of her time, and who\nmastered all the accomplishments of a woman of high station at that day\nbefore she was twelve years old, set herself the task of bettering her\nadopted country as soon as she had entered it. The men of that time knew\nless than the women; for their education, unless they were destined for\nthe church, was purely military. Ecclesiastics were lawyers, doctors,\nauthors, travellers, _savants_, poets, and schoolmasters; while the\nmajority of laymen were only soldiers. But the women of corresponding\nbirth were taught Latin and a good deal of medicine, besides household\nknowledge, embroidery, the national literature, music, and painting. For\nthe times this was no unworthy curriculum. They had a practical\nknowledge of surgery and of the healing herbs of the field\u2014which, in\ndays when the chances of life and death often hung on the possibility of\nreaching or finding a physician within the radius of forty or fifty\nmiles, was a very valuable gift\u2014and an equally practical and useful\nacquaintance with all the details of housekeeping. Nothing in those days\nwas \u201cmade easy\u201d; mechanical contrivances for saving time and trouble\nwere not thought of; and even the highest people worked slowly with\ntheir hands and did cheerfully without the luxuries which a cottage\nwould scarcely lack in these days. Hedwige in her later years\u2014for she\nnever gave up her habits of industry\u2014often reminded her attendants of\nthe maxim, \u201cHe that worketh not, neither let him eat,\u201d and would never\nallow that the rule did not apply to sovereigns as well as to private\nindividuals. Her own life was laborious; she rose with the dawn, winter\nand summer, and, though her devotions took up many hours, she yet had\nenough to give to the education of her children, the making of vestments\nfor poor churches, and of clothes for her pensioners. Her virtues, which\nwere great and generous, flowed naturally into the mould of her time;\nshe built and endowed monasteries, interceded for prisoners and\ncriminals, made daily distributions of alms to the poor, nursed the sick\nand leprous in the hospitals\u2014which she was the first in her adopted\ncountry to found and secure\u2014and she brought up a number of orphan\nchildren. Of these she was so fond that when she travelled she took them\nwith her in several covered wagons. Later on she kept in the palace at\nBreslau, at her own expense, thirteen poor men, whom she served every\nday at dinner, just before her own meal, and otherwise ministered to\ntheir wants in memory of our Lord and his apostles. In fact, her life is\na kind of transcript of that of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, and even the\npoetical legends of miracles wrought to turn away her husband\u2019s\ndispleasure, familiar to us all through the pictures of St. Elizabeth\nand the bread turned to roses, have a counterpart in Hedwige\u2019s life.\n\nThere is a prevalent idea that holiness and the present time are\nincompatible, or rather that the holiness of which the biographers of\nmedi\u00e6val saints admiringly tell us is out of place in this century. The\nmistake lies in the frame of the picture presented to us. Holiness is of\nall times, and is the same in substance as it ever was. If, instead of\nreproducing the beautiful legends of old, and restoring a sort of\nliterary Preraphaelitism in the history of the strong and wise women of\nby-gone times, the modern biographer were to go to the root of the\nmatter and bring out in strong relief the commonsense virtues, the\nsimplicity and faithfulness to natural duties, the reliance upon God,\nand the single-minded purpose which distinguished the women who are\nknown as saints, they would succeed in winning the interest of modern\nreaders. These saints were wives, mothers, and mistresses, lived and\nloved, sorrowed, rejoiced, and suffered, as women have done from the\nwives of the patriarchs down to the good women of our own century,\nperhaps of our own acquaintance. They were models whom it is\npraiseworthy to copy\u2014not pictures held up to our gaze as beautiful\ninaccessibilities. The very rudeness of life then should make them more\nhuman in our eyes; they made mistakes with good intentions; they had\npredilections which savored of weakness; they struggled through\ntemptations to final perfection\u2014for saintship implies, not the\nglorification of every act they ever did, but the general state of their\nlife and soul after they had suffered and conquered in the fight that we\nall have to wage with the world, the flesh, and the devil. Of the\nstriking incidents of a saint\u2019s life it is best to judge as one would of\nthose in the life of any other personage of by-gone ages\u2014that is,\naccording to the standard of the age in which he or she lived; of the\nroot-virtues which won the saint\u2019s canonization: by the everlasting\nstandard of the Ten Commandments. There is no more mischievous error,\nnor one more likely to blind us to the good we can draw from the lives\nof men and women who have gone before us, than the view which sets a\nbarrier between historic holiness and every-day life at the present day.\n\nHedwige lived in times which had their share of wars, invasions,\npestilences, and other such stirring events: Poland and Germany were in\na stormy state, and the fate of many of her own family was peculiarly\nstormy; indeed, hardly a sensational drama of our day could deal in more\nviolent incidents than did the half century through which she lived. Her\nsister Agnes became the wife of Philip, King of France, in place of his\nlawful but divorced wife, Ingeburga, and incurred not only personal\nexcommunication as an adulteress, but was the cause of the French\nkingdom being laid under an interdict for more than a year. Her elder\nsister Gertrude, Queen of Hungary, was assassinated by a political\nfaction in the absence of her husband, who had left her regent. Her two\nbrothers, Henry and Egbert (the latter Bishop of Bamberg), were the\naccomplices of Otho of Wittelsbach, the suitor of Hedwige\u2019s only\ndaughter, in the murder of Philip, the Emperor of Germany, whom he slew\nto revenge himself for the warning the emperor had given the Duke of\nSilesia against the would-be suitor of the young princess; for Otho was\nas cruel as he was brave. For this deed the Electors at Frankfort\ndegraded the brothers from their dignities, titles, and possessions,\nafter which Henry exiled himself to the Holy Land, where he fought the\nSaracens for twenty years, and Egbert fled to Hungary, where the queen,\nhis sister, gave him a home and shelter for the rest of his life. Otho\nwas beheaded, his head thrown into the Danube and his body exposed to\nthe birds and beasts of the forest.\n\nBut the punishment of treason did not end here; Hedwige\u2019s home was\ndestroyed by the indignant avengers of the emperor, and her father\u2019s\nheart was broken at the news of his son\u2019s crime; so that of the old\ncradle-land of the family nothing but smoking ruins and sad memories\nremained, while a few years later she saw her two sons, Henry and\nConrad, meet in deadly conflict as the heads of two rival parties in the\nduchy, the latter defeated and pursued by his brother, and only saved by\nhis father to die a few days later from a fall when out hunting. Her\nhusband and her remaining son died within three years of each other, the\nlatter in battle against the invading Tartars; and, what no doubt\npierced her heart still more, her husband was excommunicated for\nretaining church property in provinces which he claimed as his by right\nof the testament of the Duke of Gnesen and Posen. The early death of\nthree other children must have been but a slight sorrow compared with\nthese trials, and the peaceful life of her sister Matilda, Abbess of\nKitzingen, and of her daughter Gertrude, second abbess of Trebnitz\u2014the\nsame who escaped becoming the bride of \u201cWild Otho,\u201d as he was\ncalled\u2014could not but have made her envy it at times. She had had in her\nyouth an inclination towards the monastic life, but gave it up at her\nparents\u2019 desire, and married, according to the customs of her time and\nclass, at the childish age of twelve. But she had seemed from her\ninfancy marked out for no common lot; she was grave, sedate, and\nwomanly; she felt her marriage to be a mission and the beginning of\nduties; she saw at a glance the state of neglect and uncivilization and\nthe need of betterment in which her adopted country stood, and set about\nimbuing her husband with her ideas concerning improvement. He was only\neighteen, and loved her truly, so he proved to be her first disciple.\nShe began by learning Polish, which her husband\u2019s sister Adelaide taught\nher, and then gathered all the inmates of the palace, to teach them\nprayers and the chief doctrines of the faith, in which they were very\nimperfectly instructed, although full of readiness, even eagerness, to\nbelieve. Her father-in-law, the reigning duke, fully appreciated her\nworth and respected her enthusiasm. Her husband joined her in plans for\nfounding monasteries and building churches when it should come to his\nturn to reign over Silesia; and in the meanwhile she strove to teach the\nnobles and the people a greater respect for the priesthood by herself\nsetting the example of outward deference towards priests, whether native\nor foreign, ignorant or learned. The strangers she always asked to the\npalace, gave them clothes and money for their journey, attended their\nMasses, and sometimes served them at table.\n\nIn order to introduce clerical learning and morals into Silesia and\nPoland, it was necessary to rely upon Germans, as has often been the\ncase in other countries, where a foreign element has been, for some\ntime at least, synonymous with civilization. In England Italians\nchiefly, in a less degree Normans, and in one signal instance a\nGreek,[12] brought with them the knowledge of church architecture and\nchant, besides secular learning; Irish missionaries had before that\nhelped on the Britons, and Saxons, later on, carried the same\ninfluence across the sea to heathen Germany, who in her turn became\nthe evangelizer of the Slav nations. Still later, when Poland was as\nfervent a Catholic country as Germany, another Hedwige (the name had\nthen grown to be a national one) converted the Lithuanians and became\nthe mother of the Jagellon dynasty. Here, on the confines of Russia,\nthe Latin Church stood face to face with the Greek, and the tide of\nprogress and conversion was stayed. Then came the perpetual turmoils\nwith the warlike Turks, till religion became rather an affair of the\nknight than of the missionary, until that wave of circumstances having\npassed away, and the Turks having sunk from the height of their\nmilitary renown to the insignificance of a mongrel and undisciplined\ncrowd, the battle between faith and scepticism\u2014the modern form of\nheathenism\u2014has shifted to a great degree to the arena of the mind. The\nLepanto of our day is being fought out as obstinately on paper as that\nof three hundred years ago was on sea; of its nature it cannot be as\nshort or as decisive, but it is nevertheless the counterpart\u2014and the\nonly worthy one\u2014of that romantic and daring feat of arms. The struggle\nin the days of Hedwige was in some sense much narrower; but though her\nhusband and son engaged in it rather as blind instruments than\nfar-seeing directors, she, with the instincts of her sex and her\nhabitual union with God, helped in it as a teacher and missionary. She\nproved her gift for it first upon her household, then, in the years of\nher retirement, upon her special charge\u2014some young heathen girls,\nnatives of Prussia, whom she taught herself and provided for in life.\nOne of these, Catherine, to whom she was godmother, she married to her\ntrusty chamberlain, Schavoine, and left them the estate of that name\nafter her death. But notwithstanding her thirst for doing good and her\nhigh idea of her duty to her subjects, she thoroughly enjoyed the\nquiet of home-life, away from the court, and, whenever it was\npracticable, would spend some weeks at a time with her young husband\nand her children at L\u00e4hnhaus. It is here that her memory lives\nfreshest at present; here that she tended her dovecot, which is\nbrought to mind by the yearly market of doves, unique of its kind,\nstill held at L\u00e4hn on Ash-Wednesday; here that she and her favorite\ndoe crossed the Hedwigsteig, a rough, rocky pathway, to the Chapel of\nthe Hermit and the image of the Blessed Virgin, which afterwards\nbecame a pilgrimage-shrine, where the neighboring peasants came to see\nher and unite in her prayers, so that the present village dates back\nto the huts of branches hastily put up around the spreading tree that\nformerly protected the image; here that she rested on the Hedwigstein,\nor moss-grown boulder, yet remaining, with her name attached to it;\nhere that she built a chapel dedicated to St. Nicholas, and\nestablished some Benedictine monks; and here that in her later years\nshe received the confidence of her friend, Baroness Jutta of\nLiebenthal, a pious widow, who founded the monastery of that name for\nBenedictine nuns and the education of young girls, and herself became\nits first abbess.\n\nDuke Henry, when he came to be sovereign, did not forget his plans and\npromises, but helped her generously in the endowment of her hospitals,\nchurches, and monasteries. Himself the son of a German princess, he had\ngreat faith in the influence for good, in morals, in agriculture, in\nlearning, of his mother\u2019s and his wife\u2019s countrymen; and, according to\nthe custom of the time, Hedwige was accompanied on her journey to\nSilesia, as a bride, by an escort of German knights, who were not to\ncompose a separate court or household for her, but to settle in the\ncountry and make it their home. Such immigration, of course, had its sad\nas well as its good side; it led to jealousies that were neither\nunnatural nor inexcusable, although it also leavened the country with\nsome useful and healthy habits. It was on this delicate question that\nher two sons quarrelled so violently as to make it the pretext of a\ncivil war; Conrad, the youngest, being passionately attached to the old\nPolish customs and not discriminating between these and crying abuses,\nwhile Henry, the eldest, inherited his father\u2019s love for the Germans.\nThe old nobility formed a powerful party and rallied round Conrad,\nhailing him as their future national sovereign, although his father was\nstill alive and his elder brother the acknowledged heir. Henry the\nBearded had by that time retired from public life, and divided his\npossessions between his two sons, giving the eldest the city of Breslau\nand all Middle and Lower Silesia, while the youngest received the\nprovinces of Leubus and Lausitz. The latter were less cultivated than\nthe former, but this was chiefly due to that want of, or remoteness\nfrom, German influence and immigration; so that the father, knowing his\nsons\u2019 opposite views on this subject, hoped to satisfy each by his\npartition. Conrad, however, resented the gift of a less civilized and\nextended territory, and took this pretext to make war on his brother,\nwith the result already noted.\n\nThe retirement of Henry, the husband of Hedwige, which lasted for twenty\nyears or more, was the result of a strange form of piety and\nself-renunciation not uncommon in the middle ages. The Duke and Duchess\nof Silesia had been married twenty-three years, and had had six\nchildren, three of whom died in infancy. A little after the birth of the\nyoungest, in 1209, Hedwige, still in the bloom of her years (she was\nonly thirty-five and her husband forty-one), and after many prayers and\nstruggles, felt herself impelled to dedicate the rest of her life to God\nonly, and, with her husband\u2019s consent, to live separate from him. They\nhad always loved each other tenderly, and Henry\u2019s conduct, unlike that\nof many sovereigns of his and of later times, had been irreproachable;\nhe looked upon his wife as a saint, and upon her wishes as commands; he\nhad allowed her to guide his charities and public improvements, had\nfollowed her advice, had trusted to her to bring up his children exactly\nas she thought fit, which was more rigorously and less luxuriously than\nis often the case with royal children\u2014in a word, had leant wholly upon\nher. To signify his full acquiescence in this half-monastic vow, he\nreceived the tonsure, and, contrary to the custom of his class at that\ntime, let his beard grow, whence came his surname, the Bearded.\n\nHedwige retired to Trebnitz, where she lived in a separate house with\nher own women and the chamberlain Schavoine, who took his name from the\nestate which Henry gave her on their separation. Other grants of money\nwere also made her, and her husband promised his countenance and help in\nany good work she should wish to do there or elsewhere throughout his\npossessions. They often met in after years, generally at festive\nceremonies for the building or opening of churches, and once at the\ngrave of their unhappy son Conrad; and Henry himself, though keeping up\na court and moving from place to place, betook himself to prayers,\nstudy, and good works, having given over the government to his sons. In\nhis old age he came forth again in the character of a sovereign and a\nleader, and, indeed, led a stormy, stirring life for a few years before\nhis death.\n\nHedwige, in this proceeding of her retirement, had another object in\nview\u2014that is, the example which she hoped her voluntary giving up of\nmarried life would be to the married priesthood of Poland and Silesia.\nSuch was, to a great extent, the case, and the celibacy of the clergy,\nso long preached in vain, became in a few years the rule instead of the\nexception.\n\nThe Cistercian abbey of Trebnitz, now Hedwige\u2019s home, was the first\ninstitution of its kind for women. It was begun in 1200 and finished\neighteen years later, but was ready to be inhabited in 1202. It stood in\na wooded region, three miles from Breslau. The legend of its foundation,\nas commemorated in an old rhyme or _Volkslied_ (people\u2019s song), refers\nit to a vow made by Henry, who, while out hunting, got entangled in a\nmorass and could see no human means of rescue; but what is certain is\nthat the royal couple had long planned and looked forward to a monastery\nfor women, and the date of the laying of the first stone of Trebnitz\ncorresponds with that of Henry\u2019s accession to the throne. The building\nwas intended to accommodate a thousand persons, and was built by the\nhands of convicts and prisoners, even those who were condemned to death,\nwhose work on it was to be equivalent to the rest of their sentence.\nHedwige\u2019s pity for, and kindness to, captives, whether innocent or\nguilty, was a conspicuous trait of her character; and the undeserved\nphysical hardships of prisoners in those times were enough to turn the\nsympathies of every kind-hearted person from justice towards the\ncriminal. In the same way did the neglected sick, and especially the\nlepers, touch her heart; indeed, all the oldest hospitals in Silesia are\ndue to her.\n\nThe neighboring Cistercian monks of Leubus cast the leaden plates for\nthe roof and the smaller bells of the new monastery, in return for which\nHenry gave them two estates; and the duke himself with his foremost\nnobles inspected the progress of the work, and solemnly made the round\nof the land deeded to the institution, marking his own name on the\nboundary stones. Bishop Egbert of Bamberg, Hedwige\u2019s brother (this was\nbefore his disgrace), procured a body of Cistercian nuns of his diocese\nas a beginning, and accompanied them himself on their journey to their\nnew home. Hedwige\u2019s great-uncle, Provost Popo of Bamberg, came too, and\nthe meeting of these strangers with the high clergy of Silesia and\nPoland was, as the old chroniclers would have said, \u201ca brave and\npleasant sight.\u201d The buildings were decorated with evergreens, and the\npomp of jewelled garments, clerical and national costumes, armor, horses\nrichly caparisoned, embroidered robes and canopies, was dazzling. It was\nthe Sunday within the octave of the feast of the Epiphany\u2014a sharp,\nbright winter\u2019s day; the cavalcade from the court of Breslau, consisting\nof the duke and duchess and their retinue, escorted the nuns and the\nforeign ecclesiastics, while the bishops of Breslau and Posen, each with\nhis chapter, and the Cistercian abbot under whose jurisdiction Trebnitz\nwas placed, received the latter at the gate of the finished portion of\nthe new church. Here the duke handed the Abbess Petrussa, Hedwige\u2019s old\nfriend and teacher, a deed of the property henceforth belonging to the\norder\u2014a document which, like all following ones of the same kind, ended\nwith a forcible denunciation of any future injury to the rights of the\nabbey. \u201cWhoever injures this foundation, without giving full\nsatisfaction therefor, shall be cut off from the church; and let his\neverlasting portion be with Judas, the Lord\u2019s betrayer, who hanged\nhimself, and with Dathan and Abiron whom the earth swallowed up alive.\u201d\n\nWhen the deed had been read, and the dedication of the building \u201cto the\nhonor of God and of the holy apostle Bartholomew\u201d declared, the clergy,\nwho held torches in their hands, threw them on the ground, as a sign of\nall secular claims on the possessions of the abbey being extinguished;\nand during this ceremony the solemn excommunication against all who\nshould injure the monastery was read aloud once more. The men who had\nworked at the building, or in any way contributed to it, were freed from\nall feudal claims, from the obligation to fight, to furnish huntsmen,\nfalcons, or horses for the ducal household, to work at the fields or at\nthe public works, and received the immunities and protection usual to\nthe vassals of a monastery.\n\nAlthough Trebnitz was undoubtedly named after the neighboring village so\ncalled, a story grew up of the humorous mispronunciation of a Polish\nword, _trzebanic_, by the German abbess, when asked by Henry if \u201cthere\nwas anything else she needed?\u201d The word signifies \u201cWe need nothing\nmore,\u201d and has some likeness to the name of Trebnitz; but popular tales\nsuch as this abound everywhere. Among the later gifts to the monastery\nwere three villages, bound to supply the nuns with honey, wax, and\nmead\u2014the first for their \u201cvesper-meal,\u201d the second for their candles and\ntorches, and the third for their \u201cdrink on holidays.\u201d The object of the\ninstitution, which the original deed set forth as being the securing of\n\u201ca place of refuge wherein the weaker sex may atone for its sins through\nthe mercy of God,\u201d was at once obtained, and other advantages also grew\nup around the women\u2019s republic of Trebnitz. It was soon filled with\nyoung girls sent there to be educated; widows came either to enter the\norder or to live under its rule and protection as out-door members;\nwomen fled there to repent, and others to avoid temptation; and lastly\ncame Gertrude, the duke\u2019s daughter, to become a nun within its walls.\nSeven years after its festive opening Hedwige herself retired there and\nbegan the second half of her long life by caring for and educating the\nheathen maidens from Prussia. Trebnitz was her favorite home until her\ndeath, and the institution which was most identified with the holy\nDuchess of Silesia; but the list of great works she and her husband set\non foot, each of them a starting-point of much hidden good, is a long\none. The parish church of Bunzlau having, with most of the town itself,\nbeen burnt, she built a new one, dedicated to Our Lady. At Goldberg, a\nvillage near one of the royal summer palaces, she founded a Franciscan\nconvent, intended to serve the purpose of a school for the neighborhood.\nNimptsch, her place of refuge during the civil war between her two sons,\nwas not forgotten; for while there she laid the first stone of a church,\nand almost at the same time began one dedicated to St. Andrew for the\ntown of Herrnstadt. Her friends often remarked on her lavishness in\nbuilding, and asked her whence she could expect to draw the means. She\nused to answer confidently: \u201cI trust that the heavenly Architect who\nmade the world, and my dear and faithful husband Henry, will not let me\nbe shamed, so that I should be unable to finish what I have begun with\ngood motives and to their honor. Do not be too anxious about my doings;\nall will end well with God\u2019s help.\u201d In Breslau, the capital, she built\nthree hospitals\u2014that of the Holy Ghost, that of St. Lazarus (this was\nfor lepers), and that of St. Barbara. For many years Hedwige\u2019s charity\ntowards the sick had produced a rivalry among all good men, both nobles\nand burghers, to tend and care for some sick persons in their own houses\nor in rooms hired or built for the purpose; but her wish always was to\nfound a public hospital. The duke gave her a suitable piece of land for\nthe building and garden; the abbot of the Augustinians, Witoslaus, gave\nhis lay brothers as sick-nurses and his choir-monks as overseers and\nconfessors. Contributions flowed in from the rich members of the\npopulation, and the first hospital was finished in a very short time.\nThe third contained what was an immense luxury in those days\u2014a number of\nbath-rooms, open gratis to the poor on certain days, and rooms where\nthey could be bled, as was the custom on the slightest illness. All\nthose who came in contact with Hedwige caught her spirit of generosity,\nand rich men, lay and ecclesiastic, vied with her in founding churches\nand monasteries. Canon Nicholas of Breslau, the duke\u2019s chancellor,\nobtained Henry\u2019s leave to endow a Cistercian monastery with the estates\nwhich the duke had given him for his lifetime, and others followed his\nexample.\n\nThese ceremonies were always solemn and the deed of gift publicly read,\nsigned, witnessed, and sworn to. As much pomp hedged them in as was\nusual in a treaty of peace or the betrothal of sovereign princes; and,\nindeed, the foundation of churches, though a common occurrence, was\nlooked upon as quite as important as any civil contract. In 1234 a\nterrible famine, fever, and pestilence decimated the land, and, among\nmany other Silesian towns that possessed as yet no hospital, Neumarkt\nwas in special distress. Hedwige hurried there and set on foot a\ntemporary system of relief and nursing, but also entreated her husband\nto build a permanent hospital for incurables, where they might be cared\nfor till their death. This he did, and attached to it a provostship, the\nchurch dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, and Pope Innocent IV. sent\nspecial blessings to the Bohemian Benedictine monks who were entrusted\nwith the care of the sick. Four years later Henry built a church in\nL\u00f6wenberg and gave it to the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem; this was\na month or two before his death. But these are only a few of the works\nof this generous couple. Many villages and remote places obtained\nbenefits from them, travelling priests were cared for, young girls\nhelped in their need and protected or dowered, many poor families housed\nand fed; and the famine of 1234 especially gave Hedwige an opportunity\nof justifying her title of \u201cMother of the poor.\u201d She distributed\nunheard-of quantities of grain, bread, meat, and dried fruits to the\npeople, who came for relief from long distances. She gave lavishly, with\nthat apparent recklessness that marks the charities of saints, smilingly\nsaying, \u201cWe must help the poor, that the Lord may have pity on our own\nneeds and appease our own hunger.\u201d She forgave all feudal dues for years\non her own possessions, and looked after her employ\u00e9s so diligently that\nthey complained that the \u201cduchess left them nothing but the leavings of\nthe peasants.\u201d When she did not distribute her alms in person, the poor\ngroaned and wept, and cared less for the charity than if it had been\nseasoned by her gracious presence. When Breslau was wholly burnt down in\n1218, and three years\u2019 distress fell upon the land, she did the same and\nrelieved thousands. That year was marked by the death of the Abbess of\nTrebnitz, Petrussa, and the choice of Princess Gertrude as her\nsuccessor, which coincided with the festival held to celebrate the\nentire finishing of the monastery and the dedication of the church. The\nreligious ceremonies were followed by a banquet in the refectory and by\ngames for the people in the courtyard. Henry was present and rejoiced\nwith her; her son\u2019s wife, Anna, daughter of King Ottokar of Bohemia, was\nthere with her children, one of whom was to fill, but unworthily, the\nthrone of Silesia. It was a family gathering as well as a religious\nfeast; but if, as tradition says, Hedwige was then gifted with a more\nthan ordinary insight into the future, she must have felt sad to think\nof the turmoil that was coming and that would part her more and more in\nspirit from her husband.\n\nAfter the death of his second son, Conrad, Henry turned his arms against\na relation of his own, Duke Ladislaus of Gnesen and Posen, and came off\nvictorious. His old warrior-blood once again stirred in him, it was\nimpossible to keep him from the excitement of war, and Hedwige\u2019s\nentreaties and messages were of no avail. She feared the excommunication\nwhich Pope Innocent had more than once threatened to launch against the\nrestless Polish sovereigns, and was relieved when he undertook a war\nagainst the Prussians, who at least were heathens, and whose cruelties\nreally needed strong repression. Still, it was rather the thirst for\nfighting that led the Duke of Silesia against them than any exalted\nmotive of justice or desire to open the way for their conversion.\n\nThe pretext for the expedition was the cruelties they committed on their\ninroads into Poland, and especially the duchy of Masovia. To attack them\namong their own forests and morasses was so hopelessly difficult that\nthe bishops, whom the pope had admonished to preach a \u201ccrusade\u201d against\nthem, had hitherto refrained from doing so. The event proved the wisdom\nof this inaction; for after marching a large army over the border, under\nthe command of Henry of Silesia and Duke Conrad of Masovia, with whom\nthe bishops with their men-at-arms joined forces, the assailers found\nthemselves in a network of marshes, behind which the assailed quietly\nwaited. The wearied troops had at last to be ingloriously marched back\nagain, while the enemy came out in their rear, made a raid into Masovia,\ncarried off five thousand Christian captives, burnt a thousand villages\nand hamlets as well as almost every church in the province, and drove\nDuke Conrad into Germany for refuge. Henry then advised the fugitive\nduke to call upon the German Knights of Venice, a military order who\nafterwards under their grand master, Hermann Balk, settled in Kulmerland\nand effectually routed and conquered the Prussians. The conversion of\nthe latter was, therefore, a feat of arms rather than a triumph of\nmissionary zeal; and perhaps it was less to be wondered at that, after\nonly three hundred years\u2019 Christianity, they should have accepted\nanother change in the shape of the Lutheran Reformation. The order\nitself, however, was more blamable, in that it departed, in the person\nof its head, the famous Albert of Brandenburg, from its old chivalric\nstandard of honor, and went over to the \u201cnew doctrine,\u201d as it was\ncalled, because this defection promised political independence. And,\nagain, it strikes one, in reading of these thirteenth-century feuds,\nthat history repeats itself; for a new religious war has sprung up\nbetween Prussia and Posen, and the two civilized races are in much the\nsame relative positions, speaking broadly, as the two barbarous ones\nwere then, although Posen can point to a short and dazzling career\nbetween the two eras of persecution.\n\nIt is impossible here to recount the various and sad events that led up\nto the death of Henry. He died in 1238, at the age of seventy, under the\nban of excommunication, which was only partially removed, and deprived\nto the last of the presence of his saintly wife. The scene of the return\nof his body to the abbey church at Trebnitz was heartrending. The nuns\nand vassals, no less than his widow and children, looked upon him as\ntheir stay and their protector; they bewailed him with genuine grief as\ntheir benefactor, and buried him with all imaginable respect and pomp as\ntheir founder. Hedwige\u2019s life as a widow became more penitential than\nbefore.\n\nAfter her death a hair-shirt and a belt with small, sharp points turned\ninwards were found on her body; but these she had worn for many years\nbefore her widowhood. Her cloister-life, however, was not her only one,\nfor she watched with intelligent interest the politics of the time, the\ngreat events, and even the less obtrusive details, whose consequences to\nthe cause of good might afterwards be manifold; and above all she lived\nin her son, Henry the Pious, a worthy and able sovereign, whose reign\nwas to be short, stormy, and glorious.\n\nIn January, 1241, the Tartars, under their chiefs Batu and Peta, having\npreviously desolated Russia, fell with nearly three hundred thousand\nfighting men upon Bohemia, Hungary, Silesia, and Poland. The King of\nHungary, Bela, was beaten by Batu, while Peta besieged, took, and burnt\nCracow on his way to Silesia. The King of Bohemia, Wenzel, brought as\nlarge an army as he could to defend his frontiers, while Henry gathered\nthirty thousand men in his father\u2019s city of refuge, Liegnitz, waiting to\nattack Peta on his road to Breslau. Trebnitz was in dire confusion;\nmonasteries always fell the first prey to the heathen invaders, and the\nnuns judged it prudent to scatter themselves and claim each the\nprotection of her own family, while Hedwige, with her daughter, the\nAbbess Gertrude, and her daughter-in-law, Anna, shut themselves up in\nthe strong castle of Crossen on the Oder. Before she left she gave her\nson a scarf, or rather sword-belt, embroidered with her own hands, which\nhe received as an omen of good-fortune, cheering her with hopes of his\nspeedy and victorious return, while the stricken, heroic mother feared\nbut too surely that she should never see his face again. All Breslau\nretired within the citadel to await the attack, and Henry tried to\nintercept the foe on his way. He drew up his army on some high ground\njust outside the walls\u2014Wahlstatt, a good battle-ground, as he judged\u2014and\nhimself gave the signal to attack the oncoming foe. He commanded the\nmain body, while lesser brother-sovereigns directed the wings; but the\nirresistible might of numbers, which was the chief reliance of the\nTartars, bore down all opposition, as a whirlwind does the densest\nforest. The Poles and Silesians fell like heroes, defending themselves\nand asking no quarter, until a cry arose in German, \u201cStrike dead! strike\ndead!\u201d which, whether raised by accident or by treachery, produced a\npanic by its likeness to the Polish word for \u201cFly! fly!\u201d The army seemed\nliterally to melt away; squadrons broke and ran, and a cloud of small,\nsharp Tartar arrows clove the air after them; the Asiatic cavalry hunted\nand trampled down the fugitives. One of the Polish leaders at last\nsucceeded in rallying part of the troops, and the fight began again with\nsome hopes of victory, when the enemy had resort to a kind of infernal\nmachine used in ancient Indian warfare, the likeness of a gigantic head,\nwhich was so made as to give out a dense smoke and unbearable stench,\nbesides being in some degree explosive. The contrivance was held by the\nChristians to be magical and devilish, and the Tartars themselves, so\ndangerous was it to those of their own men who had the handling of it,\nonly resorted to it in the utmost extremity, which shows how\nhard-pressed they were on this occasion by the Silesian soldiery. But\nthe terrible device stood them in good stead this time. The panic was\nrenewed, and once more a wild flight and wilder pursuit took place; the\nleaders, the knights, and Henry himself, regardless of the flight of\ntheir followers, fought on long after they knew their fate to be\nhopeless and death certain. One by one the brave fellows were cut down,\nthe little band decreased at every stroke of sword or flight of arrows,\nand the duke, with four knights, found himself almost alone on the lost\nfield of battle. They urged him to try to save his life by flight; he\nscouted the proposal, and told them that since God had not willed that\nhe should conquer, he would at least die. \u201cFor the faith,\u201d he said; \u201cat\nleast, it will be a martyr\u2019s death.\u201d His charger was killed under him,\nand he fought on foot for some time, hewing a lane for himself through\nhis enemies. One of his knights managed at last to bring him a fresh\nhorse, which he had no sooner mounted than his person was recognized by\nhundreds of his foes and he was hemmed in on all sides. While in the act\nof lifting his sword to cut down a Tartar in his front, he was wounded\nfrom behind by a long lance thrust in precisely where a joint in his\narmor exposed the shoulder; the spear went right through and pierced the\nlung, and the son of Duchess Hedwige sank dying from his horse. The\nenemy cut off his head, and, hoisting it on a spear, paraded it before\nthe walls of Liegnitz, summoning the defenders to surrender; but they,\nguarding Henry\u2019s young sons, answered back from the battlements: \u201cIf we\nhave lost one duke to-day, we have four yet with us in the castle, and\nthese we will defend to the last drop of our hearts\u2019 blood.\u201d The next\nday they were relieved by King Wenzel of Bohemia, who, however, came too\nlate to do anything but hasten the departure of the Tartar horde, which\nhad suffered severely in the encounter, but rallied soon enough to\nmaraud, burn, and sack churches, abbeys, villages, etc., throughout\nHungary and Silesia, Bohemia and M\u00e4hren, until, one year later,\nJaroslaus von Sternberg finally routed their diminished army under the\nwalls of Olm\u00fctz. This roused Germany and France, and the Christian\nsovereigns combined sent a mighty army, under the command of Wenzel of\nBohemia, to defend the Austro-Hungarian frontiers, whence the Tartars\nretreated, by the same road by which they had come, to their steppes on\nthe high table-lands of Asia. Their traces in Europe, however, were not\nblotted out for half a century; the ruined churches, blackened villages,\nand ravaged fields long showed their awful track; and the outward work\nof Hedwige\u2019s life would have been well-nigh destroyed had not the spirit\nshe had brought with it remained alive as the germ of a future exterior\nrestoration.\n\nThe night of the lost battle, when Henry\u2019s headless body lay on the\nfield, Hedwige, after a prayer of unusual length, woke her nearest\nfriend and favorite attendant, and said to her:\n\n \u201cDemundis, this night I have lost my only son. He has left me as\n swiftly as a bird flies upwards, and I shall never look upon his\n face again.\u201d She forbade her to say anything of this to the dead\n man\u2019s wife and sister until some messenger from the army should\n bring news of the battle; and it was not till the third day that\n Jaroslaus von Janowitz came with the terrible tidings. Anna,\n Henry\u2019s young widow, hastened to the field to seek and recover\n her husband\u2019s body, which was so mutilated that she only\n recognized it by the six toes of the left foot. The corpse was\n brought to Trebnitz and buried with his father, brother, and\n infant sons in the abbey church. Hedwige prayed thus aloud over\n his grave: \u201cO Lord! I thank thee that thou hast given me such a\n son, who, as long as he lived, loved and honored me truly, and\n never gave me an hour\u2019s sorrow. However gladly I would have kept\n him by my side on earth, I hold him blessed in that, by the\n shedding of his blood, he is now united in heaven with thee, his\n Creator. With supplication, O Lord! do I commend his soul unto\n thee.\u201d\n\nHedwige\u2019s life and work were drawing to an end. Her last public act was\none of charity to the dead and comfort to the bereaved living. The\nbodies of many heroic defenders of their country had been left to rot\nupon the field of battle. She had these gathered together and buried in\nconsecrated ground, and ordered solemn requiems to be sung for the\nrepose of their souls, while she made herself accessible to every\nsorrowing widow, mother, sister, or orphan of the dead soldiers,\nlistened to their complaints and laments, comforted and helped them, and\nbrought God\u2019s peace once more into their hearts. After this she prepared\nherself to die. Her first care was a practical one: she set her affairs\nin order\u2014a moral duty too often foolishly confounded with worldliness.\nThen she redoubled her devotions, and, sending for her chaplain, asked\nto receive Extreme Unction. He demurred, seeing no sign of death about\nher; but her holiness was so well known that he asked her the reason of\nher request.\n\n\u201cIt is a sacrament,\u201d she answered reverently, \u201cwhich should be received\nin full consciousness, that we may treat it with due reverence and\nthankfulness; and I fear that sickness would make me receive it with\nlittle or no preparation, and would prevent me from being, as far as\npossible, worthy of this dying grace. I shall belong to the sick before\nmany days are over, and I would fain be strengthened for the passage\nthrough death to the joy of meeting my God.\u201d\n\nHer agony was not long, but she seemed to struggle with a fear of death\nand of the devil\u2019s temptations. When her daughter wished to send for\nAnna, she said: \u201cNo; I shall not die before she comes home\u201d (she was\nthen absent on a visit to her brother, King Wenzel of Bohemia). Her\nbiographers tell us that angels and saints visited her on her death-bed.\nShe died with the veil of her holy niece, Elizabeth of Hungary, wound\nround her head, and held in her hand, and often to her lips, a little\nivory image of the Blessed Virgin. At the very last she was calm and\npeaceful, blessed her daughter and daughter-in-law, and every nun in the\nmonastery of Trebnitz, her chosen home, and died at evening twilight, on\nthe 15th of October, 1243. Twenty years later the clergy of Silesia,\nPoland, and Bohemia sent deputies to Rome to beg for her canonization,\nwhich Pope Clement IV. proclaimed almost immediately. Many miracles\nthrough her intercession were sworn to by credible witnesses, and the\nneighborhood blossomed with gracious and beautiful legends of the\nsainted duchess, the mother of the poor and the guardian angel of\nSilesia. The ceremony of transferring her body to a shrine in the abbey\nchurch at Trebnitz in 1268 was the occasion for a national festival;\npilgrims flocked in from the remotest districts, and many foreigners\ncame too. Sovereigns and knights, in costly robes and armor, walked in\nprocession to her altar; lay and ecclesiastical pomp was showered upon\nand around her remains; but nothing of all this was so great a tribute\nas the memory she left, deep in the heart of the people, of a model\nwife, mother, mistress, and sovereign, a woman strong in principle,\ntruthful in every word and deed, charitable yet not weak, merciful yet\nnot sentimental, a wise, far-seeing, but tender, brave, and thoroughly\nwomanly woman.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE CHARACTER OF THE PRESENT INDUSTRIAL CRISIS.\n\n FROM THE REVUE GENERALE.\n\n\nEvery one agrees that \u201cbusiness is bad\u201d; but how many give themselves\nthe trouble to look for the causes of this persistent stagnation? Some\nare distressed, others astonished, by it. The calmer observers\u2014those who\nare not dismayed beyond measure by a deceptive view from the bank of the\nriver of fortune\u2014seek for comparisons in the crises of 1837, 1848, and\n1866.\n\nA gifted writer, who conducts with deserved success a technical magazine\nof our country, the \u201cMonitor of Material Interests\u201d (_Le Moniteur des\nInt\u00e9r\u00eats Mat\u00e9riels_), has examined this interesting subject in a series\nof remarkable articles. M. George de Laveleye\u2014who must not be confounded\nwith his relative, the professor at Liege\u2014maintains that the present\ncrisis is not transient. He attributes to it a permanent character. If\nthe reader will follow attentively the summary that we are about to give\nof the argument of M. De Laveleye, he will not be too alarmed at his\nconclusion.\n\nGenerally, these crises have had the effect of rarefying the capital by\nwhich the great industrial enterprises were fed; these, then, deprived\nof the food which enabled them to live, seemed to hesitate; then they\nshook and fell. But to-day what do we see? Entirely the reverse. Money,\nfloating capital, unused funds, are more abundant than ever; the\ncash-boxes overflow; the large banks literally sweat with gold; and this\nexcess, this plethora of unemployed capital causes the public funds to\nadvance and the price of money to decrease. It is business that is\nwanting; it is the employment of capital that is in default.\n\nWhence comes this accumulation of savings and this inertia of capital,\nand how does it happen that new and tempting enterprises do not attract\nit, notwithstanding its apparently low price? M. De Laveleye thus\ninstructs us:\n\n \u201cAll these tempests,\u201d says he, speaking of the crises of 1837,\n 1848, 1857, and 1866, \u201cwhich reproduced themselves at almost\n equal intervals, were periods of settlement which marked the\n impatience of the industrial speculation over-excited during a\n period of forty years; each time that it had abused credit, each\n time that there was a disproportion between the engagements\n entered upon and the available resources, industrial,\n commercial, and financial Europe received a warning; credit\n vanished suddenly; there was a series of commercial or\n industrial failures; there was a violent contraction in the\n stock exchanges and in business; there was a slackening of new\n enterprises or of those already in hand; there were more losses\n than one could reckon. But at each of these momentary and\n transitory crises a remedy was very quickly found. Thus we had\n free trade and the upward movement of commercial relations; we\n had the play of free joint-stock companies; we had the war of\n secession, which, from a European point of view, was a powerful\n derivative; finally, during this long period we had the\n discovery of gold and silver mines, coming annually to swell the\n stock of metal at the disposal of business and of speculation.\n Thus these crises were not of long duration. It sufficed to let\n the overworked market have time to assimilate the stocks of\n paper or of merchandise from which it suffered, to re-establish\n the equilibrium between the current debts, circulating capital\n and credit, and immediately industrial and commercial Europe\n resumed her progressive march; the new enterprises which\n presented themselves obtained public favor; the warning was\n forgotten; the play of credit renewed itself; and after a period\n of enforced quiet, which never exceeded three years, we felt\n vibrating anew that febrile activity which, in forty years, has\n caused a veritable transformation of the world.\u201d\n\nThis was always the course of these crises in the past. To-day there is\nnothing like this; on the contrary, \u201cif there be a disproportion between\nundertakings and resources, it is absolutely the reverse of that which\nmarked the preceding crises: the undertakings are almost null, and the\nresources are exaggerated.\u201d\n\nWhy? Because the present crisis is not merely a transitional crisis: it\nis a permanent, final one; the origin of the evil from which the\nindustry and the commerce of Europe suffer is to be traced to other\ncauses than those commonly attributed to it. The true origin of the\ncrisis, says M. De Laveleye, is the withdrawal of capital from the\noperations in which it had been employed, and the inactivity and\nunproductiveness to which it has been since doomed. At the beginning of\nthe crisis of 1873 a general panic was produced among the lenders, whose\nconfidence was profoundly shaken, and they exerted themselves all at\nonce to realize their money. The bankers and the money-lenders of Europe\nwere seized, by a unanimous accord, with a desire to have their capital,\nor that which remained of it, in their hands\u2014\u201cto see their money again,\u201d\nas M. De Laveleye says. They realized their foreign securities; they\nretired _en masse_ from the industrial enterprises in which they were\nengaged abroad; and, above all, they cut off credit. The countries and\nthe establishments which lived on credit and on outside capital saw\ntheir resources cut off and suspended their activity, believing,\nhowever, that the crisis would be only temporary. The three principal\nlending countries\u2014England, France, and Holland\u2014realized their money, at\nthe price of heavy losses on more than one occasion; and, under the\ninfluence of the panic, they contented themselves with keeping it under\nlock and key in their cash-boxes. From this resulted a great and rapid\ndecline in the rate of interest. Bank paper fell to one per cent., and\nthe lenders upon short bills, with incontestable securities, got but a\nhalf per cent. This was the result of the return of the capital drawn\nback from the foreign countries to which it had been lent; the\ncapitalists had but one ambition: they wished to be certain that their\nmoney was running no risk whatever.\n\nThe result of all this was that, in every instance where they lived on\nborrowed capital, industrial works were stopped and all sorts of\nenterprises were cut short. On the other hand, a plethora of capital was\nproduced among those who had realized, and who could no longer find\nmeans to employ their funds with profit. This is the explanation and the\nfirst characteristic of the present crisis\u2014the accumulation of capital\nand the low price for the use of money.\n\nThe accumulation is general; but it is principally in the rich\ncountries, like England and France, that this excess was produced. The\nsame phenomenon, however, also showed itself in Austria, Italy, Sweden,\netc.\u2014countries which live in part upon foreign capital. On the other\nhand, the countries which depended entirely upon this capital\u2014Turkey,\nEgypt, Peru, etc.\u2014were crippled, as they were deprived of the resources\nwhich credit had previously placed at their disposal.\n\nThus, then, nothing happened as in the preceding crises, and from 1873\nto 1877 all has been new, the phenomena themselves and their causes.\nThere would be reason for surprise and bewilderment at this if one did\nnot admit, with M. De Laveleye, that only now has ceased the industrial\nand speculative movement which has led Europe for forty years to send\nher money abroad. New employments for capital are very nearly exhausted;\nnew sources of riches have been exploited as much as they can be. The\nmovement of the last forty years, especially active since 1851, is not\nmerely arrested for a moment to resume its march once more, as in the\nprevious crises; it is definitely terminated.\n\nThe design of the past movement was the economical furnishing of Europe\nand of the world: and this equipment is completed, or nearly so. But in\ngiving proof of this assertion and seeking for its justification, M. De\nLaveleye supplies a very clear account of the direct and specific causes\nof the crisis through which we are passing.\n\n \u201cWestern Europe,\u201d he says\u2014\u201cand by this generic expression we\n mean Europe rich in capital and feeding great foreign\n enterprises\u2014Western Europe has made a rude return upon herself.\n She has retaken her money; she has made an inventory of what she\n possessed abroad, and she shows herself solicitous to preserve,\n to keep by her, this scattered wealth. The first element of the\n force of progress, then, is in default; the money is wanting; it\n is hidden; it is refused. Concurrently, what have the borrowing\n countries done since 1873? They have abandoned the game and\n ceased an impossible struggle, which consisted in paying to\n Western Europe a revenue which was not produced by the soil or\n by practicable enterprises. They have become bankrupt, and the\n crisis in their government funds has opened the eyes of the two\n champions. Each perceived that he was ruined: the borrower by\n becoming indebted without sufficient motive; the lender not only\n by lending his capital upon illusory guarantees, but by\n receiving finally only a part of it, under the form of\n arrearages.\u201d\n\nThis is the second cause. As for the third:\n\n \u201cIt is the depreciation of silver, due to the incapacity and the\n improvidence of the Western states, which imagined they could\n make a good stroke of political economy by allowing one of the\n agents of circulation to debase itself.\n\n \u201cPrincipal possessors of the stock of gold these states have\n obeyed an egoistic thought in seconding the movement for a\n single metal as currency\u2014gold; a movement which had for its\n first effect an increase in the relative value of their metallic\n circulation. But they took no note of another very grave\n consequence of this disturbance of equilibrium.\n\n \u201cWhen a nominal money submits to variations in value as great as\n those which have been noted in silver, it becomes provisionally\n inapt for its functions. Commercial enterprises, based upon this\n metal, become extremely dangerous, and are no longer attempted\n by those who wish to operate only with the security attached to\n studied and matured plans. But all the commerce with the East is\n based upon silver, which, for these countries, is the nominal\n money. When the value of silver, and, following it, the course\n of exchange, became subject to oscillations of ten and fifteen\n per cent., there was no longer any security for international\n commerce. The cost of despatching and of selling raw material or\n manufactured goods could no longer be precisely fixed; and the\n most careful merchant became a speculator in spite of himself.\n He then stopped, and by that very act he added to the difficulty\n of the situation. The fall in the value of silver broke the\n charm exercised by the constant augmentation of the stock of\n metals put at the disposal of international enterprises.\n\n \u201cThis is the third element in the advance of progress which has\n disappeared in its turn; and we may thus sum up:\n\n \u201c1. The lenders are not willing, provisionally, to enter upon\n new schemes.\n\n \u201c2. The borrowers, weary or feeble, are incapable of giving\n birth to new illusions.\n\n \u201c3. The monetary crisis has added its action to these two\n negative elements.\n\n \u201cSo that to-day, after proper deliberation, people decide to do\n nothing; or, at least, to do nothing under the former conditions\n of international enterprises.\u201d\n\nBut is it admissible that we shall do nothing henceforth, and that the\npresent situation will prolong itself indefinitely? No, assuredly; and,\nso far as this goes, M. De Laveleye recognizes with every one that the\nstagnation of business cannot endure, that a reaction is inevitable, and\nthat it will come in its time.\n\n \u201cBut,\u201d he hastens to add, \u201cthis return to activity will not be\n produced at all in the form known and hoped for by those who\n have seen the revivals of speculation after the crises of 1837,\n 1857, and 1866; and this for the logical reason that the\n industrial, commercial, financial, and speculative activity of\n the middle of this century has had for its base and aim the\n economical furnishing of the world (_l\u2019outillage \u00e9conomique du\n monde_), and that this furnishing is very nearly completed.\n\n \u201cThe base and the object of the former activity will no longer\n exist, or scarcely so. We must, then, wait for a profound\n modification in the form and conditions of this activity.\n\n \u201cThis is why we have called the present crisis a permanent, a\n final crisis\u201d\u2014_une crise d\u00e9finitive_.\n\nHe goes on to give his reasons for this idea, that the economical\nfurnishing of the world is finished, or so far advanced that henceforth\nwe can expect no such development as we have seen in the past:\n\n \u201cIn Holland the great works are done: the drains are\n continued; Amsterdam is connected with the sea; international\n communications are established.\n\n \u201cIn Italy, in Spain, the great arteries are provided with iron\n roads, and the products of their working are notoriously below\n what one could reckon as remuneration upon the capital. The\n seaports, the mines, are sufficiently provided for in these\n countries; the towns, there as elsewhere, have their markets,\n their water and gas works, their new quarters, their tramways.\n\n \u201cAs for the Pyrenees, they are crossed; the Alps also; and after\n the tunnel already made by Mont Cenis toward France, the road in\n construction through Saint-Gothard toward Germany, and the very\n sufficient pass through the Brenner toward Austria, industrial\n activity will no longer find any occupation in this quarter.\n\n \u201cIn Russia the principal railroad lines are completed.\n\n \u201cThe railway system of Prussia is finished, and in that country\n industry is so well furnished that she is murdered with her own\n tools; the means of production and of transportation are too\n vast, and in evident disproportion to the possible business of\n the country.\n\n \u201cAustria is supplied, and there it would be rash to go further.\n\n \u201cTurkey has railroads. It has been difficult enough to construct\n them; one does not speak of them willingly.\n\n \u201cThe United States have borrowed enough from us to establish\n their system; it is compact and well provided with lines, even\n opposition lines. That country has regained its lost time; it is\n necessary to watch its steps now that it is furnished\n sufficiently to put itself in competition with the industry of\n Western Europe.\n\n \u201cThe Isthmus of Suez is opened.\n\n \u201cThe transatlantic cables are laid.\n\n \u201cThe transformation in the merchant marine is three-fourths\n completed; the sailing ship has disappeared, or at least is\n relegated to the second place; the steamers have the principal\n trade.\n\n \u201cOn whatever side we turn our eyes we see these accomplished\n results of the work of the last forty years. These results may\n not be always excellent from the financial point of view; many\n errors have been brought out, and by the side of some brilliant\n exceptions we must count a number of deceptions for the\n capitalists engaged, and for the governments which have become\n needy and insolvent. But, whatever may be the financial result,\n these lands have been stirred up and dug out; the blocks and the\n rails have been laid; the towns have been transformed; the\n distances have been shortened; the new apparatus has been given\n in profusion to the rich countries, in more reasonable limits to\n countries less open; everywhere what was strictly necessary has\n been done; often too much has been done.\u201d\n\nHere, very clearly expressed, is the result of the forty years of\nactivity which we have had, and this result is really the end toward\nwhich tended the great industrial movement that, for so long a time, has\nheld minds awake, has kept the dockyards, the workshops, the factories,\nthe forges at work. This end is attained; we see it; and among the\nserious consequences of this fact is one which M. De Laveleye exposes\nwith his usual lucidity:\n\n \u201cThanks to the facilities of communication, to the new routes\n opened, to steam and to electricity, the conditions of commerce\n and industry are changed. There is no longer any place, as there\n was at the beginning of this century, for the boldness of the\n manufacturer or the trader, counting upon his skill as well as\n on his risk to obtain a large remuneration due to his audacity,\n to his special knowledge, and to his capital.\n\n \u201cBetween the new and the old commerce and industry there exists\n the same difference as between the wars of the empire and the\n last campaigns of France and of Austria.\n\n \u201cThe same causes have produced the same results. In war the\n cannon and guns of perfection, the railways and the telegraphs,\n the vast masses of men, have produced rapid campaigns, in which\n personal valor and the chances of war, going almost for nothing,\n contributed very little to the final result. In industry the\n same perfection of apparatus has changed the conditions of\n trade; and the masses of men are replaced by the abundance of\n circulating capital and the facility of the means of credit\u2014two\n other products of this active period of forty years.\n\n \u201cOnly, in war the final result places the vanquished at the\n mercy of his foe, who can, as it appears, dictate his laws; in\n industry and in commerce the final gain is not left arbitrarily\n to the swiftest or to the best equipped. He must content himself\n with little; he is forbidden to abuse the victory which, without\n this moderation, will not be long in escaping him.\u201d\n\n This is what we have come to; and from a purely economic point\n of view we can recognize, with the judicious writer who has\n furnished us with the process of the struggle, that the most\n certain consequences of all this will be the following:\n\n .pm letter-start \u201cThere will be an excess of circulating\n capital, free from employment.\n\n \u201cNow, as long as this has not been the case the product of\n capital has been as follows:\n\n \u201cFrom three to four and a half per cent. on unquestionable\n securities of the first class.\n\n \u201cFrom four and a half to six per cent. on real estate security\n of the second class.\n\n \u201cFrom six to eight per cent. on loans and limited liabilities.\n\n \u201cFrom eight to ten per cent. and upwards on industrial,\n financial, and speculative ventures.\n\n \u201cIn the future and during a still indefinite period, which\n cannot fail to be long, very long, this scale must be modified\n by the excess of unemployed capital.\n\n \u201cUnquestionable securities will descend to three per cent., or\n below that; those of the second class will bring four and a\n half; men will be happy to make six per cent. in manufactures or\n production; finally, one can obtain eight per cent. only by\n running wild risks. There will be a general change in the rate\n of capitalization, in the sense of lessening the interest while\n increasing the amount of capital. Some exceptions\u2014that is to\n say, some happy chances, some skilful personal strokes\u2014may occur\n to confirm this rule. The general movement, however, will, we\n believe, be that which we have indicated.\u201d\n\nBut what remains, then, to be done? Little of anything, if we wish to\nattribute to the revival of activity, which will come in its own time,\nonly the sense and the direction which the movement has had until now.\nOn the other hand, forced to admit that the human spirit has not at all\ngone to sleep, and that the inventive genius which the Master of all\nthings in his goodness has bestowed upon his humble creatures has not in\nthe least diminished, it is necessary also to confess that in the future\nit is the unknown which opens before us; and just as, before this\ncentury, people had not even thought of all the beautiful applications\nof heat, electricity, steam, and light which have made the material\nglory of our age and of an illustrious galaxy of _savants_, even so\nto-day we cannot say toward what end the efforts of humanity might tend\nto-morrow. One Being only knows it\u2014he who knows all and sees all, he for\nwhom the past, the present, and the future are but one, he who does not\ndepend at all on time\u2014God, in fact, the creator of all that has been,\nthat is, and that shall be, the great dispenser of all good and of all\nprogress; he who disposes of man at his will in one way or the other,\noften while the latter, in his folly, refuses to abase his blind\npresumption sufficiently to recognize him.\n\nLet us, then, leave to the future that which belongs to the future, and\nlet us hold ourselves, each one for his own account, ready to obey the\nimpulse which it may please God to give us.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE LAST PILGRIMAGE TO MONT SAINT-MICHEL.\n\nWhen the traveller who is visiting the beautiful localities of the\nChannel Peninsula quits the southern faubourg of Avranches\u2014a picturesque\nlittle town built of sparkling granite\u2014a road, marked by a succession of\nrapid declivities, brings him to the shore of a large bay formed by the\nsinking of the coasts of Normandy and Brittany. Before him reaches, far\naway and out of sight, the flat extent of sands, furrowed by the rivers\nS\u00e9e, S\u00e9lunce, and Co\u00ebsnon, whose silvery windings the eye can follow to\na considerable distance. On the higher parts of these sands grows a fine\nkind of grass, the _poa_ of the salt-meadows, and which, mingled with\nmarine plants and sand-weeds, furnishes a favorite pasture for sheep.\nThe lower and barren portion of the sands disappears twice a day beneath\nthe tide, which at times spreads gently and caressingly over them, while\nat others it rolls foaming in with precipitate fury, as if eager to pass\nits appointed boundary. At high tide nothing is visible but an immense\nlake, partially engirdled with hills; and in the distance, like a\npyramid of granite, sometimes from the bosom of the waves, sometimes\nfrom the expanse of sand, rises a nearly circular rock, laden with\nconstructions of various kinds intermingled with vigorous vegetation,\nand crowned by large and lofty buildings.\n\nThis is the famous Mont Saint-Michel: _au p\u00e9ril de la mer\u2014in periculo\nmortis_, as our fathers were wont to say in their strong and simple\nlanguage, which, like nature, speaks in images.\n\nThe first time we saw St. Michael\u2019s Mount was in sailing from\nSouthampton to St. Malo, towards four o\u2019clock one bright morning in\nJune. The early sunshine lighted up the higher part of the rock, with\nall its wealth of natural and architectural inequalities, in one blaze\nof gold, while its base lay still in shadow. The only illuminated\nobject, rising from a purplish haze, its brightness heightened by the\nblue of sea and sky, above, beneath, and around, it appeared rather like\nan ethereal vision than anything of earth.\n\nMount St. Michael! What memories are awakened only by the name, which is\nin itself a magical evocation of bygone centuries! Here, too, present\nrealities still rival the memories of the past. With respect to its\nnatural situation, as well as the share which human hands have had in\nits formation, there is about it much that defies comparison. It is at\nonce a nest of legends, the home of religious thought, of prayer and\nmeditation, as well as of learning and the arts. Mount St. Michael,\nbeing a monastery, a cathedral, and a fortress, is, in its triple unity,\na summary of the three great elements of the life of France during all\nthe poetic, heroic, and religious though stormy period of the middle\nages.\n\nBeaten into ruggedness by the storms of heaven, and discrowned of the\ngolden statue of its patron archangel, the summit of the mount no longer\nsprings upward into space with the same loftiness and lightness that\nused to strike so forcibly those who beheld it for the first time. The\ngreat human work thus seems as if arrested in its heavenward climbing;\nbut, like other and grander majesties, St. Michael\u2019s Mount has been\nuncrowned without undergoing any diminution of its glory, and it still\npresents its singular threefold aspect to the eye. On the western side\nthe rock, stern and bare, seems to bid defiance to the hand of man; on\nthe north a strong wall rises to the height of two hundred feet from\nbase to battlements, strengthened with buttresses and flanked by\nbastions, pierced irregularly with pointed windows, and surmounted by a\nseries of elegant arcades. To the south we find a rich display of\narchitectural art, the exuberance of which is almost equalled by its\ncaprice. Above all, and larger than all the rest, rises the church, with\nits forest of granite pinnacles and turrets overlooking the distant\nhorizons of Normandy and Brittany, and, to use the language of the\nancient chroniclers, imposing the fear of the archangel on the vast\nexpanse of ocean\u2014_immensi tremor oceani_.\n\nIn ages long anterior to any of its architectural constructions, and\nbefore the Christian era, this rock, much loftier then than now, rose\nfrom the midst of a vast forest which extended from Coutances to the\nrocks of Cesembre beyond St. Malo. This forest of Scissey, or Chesey\n(Sissiacum), took its name from the goddess Sessia, who was invoked at\nthe time of sowing, and worshipped as the protectress of the corn while\nin the ground. The rock itself was called Tomba, and also Belenus, the\nname given by the Gauls and Druids to their sun-god,[13] and which was\nidentical with Baal of the Ph\u0153nicians, Bel of the Assyrians, and the\nApollo of the Greeks.\n\nOn Mount Belenus was a college of nine Druidesses, the eldest of whom,\nlike the pythoness of Delphi, uttered oracles.[14] The Romans, in the\ncourse of their conquests in Gaul, made Bel give place to Jove: Tomba\nBelenus became _Mons Jovis_ and was sacred to Jupiter.\n\nIn the year 708 Mount Belenus, which until that period had formed a part\nof the mainland of Armorica, was suddenly detached from it by a terrible\ncatastrophe which spread desolation over the country. The sea, flowing\nin with tempestuous fury, overpassed its limits, submerged the ancient\nforest, as well as the inhabited parts of the coast, and, except when\nthe tide is out, made an island of the Mount.[15] It was in this same\nyear of 708, in the reign of Childebert II., that St. Aubert, the first\nBishop of Avranches, in obedience to a vision built there a church\ndedicated to the Archangel St. Michael, and at the same time founded a\nmonastery of clerks regular, who replaced the two or three hermits who\nhad formerly lived in seclusion on the Mount.\n\nThis monastery acquired, later on, a fresh importance under the Dukes of\nNormandy. Duke Richard I. enlarged and made of it an abbey of the Order\nof St. Benedict. In 1002 or 1003, great part of the church and\nsurrounding buildings being consumed by a fire which broke out, Duke\nRichard II. considerably enlarged as well as strengthened the foundation\nby the construction of the crypt, upon which the new edifice was raised.\nThis crypt appears to be cut out of the solid rock, and is divided in\ntwo parts by a wall. Its low and vaulted roof is supported by massive\npillars, round or square. A larger or grander subterranean vault does\nnot perhaps exist, with its space of seventy metres in length by twelve\nin breadth, and its three aisles formed by about twenty pillars. The\nroof sustains the weight of two stories of building, the dormitory over\nthe refectory, and the magnificent cloister over the Hall of the\nKnights.[16]\n\nThe original church soon becoming too small to contain the numerous\npilgrims who flocked thither, the construction of a new one was begun by\nthe Abbot Raoul, who, in 1048, raised the four pillars and the arch of\nthe great tower. The nave, and that part of the monastery called _La\nMerveille_, were built by his successor, Renaud.\n\nIt was in 1091 that Henry, the youngest son of the Conqueror, was\nbesieged in the fortress of Mont Saint-Michel by his brothers Robert and\nWilliam. After the expulsion of the wretched John from Normandy, Abbot\nJourdain wishing to preserve the Mount to the kings of England, Philip\nAugustus sent against him Guy de Thouars, who, after a lengthened siege,\nbeing unable to take it, set in on fire. It suffered severely from\nanother conflagration in 1350, when struck by lightning during a\nterrible storm. The liberality of Philip de Valois restored the church\nand monastery to more than their former splendor.\n\nEarly in the fifteenth century Abbot Jolivet surrounded the town with\nfortifications. The English, at this time invading France, besieged Mont\nSaint-Michel, but were repulsed by the brave d\u2019Estouteville and his\ncompanions-in-arms, one hundred and twenty-nine in all, who successfully\ndefended the post entrusted to them when the greater part of France had\nsubmitted to the conquerors.\n\nDuring the religious wars Mont St. Michel was several times attacked by\nthe Protestants. On the Feast of St. Mary Magdalen, July 22, 1577, a\nnumber of them, habited as pilgrims and concealing their weapons, were\nadmitted without suspicion into the church, where, after hearing several\nMasses with great show of devotion, they divided into small groups, and,\nwith an air of calm indifference, occupied different parts of the\nbuildings, until, secure of their position, they murdered such of the\nguards as did not escape by flight or concealment, and then fell not\nonly upon the garrison but on the monks, even massacring the priests who\nhad been saying Mass for them.\n\nThis noble abbey had for more than a thousand years an existence worthy\nof its origin. Mingling in the religious and warlike history of France,\nit was simultaneously or by turns occupied by knights and monks; the\nabode of faith and courage; an advanced sentinel in the direction of\nEngland, and thus affording protection against the foes of this world\nand of the next, defending alike with the cross and with the sword, and\nheld in veneration by the whole of Christendom.\n\nDuring the ages of faith pilgrims came hither by thousands, from all\nlands, braving the danger of these treacherous sands, to invoke in this\nhis sanctuary the prince and leader of the armies of heaven.\n\nThe sacrilegious impiety of modern times could no more spare St.\nMichael\u2019s Mount than so many other holy and beautiful relics of the past\nwhich it has seen fit to mutilate or destroy. The First Republic\nsuppressed the monastery, drove out the monks, demolished a portion of\ntheir church, changed the name of Mont Saint-Michel to that of _le Mont\nLibre_, or the Free Mount, and turned it into a prison!\u2014doubtless in\norder to prove the suitability of its new appellation.\n\nThe first prisoners there were the priests of Brittany and Normandy.\nPrayer was thus at least not yet banished from its ancient abode. In\n1811 Napoleon made of it a _Maison de R\u00e9clusion_, which, in 1818, became\na _Maison de D\u00e9tention_, and it was at the same time also a state\nprison. Rarely has any place seen more sad and strange vicissitudes. The\nchosen dwelling-place of those called to serve God in a religious life\nbecame the sink of every crime pursued and punished by society, and the\npopulation of Mount St. Michael was now recruited not from men who had\nreceived a holy vocation, but from courts of assize.\n\nA decree of 1863, however, relieved it from this unworthy fate, alike\nsaddening to Christians, arch\u00e6ologists, and poets, and Mont\nSaint-Michel, which now belongs to the see of Coutances, has been\nconfided by the ecclesiastical administration to the charge of twelve\npriests of the Congregation of Pontigny in the diocese of Sens, who\ncarry on the services in its church, receive the visitors drawn thither\nby the sanctity or historical interest of the place, and fulfil the\noffice of preachers and missionaries to all the parishes of the Channel\nIslands. An orphanage for boys is now flourishing in the old barracks,\nand by its side are _ateliers_ where painting on glass is carried on\u2014a\nkind of painting (or staining, rather) which, more than any other, has a\nreligious object. All this is, so far, a return to a better state of\nthings, but the solicitude of its diocesan does not find it enough,\nfeeling that, though much has been done, still the present is too unlike\nthe past, and earnestly desiring to restore the abbey to its former\nsplendor. And he will do it yet. Already the pilgrimages thither are\nrenewed with a fervor worthy of ancient days.\n\nFew things can be more beautiful and edifying than the holy festivities\nof which the most recent of these pilgrimages has just been the\noccasion, and which have left so deep an impression on those who took\npart in them, and who followed the imposing order of the successive\nreligious ceremonies, stamped as they were with the character of dignity\nand grandeur which the Catholic Church has impressed upon her liturgy\nand worship.\n\nFrom earliest dawn long bands of pilgrims, conducted by the priests of\ntheir respective parishes and preceded by their banners, began to enamel\nwith picturesque groups the white monotony of the sands. On arriving at\nthe Mount they formed into regular columns and slowly ascended the steep\nacclivity to the church. Towards nine in the morning the Mount presented\na singular aspect, not unlike a gigantic ant-hill: the flights of steps\ndisappeared under the long processions mounting them, while the ramparts\nwere as if crenellated with the heads of the crowds watching for the\narrival of the Bishop of Coutances and Avranches and the Bishop of\nBayeux and Lisieux. An involuntary delay on the part of the bishops was\nfor a time the cause of extreme anxiety. Anything may be feared from\nthis dangerous bay, whose shifting sands change their direction after\nevery tide, and engulf the late or unwary traveller in an abyss of mud.\nThe first carriage had passed safely on to _terra firma_, but the wheels\nof the second were perceived to be sinking, and the horses, terrified at\nno longer finding any footing, were becoming so unmanageable that a\nfatal catastrophe would have been almost inevitable, had not the men of\nthe place hastened to the rescue and succeeded by their prompt energy in\ndragging the carriage out of danger.\n\nThe two prelates presented themselves at the entrance gate as the clock\nof the great tower began to strike eleven, and were saluted by\nacclamations so enthusiastic that it seemed as if the whole Mount were\nbidding them welcome. They proceeded up the steep lane that winds upward\nbetween houses that look as if piled almost one upon another, and which\ndate from three or four centuries back, low, square, and solid, and\nhaving for the most part only one story, plunging their foundations into\nthe rock, and wedged, as it were, against each other, the better to\nresist the force of hurricanes and tempests. Here and there trees of\nthick foliage overshadow the narrow, winding ascent, which at intervals\nthrough some unexpected opening shows a vast horizon over the waters of\nthe Channel, with its lovely islands, and the coast of France.\n\nThe procession reached in due time the threshold of the ancient abbey,\nand, after a few words of warm and respectful welcome spoken to the\nbishops by the reverend father prior, entered the church.\n\nThere is something unique in the beauty of this basilica which so nobly\ncrowns the summit of Mont Saint-Michel, and of which the four\nextremities rest on four enormous arched vaults founded in the rock. It\npossesses all the essential parts of a great cathedral\u2014nave, aisles,\ntransepts, choir, and apse. The nave is Roman, the choir Gothic, and the\naisles _Moresque_ or Byzantine. Boldly cut in granite, the architecture\nis as remarkable as the site.\n\nThe nave was formerly two hundred and forty feet in length, but\nunderwent an irreparable mutilation under the First Republic, when it\nwas shortened by the cutting away of four of its eight transverse\nvaultings. It nevertheless remains singularly imposing\u2014simple even to\nseverity, but relieved by its triforium and a gallery with deep arcades.\nThe collateral arches, which are somewhat narrow, have the horseshoe\nform usual in Arabian architecture; the transepts, like the nave, are\nRoman, but of more recent date; the choir, which is of the best period\nof flamboyant Gothic, very delicately sculptured, has in the clerestory\na square window of remarkable richness; and in the apse, which is of\ngranite, delicate lines of tracery spring upwards with exquisite\nlightness. On the keystone of its vaulted roof is the escutcheon of the\nabbey. The choir is surrounded by bas-reliefs representing the four\nevangelists, and a ship, symbolical of the church militant, tossing on\nan angry sea which cannot overwhelm her, guided as she is by an unerring\npilot\u2014_Fluctuat, non mergitur_.\n\nThe noble edifice had on this day received an additional decoration from\nthe number and beauty of the banners there displayed, the principal of\nwhich was a large standard in the nave representing the archangel St.\nMichael victorious over the dragon. On the balustrade in front of the\naltar were hung the sword and banner of General Lamorici\u00e8re, with his\nmotto, _In Deo spes mea_. Within the balustrade were erected the two\nepiscopal thrones. The chapel of St. Michael, which occupies the left\narm of the cross, and in which is the statue of the archangel, was\nthickly hung with the banners of the different parishes represented in\nthe pilgrimage. Among their mottoes were such as these: _Quis ut Deus?_\n_Defende nos in periculo_; _Deo soli semper Honor_; _Deo et Patri\u00e6_,\netc. Above these floated the banner of the Sovereign Pontiff. There is\nin the same chapel some rich tapestry, the work and offering of the\nladies of Avranches\u2014_les Avranchines_, as they are prettily called in\nthe country.\n\nIn the chapel facing this one, and in the left arm of the cross, are the\ntwo crowns offered to the glorious archangel, the one by the Holy\nFather, the other by the faithful of France. The latter, resplendent\nwith diamonds and other precious stones of great value, is to be used\nnext year for crowning the statue of St. Michael.\n\nHigh Mass having been sung by the Bishop of Bayeux, his right reverend\ncolleague addressed the assembled multitude. Mgr. Germain, although one\nof the youngest members of the French episcopate, is also one of the\nmost eloquent, and owes simply to his merit the rapidity with which he\nhas risen to be chief pastor of one of the most religious dioceses of\nFrance. As chaplain of the _Lyc\u00e9e_ of Caen, he quickly gained the hearts\nof the youth placed under his spiritual care; as _cur\u00e9_ of the Cathedral\nof Bayeux, he made his influence felt in the whole city; and now, as\nBishop of Coutances and Avranches, the influence for good which has\nmarked each step of his career finds a wider field of action, of which\nhe does not fail to profit. With a few words from his discourse, which\nare a summary of the whole, we conclude:\n\n\u201cThe days in which we live find the church still engaged in a warfare\nsimilar to that which St. Michael, the champion of God, sustained\nagainst the rebel angels. Still the same revolt continues, and man has\nlearnt from Satan to declare, \u2018_Non serviam!_\u2019 As children of God and of\nhis church, let it be our happiness, as it is our privilege, to _obey_.\nGod and his church having an authoritative claim on our obedience, let\nus see that ours shall resemble that of the blessed angels, which is\nloving, intelligent, thorough, and prompt.\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n NEW PUBLICATIONS.\n\n\nTHE LIFE OF MARIE LATASTE, Lay Sister of the Congregation of the Sacred\n Heart. With a brief notice of her sister Quitterie. London: Burns &\n Oates. (For sale by The Catholic Publication Society Co.)\n\nThe history of the church is marked at intervals by the appearance of\nfavored souls whose wonderful gifts of the supernatural order fully\nattest the holiness which our divine Lord has willed should be the\npre-eminent attribute of his blessed spouse. These manifestations of\nsanctity in individual souls have, besides, a special reference to the\nwants of those times in which they appear. When rapacity and luxurious\nwastefulness characterized the upper classes of French society, Almighty\nGod raised up St. Vincent de Paul, the grand apostle of charity, to\nrebuke men\u2019s hardness of heart towards their poor and suffering\nfellow-creatures. So likewise, in an era of spiritual torpor and\ncowardice, he gave to the world that prince of spiritual warriors,\nIgnatius of Loyola, and his devoted band of spiritual heroes to awaken\nmen from their lethargy. Our own times are a period of intellectual\npride, of contempt for spiritual things, and a corresponding exaltation\nof the material order; and divine Providence has seen fit to confound\nthis dangerous spirit by working great things through weak instruments,\nand by proposing new devotions which demand an increased exercise of\nfaith. As there is nothing more opposed to the peculiar spirit of the\nworld of to-day than devotion to the Real Presence, the Sacred Heart,\nand the Blessed Virgin Mary, so the church directs the attention of her\nfaithful children to these objects of pious veneration with renewed\nfervor, and God himself attests her wisdom by many wonderful signs\nhaving reference to these three goals of spiritual life. No doubt it was\nwith such intent that he bestowed those extraordinary favors on the\nsimple peasant girl of Mimbaste, Marie Lataste, which, studied in the\nlight of worldly philosophy, confound and bewilder, but which, viewed as\npart of God\u2019s supernatural economy, cannot fail to edify and encourage\nthe devout Christian.\n\nMarie Lataste was born in the department of the Landes in 1822, and died\na lay sister of the Congregation of the Sacred Heart in the year 1847;\nso of her it may be said that she compressed a long career of virtue\ninto a brief compass of time, and earned by intensity of work the crown\nwhich is most frequently won by many years of laborious effort. No\nsooner had she made her First Communion than our divine Lord began to\nattract her most powerfully to himself as he exists in the sacrament of\nthe altar. As a little girl she had been wilful and rebellious, and with\ndifficulty was brought to study her catechism and the merest rudiments\nof learning. Indeed, her schooling never went beyond the art of reading\nand writing, so that the wonderful theological and ascetic knowledge\nwhich her letters disclose cannot be otherwise regarded than as revealed\nto her by God. After her First Communion a wonderful change was made\nmanifest in her. Thenceforth her sole delight was to commune for long\nhours at a time with our divine Lord in the tabernacle, to converse\nfamiliarly with him, and to hold him for ever in her thoughts. She was\nnever easy when other occupations kept her aloof from him, and when\nreleased from these she sped to him again with all the ardor which could\nimpel a loving heart. Nor did our Lord fail to reward in a signal manner\nthis intensity of devotion to the sacrament of his love. One day,\ntowards the close of the year 1839, as Marie was repairing to the\nvillage church to perform her usual acts of adoration, a mysterious but\nirresistible force hurried her along; earthly objects faded from her\nview, the Spirit of God filled her soul, and when she entered the sacred\nedifice she beheld our Lord himself upon the altar, surrounded by his\nangels. \u201cShe did not,\u201d the recital states, \u201csee him at first with\nperfect distinctness. A thin cloud, like an almost imperceptible veil,\nappeared partially to conceal him from her sight.... At last Jesus\ndescended from the altar and approached, calling her benignantly by name\nand raising his hand to bless her. Then she beheld him with perfect\nclearness in the brilliant light with which he was invested.\u201d \u201cFrom that\nmoment,\u201d she said, \u201cthe society of mankind has never ceased to be\ndispleasing to me; I should wish to fly from them for ever and shut\nmyself up in the tabernacle with him.\u201d Thus did her interior life at\nonce ascend to the highest plane of sanctity, and she, the poor, almost\nilliterate peasant girl, began to experience those intimate dealings and\nrelations with our divine Lord which are usually deemed to be the\nprerogative of the greatest saints\u2014of those in whom supreme holiness\ngoes hand in hand with profound knowledge.\n\nBut it is a well-known characteristic of the divine economy to select\nfeeble instruments for its higher operations and manifestations, and in\nthis manner to confound human presumption and to put our pride of\nintellect to the blush. \u201cThou hast hidden these things from the wise and\nprudent, and hast revealed them to little ones.\u201d And if ever it pleased\nAlmighty God to show forth his power through the humblest of his\ncreatures, he seems to delight in doing so at the present time. He\npermits our philosophers to split hairs over the subtleties of\nevolution, to wander in perplexity through the mazy intricacies in which\nthey have enveloped themselves, whilst he reveals the undreamt wonders\nof his wisdom to the lowly and simple-minded. Father Faber has happily\ndesignated a too common class of Christians as \u201cviewy\u201d\u2014_i.e._, holding\nopinions which are but the reflection and expression of their petty\negotism. Such was not the case with Marie Lataste; she was simplicity\nitself, and our Lord favored her accordingly. She sat at his feet as\nmeek and docile a pupil as ever listened to the words of an instructor,\nand he poured into her heart the treasures of his wisdom. It is truly\nwonderful to read the profound sentiments with which her letters abound,\nand to reflect that she, a girl barely able to read and write, has given\nexpression to the most abstruse and difficult points of dogmatic\ntheology with correctness, clearness, and force, and has left behind her\nprecepts for our spiritual guidance which savor of the wisdom and\nprudence of the most consummate masters of the spiritual life. Many\nthings in her letters may appear strained because of the minuteness with\nwhich she describes her visions of spiritual things, unless they are\nscanned with the eye of faith. But both internal and external evidences\nof the genuineness of the apparitions with which she was favored, and of\nthe absolute reliability of her statements, are so numerous that in the\nface of them to doubt is to question the validity of all human\ntestimony. There can be no doubt that God has vouchsafed to our\ngeneration this beautiful picture of a soul thoroughly united to himself\nin order that our pride may be abashed, our faith strengthened, and our\nlove for him, because of his manifold mercies towards us, increased. The\nstyle of the book is attractive, and whoever reads it cannot fail to\nreap a large share of edifying knowledge.\n\n\nA POPULAR LIFE OF POPE PIUS THE NINTH. By Rev. Richard Brennan, A.M. New\n York: Benziger Brothers. 1877.\n\nTHE LIFE OF POPE PIUS IX. By John Gilmary Shea. New York: Thomas Kelly.\n 1877.\n\nA LIFE OF PIUS IX., DOWN TO THE EPISCOPAL JUBILEE. By Rev. Bernard\n O\u2019Reilly. New York: P. F. Collier. 1877.\n\nThe appearance within the space of a few months of three extended and\nelaborate biographies of His Holiness Pius IX., some of which have\nalready run into two or three editions, is a fact most significant of\nthe deep interest which is taken by the reading public of America in\neverything connected with the venerable head of the church on earth. The\nlength of years vouchsafed the present successor of St. Peter, his own\nillustrious character, and the preternatural malice of his enemies have\nnaturally heightened the curiosity regarding him of the non-Catholic\nportion of the community, while his piety, benevolence, and\nlong-suffering have endeared him to the hearts of all true children of\nthe church. The magnificent displays of Catholic sympathy and loyalty to\nthe Holy See which everywhere characterized the celebration of his late\nepiscopal Jubilee have also increased the popular demand for information\nconcerning the life of a man who, morally and officially, is\nacknowledged to be the foremost in Christendom. Judging by the volumes\nbefore us, it will not be the fault of our Catholic writers if this\nlaudable desire remain long unsatisfied. Each of these valuable works,\nwritten by gentlemen of varied accomplishments and qualifications for\nthe task, is, in style, mode of treatment, and selection of matter,\ndifferent from the others; yet all present the same leading facts and\nreproduce the same vivid scenes which have rendered so instructive and\ndramatic the long and eventful life of the Holy Father.\n\nFather Brennan\u2019s book, justly called a popular life of the great Pope,\nis written in a simple, concise, yet comprehensive manner, with little\nattempt at ornamentation or philosophic deduction. The author evidently\nintended that his work should be read and understood by persons of\naverage intelligence as well as by those of higher mental gifts. He has\ntherefore aimed at telling the story of Pius IX.\u2019s life plainly and\nconsecutively, without departing to the right or left, except when\nabsolutely compelled to do so in order to elucidate what is yet but\nimperfectly understood in the policy of the Catholic powers of Europe.\nWhile stating conscientiously the details of a career so full of changes\nand reverses of fortune, he succeeds in placing before us the true\nlineaments of his august subject in all their simplicity and beauty of\nexpression. This is more particularly observable in the chapter on \u201cThe\nSupernatural Life of the Pope,\u201d which will doubtless be read with great\nsatisfaction by those who consider the Sovereign Pontiff a providential\nman; and by such as do not, with respect and admiration. It is to be\nregretted that Father Brennan had not given at length an account of\nproceedings in Rome and the Catholic world generally for the past few\nyears, thus completing an otherwise very full and instructive biography.\n\nMr. Shea has also succeeded in producing a very readable life of the\nHoly Father, though we do not think he has done full justice to his own\nmerits as an accomplished and painstaking writer. There are evident\nmarks of haste throughout his pages which, though they do not seriously\ninterfere with the continuity or authority of the work, are apt to\nproduce an unsatisfactory impression on the minds of critical readers.\nHis _Life of Pope Pius IX._ will, however, have its admirers; for,\nexcepting these slight defects, it is a book that will interest the\ngeneral reader, no matter what may be his opinions or prepossessions,\nwritten as it is by an intelligent layman whose reputation as an author\nhas long since been established in this country and in Europe.\n\nThe Rev. Father O\u2019Reilly\u2019s biography is, however, not only more\nvoluminous and more ample in its details than either of the preceding,\nbut it is enriched by copious extracts from encyclical letters and other\nimportant documents, the proper understanding of which necessarily\nbelongs to the elucidation of the history of Pius IX.\u2019s pontificate.\nApart from its completeness and elegance of style, its chief\ndistinguishing feature is the insight it gives us into the policy and\ndesigns of contemporary rulers and conspirators in France, Italy, and\nGermany in their attempts on the integrity of the church, and their\nunderhand alliances with the secret societies to effect their evil\npurposes. Only a man who has had personal knowledge of the actors who\nfigured in the bloody drama of \u201cUnited Italy,\u201d and an intimate\nacquaintance with their present and prospective strategy, could unfold\nto the public gaze, in all its base enormity, the culpable indifference\nof the men who professed the greatest regard for the sovereign of the\nstates of the church, and the insidious schemes of the modern champions\nof liberty, whose sole and whole object is the disruption of all forms\nof government under which civil and religious freedom would be possible.\nThis it is that makes Father O\u2019Reilly\u2019s book not only interesting but\nhighly instructive; for, to a certain extent at least, it furnishes us\nwith a key to the enigma of European Continental politics which we\nAmericans, happily removed from kingcraft and secret terrorism, so much\nrequire. The venerable and venerated Chief Pastor of the church has been\nfortunate in his American biographers, and we have little doubt that he\nwill find some solace in his afflictions in the thought that three among\nour writers have almost simultaneously devoted their pens to recording\nthe incidents of his life and defending his rights as a spiritual and\ntemporal sovereign.\n\n\nREPORT OF THE SPECIAL COMMITTEE OF THE MEDICO-LEGAL SOCIETY UPON SCHOOL\n HYGIENE. New York: Terwilliger. 1876.\n\nFew subjects are of more engrossing importance than the conditions\nrequisite for the physical well-being of the rising generation; and as\nour embryo men and women spend a very large portion of their lives in\nschool-rooms, it becomes a serious matter to determine whether these\nnurseries of learning are constructed in such a manner as to consist\nwith the highest possible health standard. The investigations undertaken\nby Dr. R. I. O\u2019Sullivan and his fellow-committeemen at the instance of\nthe Medico-Legal Society reveal a condition which is truly startling.\nOxygen is the life of our life-blood, and, if it is not supplied in the\nrequisite quantity, the human system becomes predisposed to every\ndisease and the foundation of a lifetime of misery is laid. Yet it is\nnotorious that the arrangements of our much-vaunted school buildings go\nfar short of ensuring a sufficient supply of this life-sustaining gas.\nMuch of this deplorable lack of suitable arrangements is the result of\nignorance. Many self-constituted sanitarians deem loftiness of ceiling\nto be the main and, indeed, the only condition required to ensure proper\nventilation and a sufficient supply of air. They accordingly build\nwithout referenced horizontal breathing-space, in the absurd belief that\nall foul air ascends and is got rid of, some way or other. Now, the\ntruth, says the report, is \u201cthat a lofty ceiling only makes that portion\nof space above the tops of the windows a receptacle for foul air, which\naccumulates and remains to vitiate the stratum below.\u201d This is of itself\na proof that a scientific supervision of our school buildings is the\nonly guarantee we can have that the health of the children will be\nproperly considered. The quantity of carbonic acid gas given off at each\nexpiratory effort is far in excess of what our amateur sanitarians\nimagine; and when school buildings are erected without due regard for\nthe diffusion of this deadly emanation, we must not be surprised to see\nour schools filled with pale and stunted children. In addition to the\ncarbonic acid gas other deleterious exhalations of the human body poison\ncrowded rooms, and are especially the cause of the peculiarly offensive\nand stuffy odor at which healthy olfactories revolt. Who that has\nentered one of our city public school class-rooms, between the hours of\ntwo and three in the afternoon, has failed to experience this\ndisagreeable sensation? Yet physiology, as well as common sense, tells\nus that this effete organic matter which is constantly escaping from the\nlungs and from every pore of the skin is eminently injurious to health.\nNot only this, but in certain crowded portions of the city the adjoining\nstreets and buildings lend their quota of noxious effluvia to the\npoisonous agents mentioned. The committee visited \u201cone of the newest,\nbest-arranged, and best-appointed schools in the city, and found it\novercrowded and unventilated, tainted throughout the halls, and at\ntimes, by way of the fan-lights over the doors in the class rooms, odors\narising from the latrines in the basement, which are emptied only once\nor twice a week.\u201d In this model school-house only from thirty-three to\nforty-one cubic feet of air are allowed to each child, while nature\nvigorously clamors for at least eight hundred feet in the twenty-four\nhours.\n\nIn the second report read by Dr. R. I. O\u2019Sullivan we are invited to\ncontemplate a picture which but faintly reveals the evil effects that\nthe early overcrowding exercises in after-days over the adult\npopulation: \u201cLook around us in public assemblies, and see in those\nscarcely entering middle life the evidence of physical decline, the\nprematurely bald and gray, the facial muscles photographing the wearied\nbrain and overtaxed nervous system.\u201d Few can fail to realize, on due\nreflection, how much of the terrible truth of this picture is\nattributable to the bad condition of our school-houses. The conclusion\nis plain that the judgment of the trained sanitarian is of vital\nimportance in the erection of school buildings, and that, until the\nnecessity of his sage interposition is recognized by the Department of\nPublic Instruction, diseases, the result of early confinement in close\nand crowded schools, which are quite preventible, will continue to\nprevail among us.\n\n\nGOD THE TEACHER OF MANKIND: A plain, comprehensive explanation of\n Christian Doctrine. By Michael M\u00fcller, C.SS.R. New York, Cincinnati,\n and St. Louis: Benziger Bros. 1877.\n\nCATECHISM OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE, for Academies and High Schools. With\n the approbation of the Most Rev. J. Roosevelt Bayley, D.D.,\n Archbishop of Baltimore. Intermediate No. III. Benziger Bros. 1877.\n\nThis is a most useful and comprehensive book, clear and definite in its\nplan, popular and interesting in its style. It is divided into two\nparts. Part I. deals with \u201cThe Enemies of the Church\u201d from the beginning\ndown to our own times. These enemies Father M\u00fcller sets down in the\norder of time as \u201cHeathenism,\u201d \u201cHeresy,\u201d and \u201cFreemasonry.\u201d Part II. is\noccupied with showing what in these days of vague beliefs and religious\nindifferentism it is most important to show\u2014namely, that God himself is\nthe teacher of mankind, and therefore that his voice must be listened to\nand obeyed. The church is the voice of God on earth; consequently, the\neverlasting object of the enemies of God is to silence and destroy the\nchurch. These avowed enemies were in the old days the heathen; later on\nthe heretics. A deadlier foe than either, and combining the evil\nelements of both, the author points out to-day as Freemasons, the term\ncovering, of course, all forms of secret oath-bound societies.\n\nFather M\u00fcller\u2019s sketch of Freemasonry is very extensive. For his charges\nagainst the societies comprehended under that head he relies mainly on\nMasonic documents and publications. Amid a vast amount of rubbish and\njargon in the official rites and ceremonies of Masonry is plainly\ndiscernible a distinct purpose and plan, which can be considered none\nother than the destruction of all fixed belief in God and his\nrevelation, in his church, and in the order of society and government\nfounded on that belief. To expose this conspiracy against God and\nman\u2014for such it is, and nothing less\u2014is as much a service to any\ncivilized state as it is to the direct cause of religion. On this\naccount we do not think that in a book intended as much for ordinary\nreaders as for those who are better instructed Father M\u00fcller has been at\nall wasteful in the large amount of space devoted to this portion of his\nsubject. There is a tendency sometimes to pooh-pooh Masonry as a\nconvenient scarecrow. Yet those who have noted the march of events in\nEurope within the century, and particularly within the latter half of\nit, will discover a startling resemblance between events as they have\noccurred, and as it was desired they should occur according to the\nprogrammes laid down beforehand by the leaders of the secret societies.\n\nThe church does not waste her excommunications, and the fact that these\nsocieties have been again and again solemnly condemned by her ought to\nbe sufficient warning against any Catholic joining, not simply societies\nwhich are avowedly Masonic, but secret societies of any kind whatever. A\ngood and lawful society has no need of secrecy.\n\nThe second and more important portion of the book is taken up with what\nis really a most lucid and careful explanation of that portion of the\ncatechism which refers more especially to God and the church. The\nquestions and answers in the catechism are necessarily brief, and the\nexplanation of the answers is left to the teacher. The teacher,\nunfortunately, is not always as instructed as he or she might be,\nwithout at all being a paragon of learning. For such, as indeed for all,\nthis portion of Father M\u00fcller\u2019s book will be of the greatest assistance.\nHere, for instance, is a question in the catechism: \u201cHow do we know that\nJesus Christ is the promised Redeemer and the Son of God?\u201d Now, upon a\nright answer to this and a thorough comprehension of the answer depends\na Christian\u2019s faith. The answer in the catechism is: \u201cWe learn it, 1,\nfrom the mouths of the prophets; 2, from the declarations of the angels;\n3, from the testimony of his heavenly Father; and 4, from his own\ntestimony.\u201d A correct reply, doubtless; but simply to give such an\nanswer to the ordinary student of whatever age is to speak to him almost\nin an unknown tongue, while to saddle the average Sunday-school teacher\nwith a clear and comprehensive explanation of the answer is quite to\noverweight him.\n\nFather M\u00fcller\u2019s explanations attached to such questions are excellent.\nThey are full without being tedious, and condensed without being\nobscure. About half the second part is very wisely devoted to an\nexposition of the Ninth Article of the Apostles\u2019 Creed\u2014\u201cThe Holy\nCatholic Church\u201d\u2014which is to be commended, as, indeed, may be the whole\nbook, just as highly to the attention of earnest and inquiring\nnon-Catholics as of Catholics. As a whole, the book serves two great\nends: it is a solemn warning against the prevalent evils of the day,\nunbelief and hatred of the truth; also, a judicious and able exposition\nof the two great facts in the Christian belief, God and the church. The\nwork has this advantage over more learned treatises on the same\nsubjects: that while it commands the attention of the highest, it is\nwithin the comprehension of any person of ordinary intelligence. We know\nof no work in English better adapted to afford Catholics whose\nopportunities of study have not been very great a clear and intelligent\nreason for the faith that is in them. The catechism, noticed at the\nhead, in addition to the usual instruction, contains a short form of\nmorning and evening prayers, instructions for confession, prayers at\nMass and before and after communion, as well as a brief but useful\nsummary of sacred history.\n\n\nTHE GRAMMAR-SCHOOL SPELLER AND DEFINER: Embracing graded lessons in\n spelling, definitions, pronunciation, and synonymes; proper names and\n geographical terms; a choice selection of sentences for dictation;\n and a condensed study of English etymology; also ecclesiastical\n terms, etc. By E. D. Farrell. New York: The Catholic Publication\n Society Co. 1877.\n\nWith the exception of Swinton\u2019s, there is scarcely a speller in general\ncirculation through the schools of this country which is worthy of the\nname. Whatever is valuable in many of them has been unscrupulously\npilfered, directly or indirectly, from Sullivan\u2019s _Spelling-Book\nSuperseded_, the text-book used in the Irish national schools; and\ndoubtless it is all the better for the pupils that it has been so. The\npresent work possesses at least one merit: it is a brave departure from\nthe well-beaten path of the plagiarist. Not that it is completely\noriginal; that is impossible; but it is as nearly so as is compatible\nwith utility. It has strong marks of individuality in every page and\nlesson, and is evidently the production, not of a mere book-maker, but\nof an experienced instructor of youth, who has felt, in common with\nother teachers, the necessity of more thought in the conception, and\nsystem in the arrangement, of lessons in orthography.\n\nWe find, after a careful inspection, that the work contains information,\nnot to be found in similar works, on Anglo-Saxon roots, ecclesiastical\nterms, noted names of fiction and of distinguished persons; words\nrelating to various occupations and sciences, etc., all of which are\nstrict essentials to a useful education. Miscellaneous words and\ndefinitions, Latin roots and English derivatives, and miscellaneous\nsentences for dictation occupy nearly half the volume, the remainder\nbeing distributed between twenty-six other subdivisions of the subject;\nand well-informed and competent teachers will say that such an\napportionment of the space is right.\n\nWe have noticed what we consider a few imperfections, unimportant,\ndoubtless, but needing emendation\u2014viz., on page 33 this definition:\n\u201cAssassinate, to attack and murder a person of importance.\u201d\nAssassination is not necessarily restricted to persons of importance.\nThe author also takes the trouble to correct such pronunciations as _p\u012b\nan\u00b4 o_ for p\u012d \u00e4\u00b4 no, _thrissle_ for thistle, _akrawst_ for across. Of\nwhat use is the teacher, if the book must attend to such matters? He\nalso orders us, on page 114, not to pronounce ge-og _jog_ in the words\ngeography and geometry. There are pupils who pronounce these words\njoggraphy and jommetry, we know, and such is evidently the error against\nwhich he wishes to guard. These oversights, so prevalent in other\nspellers, are, fortunately, of rare occurrence in this, and a little\ncareful revision will render the book still more worthy of the title, to\nwhich it has already such strong claims, of the model speller of the\npresent day.\n\n\nMISSA DE BEATA MARIA ET MISSA IN FESTIS DUPLICIBUS, ITEM IN DOMINICIS\n ADVENTUS ET QUADRAGESIM\u00c6: uti in Graduali Romano et Ordinario Miss\u00e6,\n ab illustri Domino Frederico Pustet, S. Sedis Apost. typographo, \u201csub\n auspiciis SS. D. N. Pii IX., curante Sacr. Rit. Cong.\u201d Cum permissu\n superiorum. Opus II. Published by the author, P. Ignatius Trueg,\n O.S.B., St. Vincent\u2019s Abbey, Beatty P.O., Pa.\n\nWe heartily congratulate all who may be interested in the study or\nexecution of Gregorian chant upon the production of this work. Within a\nvery few years the study of the holy chant of St. Gregory has occupied\nthe attention of church musicians both in Europe and America, and many\nnotable efforts have been made to restore it to its rightful place in\nthe sanctuary. In fact, there is a true revival and reformation of\nchurch music in progress.\n\nOne of the chief difficulties which presents itself to the ordinary\nmodern musician who acts as choir-master or organist is the simple\nmelodic form of the chant with its musical notation as it is printed in\nall authorized office-books. Unaccustomed to its tonality, he makes\nwretched work of the phrasing and accentuation, and his execution is\nlike that of a schoolboy spelling his words before pronouncing them.\nIgnorant also of its modality, his attempts at harmony are more wretched\nstill. Under the hands of such performers the chant becomes poor\n_music_, without expression, in the minor key.\n\nTranslations of the chant into modern notation harmonized with a view to\ngiving some notion of the distinctive character of the various modes,\nare therefore a necessity for all who have not made such a thorough\nstudy of the chant as to enable them to read from the original notation\nand harmonize it at sight.\n\nThe present work of Rev. F. Trueg has been composed to supply this want,\nand will be found in many respects to be superior to the greater number\nof such translations hitherto published. It comprises the three masses\nof the _Graduale Romanum_ as given in the Ratisbon edition\u2014viz., for\nfeasts of the Blessed Virgin, for double feasts, and for the Sundays in\nAdvent and Lent, together with the responses at Mass. The harmonization\nis arranged in such a manner that it serves not only as an instrumental\n(organ or string quartette) accompaniment, but also, if so preferred,\nfor a vocal execution in four parts without instrumental accompaniment.\nSome excellent remarks also accompany it by way of preface, explaining\nthe notation employed, and giving some valuable hints as to the proper\n_tempo_ to be observed.\n\nWe commend its careful study to organists and chanters, and trust that\nit may receive such patronage as to warrant the composer in completing\nhis design of publishing the entire _Graduale_ and _Antiphonarium_ in\nthe same form.\n\n\nBLANCHE CAREY; OR, SCENES IN MANY LANDS. By Patricia. New York: P.\n O\u2019Shea. 1877.\n\n\u201cBlanche Carey was a charming girl of twenty-two summers, beautiful and\naccomplished. She had just completed her education at a fashionable\nboarding-school, and was gifted with those graces which constitute the\ntrue characteristics of woman. She was the admired of all who knew her,\nthe pride of the family circle, the delight of society, unrivalled in\nintellectual attainments. If we add to these beauty and grace of form,\nthe picture is complete.\u201d\n\n_Phew!_ And we are only at the first page. What is one to say of so\noppressively perfect a heroine? But \u201cthe picture\u201d is _not_ \u201ccomplete\u201d\nyet; for in the second page the inventory of her qualities and\naccomplishments is continued in this thrilling style: \u201cThe harp she\nfingered with unrivalled skill; the piano keys she swept like a\nwhirlwind\u201d (good gracious!), \u201cwhile she executed on the guitar with no\nless grace and finish.\u201d We are slightly at a loss to understand whether\nor not this highly-accomplished young lady performed all these startling\nfeats at once, as the author would seem to imply. The picture of a girl\n\u201cfingering\u201d the harp with unrivalled skill, \u201csweeping\u201d the piano-keys\n\u201clike a whirlwind,\u201d while she \u201cexecutes\u201d on the guitar \u201cwith no less\ngrace and finish\u201d than a whirlwind presumably, is something that\ncertainly possesses the merit of novelty. \u201cFinding that she was already\nproficient in music, she did not wish to devote further time to\npainting\u201d\u2014why, we do not know. However, \u201cit\u2019s of no consequence,\u201d as Mr.\nToots would say.\n\nBlanche goes to Rome and sees the Holy Father, who \u201cwas quite affable\u201d\nto her, she assures us. Here is one of the \u201cScenes in Many Lands\u201d:\n\n\u201cOur Irish tourists\u201d (Blanche and her grandfather, a Mr. O\u2019Rourke) \u201chad\nalready made quite a sojourn in Italy, and to the old gentleman\u2019s\nastonishment, as he entered the coffee-room with his granddaughter\nleaning on his arm, both apparently fatigued after a long drive in the\nsuburbs\u201d (we are at a loss to understand whether the writer means by\n\u201csuburbs\u201d the suburbs of Italy or the suburbs of the coffee-room), \u201cthey\nobserved a young man of prepossessing appearance seated at an opposite\ntable, gazing at them very earnestly. His travelling companions were two\nladies. One of them, though by no means elderly, might be taken for his\nmother; the other young and somewhat coquettish in manner\u2014evidently his\nsister from the striking resemblance she bore him. _All denoted the air\nof the Parisian._\n\n\u201c\u2018That gentleman must be going to make our acquaintance,\u2019 said Blanche.\n\u2018He must, I imagine, be dying to know us. All three are looking at us. I\nknow they are French _by the way they drink wine_.\u2019\n\n\u201cThe party in question rose to adjourn to their apartments. As they left\nthe room, Frank Mortimer\u2014for such was his name\u2014glanced several times at\nBlanche. _She, of course, not condescending to notice the supposed\ncuriosity, evaded it._\u201d\n\nArtful yet discreet Blanche! Of course she makes his acquaintance in the\nnext page\u2014we have only reached page 6 yet, so that it will be seen\nevents move rapidly\u2014and here is how she makes it:\n\n\u201cHaving waited for some moments in the pretty boudoir, looking out on a\nveranda of orange-trees not yet in blossom\u201d (we copy _verbatim_),\n\u201cBlanche was humming one of her favorite airs, \u2018Beautiful Isle of the\nSea,\u2019 which she imperceptibly changed to \u2018Let each man learn to know\nhimself.\u2019 Frank entered _on the words_, and seemed slightly confused for\nan instant, but, quickly recovering his composure, he addressed his\nvisitors _with the ease and grace of a debonair_.\u201d\n\n\u201cMay we not hope to meet _ye_ in Paris?\u201d is one of the questions put by\nthe easy and graceful \u201cdebonair\u201d to his visitors. He falls in love with\nBlanche, of course, though he confesses that he \u201calmost fell in love\nonce with a lady from South America,\u201d and no wonder. \u201cShe was a most\nperfect creature in face and form; that delicate cast of countenance\nwith an exquisite profile; hair that might be called golden, coiled _on\nthe tip of her head_.\u201d\n\nThe parting at the end of the first chapter, between Blanche and Frank,\nis not altogether as poetical as it might have been made. The train\nwhistle interferes with it considerably. \u201cA whistle, and all was\nconfusion; everybody astir to get on board. A second one, and Frank\nstarted to take leave. He tried to speak, but it was impossible. His\nface quivered with emotion. He pressed the hand of Blanche in silence,\nand, darting out of the carriage, he encountered Mr. O\u2019Rourke at the\ndoor. Bidding him a hasty farewell, he was soon lost in the crowd. \u2018What\na fool I am!\u2019 he thought, \u2018but _I am human nature_. Yet is it not a\nweakness to bow to its dictates? Should I ever meet that gifted creature\nagain, I will tell her all....\u2019 He wiped the cold perspiration from his\nforehead, and, with a sigh, tried to forget his misery.\u201d\n\nWhat a fool he was indeed! Yet he said one sensible thing: \u201c\u2018Oh!\u2019 said\nBlanche, laughing, \u2018am I not a favored child of fortune? When I go home\nI shall write a novel or some work of fiction.\u2019\n\n\u201cFrank Mortimer smiled as the words fell from her lips. \u2018Heaven save\nyou,\u2019 he said, \u2018from such a fate!\u2019\u201d\n\nFrank\u2019s prayer was not heard, seemingly, and the result, we suppose, is\n_Blanche Carey_. We have not got beyond the first chapter of this\nfascinating \u201cwork of fiction,\u201d and we are not likely to get beyond it.\nThe reader may easily judge of its attractions by the extracts given,\nwhich were positively too tempting to pass by.\n\n\nTHE LETTERS OF REV. JAMES MAHER, D.D., LATE P.P. OF CARLOW-GRAIGUE, ON\n RELIGIOUS SUBJECTS. With a memoir. Edited by the Rt. Rev. Patrick\n Francis Moran, D.D., Bishop of Ossory. Dublin: Browne & Nolan. 1877.\n\nSeldom do we have an opportunity to welcome the appearance of so\nvaluable a book as this, which is the embodiment of those sentiments,\nviews, and convictions that distinguish the modern Irish priest. Few men\nloved his religion and his native land with a more intense fervor than\nFather Maher. This double love nourished his frame, increased his\nstrength, stimulated his thoughts, nerved his heart, and underlay every\nthought and action of his life. He was a man who simply delighted in\nevery opportunity of saying a word or doing a deed in behalf of his\ncreed or his country. As a controversialist his enthusiasm made him\nalmost bitter, but with that bitterness which is born of zeal for the\ntruth. A man of stalwart frame and magnificent proportions, he exercised\na magnetic influence over his listeners by his presence alone.\nThroughout the entire range of controversial literature it would be hard\nto find anything equal to his scathing arraignment of Archbishop Whately\n_apropos_ of the Nunnery Inspection bill: \u201cI have myself,\u201d he writes,\n\u201ctwo sisters and eighteen nieces who, following the call of Heaven, have\nselected the religious life. Some of them are in convents in England,\nsome in Ireland, some in America; all engaged in the noble service of\nforming the tender minds of the children of the poor to virtue, for\nwhose sake and the sake of their Father in heaven they most willingly\nsurrendered in the morning of life all earthly prospects. I well\nremember what they were under the paternal roof. I know what they are in\nthe cloister. I have never lost sight of them; and as to their\nhappiness, to which I could not be indifferent, I have only to affirm,\nwhich I do most solemnly, that I have never known people more happy,\nmore joyous, more light-hearted, or with such buoyant hopes as good\n_religieuses_. Their character, my lord, is unknown and will remain a\nmystery to that world for which Christ refused to pray.\u201d These are the\nbrave words of one of the most conspicuous champions of religious\nfreedom, and one of the most determined antagonists of the smelling\ncommittee who strove to insult the purest and noblest of women. His\nspirit is not dead among his _confr\u00e8res_ in the Irish vineyard, for\nCardinal Cullen, the nephew of Father Maher, and the distinguished\nprelate who has given these inestimable letters to the world\u2014a near\nrelative of the great priest\u2014lives to represent every feeling and pulse\nof his heart.\n\n\nSPECIALISTS AND SPECIALTIES IN MEDICINE. Address delivered before the\n Alumni Association of the Medical Department of the University of\n Vermont. Burlington. 1876.\n\nThis address of Dr. Henry, though unpretending in form, is exceedingly\nwell timed and full of suggestiveness. The doctor evidently belongs to\nthe conservative class of his profession, who long for the day when\neminent respectability, which is the escutcheon of the medical man in\nEuropean countries, will be fairly won and worn by every one who\nsubscribes M.D. to his name. As a consequence, he is the bitter enemy of\nevery form of quackery and undue pretentiousness. He certainly handles\n_soi-disant_ specialists without gloves, and gives the best of reasons\nwhy the community should rebel against their assumption of skill. Too\nmany so-called specialists are men who have devoted their time and\nattention to a special branch of the profession while entirely\nneglecting the others. This is illogical and cannot be done. Medicine is\na science whose parts are bound together as indissolubly as the stages\nof a reasoning process, and whoever imagines that he can master one\ndepartment without a knowledge of the others simply follows the advice\nof Dogberry. We have oculists and aurists and gyn\u0153cologists without\nnumber who have no knowledge of general pathology. This is altogether\nwrong. The true _raison d\u2019\u00eatre_ of a specialist is that, having\nprofoundly studied the science of medicine, he finds that his natural\naptitude or taste draws him to one branch of the profession rather than\nto others. In this manner only have the prominent and highly-reputed\nspecialists in Europe and among ourselves won their fame and fortune.\nDr. Henry, in a clear and trenchant style, demonstrates the absurdity of\nspecialties, as such.\n\n\nMONGRELISM. By Watson F. Quinby M.D. Wilmington, Del.: James & Webb.\n\nThis curious monogram is worth perusing, if for no other reason than the\nfanciful and novel views which it presents. The author attributes many\nof our present social evils to mongrelism, or the admixture of distinct\ntypes of men. He finds in the Book of Revelation the foreshadowing of\nthe natural distribution of men into white, red, and black, deeming the\nthree similarly colored horses to be typical of those three branches of\nthe human family, while the fourth horse, on which sat Death, he\nconsiders to be the emblem of mongrelia. He opposes J. J. Rousseau\u2019s\nidea that man\u2019s primitive condition was one of barbarism, and contends\nthat historical and arch\u00e6ological discoveries prove rather a\nretrogression than an improvement. The Chinaman is Dr. Quinby\u2019s ideal of\na mongrel. In the land of flowers every art once flourished, learning\nwas cultivated, the harpist filled the air with sweetest strains, and\nthe poet sang delicious lays in the beautiful vale of Cashmere, till the\nbane of mongrelism fell on it and all progress ceased. Mexico and South\nAmerica are other evidences of the pernicious influence of hybridism.\nThe conclusions of the author are in many instances sound, but his\nreasoning is too fanciful to satisfy a sober-minded reader. His\nstatement that the rapid influx of Chinese into our midst is fraught\nwith mighty perils is well worth pondering over, and no true statesman\nwill shun the serious consideration of this knotty problem.\n\n\nJACK. From the French of Alphonse Daudet. By Mary Neal Sherwood,\n translator of _Sidonie_. Boston: Estes & Lauriat. 1877.\n\nAnother painful story by this gifted author. It is cleverly told and the\ntreatment is highly artistic, showing all that careful finish that\nFrench writers bestow even on their smallest characters. The characters\nin this story are most of them wretched enough. Lovers of the real in\nfiction will find them realistic enough. There is a tone of hopelessness\nand helplessness in _Jack_, as in _Sidonie_, that is very disheartening.\nAccording to M. Daudet, a relentless Fate would seem to clutch some\nmiserable mortals, and hold them till death came as a happy release.\n\u201cThe mother cried in a tone of horror, \u2018Dead\u2019?\u201d \u201cNo,\u201d said old Rivals;\n\u201cno\u2014_delivered_,\u201d are the last lines of _Jack_.\n\nThere is much truth and also much untruth in the lesson of the book.\nSocial surroundings, of course, influence very materially the growth,\nphysical and moral, of lives. But they are not everything; over and\nabove them all is a man\u2019s own will, and that is the true lever of his\nlife. \u201cJack\u201d only needed a little more resolution and nerve to have made\nhim a very useful member of society instead of a nincompoop. As in\n_Sidonie_, so here, the minor characters are to us the most interesting.\nThe humor in _Jack_ is unfortunately less in quantity and more sardonic\nin quality than in _Sidonie_. We suppose it is hopeless to expect M.\nDaudet to look for once at the brighter side of life and find his heroes\nand heroines among respectable people. Meanwhile, we give him all praise\nas a very powerful artist, though a very unpleasing one. He is fortunate\nin his American translator.\n\n\nMCGEE\u2019S ILLUSTRATED WEEKLY: Devoted to Catholic Art, Literature, and\n Education. Vol. I. New York: J. A. McGee, Publisher. 1877.\n\nAn illustrated Catholic weekly journal, which should successfully\ncompete in point of illustration and literary workmanship with the\nnumerous non-Catholic and anti-Catholic\u2014we had almost said\ndiabolic\u2014journals that are so abundant to-day, was something greatly\nneeded in this country. Various attempts have been made in the past to\nestablish such a journal. They were so many failures. The volume which\nforms the subject of the present notice is certainly the most successful\nwe have yet seen here, and we have great hopes that, with an increased\npatronage, which it certainly deserves, it may be all we could wish it\nto be. It has advanced very much, both in style of illustration, in\nselection of subjects, and above all in editorial character and ability\non its own earlier numbers.\n\nThe publisher has had the good fortune as well as the good sense to\nsecure a really able editor in Col. James E. McGee, who, in addition to\nbeing an excellent writer, possesses that sound journalistic sense and\njudgment without which the very best matter is simply wasted in a\npublication of this kind. Most of the illustrated journals of the day\nare so much mental and moral poison, and the deadliest are those that\nare most generally liked and enjoy the widest circulation. To furnish an\nantidote to this bane is a good as well as a bold work, which deserves\nwell of Catholics everywhere. We most heartily wish continued success to\nthe new venture.\n\n\nTHE BIBLE OF HUMANITY. By Jules Michelet. Translated from the French by\n Vincenzo Calfa. With a new and complete index. New York: J. W.\n Bouton. 1877.\n\nThis is a translation of what may be called a sensational romance by\nJules Michelet, founded on the earliest records of various races of the\nhuman family, including the Old and the New Testament. The author runs\nriot amidst these ancient documents; and his disordered imagination\nmisinterprets them unscrupulously, denies boldly what does not answer\nhis purpose, and invents at pleasure, until in the end nothing is left\non the mind of the reader except the impression of a defying, scoffing,\nand voluptuous disciple of M. Voltaire\u2014Jules Michelet.\n\nThe translation is in good English; we have no reason to think it is not\nfaithfully done.\n\n\nTHE POETICAL AND PROSE WRITINGS OF CHARLES SPRAGUE. New edition. With a\n portrait and a biographical sketch. Boston: A. Williams & Co. 1876.\n\nMr. Sprague\u2019s writings, whether in prose or poetry, are of that kind, we\nfear, that are not destined to live long in men\u2019s memories, however much\nimmediate interest and attention they may excite at the time of their\npublication. His verse was smooth enough and sweet enough as a rule,\nwith little or nothing in it to jar on sensitive feelings, and little or\nnothing in it also to rouse feeling of any kind. The present edition is\nhandsomely brought out.\n\n\nANNALS OF OUR LADY OF THE SACRED HEART. Monthly bulletin of the\n Archconfraternity of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, published with the\n approbation of Rt. Rev. Edgar P. Wadhams, Bishop of Ogdensburg.\n Printed for the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart, by Chas. E.\n Holbrook, Watertown, N. Y.\n\nWe have received the first number of this little publication, the object\nof which is best set forth in the words of the dedication \u201cto the\nclergy, religious communities, colleges, institutions of learning, and\nCatholic societies of America.\u201d \u201cThe Missionaries of the Sacred Heart of\nJesus established at Watertown earnestly recommend to the zeal of\nCatholics the monthly publication entitled _Annals of Our Lady of the\nSacred Heart_. Its object is to make known and to propagate in America,\nand in the English possessions, the admirable devotion to Our Lady of\nthe Sacred Heart, and, through Mary, to lead souls to the Sacred Heart\nof Jesus.\u201d The publication begins with the June number.\n\n\nTHE CATHOLIC PARENTS\u2019 FRIEND. Devoted to the cause of Catholic\n education. Edited monthly by M. Wallrath, pastor of the Church of the\n Immaculate Conception, Colusa, California. Numbers for May, June, and\n July, 1877.\n\nWe think this little publication may do great good to the cause of\nCatholic education. We trust it may have an extensive patronage. A\nlittle more timeliness and brevity in the articles, and a more pointed\nand direct application of them to matters moving around us here at home,\nwould add greatly to the value and interest of so excellently conceived\na work.\n\n * * * * *\n\nWe have received from the Catholic Publication Society Co. advance\nsheets of Cardinal Manning\u2019s latest volume, reprinted from the English\nplates, which were specially furnished to this house by the English\npublishers. It is impossible at so short a notice to deal fitly with a\nwork by so eminent an author, and touching on a variety of subjects,\neach one of which is timely and important. Some indication of the value\nof the volume may be gathered from the titles of the various papers:\n\u201cThe Work and Wants of the Catholic Church in England\u201d; \u201cCardinal\nWiseman\u201d; \u201cFrench Infidelity\u201d; \u201cIreland\u201d; \u201cOn Progress\u201d; \u201cThe Dignity\nand Rights of Labor\u201d; \u201cThe Church of Rome\u201d; \u201cC\u00e6sarism and\nUltramontanism\u201d; \u201cUltramontanism and Christianity\u201d; \u201cThe Pope and Magna\nCharta\u201d; \u201cPhilosophy without Assumptions,\u201d etc., etc.\n\n\n BOOKS AND PAMPHLETS RECEIVED.\n\n\nSAINT ELIZABETH, QUEEN OF HUNGARY. By the author of _Life in a\n Cloister_, etc.\n\nHORTENSE: an Historical Romance. Translated from the French. By R. J.\n Halm. Kelly, Piet & Co., Baltimore.\n\nTHE CROWN OF HEAVEN, THE SUPREME OBJECT OF CHRISTIAN HOPE. From the\n German of Rev. John N. St\u00f6ger, S.J. By Rev. M. Nash, S.J. P. O\u2019Shea,\n New York.\n\nSELECTIONS from the _Imitation of Christ_. SELECTIONS from the _Thoughts\n of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus_. Roberts Bros., Boston.\n\nSTRENGTH AND CALCULATION OF DIMENSIONS OF IRON AND STEEL CONSTRUCTIONS,\n WITH REFERENCE TO THE LATEST EXPERIMENTS. Translated from the German\n of J. J. Weyrauch, Ph.D., Prof. Polytechnic School of Stuttgart. D.\n Van Nostrand, New York.\n\nTEN YEARS OF MY LIFE. By the Princess Felix Salm-Salm. R. Worthington,\n New York.\n\n_The Forty-seventh Annual Report of the Inspectors of the State\n Penitentiary for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, for the year\n 1876_. Sherman & Co., Philadelphia.\n\nSIXTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE WOMAN\u2019S BAPTIST MISSIONARY SOCIETIES. With\n the Proceedings of the Annual Meetings. Rand, Avery & Co., Boston.\n\nNINTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE CLARKE INSTITUTION FOR DEAF MUTES AT\n NORTHAMPTON, MASS., FOR THE YEAR ENDING SEPTEMBER 1, 1876.\n\nON THE VALUE AND CULTURE OF ROOTS FOR STOCK FEEDING. By David Landreth &\n Sons. McCalla & Stavely, Philadelphia.\n\nFINAL ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE WOODRUFF SCIENTIFIC EXPEDITION AROUND THE\n WORLD. Indianapolis _Journal_ Co., Indianapolis.\n\nANNALS OF THE CATHOLIC INDIAN MISSIONS OF AMERICA. Bureau of Catholic\n Indian Missions, Washington, D. C.\n\nINDULGENCES APOSTOLIQUES, OU INDULGENCES APPLICABLES AUX VIVANTS ET AUX\n DEFUNTS. Que le Saint P\u00e8re Pie IX. attache aux Rosaires, Chapelets,\n Croix, etc., qui en ont obtenu le pouvoir approuv\u00e9 par l\u2019autorit\u00e9\n comp\u00e9tente. Rome: Libreria di Roma.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n THE\n\n CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n ---------------------\n\n VOL. XXVI., No. 152.\u2014NOVEMBER, 1877.\n\n ---------------------\n\n\n THE FREE-RELIGIONISTS.\n\n\n I.\u2014THE NEW-ENGLANDER.\n\nThis pamphlet[17] of ninety-five pages gives an account of the last\nannual meeting in Boston of the \u201cFree-Religious Association, its object\nbeing to promote the practical interests of pure religion, to increase\nfellowship in spirit, and to encourage the scientific study of man\u2019s\nreligious nature and history.\u201d Associations of this kind seem to be\nnecessary as safety-valves to a certain class of men and women, chiefly\nfound in New England, who, especially in matters of religion, are in a\nstate of effervescence, and feel the pressing need at times of publicly\ndelivering themselves of such thoughts as come uppermost in their minds\non this and kindred subjects. The phenomenon is a peculiar one, and\nperhaps in no other country could such a variety of odd spirits as are\nusually found in these assemblies be convoked. Their proceedings are\nfull of interest to the student of religion and the mental philosopher,\nno less than to the observer of the phases of religious development of\nsome of the most active thinkers of this section of our country.\n\nThe American mind at bottom is serious, clings with deathless tenacity\nto a religion of some sort; and of none is this more characteristic than\nof the descendants of the Puritan Fathers. The children of the Puritans\nmay be eccentric, at times fanatical, and inclined to thrust their\nreligious, social, political, and even dietetical notions upon others;\nbut they are men and women who think; they are restless until they have\ngained a religious belief, and are marked with earnestness of some sort,\nenergy, and practical skill. The Puritan race is a thinking, religious,\nand an aggressive race of men and women. Whatever he may be, there is\nalways in a genuine Puritan a great deal of positive human nature. Let\nhim be under error, and his teeming brain will breed countless\ncrotchets, any one of which he will maintain with the bitterest\nfanaticism, and, if placed in power, will impose it upon others with a\nruthless intolerance.\n\nGive him truth, and you have an enlightened faith, indomitable zeal, and\nnot a few of the elements which go to make up an apostle. The main\nqualities which distinguish the typical New-Englander, though not\naltogether the most attractive, are nevertheless not the meanest in\nhuman nature, and we candidly confess, though not a drop of Puritan\nblood runs in our veins, that we have but few dislikes, while we\nentertain many feelings of sincere respect, for the New England type of\nman. It is, therefore, with special interest that we read whatever\noffers an insight into the workings of the minds of so large,\ninfluential, and important a class of the American people.\n\n Copyright: Rev. I. T. HECKER. 1877.\n\n\n II.\u2014WHAT IS THE FREE-RELIGIONIST MOVEMENT.\n\nThe Unitarian Association did not go far enough and fast enough to suit\nthe temper of a class of its more radical and ardent members; hence the\nexistence of the separate organization of \u201cThe Free-Religious\nAssociation.\u201d The movement of the free-religionists may be said to\nspring from a laudable desire to get rid in the speediest way possible\nof the spurious Christianity which was imposed upon them by their\nforefathers as genuine Christianity and pure religion.\n\nSuppose they have accomplished this laborious task of purification, what\nthen? Have they found wherewith \u201cto yield the religious sentiment\nreasonable satisfaction,\u201d which Mr. Tyndall says \u201cis the problem of\nproblems at this hour\u201d? By no means; this discovery is quite another\naffair.\n\n\n \u201cHic labor,\n Hoc opus est.\u201d\n\n\nThey have only reached its starting-point. Let them begin their search,\nand investigate every form or scheme of religion that has existed among\nmen from the beginning of the human race; let them speculate on these to\ntheir hearts\u2019 content, and indulge in the fancy that they have a mission\nto invent or construct a new religion\u2014and what then? Why, they will\nfind, at the end of all their earnest efforts, that there are, and\nespecially for those who have been under the light and quickening\ninfluences of Christianity, but two possible movements, one a continuous\ncurve and the other a tangent. One or the other of these lines they will\nbe inevitably forced to take. If they pursue the first and push their\npremises to their logical consequences, they will, if intelligent and\nconsistent, be led at some point into the circle of the Catholic Church;\nif they follow the latter, and have the courage of their opinions, they\nwill declare themselves first infidels and then atheists. The fact is\nbecoming daily more and more plain to intelligent and fearlessly honest\nmen that there is no logical standing ground, we do not say between\nCatholicity and atheism\u2014for atheism has no logical standing position\nwhatever\u2014but that there is no logical standing ground at all outside of\nCatholicity. For Catholicity professes to be, and has ever maintained\nthat it is, the most perfect manifestation to men of the supreme divine\nReason, and to reject the truths which it sets before human reason with\nthe convincing evidence of their divine origin necessarily involves the\ndenial of human reason itself; consequently, human reason inevitably\nfalls, in the end, with the rejection of Catholicity. A man may reject\nProtestantism and claim human reason; nay, he is bound to repudiate\nProtestantism, if he holds to human reason, for the doctrine of \u201ctotal\ndepravity\u201d taught by orthodox Protestant sects undermines altogether the\nvalue of human reason.[18] But Catholicity appeals confidently to human\nreason for its firm support, since its entire structure is based upon\nthe infallibility of human reason in its sphere, and the irrefragable\ncertitude of its great primary truths. The interdependent relations,\ntherefore, existing between reason and Catholicity are essential, and\nthey stand or fall together. The way that Dr. Holmes has put this\nquestion is not, we beg his pardon, the right way; he says: \u201cRome or\nReason?\u201d He should have said: Rome and Reason.\n\nThere can be no rational belief in God, in the immortality of the soul,\nin human responsibility as against Christianity, as there can be no\nrational belief in Christianity as against Catholicity. Outside of the\nCatholic Church there is only nihilism.\n\n\n III.\u2014THE DRIFTS OF FREE-RELIGIONISM.\n\nIt would be difficult to predict the precise course of these\n\u201ccome-outers\u201d of the latest date, called free-religionists. Some will\nprobably stop after having repudiated Protestantism, rest upon the\ntruths of reason, and, without inquiring further, vainly try to satisfy,\nwith a species of theism, the great aspirations and deep needs of their\nsouls; eventually they may fall back on old Unitarianism. Others will\nventure to examine, as some before them have done, the claims of the\nCatholic Church, and finding that these are founded on human reason,\nthat her doctrines perfect the truths of human reason, and that she\nalone is adequate to satisfy all the wants of the human heart, will\nbecome in the course of time Catholics, and save their souls\u2014that is,\nreach their high destiny. Another section will, during, perhaps, their\nwhole lives, seriously amuse themselves with the study of Brahminism,\nBuddhism, and every other kind of outlandish religion\u2014not a vain\nintellectual amusement, except when associated with the absurd idea of\nconcocting a new religion. While the larger section, we fear, will\nfollow the tangent and end in nihilism. For although the main drift of\nthe religious world outside of the Catholic Church, especially in the\nUnited States, is towards naturalism; although the face of each\nfree-religionist looks in a somewhat different way, yet the actual\nmovement of the greatest number of these Unitarian dissenters is\napparently in the direction of zero.\n\nPrecisely where the president of the Free-Religious Association stands,\nto what definite truths he assents as undeniable, and what convictions\nhe holds as settled, is not to be gathered from any of his sermons,\ntracts, speeches, and several published books. He seems to be laboring\nunder the impression that he has a mission to bring forth a new\nreligion, but thus far he or his associates in this illusive idea have\ngiven to the world no new word in religion, or in morals, or in\nphilosophy, or in politics, or in social life, or in art, or in science,\nor in method, or in anything else _scibile_. Mr. William R. Alger has\nventured to predict to his free-religionist brethren in their last\nannual gathering a new incarnation and its gospel, in which we fail to\nsee anything new or important, if true. \u201cThe spirit of science,\u201d such\nare the words of his prophecy, \u201cenriched with the spirit of piety, is\nthe avatar of the new Messiah.\u201d\n\nFrancis Ellswood Abbot, a conspicuous member of the Free-Religious\nAssociation, as well as one of its active directors and the editor of\nthe _Index_, a weekly journal which is in some sort the organ of the\nfree-religious movement, has, among other notable things, come to the\nfront and publicly impeached Christianity. His indictment contains five\ncounts against the Christian religion: \u201chuman intelligence, human\nvirtue, the human heart, human freedom, and humanitarian religion.\u201d[19]\nHere are his charges: \u201cChristianity,\u201d he says, \u201cno longer proclaims the\nhighest truths, inculcates the purest ethics, breathes the noblest\nspirit, stimulates to the grandest life, holds up to the soul and to\nsociety the loftiest ideal of that which ought to be.\u201d[20] But this is\nneither new nor original; for what is the Christianity which Mr. Abbot\nso boldly impeaches? Why, in all its main features it is that\ndisfigurement of Christianity which he has inherited from his\nCalvinistic progenitors, and which the Council of Trent impeached, and\nfor the most part on the very same grounds as he does, more than three\ncenturies ago; so that in each of his articles of impeachment every\nCatholic to-day will heartily join, and to each of his charges say:\nAmen; _Anathema sit!_\n\nWhat is surprising to Catholics is that there should be intelligent and\neducated men living in this enlightened nineteenth century who have\nfound out that Calvinism is false, and have not yet discovered in the\nintellectual environment of Boston that Calvinism is not Christianity.\n\u201cThey do not attack the Catholic Church,\u201d said Daniel O\u2019Connell, in\nspeaking of a similar class of men, \u201cbut a monster which they have\ncreated and called the Catholic Church.\u201d\n\nBut Mr. Abbot is not of the men who are content to rest in mere\nnegation. In a lecture delivered by him in a course under the auspices\nof the Free-Religious Association, entitled _A Study of Religion_, after\nmuch preliminary discourse, he gives with the heading, \u201cThe New\nConception of Religion,\u201d the following definition of religion:\n\u201cReligion,\u201d he says, \u201cis the effort of man to perfect himself.\u201d[21] Now,\nwhat is the origin of \u201cman\u2019s effort to perfect himself\u201d? \u201cReligion,\u201d he\naffirms, \u201cappears in its universal aspect as the _decree of Nature_ that\nher own end shall be achieved. Religion is the inward impulsion of\nNature, seconded by the conscious effort of the individual to conform to\nit,\u201d etc.[22]\n\nWhat Mr. Abbot calls \u201cnature\u201d and \u201cideal excellence in all directions\u201d\nis what the common sense of mankind has named God. Mr. Abbot has no\nobjection to the same name; only he insists that the idea of God, which\nis very proper, should be submitted \u201cto the educated intelligence of the\nhuman race.\u201d[23] \u201cIt is,\u201d he says, \u201cbecause I do believe in God that I\nam willing to submit my belief in him to the sharpest and most searching\nscrutiny of science.\u201d[24]\n\nNow, Mr. Abbot admits that if you once concede the Messianic claim of\nChrist, \u201cthen it is true that Catholicism is itself Christianity in its\nmost perfect form.\u201d[25] He therefore stops virtually in his analysis of\nreligion at the idea of God, and, if he believed in the Divinity of\nChrist and did not eschew logic, he would have to embrace Catholicity.\nMr. Abbot, like many Unitarians, agrees on this point with P. J.\nProudhon, but with this difference: the Frenchman recedes a step, and\nmaintains that \u201coutside of Christianity there is no God, no religion, no\nfaith, no theology.... The church believes in God, and believes in God\nmore faithfully and more perfectly than any sect. The church is the\npurest, most perfect, and most enlightened revelation of the divine\nBeing, and none other understands what is worship. From a religious\nstand-point the Catholicism of the Latin peoples is the best, the most\nrational, and the most perfect. Rome, in spite of her repeated and\nfrightful falls, remains the only legitimate church.\u201d Hence Proudhon and\nthose of his school lay it down as a _sine qua non_ that the elimination\nof the idea of God, and of all obligation to any divine law, is the\ncondition of all true progress. From this we may draw the conclusion\nthat Francis E. Abbot is on the curve line, and, if he follows out his\ndefinition of religion to its logical consequences, he will surely land,\nwhatever may be the sweep of his continuous curve, in the bosom of the\nCatholic Church. There is no escape from this ultimate result, if reason\nis to rule, except by hastily taking the back track, and starting on the\ntangent, and eventually plunging with Proudhon into the dark abyss of\nnihilism. Hence every sagacious straight-line radical cannot but look\nupon the platform of the editor of the _Index_ as the jumping-off place\ninto popery for all consistent theists. That this is not meant as\npleasantry, but is written in downright earnestness, we quote the\nconclusion of his lecture on _A Study of Religion_, and preface it by\nsaying that the language with which he urges his definition of religion\non his hearers finds in every word an echo in the hearts of all sincere\nand instructed Catholics, and receives their full endorsement.\n\n \u201cI speak now,\u201d he says, \u201cas one who _believes_ in religion, thus\n conceived, from the sole of the foot to the crown of the head,\n without apology either for the name or the thing, and without\n the smallest concession to the prejudice that assails either the\n one or the other. To-day I speak only to the large in heart and\n broad in mind\u2014to those who must accept science and would fain\n accept religion too. To these I say that science itself would\n lose its fearless love of truth, were it not that religion fed\n its secret springs; that social reform would lose its motive and\n inspiration, literature and art their beauty, and all human life\n its sweetest and tenderest grace, did not religion evermore\n create the insatiable hunger after perfection in the soul of\n man. Bright, cheerful, ennobling, stimulating, emancipating,\n religion is the greatest friend of humanity, ever guiding it\n upward and onward to the right and the true; ay, and to all we\n yearn for, if, as we believe, the right and the true are indeed\n the pathway to God.\u201d\n\nBut not all free-religionists are gifted with so deep, intelligent, and\nhealthy an appreciation of the essence of religion as Francis E. Abbot,\nwho leaves nothing at present to be desired but the courage of his\nconvictions\u2014_proficiat!_\n\nThere is, however, in the _Christian Inquirer_ a revelation made by\nWilliam Ellery Channing, a distinguished nephew of the celebrated Dr.\nChanning, which tells quite another story. It appears by this article\nthat the president of the Free Religious Association, O. B. Frothingham,\nhad attributed to Mr. Channing, one of the speakers in the tenth annual\nassembly, a \u201cpoetic Christianity,\u201d a \u201creligion in the air,\u201d an\n\u201cup-in-a-balloon\u201d religion, and in reply to this accusation he draws\nfrom nature the following unattractive personal portraits:\n\n \u201cLet me,\u201d says Mr. Channing, \u201cmake a clean breast of it to you\n before all onlookers. What you mean by the \u2018rumors\u2019 that I had\n become \u2018ecclesiastical in tastes and opinions\u2019 I can but\n conjecture. But the simple facts are in brief these: You\n remember how seven years ago, on the public platform, and in the\n reunions of the Free-Religionists in dear John Sargent\u2019s\n hospitable rooms, and in private \u2018confabs\u2019 with yourself, and W.\n J. Potter, and S. Longfellow, and S. Johnson, and J. Weiss, and\n T. W. Higginson, and D. A. Wasson, and F. E. Abbot, etc., I\n tried to preach my gospel, that the _vital centre_ of free\n religious union is the _life of God in man_ as made gloriously\n manifest in Jesus the Christ. And you remember, too, how around\n that centre I illustrated the historic fact that the great\n religions of our race arranged themselves in orderly groups.\n For nearly a year I opened my heart and mind to the\n free-religionists and liberal Christians, without a veil to hide\n my inmost holy of holies. But shall I tell you, my friend, that\n when I bade you all farewell, in the summer of 1870, it was with\n sad forebodings? And why? The story, too long to tell in full,\n ran thus: One, in his wish to be bathed in the sense of\n ever-present Deity, had ceased to commune with the Spirit of\n spirits in prayer. Another, in his repulsion from imprisoning\n anthropomorphism, had abandoned all conceptions of a personal\n God, and so lost the Father. A third, in his historic purpose to\n lead a heavenly-human life, here and now, gave up the hope of\n immortal existence, as a sailor might turn from contemplating\n the cloud-palaces of sunset to pull the tarry cordage and spread\n the coarse canvas of his ship. And, saddest of all, a fourth, in\n his bold purpose to be spontaneous in every impulse and emotion,\n spurned the motherly monitions of duty so sternly that\n conscience even seemed driven to return to heaven, like \u2018Astr\u00e6a\n Redux.\u2019 In brief, one felt as if the liberal college of all\n religions in council with pantheism, agnosticism, and atheistic\n materialism was destined to fall flat to dust in a confused\n chaos of most commonplace _spiritual \u2018know-nothingism.\u2019_ Such\n was my disheartening vision of the near future for dearly-loved\n compeers. And a darker valley of \u2018devastation,\u2019 as our\n Swedenborgian friends say, than I was driven into I have never\n traversed.\u201d\n\nBut Mr. Channing goes further; he shows that he has studied the\nreligious philosophers of antiquity to some purpose, seized their true\nmeaning and real drift, and in touching language takes his readers into\nhis confidence, offering to them an insight into his present relations\nto Christianity.\n\nThe following remarkable paragraph possesses a thrilling interest for\nCatholics; and if it affects others as it has the present writer on\nreading it, they will not fail to offer up an aspiration to Him who has\ngiven such graces to the soul of the man who penned it\u2014and doubtless to\nothers among the free-religionists\u2014that he will render their faith\nexplicit and perfect it.\n\n \u201cOnce again,\u201d he says, \u201cI sought comfort with the blessed\n company of sages and saints of the Orient and Hellas\u2014with\n Lao-Tsee and Kung Fu-Tsee; with the writers of the Bhagava-Geeta\n and the Dhamma-Bada; of the hymns of ancient Avesta and the\n modern sayings and songs of the Sufis; with radiant Plato and\n heroic Epictetus, etc., etc. Once more they refreshed and\n reinspirited me as of old. But they did something better: hand\n in hand they brought me up to the white marble steps, and the\n crystal baptismal font, and the bread and wine-crowned\n communion-table\u2014ay, to the cross in the chancel of the Christian\n temple\u2014and, as they laid their hands in benediction on my head,\n they whispered: \u2018Here is your real _home_. We have been but your\n guides in the desert to lead you to fellowship with the Father\n and his Son in the spirit of holy humanity. Peace be with you.\u2019\n And so, my brother, once again, and with a purer, profounder,\n tenderer love than ever, like a little child, I kissed the\n blood-stained feet and hands and side of the Hero of Calvary,\n and laid my hand on the knees of the gentlest of martyrs, and\n was uplifted by the embracing arms of the gracious elder\n Brother, and in his kiss of mingled pity and pardon found the\n peace I sought, and became a Christian in _experience_, as\n through a long life I had hoped and prayed to be. Depend upon\n it, dear Frothingham, there is on this small earth-ball no\n _reality_ more _real_ than this central communion with God in\n Christ, of which the saints of all ages in the church universal\n bear witness.\u201d\n\n\n IV.\u2014THE MEETING.\n\nBut we have wandered off somewhat from our present point, which is the\nproceedings of \u201cthe tenth annual meeting\u201d of the free-religionists in\nBoston. What is singularly remarkable among so intellectual and\ncultivated a class of men as assemble at these gatherings, and\nespecially among its select speakers and essayists, is that they should\ndisplay so great a lack of true knowledge of the Catholic Church. If the\nCatholic Church is not worthy of serious study, then why make it a\nsubject for speeches and essays in so important an assembly? But if it\nbe worthy of so much attention, why not give it that investigation which\nits significance demands? We dare not say that the leaders among the\nfree-religionists are not intelligent men, that they have not read\nconsiderably. But when they charge the Catholic Church with heresies\nwhich she has condemned; when they attribute to her doctrine which she\nalways has detested and does detest; and when they blacken her with\nstale and oft-refuted calumnies, and recklessly traduce her dearest and\nbest, her holiest children, we dare not trust ourselves to give\nexpression to what comes uppermost in our thoughts. Shakspeare gives\ngood advice in this matter:\n\n\n \u201cThough honesty be no Puritan,\n Yet it will do no hurt.\u201d\n\n\nWe recommend this to the consideration of our free-religionists. It will\ndo them \u201cno hurt\u201d to show more of this virtue when speaking of the\nCatholic Church. It becomes those who talk so much about science to talk\na little less about it, and, when the Catholic religion is concerned, to\ngive more evidence of scientific study. Especially does this course\nbecome men who claim to be public teachers belonging to a body whose\nobject is \u201cto encourage the scientific study of man\u2019s religious nature\nand history.\u201d\n\nThe first essay, delivered by William R. Alger, entitled _Steps towards\nReligious Emancipation in Christendom_, and published in their tenth\nannual report, will serve to illustrate our meaning. Mr. Alger is a\nscholar of repute, a man who has travelled abroad, written and published\nseveral books displaying extensive reading, refined tastes, and high\nliterary culture. He is, moreover, a distinguished minister of the\nUnitarian denomination. His essay, we have reason to believe, was\nprepared with the usual care bestowed upon such papers; for the\npresident of the association, in introducing the author, said: \u201cThe\ndiscussion will be opened by an essay by Mr. William R. Alger, of New\nYork, who has made this matter in its historical aspects the study of\nyears, and is carefully prepared to present the result of his deepest\nthought and investigation.\u201d[26]\n\nIn its fourth paragraph the essay proposes to give a rough sketch of the\n\u201cdoctrinal thought\u201d on which in medi\u00e6val times the \u201cintellectual unity\u201d\nof the church rested. Our limits will not allow us to quote it entire,\nbut it is enough for our purpose to say\u2014and we weigh our words before\nputting them on paper\u2014that scarcely any one sentence of this paragraph\ncontains a correct statement of the \u201cdoctrinal thought\u201d of the Catholic\nChurch either in the middle ages or in any other age.\n\nHere are some of the statements: \u201cThe whole human race, descended from\nAdam, who lived _five thousand years before_,\u201d etc. Mr. Alger would\nconvey new information to the readers of THE CATHOLIC WORLD, if he would\ngive his authorities for this assertion. Thus far, if our authorities do\nnot deceive us, the Catholic Church has, in her wisdom, left the\nquestion of the date of man\u2019s appearance upon this earth to the\ndiscussion of chronologists and to the disputes among scientists.\n\nAgain: \u201cThe Bible, a mysterious book dictated by the Spirit of God,\ncontaining an infallible record of what is most important in this scheme\nof salvation, _is withheld from the laity_.\u201d It would also increase the\nknowledge of our readers if the author had given his authorities to\nprove the above charge. The testimony of Catholics, if we be a judge, is\nprecisely the contrary to this accusation. They entertain the conviction\nthat it was the most earnest desire of the church in the period of which\nMr. Alger is speaking to render the Bible accessible to all classes of\nmen. Her monks devoted themselves to the severe manual labor of copying\nthe Bible, and engaged in the noble toil of translating it into the\nvulgar tongues of various nations, that the people might become readers\nof the Bible. She exposed the Bible publicly in her libraries, and\nchained it to their walls by the windows, and to desks in her churches,\nin order that it might be read by everybody and not stolen. The charge\nis simply an old and oft-repeated calumny quite unworthy a man of\nreputed intelligence.\n\n\u201cThe actual power or seal of salvation is made available to believers\nonly through the sacraments of the church\u2014confession, baptism, Mass, and\npenance\u2014legally administered by her accredited representatives.\u201d There\nis such an inextricable confusion pervading this statement that it is\ndifficult to discern its meaning. No one, we venture to say, who had\nmastered the \u201cdoctrinal thought\u201d of the church would have ever penned so\ndistracted a sentence on so important a point. One would suppose that,\naccording to Mr. Alger, there were two sacraments, one \u201cconfession\u201d and\nthe other \u201cpenance\u201d; whereas every Catholic who has learned the little\ncatechism knows that \u201cconfession,\u201d the popular term, means, in the\nlanguage of the church, the Sacrament of Penance. Then what is meant by\n\u201cbaptism legally administered by her accredited representatives\u201d? This\nis not clear; but the whole statement is so confused in thought and\ntangled in expression that the only hope of understanding the author\u2019s\nmeaning is to give him an opportunity of trying again. It would be,\namong ourselves, interesting to read from non-Catholic authors the\n\u201cdoctrinal thought\u201d of the church on what is essential to salvation and\nwhat is ordinarily necessary to salvation. It would also, we are\ninclined to think, clear up many of their misconceptions and do them no\nlittle good to have correct ideas on so important a matter.\n\n\u201cThose,\u201d says Mr. Alger, \u201cwho humbly believe and observe these doctrines\nshall be saved; _all others lost for ever_.\u201d\n\nThis sentence follows the preceding one, and the same confusion and\nerror underlie both. When the ingenuous author of this essay has\ncorrected the former sentence by reading up on the point involved, he\nwill, as a matter of course, correct the error contained in the latter.\n\nPassing now over several paragraphs containing many charges, we regret\nto say, in unusually bitter words, we come to the following: \u201cThe\nrevival of the Greek learning, the study of the works of Plato,\nAristotle, the classic poets, orators, and historians, with their\nbeautiful and surprising revelations of genius, virtue, and piety,\n_entirely independent and outside of the church and Bible_, exerted an\nimmense force in liberalizing and refining the narrow, dogmatic mind of\nthe Christian world, refuting its _arrogant pretensions to an exclusive\ncommunion with God and heritage in Providence_.\u201d If the cultivated\nwriter of this essay had qualified the phrase \u201coutside of the church\u201d\n_as I understand it_, \u201cexclusive communion\u201d _as I view it_, this\nsentence might pass; but, as it stands, the position in which the\nCatholic Church is placed is entirely false, and we refer our readers to\nwhat is said on these points under the heading of \u201cThe Mission of the\nLatin Race,\u201d commencing on page 5, in the last number of this magazine.\n\n\u201cNow the Pope,\u201d says Mr. Alger, \u201cexcommunicates the emperor, sets up a\nrival, foments a rebellion among his subjects, or launches the terrible\ninterdict on a whole nation, shutting the churches, muffling the bells,\nforbidding confession to the penitent, unction to the dying, burial to\nthe dead.\u201d[27] Either the author has been imposed upon by his\nauthorities, or perhaps he has not weighed sufficiently his words. The\neffect of an interdict of the Pope is inaccurately stated. These are\n\u201cterrible\u201d matters, and one who is reciting history should be careful\nand exact in his specifications. Here, as before, he is bound to give\nhis authorities, and learned and credible ones, or change his language.\n\n\u201cThe repeated gross contradictions of bishops, councils, and popes,\ntheir inconsistent decrees reversing or neutralizing each other,\n_infallibility clashing with infallibility_, begat irrepressible\ndoubts.\u201d[28] This sentence may pass for a rhetorical flourish, but it\ninvolves a grave, a very grave, a most grave charge, and is backed up by\nno example, or proof, or relation of authorities! These cutting and\nslashing assertions where conscientious accuracy is required and sound\nscholarship ought to be displayed, place the intelligence and education\nof his Boston audience in no enviable light. Let us have some specimens\nof \u201cinfallibility clashing with infallibility\u201d by all means:\n\n\u201cLuther sprang forth with one-third of Christendom in revolt at his\nback.... But _the fundamental doctrines_ of the church scheme otherwise\nremained _essentially_ as they had been, unchallenged.\u201d[29] What a pity\nthat the theologians of the sixteenth century had not known that \u201cthe\nfundamental doctrines of the church scheme remained essentially\u201d the\nsame! The Council of Trent, if it had only understood this, might have\nsaved its anathemas.\n\n\u201cAfter Luther, then, we see Christendom, with _fundamental agreement of\nbelief_, differing, for the most part, only in affairs of polity and\nritual, split into two bodies\u2014those who rest their belief on the\n_inspired_ authority of the church, and those who rest it on the\ninspired authority of the Bible.\u201d[30] Here again we have another\n_fundamental_ erroneous idea of the church. \u201cInspired\u201d authority is not\nwhat Catholics believe. This language shows poor theological training or\na loose way of handling delicate and important points. But on this point\nwe shall have more to say.\n\n \u201cThird,\u201d says Mr. Alger, \u201ca revolt of common sense against\n _errors with which the teachings of church and Scripture were\n identified_, but which, by the simple lapse of time, had been\n demonstrated to be false. For example, in the twentieth chapter\n of the Book of Revelations it is recorded: \u2018And he laid hold of\n the dragon, that old serpent, which is the devil, and cast him\n into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal on him\n that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand\n years should be fulfilled; after that he must be loosed a little\n season.\u2019 This passage was thought to fix the date of the Day of\n Judgment. And as the time drew near the terror was profound.\n Throughout the generation preceding the year one thousand _the\n pulpits of the Christian world rang with this frightful text and\n with awful descriptions of what it implied. The fear was as\n intense as the belief was general._\u201d\n\nHas not the author of this essay taken some romancer of history or some\nidle tale for his authority in the above charge? When and where did the\nchurch identify her teachings with this error? We grow uneasy in asking\nfor authorities and examples; and when we are given an example of things\nwhich are said to have taken place eight hundred years or more ago, no\nauthority is cited to authenticate the fact. The author may have given\nhis hearers \u201cthe result of his deepest thought,\u201d but he is too chary of\nthe authorities for his \u201chistorical study of years.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe priests,\u201d he tells us, \u201cfrom the first hour scented this enemy from\nafar, and declared war against it [physical science], as the meaner\nportion of them still do everywhere. In the twelfth century the Council\nof Tours, in the thirteenth century the Council of Paris, interdicted to\nmonks the reading of works on physical science _as sinful_.\u201d[31] We\nretract having said that Mr. Alger cites no authorities; he does in the\nabove accusation, but fails to quote the decrees or give their language,\nor tell what kind of councils these were and what their weight. We feel\nsuspicious, and have grounds for this feeling, and we demand more\ndefinite proofs. The charge is precise; let the proofs be equally so.\nLet us have the authentic decrees and _ipsissima verba_. This is asking\nonly fair play. It would not be pleasant to find this accusation, on\nserious investigation, a misconception, or a misinterpretation, or\nperhaps an invented calumny, but not by our author. We take real\npleasure in finding a point in which we agree with him. Here is one:\nthey are the \u201cmeaner portion,\u201d if there be such \u201cpriests,\u201d who \u201cwar\nagainst\u201d the study of \u201cthe physical sciences.\u201d We know of priests who\nare devoted to the study of the physical sciences, and some who are\ndistinguished in these studies; but we have no acquaintance with the\n\u201cmeaner portion\u201d who have \u201cdeclared war against physical science.\u201d\nPerhaps Mr. Alger has, and, if so, he will inform us who they are.\n\n\u201cEthnology,\u201d he asserts, \u201cmultiplies the actors in its drama [that of\nhistory], and takes _the keystone from the arch of the church theology\nby disproving the inheritance of total depravity from one progenitor of\nall men_.\u201d[32] Here the author shares the error in common with almost\nall, if not all, Unitarians and free-religionists. They seem not to be\nable to grasp the idea that the Catholic Church, in the \u0153cumenical\nCouncil of Trent, condemned the doctrines of Protestantism concerning\noriginal sin; and, whatever may be said to the contrary, the Catholic\nChurch never goes back on her authoritative decisions. Mr. Alger well\nsays that the doctrine of original sin is \u201cthe keystone of the arch of\ntheology\u201d; so much the more reason, therefore, that there should be no\nmistake on a point which shapes theology almost entirely. And if he and\nhis brethren, free-religionists and Unitarians, could be got to\nunderstand and acknowledge that the Catholic Church has condemned the\ndoctrines of Protestantism on original sin, as well as \u201cthe five points\nof Calvinism\u201d\u2014for they go together\u2014then there would be some hope that\nthe gross error of identifying Catholicity and Protestantism as\n\u201cfundamentally and essentially the same\u201d on this most important subject\nwould be corrected. The error is an egregious one, which is constantly\nappearing in their addresses, sermons, tracts, essays, books, weekly\npapers, and journals, and with that error a thousand dependent errors\nwould disappear. But, alas! we fear that we shall have to regard this as\nhopeless, and resign ourselves, for the present generation at least, to\nplacing this, with other radical errors, among the points of \u201cinvincible\nignorance\u201d! May we just here be allowed, without being stigmatized as\none of the \u201cmeaner portion\u201d of the priesthood, to put in a humble\ndemurrer to the unsustained assertion that \u201cethnology\u201d has \u201cdisproven\u201d\n\u201cone progenitor of all men\u201d?\n\nIf the reader is weary of following up with us this labyrinth of error\nin this not very long essay, he will pity the present writer; for he has\nnot touched upon one-tenth of the errors which the same short essay\nholds. We have been careful, too, to be silent on language which might\nhave come from Exeter Hall ranters or from the late Dr. Brownlee, a\nnotorious anti-popery lecturer of former days. Indeed, we can scarcely\nallow ourselves the freedom of expressing our feelings of indignation at\nreading such language coming from men who have a reputation for polite\nculture. \u201cMen,\u201d we say; for at the close of its delivery Mr. Alger\u2019s\nessay was endorsed by the president of the association as \u201cthe admirable\nessay by Mr. Alger, at once a history and an argument, a summary of\nfacts and also a summary of apprehensions and suggestions, etc.\u201d[33]\nAnother speaker pronounced it a \u201cmost magnificent and masterly\nessay.\u201d[34] We are not over-sensitive in matters of this kind, and\nbefore concluding our remarks we give a specimen of the language and\nspirit of the \u201cmost magnificent and masterly essay.\u201d\n\n\n V. FREE-RELIGIONISTS AND THE MONKS.\n\n \u201cFew men,\u201d says our estimable writer, \u201cduly feel what a debt the\n nineteenth century owes to the illustrious founders and\n cultivators of science, Aristotle, Archimedes, Kepler, Newton,\n and the hundreds of lesser lights in many departments. What a\n beneficent and herculean task they have accomplished in breaking\n the chains of _false_ authority, opening the dungeons of\n _superstition_, removing the _incubus_ of religious terror!\n Their sunlit and open-air minds, in harmonious working\n connection with nature and their race, have done much to dispel\n the _baneful_ power of a _celibate_ church, the cloistered and\n _mephitic minds of monks and hermits, introspective dreamers,\n tyrannical theorizers_, who, set apart from the living interests\n of men, had woven over Christianity _a horrid web of diseased\n logic spun out of the entrails of their own morbid brains_.\u201d\n\nLet free-religionists honor Aristotle, Archimedes, Kepler, Newton, and\nother great masters in natural science; they are worthy, and we also pay\nthem honor. Let them be grateful to those \u201ccultivators of science\u201d for\nall the hidden truths which, by their genius and toil, they have brought\nto light, and in this we also sympathize. Let them join with this class\nthe men of our own day distinguished in this line of studies: the\nHerschels, the Faradays, the Agassiz, the Quatrefages, the Darwins, the\nSecchis, the Huxleys, the Tyndalls, the Drapers, etc.; they are all\nworthy of honor and gratitude for every new truth which they have\ndiscovered and made known to the world. Not to love all truth\nunreservedly is to renounce the light of reason and to repudiate God;\nfor he was God who said, \u201cI am the truth.\u201d But this grateful\nacknowledgment for the labors of cultivators of the sciences by no\nmanner of means implies the acceptance of every hypothesis or theory,\nput forth by some of them, which for the most part are based upon\ninsufficient data or spun out of misconceptions of religion with secret\nhostility to Christianity. For there are men who pass for scientists who\nseem to be actuated more by a spirit of opposition to religion than a\nsincere desire for the discovery of the secrets of nature. Hence genuine\nscience has to suffer no less than true religion from bigots and\nhypocrites, who erect their untenable opinions into final decisions of\nscientific investigation, and cloak themselves with the honorable livery\nof science to put forth the ignoble doctrines of materialism.\nSpeculations, however brilliant, ought not to pass for science, and one\nmust be on his guard in our days, lest he allow the authority of great\nnames to impose upon his credulity the romance of science for real\nscience.\n\nBut could not the author of this essay honor the really great men of\nscience and be content, without dishonoring another class of men who\ndevoted their gifts and gave their toil as enthusiastically at least,\nand with an equal self-sacrificing spirit, to the contemplation and\ndiscovery of another, and even, in degree, a higher, class of truths?\nCould he not pay Paul without robbing Peter?\n\nThen, again, why this bitterness of expression towards the monks? Have\nthese monks no aspirations that are holy? no convictions that are\nsacred? no rights worthy of respect? Why could not the monks with equal\nliberty lead such lives as the highest feelings in their souls called\nthem to do as well as a Bronson Alcott, a Ralph Waldo Emerson, a Henry\nThoreau, or William R. Alger? What or who has given to these Americans\nthe liberty to lead such lives as they chose, and deprived men of other\nclimes of this same personal privilege? Is it a commendable thing for a\nSir Isaac Newton to lead a celibate life out of devotion to mathematics,\nand a sin for a St. Benedict to lead a single life out of as pure a\ndevotion, at least, to the religion of Christ? If Reverend Ralph Waldo\nEmerson throws up his pastorate over a respectable Unitarian\ncongregation, and retires to a remote country village to devote himself\nto the cultivation of literature and whatever he may please to think a\nmore useful calling, in fidelity to his best aspirations, why may not a\nBernadotti of Assisi retire from the business of a silk merchant,\nrenounce his gay companions, and, in obedience to the voice of God in\nhis soul, practise poverty and turn a religious reformer under the name\nof Francis? If Henry Thoreau repudiates the calling to be a clergyman\nnot to be false to his highest convictions, devotes his leisure hours to\nthe study of nature and the Greek poets, and, living for the most part\non bread and water, takes up the manual labor of making lead-pencils to\nmeet the cost of his scanty support, and in so doing not lose cast among\nthe literary brahmins of Boston, why not let, with equal freedom,\nAnthony retire to the deserts of Egypt and give himself to divine\ncontemplation and the making of baskets and mats for his innocent way of\nlife, without being loaded with a heap of most abusive epithets? Was it\nheroic in Mr. Bronson Alcott to make an attempt to realize his ideal of\na pure and holy life with a few choice spirits at Fruitlands, in the\nState of Massachusetts, while it was only the \u201cmephitic\u201d action of a\n\u201cmorbid brain\u201d in a saintly Bernard actually to realize the ideal at\nClairvaux, in the province of Burgundy in France? Are we to praise and\nnever be weary of praising the Pilgrim Fathers for abandoning their\ncountry, their homes, their friends, and their relations to come to the\nwilds of inhospitable New England, in order that they might worship God\naccording to the dictates of their consciences, and must we condemn the\nfirst pioneers in the wilderness who plunged into the solitudes of Egypt\nfor precisely the same reason, in order to fulfil the great aspiration\nof their souls to God\u2014the pilgrim saints of the desert? Who can read the\nriddle why the aspiration or effort of the soul to perfect itself is the\nresult of \u201cmephitic minds\u201d in a Hebrew, or an Egyptian, or a Latin, or a\nCelt, and the same aspiration is religious, sacred, holy, when found in\nthe soul of a New-Englander?\n\nDid it not suggest itself to the mind of the author of this essay, when\nhe perused the passage quoted against the monks, that he exposed himself\nto a flank movement? For where could you find better specimens and more\nplentifully of \u201cintrospective dreamers\u201d and \u201ctyrannical theorizers\u201d than\nin the State, in the very city, nay, in the actual audience which\nassembled at the time to listen to Mr. Alger\u2019s essay?\n\n\n \u201cO wad some power the giftie gie us,\n To see oursels as others see us!\n It wad frae monie a blunder free us,\n And foolish notion.\u201d\n\n\nWhy is it that a certain number of New England authors, whenever they\ncan find an occasion or make an opportunity, are sure to cast a fling at\nmonks and nuns and a celibate priesthood? Even the genial author, Dr.\nOliver Wendell Holmes, not to mention Whittier and others, from some yet\nunexplained cause, will turn bitter and his temper grow ruffled when he\nencounters in his literary excursions a monk or speaks of the celibate\nclergy of the church. There is no difficulty in acquitting such authors\nof intentional malice, but men so well bred and of such broad experience\nought and do know better, and should not blot their otherwise pleasant\npages with foul abuse.\n\nBut whence does this acrimony spring? Does it spring from the bully who\nstrikes a victim, knowing himself safe from a return blow? or is it that\nthe intellectual faculty of insight is lacking in these highly-gifted\nauthors? Is this rancor to be attributed to their environment? or,\nfinally, is it to be classified by some future clerical Darwin as an\ninstance of Puritanical \u201cinherited habit\u201d? Be that as it may, Catholics\nask no favors from the opponents of the church, but they have good\nreason to look for, and the right to demand, fair play, sound\nscholarship where scholarship is needed and claimed, and at least an\naverage amount of intelligence.\n\nThese monks\u2014and let us add also nuns, for their aim is identical\u2014who\nhave as a distinctive principle of life the resolve always to tend\ntowards perfection, are not perfect and make no pretension to being\nsaints, for although human nature is immanently good, there is\nnotwithstanding much evil in the world, and no class of men or women,\nwhoever they may be, is wholly free from the possibility of deviating\nfrom the path which leads to their true destiny. That there have been\namong monks and nuns hypocrites, fanatics, and those who have forgotten\nthe sacredness of their calling and given public scandal everybody\nknows: \u201cCanker vice the sweetest buds doth love.\u201d Had these incurred the\nsevere animadversion of the author of this essay, his abusive language\nmight have passed unnoticed; but no qualification is made between\ninnocent and guilty\u2014the exemplary and scandalous, one and all, are\npassed upon as the same by a most unsparing and unjust sentence.\n\nBut not all free-religionists have read the history of the church and of\nthe influence of monks upon civilization in the light of the author of\nthis essay. We cannot forego the gratification of quoting a passage\nwritten many years ago by one, a speaker in this tenth annual meeting\ntoo, in which he gives a different estimate of the church and the monks\nin the precise period of which Mr. Alger has attempted to draw a rough\nsketch, it is true, but still his intention must have been to give a\ncorrect picture.\n\n \u201cTruly,\u201d says the Rev. William Ellery Channing, \u201cthe church has\n been a quickening centre of modern civilization, a fountain of\n law and art, of manners and policy. It would not be easy to\n estimate how much of our actual freedom and humanity, of our\n cultivation and prosperity, we owe to her foresight and just\n acknowledgment of rights and duties. It is easy to ascribe to\n the cunning and love of power of priests the wonderful\n sovereignty which this spiritual dictator has exerted; but it is\n proof of surprising superficiality that these critics do not\n recognize that only sincere enthusiasm and truth, however\n adulterated by errors, can give such a hold upon human will. The\n Christian Church has been unquestionably the most dignified\n institution which the earth has seen.... Beautiful have been its\n abbeys in lonely solitudes, clearing the forests, smoothing the\n mountains, nurseries of agricultural skill amidst the desolating\n wars of barbarous ages, sanctuaries for the suffering. Beautiful\n its learned cloisters, with students\u2019 lamps shining late in the\n dark night as a beacon to wandering pilgrims, to merchants with\n loaded trains, to homeless exiles\u2014their silent bands of\n high-browed, pallid scholars watching the form of Science in the\n tomb of Ignorance, where she lay entranced. Beautiful its\n peaceful armies of charity, subduing evil with works of love in\n the crowded alleys and dens of cities, amid the pestilences of\n disease and the fouler pestilence of crime, and carrying the\n sign of sacrifice through nations more barren of virtues than\n the deserts which have bordered them.\u201d\n\n\n VI.\u2014THE FREE-RELIGIONISTS AND THE MYSTICS.\n\nMr. Alger must have seen that his canvas up to this moment was\novercharged with sombre colors, and to give it a _vraisemblance_ he put\nin the following words:\n\n \u201cThere has been another marked class of persons, in the extreme\n opposite sphere of life to those just described\u2014a class\n nourished in the inmost bosom of the church itself\u2014whose very\n important influence has acted in harmony with that of science,\n which seems so wholly contrary to it\u2014acted to melt away\n dogmatism, free men from hatred and force and fraud, and join\n them in a heavenly enthusiasm of accord. I allude to the\n mystics, who cultivated the sinless peace and raptures of the\n inner life of devotion, absorption in divine contemplation,\n ecstatic union with God. Boundless is the charm exerted,\n incalculable the good done, in impregnating the finest strata of\n humanity with paradisal germs by _Victor_, Bonaventura, Suso,\n Tauler, Teresa, Behmen, F\u00e9nelon, Guyon, John of the Cross, and\n the rest of these breathing minds, hearts of seraphic passion,\n souls of immortal flame. This class of believers, devoted to the\n nurture of exalted virtue and piety, were the choicest\n depositaries of the grace of religion.\u201d\n\nThe general reader would suppose that this \u201cmarked class of persons, in\nthe extreme opposite sphere of life to those just described,\u201d were not,\nof course, \u201cmonks.\u201d But such is the fact, with the exception of two he\nmentions. Let us examine this list. Here is the first mystic, Victor.\nVictor! Who is he? Whom does the essayist mean? There was St. Victor of\nMarseilles, who suffered martyrdom under Diocletian, July 21, A.D. 303.\nHe surely does not mean this Victor? Then there was the celebrated Abbey\nof St. Victor, near Paris, named after St. Victor of Marseilles, founded\nin the first year of the twelfth century; he cannot mean that? There is\nno telling, though. Then there was Hugh, born in Flanders, and Richard,\na Scotchman, the latter a disciple of the former, both inmates of the\nmonastery of St. Victor, both illustrious by their writings on mystical\ntheology, and saintly men. Perhaps he means one of these, or both?\nPerhaps that is not his meaning. If it be, then his sentence should have\nrun thus: Hugh of St. Victor, or Richard of St. Victor. Let us proceed;\nboth of these were \u201cmonks.\u201d St. Bonaventure, disciple of St. Francis,\nwas a \u201cmonk.\u201d John Tauler, a disciple of St. Dominic, another monk. St.\nTeresa, a nun, a \u201ccloistered\u201d nun, consequently as bad, at least, as a\n\u201cmonk.\u201d Behmen? Behmen? _Jacob Boehme_. Oh! yes; a German, a\nshoemaker\u2014not to his discredit\u2014a Protestant, and mystical writer. O\nblessed saints in Paradise! do not, we beg, lay it to our charge of\nmaking you \u201cacquainted with so strange a bed-fellow!\u201d Then comes F\u00e9nelon\nthe saintly archbishop, the friend, be it known, of monks and nuns. Now\nMme. Guyon; it is singular that there is always a strange hankering\namong a class of Protestants after Catholic writers of suspected\northodoxy. St. John of the Cross is next, and the last, though not\nleast, the Aquinas of mystical theology, a Carmelite, a \u201cmonk.\u201d Now let\nus count up. But we have forgotten our beloved Swabian, Henry Suso, the\nMinnesinger of divine love; and he too was a Dominican, a \u201cmonk.\u201d In\nsum\u2014excluding, of course, the Protestant; for of him it cannot be said\nthat he was \u201cnourished in the inmost bosom of the church\u201d\u2014we have six\n\u201cmonks,\u201d if you include both Hugh and Richard of St. Victor in the\nnumber, and one \u201ccloistered\u201d nun, all, without exception, \u201ccelibates,\u201d\nof the eight examples selected by our author as \u201cdevoted to the nurture\nof exalted virtue and piety,\u201d and \u201cthe choicest depositaries of the\ngraces of religion!\u201d Six out of eight\u2014not a bad showing for monks and\nnuns \u201cas the choicest depositaries of the graces of religion,\u201d where a\nlearned author has his pick, running over many centuries.\n\n\n VII.\u2014THE FREE-RELIGIONISTS AND CHRISTIANITY, OR THE FINAL ISSUE.\n\nIt is time to draw these remarks to a close, and that, too, without even\ncasting a glance at the speeches that followed the essay which has been\nunder review.\n\nWe did not offer, as our readers will have remarked, a refutation of the\nmisconceptions, misinterpretations, and errors which have been pointed\nout in the essay of Mr. Alger. We intentionally abstained from doing so\nuntil its author brings forth his authorities and proves his assertions,\nin obedience to a commonly-received maxim rightly followed in\ndiscussion, which says, _Quod gratis affirmatur, gratis negatur_.\nBesides, the Catholic Church is in possession, and therefore the burden\nof proof rests not on her defenders, but on the part of her assailants.\nOur refutations will come soon enough when we have learned that there is\nsomething to refute. But, that our purpose might not be ambiguous, we\nhave italicized, in most instances, the words which contain the special\nerrors to which we wished to call attention.\n\nThe opponents of the church have not changed their mode of attack, but\nonly their weapons. They no longer charge her with atheism, as the early\npagans did, or of worshipping the head of an ass, or drinking the blood\nof an infant, but absurdities and idle tales of the \u201cdark ages\u201d are\ntrumped up and laid at her door.\n\nJust now, as if by a general conspiracy, an attempt is made to place the\nchurch in a false position, as hostile to reason, science, education,\ncivilization, liberty, and the state. These are the popular charges of\nthe day, and these show at least that the \u201cgall\u201d of her enemies is\nactive and \u201ccoins slanders as a mint.\u201d Counterfeits, however, may pass\ncurrent for a limited period, but in the long run they are detected and\nbring upon their authors\u2019 heads grief and shame. Only truth and justice\nare enduring and immortal.\n\nThe true position of the Catholic Church is now, as it ever has been,\nnot against but for reason and God, science and revelation, for\neducation and Christianity, for civilization and progress, for liberty\nand law, for the state and the church; as against atheism, naturalism,\ninfidelity, barbarism, license, and anarchy.\n\nLet us have in this free country, where all religions to an uncommon\ndegree are placed on an equal footing, a fair and honest discussion,\navoiding unsupported assertions, refuted charges, and all bigotry.\nWhichever religion is worsted in such an encounter by fair and honest\nblows, why, let it die. If the free-religionists can clear the whole\nfield from Christianity, as they appear to think, and invent instead a\nbetter religion, as some fancy, let them do so and come on with their\nnew religion. Give it a fair chance, and, if their new religion proves\nto be a better one, let it have a joyful greeting.\n\nUntil then the Catholic Church is in possession of the field, and in the\ncongress of intelligent men holds its high place; for all\nthoroughly-instructed minds see clearly the impossibility of\nentertaining honorable ideas of God without being Christians, and of\nbeing Christians and not becoming Catholics. The real issue, if the\nfree-religionists can be induced to look at it, is between Catholicity\nand nihilism.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n SMOKE-BOUND.\n\n\n O cool east wind! so moist of breath,\n With strength blow from the sea,\n Loosen the smoky chains that curb\n Our proud hills\u2019 sovereignty;\n\n Wake in the silent mountain glens,\n Where streams grow dumb with drought,\n The clamor of your lowland home\u2014\n The sea-waves\u2019 battle-shout.\n\n Sweep onward with your pennon clouds,\n Marshal your spears of rain,\n Sound in the pines your bugle-call\u2014\n Set free our hills again!\n\n Hide them for days, if so you will,\n In cloudy depths of storm;\n Wrestle, as human soul should win\n Its strong, immortal form.\n\n We shall not grieve in such dark veil\n To lose our valley\u2019s crown,\n That gaineth so from your pure breath\n But mightier renown.\n\n Our hearts shall greet the slanting rain,\n Like bless\u00e8d water flung;\n Your voice shall the _Asperges_ sing\n The cross-boughed firs among.\n\n Like sin unshriven these earth-fires\n Hold heart and mountain fast,\n Each day a stronger link is forged,\n A drearier light is cast.\n\n All day the smoky shadow flings\n Its dream of heaven\u2019s blue,\n Its mockery of summer\u2019s smile,\n Its vision all untrue,\u2014\n\n Winning, at eve, the sun to spin\n Dull shadow into gold\u2014\n Bright meshes of enchanter\u2019s web\n O\u2019er hill and valley rolled;\n\n Hiding our far-off sunset peaks\n That longest keep day\u2019s light\u2014\n The temple\u2019s porch called Beautiful,\n Steps to a holier height.\n\n Broad steps whose strength our valley lacks\n To lift our thoughts on high.\n Blow, eastern wind! give our dim eyes\n Our peaks that mount the sky.\n\n O moist of breath! with cloudy lips,\n Quench these dread earthly fires\n That turn our mountain altars all\n To beauty\u2019s funeral pyres.\n\n Upon this stifling chain drop dew,\n Its glamour exorcise,\n That, pure as pardoned soul, our hills\n In Heaven-sent strength may rise.\n\n Give us anew their morning grace,\n Their midday depths of blue;\n Open the sunset gates where light\n Of Paradise shines through.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n ST. JAMES OF COMPOSTELLA.\n\nAlthough most have heard the name of Santiago in Galicia, yet it is now\na place that is scarcely known. In the days of our infancy there were\nstill such beings heard of as the pilgrims of Compostella, but the\nsilence of the present day is well-nigh oblivion: and of this famous\nsanctuary, which still exists, there only remains an almost forgotten\nand far-distant renown. France has unlearnt the very roads which led to\nthe apostle\u2019s tomb; and the Spaniards themselves, who will speak to you\nfreely of _Nuestra Se\u00f1ora del Pilar_, scarcely guess that the Madonna of\nSaragossa placed her origin under the patronage of St. James, whose\nshrine all Christendom in former days bestirred itself to go and visit.\n\nThe apostle venerated at Compostella is St. James the Great, whose\nvocation to the apostolate is related in the fourth chapter of St.\nMatthew, immediately after that of Peter and Andrew, and where we are\ntold that at the call of Jesus the brothers forthwith \u201cleft the ship and\ntheir father and followed him.\u201d According to the most probable opinion,\nZebedee and his family dwelt at the little town of Saffa, now called by\nthe Arabs Deir, about three miles distant from Nazareth. Andrichomius,\nin his _Theatrum Terr\u00e6 Sanct\u00e6_, mentions a church there, which some\nyears later no longer existed. Their prompt obedience indicates the\ngenerous character which rendered the brothers particularly dear to\ntheir divine Master, and caused them to be, with St. Peter, the chosen\nwitnesses of scenes and miracles at which the other disciples were not\npresent. The last mention made of St. James in the Gospel is in the\nnarrative of the miraculous draught of fishes after the Resurrection.\nThe next is in the Acts of the Apostles, which briefly recounts his\nmartyrdom: \u201cHerod ... killed James, the brother of John, with the\nsword.\u201d\n\nThis took place in the year 42. Of the nine years which intervened\nbetween the Ascension of our Lord and this event the Holy Scriptures say\nnothing, and tradition is our only source of information. According to\nthis, St. James departed early from Jerusalem, and, directing his course\ntowards the western countries of Europe, arrived in Spain, where he\npreached the Gospel and appointed some of the first bishops. Here also,\naccording to an ancient and constant tradition, he caused to be built at\nSaragossa a church dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, known as \u201cOur Lady\nof the Pillar,\u201d and, on the termination of his sojourn in the west,\nreturned to Jerusalem, where, a few days after his arrival, about the\ntime of the Jewish Passover, Herod caused him to be seized and\nslain.[35]\n\nIt is certain that the apostles delayed not in obeying the divine\ncommand to \u201cgo and teach the nations\u201d; neither can one explain in any\nother manner how the light emanating from Syria so rapidly illumined (as\neven the infidel critic, Renan, confesses) the three great peninsulas of\nAsia Minor, Greece, and Italy, and soon afterwards the whole coast of\nthe Mediterranean, so that in a short space of time the Christian world\nwas co-extensive with the Roman\u2014_Orbis Romanus, orbis Christianus_. St.\nJerome and Theodoret both affirm that Spain was evangelized by some of\nthe apostles. The Gothic liturgy, which is considerably anterior to the\nMozarabic, and which dates from the fifth century, is the most ancient\ninterpreter of this tradition. \u201cThe illustrious Sons of Thunder,\u201d it\nsays, \u201chave both obtained that which their mother requested for them.\nJohn rules Asia, and, on the left, his brother possesses Spain.\u201d The\ngreat doctor St. Isidore, who lived in the first half of the seventh\ncentury, writes: \u201cJames the son of Zebedee ... preached the Gospel to\nthe peoples of Spain and the countries of the west.\u201d The Bollandists\nfurnish a number of additional witnesses.[36] The breviary of St. Pius\nV. and the enactments of Urban VIII. corroborate their testimony, the\nRoman Breviary saying also that St. Braulio not only compared St.\nIsidore to St. Gregory the Great, but declared that he had been given by\nHeaven to Spain as her teacher in the place of St. James.[37]\n\nWhatever opinion may be adopted with regard to the mission of St. James,\nit does not affect the facts relating to the translation of his body to\nthe Iberian peninsula. The following account of this event is given in\nthe curious _History of Compostella_, written previous to the twelfth\ncentury by two canons of that church, and confirmed by a letter of Leo\nIII. which is quoted in the Breviary of Evreux. The facts as there given\nappear to be free from the legendary embellishments, more or less\nprobable, with which, in certain other manuscripts, they have been\nadorned.\n\nAt the time when the apostle was put to death at Jerusalem the\npersecution was so bitter, and the hatred against the Christians so\nextreme, that the Jews would not suffer his body to be buried, but cast\nit ignominiously outside the walls of the city, that it might be\ndevoured by dogs and birds of prey. The disciples of the saint watched\nfor the moment when they might carry away his remains, and, having\nsecured them, they could not venture to re-enter Jerusalem with their\nprecious burden, but turned their steps toward the sea, and, on arriving\nat Joppa, found a ship on the point of sailing for Spain. They embarked,\nand in due time reached the northwest coast of that country, and landed\nat the port of Iria, whence they proceeded some distance inland, and\nburied the body of the apostle at a place called _Liberum Donum_,\nafterwards Compostella. His sepulchre was made in a marble grotto which\nalready existed, and which in all probability had been formerly\ndedicated to Bacchus, as its name seemed to indicate. Thus the spot\nreceived the highest Christian consecration, and the people of Galicia,\namong whom were numerous converts, held in great veneration the tomb of\ntheir apostle. The pagan persecution became, however, so violent in this\nprovince that Christianity entirely disappeared from it, and was not\nplanted there again until after the first victory of the Goths.\n\nThe invasion of these barbarians, instead of being a misfortune, was of\nthe greatest benefit to the country, and resulted in prosperity which\ncontinued through several centuries. The favor shown to Arianism by some\nof the earlier kings for a time imperilled the truth, but it was not\nlong before Spain saw the faith of her first apostle flourishing in all\nits purity; and her sons would doubtless have flocked to the tomb of him\nwho was declared in the Gothic liturgy to be the patron of Spain, if the\nsame thing had not happened with regard to the tomb of the second martyr\nof our Lord as had before happened to that of the first. When the faith\nhad disappeared from Galicia the place of the apostle\u2019s tomb was\nforgotten; it is, moreover, possible that the last Christians had buried\nthe grotto which contained it, that it might be hidden from pagan\nprofanation. The spot was overgrown with underwood and brambles. Tall\nforest trees rose around it, and there was no trace left of anything\nwhich could indicate the sanctity of the spot. Thus, in the early and\nbright days of the faith in Spain, the night of oblivion rested on the\nremains of her great patron; but when evil times came upon the land\nGod\u2019s hour was come for pointing out the tomb of his apostle. The Gothic\nkings were about to disappear, and their sceptres to be wielded by the\nfollowers of Mahomet.\n\nInvited to fight against King Roderic, by a competitor to the throne of\nthe country to which he thus proved himself so great a traitor, the\nArabs thronged into Spain, which in less than ten years they entirely\nconquered. Their domination was not always violent and persecuting; a\ncertain toleration was at times accorded to the Christians; but, thanks\nto the proud courage of Pelayo and a handful of brave men who would not\ndespair of their country, and who could not be driven from the mountains\nof the Asturias, war had set her foot on the soil of Spain, to quit it\nno more until the utter expulsion of the Moors had been effected.\nGalicia, with Leon and the Asturias, had the honor of being the centre\nof the national resistance, and consequently suffered from frequent and\nsanguinary devastation while the long struggle lasted.\n\nIt was in these troubled times that the apostle\u2019s tomb was brought to\nlight.\n\nAlready several kings had established themselves in the northern and\nwestern parts of Spain. Miron, King of the Suevi, had regulated the\nlimits of each diocese; Alfonso the Chaste was then king of Leon and\nGalicia; and Theodomir, a holy and faithful prelate, was Bishop of Iria.\n\nCertain trustworthy persons one day came to inform Theodomir that every\nnight lights of great brilliancy were seen shining above a wood on the\nsummit of a hill at a little distance from the town, and that all the\nneighborhood was illuminated by them. The bishop, fearing lest there\nmight be some deception or illusion, resolved to see for himself, and\nrepaired to the place indicated. The prodigy was evident to all, the\nlights throwing a marvellous splendor; and as this continued night after\nnight, the bishop caused the trees to be cut down on that spot and the\nbrushwood cleared away, after which an excavation was commenced on the\ntop of the hill. The workers had not dug far before they came to a\nmarble grotto, within which was found the apostle\u2019s tomb.\n\nTheodomir lost no time in repairing to the court of Alfonso to announce\nthe discovery, which caused great joy to the pious monarch, who saw in\nit a sign of God\u2019s protection and a presage of the triumph of the\nChristian arms. He hastened to the spot and assured himself by personal\nobservation of the reality of the facts related to him by the bishop.\nMariana, the Spanish historian, says: \u201cAfter having examined all that\nhas been written by learned authors for and against the matter, I am\nconvinced that there are not in all Europe any relics more certain and\nauthentic than those of St. James at Compostella.\u201d\n\nThe first care of King Alfonso was to raise a sanctuary on the spot\nwhere the tomb had just been miraculously discovered. Built in haste,\nand at a time when, owing to the unsettled state of the kingdom, the\nroyal resources were very limited, the edifice was of a very humble\ncharacter as regarded both size and materials: \u201cPetra et luto opus\nparvum\u201d is the description given of it in the Act of Erection of the\nsecond church, built later by Alfonso III. The king was nevertheless\nable to endow it with a certain revenue, and to secure a permanent\nprovision to its ministers. The archives of Compostella long preserved a\nprivilege granted by Alfonso the Chaste, in virtue of which all the\nlands with their villages, for three miles round, were made over to the\nchurch.\n\nSpain was speedily made aware of the discovery; the neighboring nations,\nand in particular the Gauls, heard of it also, and the faithful from\nboth countries flocked in great numbers to the tomb, drawn by the fame\nof the miracles which immediately began to be wrought there, and of\nwhich Valafrid Strabo, who died in the year 849, makes mention: _Plurima\nhic pr\u00e6sul patravit signa stupenda_.\n\nThe relations of Gaul with Christian Spain were at that time very\nfrequent. The infidels were the common enemy. Charles Martel had driven\nthem from Gaul, but the struggle that still went on south of the Gallic\nfrontiers had an intense interest for all Christendom. Charlemagne was\nallied in friendship with Alfonso the Chaste, though it is doubtful\nwhether he ever made the pilgrimage of Compostella, as some have said.\nIt is, however, certain that he joined his entreaties to those of the\nking of Leon to obtain from Pope Leo III. the transfer of the bishopric\nof Iria to Compostella. This was the name already borne by the town\nwhich had rapidly risen round the apostle\u2019s tomb, and which was given in\nremembrance of the starlike lights which had revealed its\nlocality\u2014_Campus Stell\u00e6_.\n\nThe pope granted the request of the two monarchs. Compostella replaced\nthe bishopric of Iria and remained suffragan to the archbishop of Braga\nuntil the town of St. James should be raised to the metropolitan\ndignity. King Alfonso, who had no children, offered to bequeath his\nthrone to Charlemagne, on condition that that monarch would drive the\nMoors out of Spain. Charlemagne accepted the terms and crossed the\nPyrenees; but the Spanish princes, disapproving of Alfonso\u2019s proposal,\nleagued together against the emperor, and some of them, later on, allied\nthemselves with the Moorish king of Saragossa, and destroyed at\nRoncesvaux the rearguard of Charlemagne\u2019s army, in which perished\nRoland, the hero _par excellence_ of the lays and chronicles of the\ntime.\n\nSome time afterwards, when Ramira had succeeded Alfonso the Chaste, and\nAbderahman II. was King of Cordova, the latter, inflated by his\nsuccesses, sent to demand of the Spanish king an annual tribute of a\nhundred young maidens. Ramira indignantly drove away the ambassadors,\nassembled his troops, and declared war. He was defeated in the battle of\nAlaveda, and forced to withdraw with the remnant of his army to a\nneighboring elevation, where the Moor could not fail to attack him. The\nChristian monarchy in Spain seemed on the very brink of ruin. That night\nthe king had a dream, in which the apostle St. James appeared to him,\ngrand and majestic, bidding him be of good courage, for that on the\nmorrow he should be victorious. The king related his vision to the\nprelates and leaders of his army, and made it known to the soldiers\nalso. Immediately every heart kindled with fresh enthusiasm; the little\nband threw itself upon the infidel host, while on all sides arose the\nshout, Sant\u2019 Iago! Sant\u2019 Iago! which has ever since been the war-cry of\nSpain.\n\nThe Moors were thrown into confusion and completely routed, leaving\n60,000 of their number on the field of battle. It was averred that\nduring the whole engagement the apostle St. James, mounted on a white\ncharger, and bearing in his hand a white banner with a red cross, was\nseen at the head of the Christian battalions, scattering terror and\ndeath among the ranks of the enemy. Thus was fought, in 846, the famous\nbattle of Clavijo, all the glory of which is due to the patron of Spain.\n\nAfter a solemn act of thanksgiving to God the army made a public vow,\nobligatory on all the kingdom, to pay yearly to the church at\nCompostella one measure of corn and one of wine from every acre of land.\nImmense riches were found in the Moorish camp, and these were\nconsecrated to the erection of two magnificent churches\u2014one at Oviedo,\nin honor of the Blessed Virgin, and another under the invocation of St.\nMichael.\n\nFrom this time the devotion to the apostle who had shown himself the\nprotector and deliverer of the country spread far and wide. Pilgrims\nthronged from every quarter to his tomb, which became the great\npilgrimage of the west, the pendant to Jerusalem, with Rome between the\ntwo.\n\nThe humble church erected by Alfonso the Chaste was by no means suitable\nto the dignity of the deliverer of Spain, nor sufficient for the\never-increasing number of pilgrims. In the year 868 Alfonso III.,\ntogether with Sisenand, then Bishop of Compostella, undertook to replace\nit by a cathedral. \u201cWe, Alfonso,\u201d it is written in the Act of Erection,\n\u201chave resolved, together with the bishop aforesaid, to build the house\nof the Lord and to restore the temple and tomb of the apostle which\naforetime had been raised to his august memory by the Lord Alfonso, and\nwhich was only a small construction of stone and clay. Urged by the\ninspiration of God, we are come with our subjects, our family, into this\nholy place. Traversing Spain through the battalions of the Moors, we\nhave brought from the city of Ebeca blocks of marble which we have\nselected, and which our forefathers had carried thither by sea, and with\nwhich they built superb habitations, which the enemy has destroyed.\u201d\n\nAll the materials for the new building were thus gathered together, the\nslabs and columns of marble being of great beauty, but we have little\ninformation as to its architectural style or merit. The arts were at\nthat time in a state of temporary decay. The edifices of the Roman\nperiod had for the most part perished in the invasions of the Goths, the\nSuevi, and the Alani. These nations, after having embraced the faith,\nwere speedily civilized, and under its inspiration had raised numerous\nreligious buildings which were not without a certain grandeur, when the\nMoorish conquest of Spain brought again an almost universal ruin over\nthe land. The influence of the climate, the beauty of the Andalusian\nskies, softened the fierce character of the victors, and their minds\nspeedily received a wonderful intellectual development. Never did any\npeople make so much progress in so short a time, in art, in science, in\nculture of ideas, and also in a certain elevation of sentiment.\nArchitecture of great magnificence and originality made rapid advances\namong them, of which the richness always bore the stamp of a peculiar\ntastefulness and delicacy.\n\nThe vanquished were unable to make the same progress, nor were they to\nattain to great results until after having received the contact of the\nworks of their conquerors. These results were arrived at later on,\nthanks to a certain courtesy which, outside the war as it were, and in\ntimes of truce, established between the two peoples mutual relations and\ncurrents of influence which left their impress on all the creations of\ngenius.\n\nWhen King Alfonso commenced the cathedral of Compostella, the conquest\nwas still too recent and the animosity too great between the Spaniards\nand their subduers to allow of any amicable intercourse or interchange\nof ideas on matters connected with the arts of peace. The architecture\nof the close of the ninth century was heavy and the forms massive; not\nwithout grandeur, though for the most part devoid of grace. Such,\ndoubtless, in its general features, was the ancient cathedral of\nCompostella, which was completed about the year 874. Mariana, following\nthe statement of Sandoval, says that there was held there in 876 a\ncouncil of fourteen bishops, who consecrated the new edifice. The high\naltar was dedicated to our Lord under the title of St. Saviour, that on\nthe right to St. Peter, and that on the left to St. Paul, while the\nancient altar over the apostle\u2019s tomb, which reached back to a remote\nantiquity, received no consecration, it being regarded as certain that\nthis had received it from the first disciples of St. James.\n\nThe erection of the cathedral gave a new impetus to the pilgrimage, to\nfacilitate which roads were made in the south of France and the north of\nSpain. Monasteries and houses of refuge were built along the wild and\nlonely defiles of the Pyrenees, and bridges thrown across the streams\nand rivers. The roads were thronged by the multitudes, who came, some\nfrom simple devotion, others to do penance and seek pardon of their\nsins, and many also to obtain some particular favor\u2014the cure of a\nsickness or the success of an undertaking. Great was the renown of\nMonsignor St. James, the power of whose intercession and the splendor of\nwhose miracles were held in high esteem at Rome. Pope John X., at the\ncommencement of the tenth century, sent to his tomb a priest named\nZanelus to obtain correct information respecting the number of pilgrims\nand the authenticity of the numerous miracles; he was also charged to\nexamine the liturgical books of the Goths, respecting which it had been\nstated that they were full of errors. The bishop, Sisenand, received him\nwith all honor, supplied him with every means of faithfully acquitting\nhimself of his mission, and convinced him of the purity of the ancient\nliturgy of Spain. All the books which Zanelus took from thence received\nthe Supreme Pontiff\u2019s approval, the only alteration he required being\nthat in the words of consecration the Spanish rite should conform itself\nexactly to that of Rome.\n\nCompostella, daily enriched by travellers too numerous for her to\nentertain, became a town of ever-increasing importance. The church\nespecially, to which very costly offerings were continually being made,\nwhich had immense revenues and possessed superb domains, was in richness\nand magnificence one of the first in the world. Her prelates, however,\ndid not always make good use of their riches. The church was then\npassing through deplorable times, and corruption, which was invading all\nbesides, made inroads also in the sanctuary. The bishops of Compostella\nwere usually chosen from among the noble and illustrious families of the\nkingdom, brought up amid luxury, pleasure, and the tumult of arms, and,\ncarrying their worldly predilections with them to the episcopal throne,\nthey might be seen constantly in the chase or at the war, sometimes\ndriven from their see, and, attempting to return by force, dying a\nviolent death. One of these, Sisenand, unlike his worthy predecessor of\nthe same name, was in 979 killed at the head of a squadron while\ncharging the Normans, who had invaded Galicia. He would have been a good\ncaptain; why was he made a bishop? Compostella owed to him the solid\nwalls and strong towers with which he fortified the town. His successor,\nPelayo, being equally unfitted for his office, was deposed, and replaced\nby a pious priest named Pedro Mansorio, upon whom the misdoings of his\npredecessors were visited. He had the grief of seeing the city taken by\nthe Moors, who profaned and devastated the cathedral. His immediate\nsuccessors failed to profit by this chastisement, and, after three\nunworthy prelates had occupied the see, the enemy advanced from the\ndirection of Portugal (which they had invaded and ravaged) in greater\nnumbers than before; again they besieged and took the city, which they\nset on fire and razed the walls. Alman-Zour fed his horse from the\nporphyry urn in the cathedral which was used for the baptismal font, and\nwhich still exists; gave up the sanctuary to pillage and destruction,\nthrowing down many of the pillars, as well as a portion of the walls;\nand, taking down the bells, caused them to be dragged by Christian\ncaptives to the great mosque at Toledo, where they were turned upside\ndown and made to serve as lamps. He was proceeding to make havoc also of\nthe apostle\u2019s tomb, when a bright light, suddenly emanating from and\nenveloping it, so terrified the infidels that they stopped short in\ntheir sacrilege, fearing lest they should be stricken by the \u201capostle of\n_Isa_\u201d (Jesus). An aged monk sat by the tomb, alone, and doubtless\nhoping for martyrdom in that spot at the hand of the spoilers.\nAlman-Zour asked why he stayed there, and, on his answering that he was\n\u201cthe friend of Santiago,\u201d commanded that no one should lay hands upon\nhim, and the Mussulmans respected the fakir. It is the Moorish annals\nnearly contemporary with the events we are noticing which mention this\nincident, and which appreciate in a very curious manner the pilgrimage\nof St. James, describing as follows _Shant Jakoh_, the sacred city of\n_Kalikija_ (Galicia): \u201cTheir Kabah is a colossal idol in the centre of\nthe church; they swear by it, and come on pilgrimage to it from the most\ndistant lands, from Rome as well as from other countries, pretending\nthat the tomb which may there be seen is that of Jakoh, one of the best\nbeloved of the twelve apostles of Isa. May happiness and the benediction\nof Allah be upon him and upon our Prophet!\u201d\n\nThe army of Alman-Zour did not reap any benefit from its sacrilegious\nplunder: a contagious malady made such terrible ravages in its ranks\nthat there were scarcely any soldiers left; he therefore hastened his\ndeparture from Galicia, but was himself also stricken by death upon the\nway.\n\nIt was not possible immediately to raise the cathedral from its ruins,\nbut the confluence of pilgrims never ceased, and the offerings of\nChristendom were such as to render the hope almost a certainty that it\nwould at no distant period be worthily rebuilt.\n\nTowards the year 1038 Ferdinand, having been made king of Castile and\nLeon, fought the Moors in several engagements, defeated them in\nPortugal, and, having dispossessed them of numerous strongholds and\nfortified places, desired to testify his gratitude to the God of armies\nby repairing to Compostella. There he prayed long at the apostle\u2019s tomb,\nand took the resolution never to lay down his arms until he had broken\nthe power of the enemy.\n\nAfter taking the powerful city of Coimbra, the capture of which he\nattributed to the protection of St. James, the king returned to\nCompostella laden with booty, which, in gratitude for his victory, he\npresented to the church.\n\nCompostella had now bishops worthy of their sacred dignity. In 1056\nCresconius, who then ruled the diocese, presided, at a council held\nthere, in his quality of bishop of the Apostolic See. Rome thus\nexercised her influence, and this influence was so salutary that Pelago,\na near successor of Cresconius, desired to give it a larger place in his\nchurch. He laid aside the Mozarabic Rite and adopted the Roman in the\ncelebration of Mass and the recitation of the Canonical Hours, accepting\nat the same time all the Roman rules on important matters of sacerdotal\ndiscipline. And Compostella had not long to wait before receiving the\nrecompense of her submission and good-will. In 1075, the same year in\nwhich Ferdinand took Toledo, the see of Santiago (for this had become\nthe name of the town), which had hitherto been suffragan to Merida, was\nraised to the metropolitan dignity.\n\nWe have now reached the period in which, thanks to the liberality of the\nfaithful, the cathedral of Compostella was not only raised from its\nruins, but entirely rebuilt on a larger scale and with much greater\nsplendor. Gemirez, the first archbishop of Santiago, was one of its\ngreatest prelates.\n\nThe work of reconstruction, which had been commenced about the year\n1082, he not only actively continued, but also proposed to the chapter\nto build cloisters and offices, as well as commodious lodgings for those\nwho came on pilgrimage from distant lands, engaging for his part to pay\na hundred marks of pure silver towards the expense.\n\nThe sole aim of this prelate was the glory of God and the honor of St.\nJames, never his own worldly advantage; the people knew this, and that\nthe use made of their offerings was always in conformity with their\nintentions. The times, however, were troubled, and the archbishop had\nhis share of their disquiet.\n\nQueen Urraca, the sister of Alfonso VI. of Castile and Leon, and widow\nof Raymond of Burgundy, claimed as her right, until her son should be\nold enough to reign, the government of Castile and the countries\ndependent on it, while her second husband, Alfonso of Aragon, repudiated\nthese pretensions. Gemirez, whose influence was so great that he might\nbe regarded as the real sovereign of the country, took the part of\nUrraca, and her cause prospered for a time, owing to the weight of his\nsupport; but she ruined her own case by her haughtiness and ambition; a\nrebellion broke out, and the prelate narrowly escaped falling a victim\nto the fury of the populace, who set fire to the cathedral. Happily, the\nsolidity of its structure was such as to resist the flames, the interior\nwood-work and fittings, etc., only being destroyed, so that not many\nyears afterwards, in 1117, we find the archbishop, in an address to his\ncanons, able to speak of it as one of the richest and most beautiful as\nwell as one of the most illustrious churches in the world.\n\nIn 1130 Gemirez ended his career, but not until he had lived to see the\nwork far advanced towards its completion. We hear no more of its\nprogress for forty years afterwards. The crosses of the consecration,\nwhich are still to be seen, are floriated at their extremities, and\nbetween the arms are the sun and moon above, and the letters [Greek: A\n\u00d4] below, some of them bearing also a date which appears to be that of\n1154.\n\nThe pilgrims, who came in continuous multitudes, had innumerable perils\nto encounter on their way. The roads were bad; the countries through\nwhich they passed often so barren and thinly peopled that they were in\ndanger of dying of hunger; the highways so infested with brigands that\nin those days they were avoided as those in the East had been in the\ntime of Deborah, every one seeking rather the by-ways, which were also\nbeset with obstacles of all kinds. St. Dominic of Calzada had done well\nto make roads and build bridges, but something was still wanting to his\nwork, and that was the safety of those who travelled by them, and who\nwere constantly liable to be attacked and despoiled by the infidels, to\nbe taken captive, and condemned to slavery or death.\n\nThis state of things could not be allowed to continue. The Moors had\ntheir _rabitos_, or armed fakirs\u2014a sort of warrior-monk\u2014to protect their\npilgrims and defend their frontiers; the religious and military orders\nof the Templars and Knights of St. John were covering themselves with\nglory in the East, and Spain could not fail to profit by these examples.\nThe canons of St. Eloi had recently founded a chain of hospices,\nreaching from the frontiers of France to Compostella, specially destined\nfor the reception of pilgrims, the most considerable being that of St.\nMark, on the borders of Leon. These places of refuge, which were\nproductive of the greatest good, were richly endowed by various princes;\nbut even this was not enough: some brave noblemen of Castile resolved to\ndevote their whole life to the defence and protection of the pilgrims.\nThey placed their possessions in one common stock, and, joining the\ncanons of St. Eloi, dwelt with them in a convent not far from\nCompostella. Being advised by Cardinal Jacinthus to go to Rome and\nobtain from the Pope the confirmation of their institute according to\nthe rule of St. Augustine, they charged Don Pedro Fernandez de la Puente\nwith this embassy, and obtained a bull, dated July 5, 1175, which\nregulated their manner of life, their duties, and their privileges, and\ncreated, under the title of Knights of St. James, a military order, of\nwhich Don Pedro was the first grand master. They wore a white tunic,\nwith a red cross in the form of a sword on the breast. Their principal\nhouse was at first the hospice of St. Mark; but the castles and domains\nwhich were made over to them from time to time were so numerous that\ntheir riches became almost incalculable, and their influence and\nimportance increased in proportion. They established themselves at\nUcl\u00e8s, the better to carry on the warfare against the infidel, whose\nterror they had become. We soon find them a power in the state, the\ngrand master taking rank with kings, and at times appearing to rule\nthem. Even the simple knights had great privileges. It was not until the\nreign of Ferdinand that, owing to the skilful management of Isabella,\nthe power and influence of the order began to decrease.\n\nOur notice would be incomplete without a few words on the subject of the\nmiracles which took place at the tomb or by the intercession of the\napostle. The countless favors which have rendered many a chosen\nsanctuary justly illustrious will never be known; indeed, their absence\nwould make the continual faith of the people\u2014always asking and never\nreceiving; always believing, and yet to be ever disappointed and\ndeceived\u2014not only inexplicable but impossible, whereas it was absolute\nand complete; but exaggeration, which, even in the world of ordinary\nfacts, so frequently goes hand in hand with truth, plays still more\nfreely with facts which are beyond and above the events of daily life,\nand, not being satisfied with the simple beauty of miraculous\ndeliverances, it must fain make marvels still more marvellous\u2014quit the\ndomain of faith for that of myths and chimera. A MS. of the monastery of\nLa Marcha is full of the recital of prodigies which a faith the most\nrobust would nowadays find it difficult to accept; and C\u00e6sar of\nHeisterbach tells us that a young man of Maestricht having been\ncondemned and hung on a false accusation, commending himself to St.\nJames, was preserved alive a whole month hanging from the gibbet, where\nhis father found him safe and sound at the end of that time. Whereupon\nthe people of Toulouse, jealous of the glory which the renown of this\nannouncement gave to St. James of Compostella, attributed to _their_ St.\nJames a miracle exactly similar.\n\nIn numerous instances the accounts of the dead restored to life have\nnothing impossible or exaggerated about them, and often in their pathos\nand simplicity remind one of those mentioned in the Gospel narrative;\nfor instance, a poor woman, by the intercession of St. James, obtained a\nson, who became not only her greatest comfort, but in time her only\nsupport. He fell ill and died. With a breaking heart the mother hastens\nto the apostle\u2019s tomb, and in her agony of desolation mingles reproaches\nwith her prayers and tears, asking the saint why he had won for her the\nblessing she had desired, only to let her lose it when her need was\ngreatest, and herself a thousand times more sorrowful than before; and\nthen, full of faith, entreated him to obtain from God the life of her\nson. Her prayer was granted, and, returning home, she found the youth\nrestored. But of a very different character is the extraordinary legend\nrelated by Guibert, Abbot of Nogent, and which we quote as a curiosity.\nA certain pilgrim was on his way to Compostella to perform penance and\nobtain the pardon of a crime he had committed. On the road the enemy of\nmankind appeared to him under the form of St. James, and, telling him\nthat his sin was far too great to be remitted by a simple pilgrimage,\ninsisted that there was only one means of obtaining mercy, and that was\nby the sacrifice of his life; he must kill himself, and then all would\nbe forgiven him. The pilgrim, who believed that he was listening to St.\nJames in person and was bound to obey him, stabbed himself and died, a\nvictim to the fraud of the demon. He appears before the tribunal of God,\nand there Satan claims him as his prey by a double title: first, because\nof the old crime, which had not been remitted; and, secondly, because of\nthe new one of which he had been guilty in committing suicide. In vain\nthe poor man pleads that he had acted in good faith and in the\nsimplicity of his heart; he was in great danger of being condemned. But\nSt. James hears what is going on and hastens to the scene. He does not\nintend that the evil one should take his form and name to deceive his\npilgrims and then have all the profits, and pleads that the only way to\ndo perfect justice in the affair is to put everything exactly as it was\nbefore Satan had so odiously meddled in the matter, and to send back the\nsoul of the unfortunate man into his body again. This representation,\nbeing just, was acceded to, and the resuscitated pilgrim continued on\nhis way to Compostella, where he confessed with great contrition and was\nabsolved of all the sins of his past life.\n\nWe must, however, leave the realm of legend and return to historical\nfacts. The anchoretic life was at an early period introduced into Europe\nfrom the East, and Spain appears to have been a land where hermits\nespecially abounded. We often find them mentioned as coming on\npilgrimage to Compostella, as St. Simeon and St. Theobald in the twelfth\ncentury, St. William somewhat later, and St. John the Hermit, who built\nnear the cathedral a place of shelter for pilgrims, where he himself\nreceived them, rendering them all the offices of Christian hospitality.\n\nAnother William also came hither on pilgrimage, who was an illustrious\npersonage, though not a hermit; this was the Count of Poitou and Duke of\nAquitaine, whose past life had been anything but exemplary. In Normandy\nand elsewhere he had been guilty of grievous misdemeanors, for which he\ndesired to do penance before his death; and, more than this, he did his\nutmost, by good and upright administration, to repair the evil he had\ndone before. For this reason Hildebert, Bishop of Mans, was not well\npleased at his setting out for Spain, and wrote to him as follows: \u201cWe\nare told, most noble count, that you have undertaken a pilgrimage in\nhonor of Blessed James. We do not desire to deny the excellence of this,\nbut whosoever is at the head of an administration is bound to obedience,\nnor can he free himself therefrom without deserting his post, unless, at\nleast, he be called to one of greater usefulness. Wherefore, very dear\nson, it is an inexcusable fault in you to have preferred that which is\nnot necessary before that which is\u2014repose rather than labor, and,\ninstead of duty, your own will.\u201d But the great prelate would probably\nhave been less severe could he have foreseen the holy death of Count\nWilliam, who, on Good Friday, after having received the Blessed\nSacrament, peacefully rendered up his soul to God before the altar of\nSt. James.\n\nAbout the same time a young maiden of Pisa, afterwards St. Bona, came to\nCompostella, and there received singular favors and graces. Sophia,\nCountess of Holland,[38] journeying thither also, fell into the hands of\nrobbers, and through one whole night found that she had nothing to\nexpect but spoliation and death. In the morning their resolution was\nchanged; they threw themselves at her feet and entreated her pardon,\nallowing her to proceed unharmed on her way. After visiting the tomb of\nSt. James the princess went to Jerusalem, there to spend the remainder\nof her life.\n\nAt the beginning of the thirteenth century pilgrims from all lands had\nbecome so numerous that it was frequently impossible, especially on the\nfeast of the patron saint, for all to find even standing-room in the\ncathedral. The tumult was indescribable, and did not always end outside\nthe doors. On some occasions there were not only blows but bloodshed, so\nthat Pope Innocent III. wrote to the archbishop, saying that his church\nhad need of reconciliation, and the ceremony was performed with water,\nwine, and blessed ashes.[39]\n\nAlman-Zour, as we have previously mentioned, had caused the bells of\nCompostella to be carried to Cordova on the backs of Christian captives.\nIn 1229 Ferdinand, who had united under his sway the kingdoms of Castile\nand Leon, made the conquest of Cordova, and, finding the bells in the\ngreat mosque, he inflicted retaliation on the infidels by compelling\nthem to carry them, on their shoulders, back to the place whence they\nhad been taken two hundred and sixty years before.\n\nAfter Louis VII. of France had been on pilgrimage to Compostella, we\nhear of several other sovereigns from time to time who did the same,\namong whom was St. Elizabeth, Queen of Portugal. The Frieslanders, who\nhad a great devotion to St. James, and attributed to his aid a victory\nthey had gained over the Saracens, visited his tomb in immense numbers;\nthe English did the same, and from the time of Edward I.\u2019s marriage with\nEleanor of Castile, having stipulated for the safe-conduct of their\npilgrims, they arrived in such multitudes that the kings of France\nbecame uneasy at so great a concourse, and made an agreement with the\nking of England that his subjects should obtain permission of them\nbefore proceeding to Compostella. In 1434 this leave was granted to\nabout two thousand five hundred persons.\n\nThese were the palmy days of pilgrims, who were not only well received\nat Santiago, whither they brought activity, riches, and life, but they\nwere everywhere sheltered and protected. No cottager was too poor to\noffer them a resting-place or to share his loaf of hospitality with\nthem. A pilgrim was not only a brother come from perhaps some far\ndistant land to do honor to Monseigneur St. James, but he was also, in\nthose days when postage was unknown, the walking gazette, who brought\nthe news of other countries, and enlivened with his narratives and\nconversation the hearth of the poor as of the rich.\n\nFrom the time of the Reformation pilgrimages began to decrease. England\nand Germany were the first to discontinue them. France showed herself\nless fervent as soon as the spirit of rationalistic philosophy had\ninfected the upper classes of her people, after which the Revolution\ncarried down the lower ranks into the gulf of irreligion. The wars of\nthe empire, the spoliations of which Napoleon\u2019s generals were guilty,\nand consequently the deadly hatred which they evoked against their\nnation in the heart of every Spaniard, struck the last blow at these\npious journeyings. Only the inhabitants of the country continued to\nvisit the shrine of their apostle, and even they by degrees lost the\nhabit. Pilgrims are nowadays but few, excepting only on the feast of the\npatron, and they have ceased to be popular at Santiago. If they chance\nto be poor, the townspeople turn a deaf ear when they ask an alms \u201cfor\nthe love of St. James\u201d; or, should they be rich, seek only to turn them\nto account and to lighten their purses.\n\nAlthough greatly fallen from its ancient splendor, Santiago, formerly\nthe capital of Galicia, and now the simple chief town of a judicial\ncircuit, still has importance in the ecclesiastical order. Her\narchbishop is, by right, the first chaplain of the crown, and her\ncathedral still subsists in its integrity. She has two collegiate and\nfifteen parochial churches, though her numerous convents, pillaged in\n1807, and subsequently despoiled and suppressed, are at the present time\ninhabited dwelling-houses, destined to inevitable ruin, and throwing an\nadditional shadow into the general air of melancholy which now hangs\nover this old city.\n\nThere are but few public buildings of antiquity or interest. The\nstreets, with their dark and narrow archways, all start, like the\nthreads of a spider\u2019s web, from the one centre occupied by the\ncathedral. Everything wears an aspect that is sombre, damp, and cold,\naugmented by the hue that the granite, of which most of the edifices are\nbuilt, takes under a climate of such humidity that it has given rise to\nthe disrespectful saying that this city is the sink of Spain. And yet\nthe site is picturesque. Seen from the neighboring heights, Santiago,\nitself also built upon an elevation, with its ancient buildings, walls,\nand towers, presents a very striking appearance, and to any one who\nmounts the towers of the cathedral the grand girdle of mountains\nencircling the horizon affords a spectacle that well repays the trouble\nof the ascent.\n\nWe are in the great square, and facing the western front, containing the\nprincipal entrance of the building, which occupies the middle of a long\narchitectural line, having at its left the episcopal palace, melancholy\nenough and not in any way remarkable, and at its right the cloister,\nwith its turrets and pyramidal roofs, and its long row of arched\nwindows. This is not the cloister of Gemirez, of which nothing remains,\nbut was built in the sixteenth century by Archbishop Fonseca, who\nfurnished it with a fine library, and also added the chapter-house and\nother dependencies of the cathedral. The cloister is one of the largest\nin Spain, half Gothic in style, and half Renaissance.\n\nThis western entrance, between the cloister and the palace, is called\n_El Mayor_ or _El Real_\u2014the great or royal entrance; not that it merits\nthe title from any particular artistic beauty, but rather from a certain\neffective arrangement. The four flights of steps, two large and two\nsmall, ascend very picturesquely from the square to the doors of the\ncathedral, allowing a procession to spread into four lines, while above\nrise the lofty towers, curiously adorned with columns, vases,\nbalustrades, and little cupolas. You see at once that you are not\nbeholding a work which dates from the construction of the building,\nalthough the towers are ancient up to the height of the church walls,\nbut the upper portion is much more recent, and the same is evident of\nthe fa\u00e7ade, which occupies the space between the towers.\n\nProceeding onwards to the left, we follow a vaulted passage of the\ntwelfth century, bearing the stamp of ancient simplicity, until we reach\nthe Plaza San Martino, the north side of which is formed by the vast\nconvent of St. Martin, where, on the centre of the front, are placed,\nmounted on their chargers, the two warrior saints of France and Spain.\nHere is the market-place, whither those should come who wish to study\nfavorably the picturesque costumes of the peasants of Galicia, and, it\nmight be added, to hear cries more shrill and louder vociferations than\nit would be supposed possible for ordinary human lungs to send forth.\nBefore appearing at market the sellers of fruit and vegetables make an\nelaborate toilette, which must be not only neat but effective, those who\nare unable to comply with its requirements remaining at home. Side by\nside with the splendid fruits of Galicia, and fish from river and sea,\nrosaries, medals, and the scallop-shells of St. James are offered for\nsale.\n\nThe building forms a beautiful cross, of which the arms are nearly equal\nto the upright, the transepts having a great development. The\narrangement follows that of most of the churches in Spain, the choir\nbeing in the nave and ending where the transept begins. The aspect of\nthe latter is particularly grand, being less interrupted than the view\nalong the nave, as the eye easily penetrates the light trellis-work\nwhich makes a passage across it from the choir to the _Capilla Mayor_.\nThe rounded arches of the three roofs are evidently of the close of the\neleventh or the commencement of the twelfth century. The pillars of the\naisles, with their capitals sculptured in foliage, are light and\ngraceful, contrasting pleasingly with the heavy mass of the edifice. The\ntriforium, which runs round the nave, is composed of semi-circular\narches, each containing two smaller ones which spring from a slender\ncolumn in the centre. The east end remains as it was, with the chapels\nradiating from it, but the pillars and arches of the choir have\nundergone great alterations. The _Silleria_, or enclosure of the choir,\nis ornamented by a series of religious subjects carved by Gregorio\nEspa\u00f1ol in 1606. Many of the windows of the cathedral are very fine.\n\nBeneath the Capilla Mayor is situated the great object of the\npilgrimage\u2014the subterranean chapel containing the tomb of St. James and\nthose of two of his first disciples. The famous statue of the apostle is\nin the Capilla itself, above the great altar, which remains as it was in\nthe time of Alman-Zour. This is a monumental altar of richly-wrought\nmarble, ornamented with incrustations of silver, the working of which\noccupied no less than twenty years. It is surrounded by an enclosure of\nopen metal-work, gilt, adorned with vine-branches and surmounted by an\nimmense _hojarasco_, or canopy, which has little to recommend it in an\nartistic point of view, being carved and gilt in the height of the style\n_churrigueresque_. This serves as a dais to the statue, and is supported\nby four angels, about whose ponderous forms no remnant of celestial\nlightness lingers. Even the statue itself, before which kings and\nprinces have knelt, is not free from the faults of style inevitable to\nthe period. The apostle is seated, and holds in his right-hand the\npilgrim\u2019s staff, with a gilded gourd and wallet (_cum baculo per\u00e2que_),\nand in his left a scroll inscribed with the words, _Hic est corpus Divi\nJacobi Apostoli et Hispaniarum Patroni_. He wears on his shoulders the\n_pelerine_, or pilgrim\u2019s mantle, embroidered with gold and precious\nstones. This cape has the form of those worn by cardinals, and has\nreplaced the ancient one of gold, which was carried off by Marshal Ney.\n\nIt is a high honor to be allowed to say Mass at the altar of the great\npatron. Bishops and canons only have the right. On grand occasions it is\nsplendidly adorned; the four statues of kings which stand behind that of\nSt. James then support another small image of the apostle of exceeding\nrichness, having a nimbus of emeralds and rubies, and which is placed in\na shrine of wrought gold and silver of wonderful delicacy. This\nbeautiful _custodia_, which is nearly six feet high, was finished in\n1544 by Antonio d\u2019Arphe, and is in the style designated by the Spaniards\n_Plateresque_.\n\nPilgrims are admitted to pay their homage to St. James by mounting some\nsteps behind the altar to kiss the cape or mantle of the apostle, as at\nRome one kisses the foot of St. Peter. There is another resemblance also\nto St. Peter\u2019s at Rome in the long range of confessionals, dedicated to\ndifferent saints, and served by priests speaking different languages;\nfor it is not until after confession and communion that the pilgrim can\nbe allowed any right to the title, or receive his brevet or\n_Compostella_, which is a declaration written in Latin, and signed by\nthe canon-administrator of the cathedral, that he has fulfilled all his\nduties. These documents are frequently found among family papers, and in\ncertain cases constitute a title without which such or such possessions\ncould not be claimed.\n\nThe treasures of St. James of Compostella were formerly renowned\nthroughout the world; but there seems to have been some exaggeration\nrespecting their immensity, as, from all the objects of which the French\nplundered the cathedral in 1809, they obtained no more than 300,000\nfrancs. There still remain various rare and curious things\u2014reliquaries,\nstatues, sacred vessels, etc.\u2014some of which are of great value and\nantiquity; amongst others a crucifix containing a fragment of the true\ncross, and which is of exquisite workmanship, being also one of the most\nancient specimens of chasing known. The cross is wrought in gold\nfilagree, enriched with jewels, and resembles that of Oviedo, which is\nsaid to be the work of angels. It bears the inscription: \u201cHoc opus\nperfectum est er\u00e2 LXOO. et duodecim\u00e2. Hoc signo vincitur inimicus. Hoc\nsigno tuetur pius. Hoc offerunt famuli Dei Adefonsus princeps et\nconjux.\u201d\n\nAmong the chapels must be noticed the _Capilla del Pilar_, dedicated to\nOur Lady in memory of her apparition to St. James. This, which is behind\nthe high altar, and rich in precious marbles and jasper, was founded by\nArthur Monroy, a rich Mexican prelate, whose kneeling statue on his tomb\nhas a fine and attractive expression. Many of the other chapels are also\nremarkable; that of the kings of France, of the Conception, of the\nRelics, etc.\n\nLet us add to these riches of the old cathedral a large concourse of\nworshippers at all the services, a people profoundly religious, a\nmagnificent ceremonial, the officiating archbishop surrounded by his\nclergy, grand and solemn music swelled by the multitudinous voices of\nthe faithful; let us imagine a vast procession beneath these vaulted\nroofs, and the trembling light of the tapers illuminating the sombre\nwalls as the seemingly interminable train of choristers, clergy, and\npeople pass along, and we shall have evoked a scene which, though its\nlike may be witnessed in other lands, still bears in Spain a peculiar\nstamp of gravity and fervor, and possesses the earnest features and the\nvigorous relief of which the Spanish artists knew the secret, and which\nthey have reproduced on their canvas in warm shadows and golden lights.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n A SWEET REVENGE.\n\n I.\n\nSaint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte is a dull little town, situated in Cotentin,\nthat long eastern strip of the coast of Normandy which extends directly\nin front of the lovely isles of Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, and Sark.\nCherbourg lies to the north of it, but we only mention that fact _en\npassant_; for the incident related in these pages occurred long before\nthe Second Empire, long before Cherbourg attracted visitors to admire\nits naval displays, long before railways had shortened distances and\nbrought the Cotentinians within daily hearing of their \u201cne plus ultra\u201d\nof cities\u2014inimitable Paris. The little towns then slumbered peaceably\namidst their corn-fields and apple-orchards; and none slept sounder than\nSaint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte, whose very existence was scarcely known beyond\nthe limits of its native district. It was remarkable, indeed, for\nnothing; its church was old and fine, as most French provincial churches\nare; the open space around it formed the market-place, deserted and\nsilent except on market-days; and the Grande Rue contained the one\nhostelry of the town\u2014the H\u00f4tel Royale\u2014and various stores.\n\nBut there were also a few cross-streets, interspersed with flowery,\nbowery gardens, and it is in a house situated in one of these that our\nscene is laid. It was a plain, unpretending dwelling, but large and\nexquisitely neat. It had the widest local reputation of being the\nsnuggest in winter, the coolest in summer, and the most hospitable at\nall seasons of any in Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte\u2014nay, in the whole stretch\nof Cotentin! The garden behind it, too, was famous; the owners, M. and\nMme. Dupuis, cultivated it themselves with rare enthusiasm and taste.\nAlphonse Karr\u2019s world-celebrated flowers would have been considered pale\nand scentless beside Mme. Dupuis\u2019\u2014at least, by the Cotentinians. And the\nfruits\u2014the peaches and green-gages, the pears and grapes\u2014it was not\nbelieved possible that the like could be found even in Paris. Let us add\nthat, when in their first flush of ripeness and bloom, the greater\nportion of these carefully-tended flowers and fruits were culled by Mme.\nDupuis\u2019 own hands, and sent forth to carry light and beauty, perfume and\nfreshness, into every sick-room of the little town.\n\nThe Dupuis were a thoroughly worthy couple; they had married young, for\nlove, and had been blessed with an only child, a daughter, good and\npretty as her mother, and, like her mother, wedded early and happily.\n\nWhen the episode in their lives which is the subject of this little\nstory took place, they had passed together thirty years of tranquil,\nuneventful felicity. M. Dupuis had shortly before sold his business\u2014he\nwas a notary\u2014and was now enjoying a well-earned rest. He was a man of\nsixty, well-educated, intelligent, and still strong, active, and\nenthusiastic. His plump little wife had just completed her fifty-fifth\nyear\u2014she did not appear to be forty-five. She was of a deeper, more\nthoughtful nature than her husband, but nevertheless her sympathy with\nhim was unbounded\u2014she loved all he loved, the same people and the same\nthings. She was the type of a true wife and of a true Christian.\n\nToo modest and timid to have any personal pretensions, Mme. Dupuis\u2019\ngreat pride lay in her well-ordered home, her exquisitely clean house,\nher nicely-arranged kitchen, and, though last, certainly not least, in\nher cook and housemaid, whom she considered absolutely unparalleled in\ntheir several vocations. And it must be allowed that Jeannette and\nMarianne had, during twenty years, fully justified their mistress\u2019 good\nopinion of them. During all this time the two women had constantly\nstudied her every wish, and the result was the perfection of domestic\neconomy.\n\nThe family party was completed by a large white Angora cat, promoted\nsince the marriage of Mlle. Dupuis to the enviable position of \u201cpet of\nthe household,\u201d and universally considered in Cotentin to be the most\nremarkable animal of its species.\n\n\n II.\n\nOne winter\u2019s evening, when the snow lay deep in the streets and the\nnorth wind whistled fiercely around the eaves, M. Dupuis\u2019 dining-room\nlooked particularly cheerful. The heavy tapestry curtains were drawn\nclose before the windows, and a flaming wood fire showered sparkles of\nreflected light on the crystal and silver placed on the round\ndining-table, and lighted up the portraits of some sober-looking\npersonages in powdered wigs which adorned the walls. The handsome\ntortoise-shell and copper clock, a masterpiece of the style Louis\nQuinze, standing on a hanging shelf above the sofa, was, perhaps, the\nbest article of furniture in the room; the chimney-piece was too\nencumbered with porcelain shepherds and shepherdesses, and china jars\nfilled with artificial flowers and covered with great glass globes,\nfor the taste of the present day. Fashion had slumbered in\nSaint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte for many a long year. But there was light and\nwarmth, and a pervading feeling of comfort, worth all the gilded,\nsatin-covered chairs and lounges that Parisian taste can devise, all\nthe Venetian mirrors and Sevres vases that luxury can afford. Mme.\nDupuis\u2019 dining-room was certainly rococo and provincial, incongruous\nin some respects, deficient in harmony, but what sincere, cordial\nhospitality those four walls had witnessed! what pleasant repasts!\nwhat real good, wholesome eating! what merry toasts had been drunk\nthere in claret, in sherry, and champagne\u2014wines as bright as Mme.\nDupuis\u2019 eyes, and as pure and unadulterated as her heart!\n\nA second clock, a very ugly one it must be confessed, a representative\nof the bad taste of the First Empire, which stood in the centre of the\nalready too encumbered mantel-shelf, marked five minutes past six, and\nMme. Dupuis was seated at the head of her dining-table. She was neatly\ndressed in black silk; her dark brown hair, streaked here and there with\nsilver threads, was arranged in simple bandeaux on each side of her\ntemples, and a small lace cap trimmed with a few knots of pink ribbon\nconcealed the paucity of the \u201cback hair\u201d; for Mme. Dupuis was behind her\ntime. She had not \u201cmarched with her age,\u201d and had not yet learned to\nwear a \u201cswitch.\u201d\n\nM. Dupuis, somewhat old-fashioned in his attire, but scrupulously neat,\nsat opposite to her. At an equal distance from each was placed a\ngentleman as old apparently as the ex-notary, but infinitely more\npretentious in his style both of dress and manner. His coat and trowsers\nwere of Parisian cut; his beard in the latest mode; his voice\ndictatorial\u2014a man of the world evidently, and evidently also accustomed\nto think more of himself than of any one else. The little party was\nbusily engaged in the agreeable duty of eating sundry \u201cplats\u201d which\ndiffused a most appetizing odor. Marianne, madame\u2019s right hand and\nfaithful aid during many long years, waited at table, while the\nbeautiful Angora sought its fortune around and under.\n\n\u201cWell, it happened just as I tell you,\u201d said Mme. Dupuis, as she handed\nher guest a delicious-looking chop\u2014\u201cit happened just as I tell you, M.\nRouvi\u00e8re. I believed that he had gone crazy\u2014completely crazy; get down,\npuss! He came rushing up-stairs, four steps at a time, crying at the top\nof his voice, \u2018It\u2019s Tom! it\u2019s Tom Rouvi\u00e8re, that fellow Tom!\u2019 Excuse me,\nM. Rouvi\u00e8re, but that\u2019s his word, you know. As for me, I followed,\nstumbling as I went along, killing myself trying to make him hear that\nit was much more likely to be M. du Luc in his new carriage; for I knew\nthrough Mme. le Rendu that M. du Luc was to dine to-day at Semonville,\nand, as he never passes through Saint-Sauveur without stopping to wish\nus good-day, I had every reason to believe....\u201d\n\n\u201cO my dear Reine!\u201d interrupted M. Dupuis, \u201cwhat necessity is there for\ntelling all that to Rouvi\u00e8re? He knows nothing about M. du Luc and Mme.\nle Rendu; how can all that interest him? Besides, you know that M. du\nLuc never has post-horses to his carriage, so it could not be he.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut I believed it was,\u201d replied madame.\n\n\u201cAllons! never mind now, dear,\u201d returned her husband, \u201cbut do keep your\ncat off; she is teasing Rouvi\u00e8re.\u201d\n\n\u201cPuss! puss!\u201d cried Mme. Dupuis, \u201ccome here and behave yourself, do.\nNow, George,\u201d she continued, \u201cyou must acknowledge that it was much more\nnatural that I should expect to see M. du Luc, our country neighbor,\nthan M. Rouvi\u00e8re, whom I did not know, and from whom you had never heard\nfor more than thirty years\u2014really, now. What do _you_ say, M. Rouvi\u00e8re?\nYou shall be judge.\u201d\n\nM. Rouvi\u00e8re, who during this dialogue had been silently eating and\ndrinking with evident appetite, looked up from his plate with an\nexpression of impatience anything but flattering to the lady.\n\n\u201cOf course you are right, madame,\u201d replied he sharply; \u201cof course you\nare right. But, God bless me, madame, I really believe that your chops\nare fried with crumbs!\u201d\n\nPoor Mme. Dupuis started at this abrupt interpellation; her\ngood-tempered smile vanished; one might have fancied there was a tear in\nher eye as she answered gently: \u201cI am so sorry! It was I who made\nJeannette crumb them. I thought they would be more delicate.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat heresy!\u201d exclaimed Rouvi\u00e8re. \u201cMy dear lady, nobody now fries chops\nin crumbs, just as nobody now wears leg-of-mutton sleeves! Gracious\nheavens! Providence has granted you one of the very best articles of\nfood that the culinary art is acquainted with\u2014real, genuine, _pr\u00e9-sal\u00e9_\nmutton, pure Miels mutton\u2014and you fry it in crumbs\u2014you actually _dare_\nto fry it in crumbs! _Parbleu!_ I have sailed round the world, but I had\nto come to Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte to see Miels mutton fried in\ncrumbs.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow sorry I am!\u201d cried poor Mme. Dupuis humbly. \u201cLet me help you to\nsome sole, M. Rouvi\u00e8re. We have a market for fish only once a week, but,\nas M. Dupuis is very fond of fish, I have made an arrangement with a\nfisherman from Porthail, so that we have a little extra \u2018plat\u2019 every\nWednesday, and as, most fortunately, to-day happens to be Wednesday....\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! come, Reine,\u201d interrupted M. Dupuis, who had been listening with a\nvery vexed expression of countenance to what was passing between his\nwife and his friend, \u201cdon\u2019t go on with all these details; what interest\ncan they have for Rouvi\u00e8re? Well, Tom, tell me, now, where were you\neight days ago at this very hour?\u201d\n\n\u201cEight days\u2019 ago, George,\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re, and he stopped eating to\nreflect\u2014\u201ceight days ago I was in Dublin.\u201d\n\n\u201cIn Dublin!\u201d exclaimed Dupuis admiringly. \u201cWhat a fellow!\u201d\n\n\u201cFrom Dublin,\u201d continued M. Rouvi\u00e8re, \u201cI went to London, and from London\nto Jersey, and from Jersey\u2014here!\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd was it when you got to Jersey that the happy thought occurred to\nyou to come and stir up your old friend?\u201d asked Dupuis; and his bright,\nsoft eyes rested affectionately on Rouvi\u00e8re\u2019s face.\n\n\u201cYesterday morning, my dear boy,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re. \u201cThere was a map of\nNormandy hanging up in the hall of the hotel where I was staying, and I\nwas looking at it almost mechanically, when suddenly I came across the\nname of Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte. \u2018Saint Sauveur-le-Vicomte!\u2019 I repeated\ntwo or three times to myself. \u2018Isn\u2019t that the name of the little town\nwhere George Dupuis used to live\u2014my friend George? I\u2019ve a mind to go and\ndine with him, if he be still alive.\u2019\u201d\n\nM. Rouvi\u00e8re seemed to be looking for something on the table as he\nfinished these words. Mme. Dupuis, watching every feature, anxiously\ninquired what he wanted.\n\n\u201cSome lemon, madame, for this sole,\u201d replied he. \u201cMarianne\u2014I think I\nheard you call her Marianne,\u201d he added, turning towards his\nhostess\u2014\u201cMarianne, haven\u2019t you a lemon?\u201d\n\n\u201cHere is one,\u201d exclaimed Mme. Dupuis, rising hastily and running to the\nsideboard. \u201cNow tell me, M. Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d she said with her pleasant smile,\nas she laid the lemon by his plate, \u201chave you really been going up and\ndown the highways and by-ways of the world during thirty long years,\njust like the Wandering Jew?\u201d\n\n\u201cI have indeed, madame,\u201d replied her guest, squeezing the lemon-juice\nout over his sole.\n\n\u201cYou must have eaten some strange things in your travels,\u201d continued the\nlady.\n\n\u201cI rather think so,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re, with his mouth full of fish;\n\u201cthings _you_ never heard of! Marianne, my good girl, I smell coffee\nroasting in your kitchen. Now, nearly every one, especially here in the\nprovinces, roasts it too much\u2014all the aroma is driven off; run quick,\nthat\u2019s a good lass, and tell the cook\u2014Jeannette, isn\u2019t it?\u2014that the\ncoffee must only be toasted\u2014just scorched. Do you understand, eh?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, yes, I understand well enough,\u201d muttered Marianne as she went out;\n\u201cthat fellow seems to like nothing!\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear lady,\u201d went on Rouvi\u00e8re, turning to Mme. Dupuis, \u201cthe very\naccident I feared for your coffee has happened to your chicken\u2014it is\ncooked too much, or rather it has been cooked too fast. It is a great\npity, for it was an excellent fowl!\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! dear, oh! dear,\u201d exclaimed Mme. Dupuis, who was beginning to feel a\nkind of despair thus far unknown to her. All her dinners hitherto had\nbeen subjects of compliment; _this_ was quite a new experience. \u201cOh!\ndear, oh! dear, how many misfortunes at one time. Pray excuse me, M.\nRouvi\u00e8re; you came so unexpectedly, you know. We had no time to do\nthings well. But do, pray, stay a few days with us, and you shall see. I\npromise you that everything shall be better.\u201d\n\n\u201cImpossible, madame,\u201d replied the guest, as he accepted a fine snipe\ndone to a turn; \u201cyou are very kind, but at nine o\u2019clock this evening I\nmust be on the road again. Yes, madame, you may well say that I have\neaten strange things,\u201d he continued, raising his voice. \u201cI\u2019ve eaten\nkouskoussou under the Arab\u2019s tent; curry\u2014that incendiary curry\u2014on the\nshores of the Ganges; I\u2019ve dined off the frightful tripang in Java; and\nin China on swallows\u2019 nests stewed in castor-oil!\u201d\n\n\u201cGood gracious!\u201d ejaculated Mme. Dupuis.\n\n\u201cWhat a wonderful fellow!\u201d exclaimed M. Dupuis enthusiastically.\n\nM. Dupuis was unwontedly silent; he was evidently exceedingly annoyed,\nand it was pitiful to see the deprecating glances his little wife\ndirected towards him from time to time. He, however, kept his eyes fixed\nsteadily on his plate.\n\n\u201cIn Panama,\u201d went on Rouvi\u00e8re, \u201cI\u2019ve eaten roasted monkey. But what need\nto enumerate? There\u2019s nothing edible in creation that I have not\nswallowed. So that I believe I may say,\u201d here he bowed thanks for a\nsecond snipe, \u201cthere does not exist a man under the firmament of heaven\neasier to satisfy than myself. The Rocky Mountain Indians\u2014those Indians\nare most extraordinarily sagacious\u2014the Rocky Mountain Indians, I say,\ngave me a surname while I was among them\u2014\u2018Choc-ugh-tou-saw,\u2019 which\nsignifies good-humored stomach, because I was always satisfied with my\ndinner!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat a wonderful fellow!\u201d reiterated Dupuis. \u201cCome, Tom, try this\nBurgundy; your throat must be dry. What a wonderful fellow, to be sure!\u201d\n\n\u201cDo let me prevail on you to take another snipe,\u201d said Mme. Dupuis,\nholding up to the guest\u2019s acceptance a third fine, fat bird; \u201cI\u2019m so\nglad to find that you like them!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, madame, no, a thousand thanks. Yes, I don\u2019t deny that I am fond of\nsnipes, but, I\u2019m sorry\u2014I can\u2019t deceive you\u2014these are not just what they\nought to be. In the first place, they have not been killed long enough;\nand, secondly, you have forgotten to pepper them\u2014a process absolutely\nnecessary with game. But, excuse me, for the last half-hour I\u2019ve been\nlooking at that covered dish, wondering what there is in it. I really\ndon\u2019t believe that I have ever felt more curiosity in the whole course\nof my life; excuse me, I must look into it.\u201d\n\nHe raised the cover as he spoke, peering in with eyes and nose.\n\n\u201cIn the name of all the saints, what is it?\u201d he exclaimed, as he\ncontemplated the contents and sniffed up the steam.\n\n\u201cMy dear friend,\u201d answered Dupuis, a little nervously, \u201cit is something\nI had concocted on purpose for you\u2014it is macaroni.\u201d\n\n\u201cMacaroni! _That_ macaroni!\u201d shouted Rouvi\u00e8re, as if never more\nsurprised in his life.\n\n\u201cYes, M. Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d explained Mme. Dupuis, no longer smiling, poor\nlittle woman! \u201cThis dish was inspired by George\u2019s friendship. He\nremembered that you were very fond of Italy, so I sent in haste to the\ngrocer\u2019s; he fortunately had still a small quantity of macaroni on hand,\nand then, with the help of my cookery-book\u2014for Jeannette couldn\u2019t manage\nit\u2014I made you a _plat \u00e0 l\u2019italienne_.\u201d\n\n\u201c_A l\u2019italienne!_\u201d repeated George\u2019s old friend with a sneering laugh.\n\u201cMy dear, good lady, that\u2019s not macaroni _\u00e0 l\u2019italienne_! Oh! no, no.\nHowever, who knows?\u2014it may be good to eat all the same. Let us try!\u201d So\nsaying, M. Rouvi\u00e8re helped himself to a spoonful, while his hosts looked\non anxiously.\n\n\u201cWell, how do you like it?\u201d asked George, when the taster, after many\ngrimaces, had got down a mouthful.\n\n\u201cLike it!\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re, \u201cwhy, not at all; you might as well try to\nmasticate organ-pipes! It really is something remarkable; it\u2019s fossil\nmacaroni, petrified macaroni! The grocer who sold it to you deserves the\njail; _I_ shouldn\u2019t wonder if he belonged to some secret society!\u201d\n\n\u201cMarianne, quick! change M. Rouvi\u00e8re\u2019s plate,\u201d said Dupuis sharply\u2014for\nthe old servant was gazing at her master\u2019s friend with a very\nunmistakable expression of disgust on her honest face. \u201cMy dear Tom,\u201d he\ncontinued, \u201cwhat a bad dinner you have made!\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are jesting,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re carelessly; \u201cat all events, your\nwine is capital.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t know what to say,\u201d sighed poor Mme. Dupuis. \u201cI feel ready to\ndie with vexation. But, dear M. Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d with a pretty supplicatory\ngesture, \u201cdo, I beg and pray of you, do taste my rice-pudding.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery willingly, my dear lady,\u201d answered the terrible guest\u2014\u201cvery\nwillingly; only let me first finish eating these green peas, which have\nbeen very well preserved, and would be really perfect had the cook\nspared her butter a little!\u201d\n\nAt this moment the church bells began to ring the _Angelus_, and Mme.\nDupuis rose precipitately from the table.\n\n\u201cYou will pardon my leaving you to finish dinner with George,\u201d said she\nto Rouvi\u00e8re; \u201cI shall be back long before you go.\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely you are not going out such an evening as this!\u201d exclaimed\nRouvi\u00e8re. \u201cWhy, there\u2019s a foot deep of snow in the streets!\u201d\n\n\u201cMy wife goes to church every evening, winter and summer, at the\n_Angelus_, no matter what the weather,\u201d remarked George. \u201cShe has done\nso for nearly fifty years, and nothing will break her of the habit now.\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! very well,\u201d returned Rouvi\u00e8re. \u201cI hope you like your pastor, Mme.\nDupuis?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! yes, indeed I do,\u201d replied the good little woman enthusiastically;\n\u201che is a most worthy man. Do stay twenty-four hours longer with us, M.\nRouvi\u00e8re, and I will ask him to dine with us; you will be glad to know\nhim, I am quite sure.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo am I,\u201d returned her husband\u2019s old chum, with the little sneering\nlaugh which seemed to be natural to him; \u201cbut I must wait for another\nopportunity.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, George,\u201d said Mme. Dupuis, as she tied her wadded hood and slipped\non the cloak and india-rubber shoes which had been placed ready for her\non a chair, \u201cdo beg your friend to taste the rice-pudding; and, M.\nRouvi\u00e8re, do try my preserves. I make them myself, and I really believe\nthat they are excellent. Good-by for the present!\u201d\n\n\u201cGood-by, madame.\u201d\n\n\u201cHem! hem!\u201d ejaculated Rouvi\u00e8re as the door closed behind the lady, \u201cso!\nso! Now let us look at this rice. Your wife\u2019s given to piety, eh,\nGeorge?\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, she is a religious woman,\u201d replied George slowly; then added, with\nsome slight eagerness in his manner, \u201cbut she never imposes her opinions\nupon any one. She never teases me, I can assure you, although I do\nhappen to be somewhat lukewarm about church matters. But tell me,\nTom\u201d\u2014here M. Dupuis hesitated and appeared embarrassed\u2014\u201cdon\u2019t you find\nher very provincial, very rustic?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! no, not at all,\u201d answered Rouvi\u00e8re in a tone which seemed to imply\nthe contrary of his words.\n\n\u201cYes, you do\u2014I know you do!\u201d cried George passionately. \u201cBut what _can_\nyou expect? It\u2019s not her fault! She has lived in this hole all her life.\nAnd your unexpected visit has excited her\u2014upset her. She really talked\nas if she did not know what she was saying\u2014such nonsense, such silly\ngossip!\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! no, not at all,\u201d repeated Rouvi\u00e8re, as he steadily devoured the\nrice-pudding.\n\n\u201c_Parbleu!_ yes; don\u2019t deny it!\u201d cried Dupuis peevishly. \u201cIt made you\nnervous\u2014I saw it did. It irritated me, I know: it really seemed as if\nshe was trying to show you her defects. It vexed me more, too, because\nshe really has many good qualities\u2014admirable qualities, poor little\nwoman!\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear George,\u201d returned Rouvi\u00e8re, pushing away his plate and coolly\nwiping his mouth with his napkin, \u201cI don\u2019t doubt it in the least; her\nrice-pudding is certainly delicious.\u201d\n\nDupuis at this moment caught sight of the pretty Angora with one soft\nwhite paw laid in silent petition on his friend\u2019s knee. His irritation,\nwith difficulty kept under so far, instantly boiled over on the head of\nthe innocent cat. \u201cGet down!\u201d he roared, \u201cget down, you brute! I\u2019ll\ndrown that beast one of these days! Take that animal away,\u201d he\ncontinued, turning angrily towards Marianne, who had just brought in the\ncoffee; \u201cif she comes into this room again, I\u2019ll throw her out of the\nwindow!\u201d\n\n\u201cCome to me, pussy,\u201d said Marianne in an extra-gentle tone of voice,\ntaking the cat in her arms and kissing it; \u201cthese Parisian gentlemen\ndon\u2019t like you, it seems. A regular Turk he is, too, turning the house\ntopsy-turvy,\u201d she muttered as she went out of the room, scowling over\nher shoulder at the visitor.\n\nRouvi\u00e8re had risen from the table during this episode, and, tongs in\nhand, was busy with the bright wood fire. He smiled maliciously when the\ncat was carried away, and, as if in very lightness of heart, broke forth\nin song:\n\n\u201c\u2018_O bell\u2019 alma innamorata! O bell\u2019 alma innamorata!_\u2019 Tell me, George,\u201d\nhe interrupted himself to say, \u201chave you a good theatre here in\nSaint-Sauveur?\u201d\n\n\u201cA theatre? That\u2019s an idea! Well, yes, we have a theatre once a year, on\nthe fair-day at mid-Lent!\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s too bad!\u201d laughed Rouvi\u00e8re. \u201cHow on earth do you contrive to get\nthrough your evenings?\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, in winter,\u201d answered George, \u201cwe chat by the side of the fire, or\nmy wife and I play at piquet; sometimes two or three neighbors come in,\nand then we have a game of whist!\u201d\n\n\u201cPhew!\u201d whistled the man of the world. \u201cWith the _cur\u00e9_, I\u2019ll swear,\u201d\nsaid he presently with his customary mocking smile, as he planted\nhimself comfortably with his back to the blaze and his coattails\ngathered up under his arms.\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d went on George simply, apparently unconscious of his friend\u2019s\nsneer; \u201csometimes with the _cur\u00e9_. And then in summer I water my garden,\nand Reine and I take a walk on the highroad up to the top of the hill,\nor in the wood by the river\u2019s side; and then\u2014well, everybody goes to bed\nearly here.\u201d\n\n\u201cVery moral, indeed!\u201d sneered Rouvi\u00e8re again, picking his teeth.\n\nBy this time Marianne had cleared away the dinner things, and, after\nplacing a provision of glasses and a bottle of brandy, another of rum,\nand a case of liqueurs on the table, had finally departed to dine in her\nturn with Jeannette, and to confide her observations on the obnoxious\nParisian to her companion\u2019s sympathizing ear.\n\n\n III.\n\n\u201cSo at last we are alone!\u201d exclaimed Dupuis with a sigh of satisfaction,\nas the maid closed the door behind her. \u201cNow, Tom, sit down and let us\ndrink. Come and tell me what you think of this brandy. Here\u2019s to your\nhealth, old friend!\u201d filling himself a glass of old Cognac and tossing\nit off excitedly. \u201cDo you know how many years it is since we last met,\nTom? Five-and-thirty, Tom\u2014five-and-thirty years!\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, _parbleu_!\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re, helping himself to the brandy. \u201cI\nsuppose it must be some thirty-five years since we parted in the\ndiligence yard, Rue Montmartre. I remember that we swore eternal\nfriendship and constant correspondence. The correspondence did not last\nlong\u2014less than two years, it seems to me\u2014but our friendship, George, it\nsmouldered under its ashes, but it kept alive, my boy!\u201d\n\nThe two friends clasped each other\u2019s hands for a moment silently.\n\n\u201cYour brandy is first-rate,\u201d remarked Rouvi\u00e8re presently, as he finished\nhis _petit-verre_.\n\n\u201cYou like it? Bravo! Well, there are still some pleasant hours in\nlife\u2014aren\u2019t there now, Tom?\u201d\n\n\u201cI believe you,\u201d answered the guest meditatively.\n\n\u201cWho should know it better than you, fortunate fellow as you are! But I\nsay, Tom, how does it happen that you have not changed in the least? Not\nin the least, by Jove! You\u2019ve remained young and handsome.... \u2018I was\nyoung and handsome!\u2019\u2014do you remember how magnificently Talma used to say\nthat? Your beard and moustaches might belong to an African lion! You\nmake me think of Henri Quatre! But drink, Tom; you don\u2019t drink!\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear old George,\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re in a quiet, confidential tone of\nvoice, and resting his two arms on the table, while he fixed his eyes on\nhis friend\u2019s flushed face\u2014\u201cmy dear old George, what _was_ your reason\nfor burying yourself alive in Cotentin? Tell me.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy do you ask me that, Tom?\u201d cried Dupuis, who suddenly became\nserious. \u201cYou find me rusty, then?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no; but _what_ was your reason? Tell me in confidence, you know.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, I am rusty; I feel it!\u201d said poor Dupuis mournfully. \u201cI tell you\nwhat, Tom, the provinces of France deserve all that is said against\nthem. They are like those springs of mineral waters which turn to stone\nevery living creature you throw into them! What reason had I, do you\nask? Gracious heavens! What is life, Tom, but a series of chances; some\nfatality gets you into a groove, and you are pushed on and on until you\nreach your grave. Try this rum, Tom.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you indulge in such prolonged libations every evening?\u201d asked\nRouvi\u00e8re.\n\n\u201cNo, never. These are in honor of you.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo I suspected. This is the rum, isn\u2019t it? Come, go on, George; I want\nto hear the rest of your _Odyssey_.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, Tom,\u201d resumed his friend, taking a sip at his glass of rum and\nbreathing at the same time a sigh which was almost a groan, \u201cyou\nremember that my prospects were pretty bright in Paris. I fully intended\nto buy that solicitor\u2019s office where I was working\u2014it had been offered\nto me on good conditions; but some family affairs called me home here,\nand here I stayed. I don\u2019t know how it happened, but it is certain that\nI found a charm in this provincial life\u2014in its futile comfort, its\nindolent habits, its tame monotony.\u201d\n\nHere poor Dupuis stopped, that he might give vent to an angry gust of\nself-reproach by punching the fire with the tongs; after a sip of rum he\ncontinued: \u201cAll these got possession of me, wound themselves around me\nlike a net, and I remained their captive.\u201d\n\nHis head bowed itself forward, and he sat gazing regretfully on the ugly\nclock in the middle of the chimney-piece.\n\n\u201cAll right, George!\u201d laughed Rouvi\u00e8re; \u201cyou don\u2019t say it, but I suspect\nthat Madame Dupuis had a good deal to do with this final catastrophe!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is true, Tom,\u201d replied the other, his countenance lighting up for a\nmoment; \u201cand you may believe it or not, as you like, but I swear that\nshe was a charming girl! Moreover, my dear old mother was living then,\nand it was a great pleasure to her to have me settle here where we were\nall born. The long and the short of it was that I married, bought my\nfather-in-law\u2019s office, and all was over\u2014the die was cast! Take some of\nthe Kirschwasser, Tom,\u201d he added hurriedly, as if his remembrances were\ntoo painful to be dwelt on.\n\n\u201cPresently,\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re, a smile flickering over his worldly-wise\nface; \u201cbut tell me, first, you\u2019ve not stayed walled up in Saint-Sauveur,\nI hope, all these thirty-five years? You take a run to Paris every once\nin a while, don\u2019t you?\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t mention it,\u201d groaned Dupuis. \u201cI\u2019ve not seen Paris since I said\ngood-by to you in the Rue Montmartre!\u201d\n\n\u201cPhew!\u201d whistled Rouvi\u00e8re, helping himself to the Kirschwasser. The\nfriends remained silent for a time, gazing at the fire.\n\n\u201cBut you used to like to travel,\u201d exclaimed Rouvi\u00e8re, at last.\n\n\u201cAnd so I do still, my dear Tom; my taste has not changed in that\nrespect, I can assure you. But what could I do? When I married, my idea\nwas to work steadily for fifteen years, and then sell my business and\nlive on what I had saved. I intended then to take a trip to Paris with\nmy wife, after that to the Pyrenees\u2014I always wished so much to see the\nPyrenees! But it was not to be; as the old women say, Man proposes and\nGod disposes. We had been married just five years when our daughter was\nborn....\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s that you say\u2014you have a daughter?\u201d interrupted his friend.\n\n\u201cA daughter and a granddaughter, Tom,\u201d replied George, with an\ninflection in his voice that sounded very like pride, and a soft look in\nhis eyes; \u201cso you understand that I had to stick to my business for ten\nyears more, that I might get her a dowry; and then, when at last I did\nsell out\u2014well, I was old ... and I couldn\u2019t think of anything pleasanter\nthan just to stay quietly in my arm-chair! Didn\u2019t I tell you that my\nlife has been nothing but a chapter of accidents from beginning to end?\nCome, shall we have some punch, Tom? I\u2019ll make it.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you will. So you have a daughter! And she is married! Well married,\nI hope?\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, yes; her husband is a sub-prefect.\u201d\n\nGeorge\u2019s voice again took a tone of gratified pride, which elicited a\nsmile from his observant friend.\n\n\u201cA sub-prefect! Bravo, bravissimo! But you\u2019re putting too much lemon\ninto that punch.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you think so? And now, Tom, that I\u2019ve made a clean breast of it\u2014told\nyou all\u2014you must explain something to me that I never could comprehend:\nhow _have_ you contrived to make your modest fortune suffice for nearly\nhalf a century\u2019s constant travel?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is easy enough to explain,\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re, sitting up straight in\nhis chair and becoming very animated and somewhat loud as he proceeded.\n\u201cI began life with ten thousand francs a year in land; my first\noperation was to change my patrimony into bank-notes, by which means I\ndoubled my income; then I invested it in the sinking funds, which\ntrebled it. And then, freed from every narrow calculation, from every\nfamily tie, from every social trammel, I took my flight into space!\nHere\u2019s to your health, my old friend George! Hip! hip! hurrah!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat a wonderful fellow!\u201d cried George in a paroxysm of admiration,\nexcited, very probably, much more by the brandy and the rum and the\npunch than by Rouvi\u00e8re\u2019s comprehension of life and happiness. \u201cWhat\nenergy! what grandeur!\u201d\n\n\u201cI consecrated my youth,\u201d continued Tom in a declamatory style, \u201cto\ndistant adventures, reserving Europe for the autumn of life. My\nfoot\u2014this foot, this very foot, George, which now touches yours on this\ncarpet\u2014has left its print among those of the tiger and the elephant on\nthe sands of India! Nay, it has even followed those terrible prowlers\ninto their forests of bamboo, lofty and solemn as our cathedrals!\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! that was something like living!\u201d ejaculated Dupuis, who listened\nwith almost breathless interest.\n\n\u201cTwo years later I arrived in Canton. What an arrival, ye gods! Never\nshall I forget the scene. It was a lovely summer night. The accession of\nthe emperor of the Celestials to his ancestral throne was being\ncelebrated. Our canoe could scarcely force its way among the junks and\nflower-boats, all of them decorated with innumerable paper lanterns.\nFireworks of a thousand different hues were reflected, mingled with the\nstars, in the flowing river, and we could watch their rainbow tints\nplaying on the porcelain temples that rise on its banks!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat a fairy-like sight! Happy, happy Tom!\u201d murmured Dupuis.\n\n\u201cFrom China,\u201d pursued Rouvi\u00e8re, after quaffing off his glass of punch,\n\u201cI sailed for the Americas. I travelled about there for several years,\ngoing to and fro, from north to south, from the savannas to the pampas,\nfrom the great austere Canadian woods to the smiling Brazilian forests;\nsometimes on foot, sometimes on horseback, oftenest in a _pirogue_. My\nlongest stay was in Peru. I could not tear myself away from that\ncoquettish city of Lima!\u201d\n\n\u201cHa! ha! _tra\u00eetre_, gay deceiver! O Tom, Tom!\u201d laughed Dupuis, shaking\nhis head in ecstasy.\n\n\u201cI turned gamester, too. It is impossible for you, George, to conceive\nthe immense attraction a gaming-table possesses in that land of gold and\nsilver and jewels. One might almost fancy that one of those fabulous\ntrees we read of in Oriental tales had been shaken over the green cloth!\nThere is little or no regular coined money to be seen on it, but dull\nyellow ingots, bright golden spangles, fiery diamonds, and milk-white,\nlustrous pearls are heaped up there pell-mell! All the treasures of\nearth and ocean seem to be brought together on that table, tumbled and\njostled in dazzling confusion! You can stay whole nights by that\nboard\u2014nights that fly like minutes\u2014your eyes fascinated, your brain on\nfire! Twenty times in twenty-four hours you are raised to the throne of\nRothschild\u2014as often precipitated down, down to Job\u2019s dunghill. You\nbecome bald, you may become mad, but you feel what life is\u2014you live!\u201d\n\n\u201cIt is true, it is true!\u201d cried Dupuis in a state of intense excitement;\n\u201cyou are right, Tom, there is no doubt of that. And to think that I have\nnever played at anything but that blackguard whist at a sou the counter!\nBut go on, Tom, go on; you really electrify me!\u201d\n\n\u201cEverything has its end,\u201d continued Rouvi\u00e8re, highly flattered by the\neffect he was producing; \u201cthere came a day of sadness and\ndiscouragement, and I took passage on board an American whaler bound for\nthe south pole. Yes, my hand has touched the frozen limits of our globe;\nI have contemplated, with feelings akin to awe, those creatures with\nhuman-like faces, the morse, on their pedestals of ice, recumbent and\ndreamy as the sphinx of Thebes. And in the midst of those silent spaces,\nso strangely different from all I had hitherto seen, I experienced\nsensations that seemed to belong to another world. A kind of\n_posthumous_ illusion of being in another planet took possession of me.\nCertainly I am much deceived if the days and nights I saw in those\nregions of ice do not resemble those in our pale satellite. What more\nshall I tell you, my dear friend? Three years after this I found myself\nin Rio Janeiro, whence I returned to Europe, after having literally\ndescribed the whole circumference of our globe with the end of my\nwalkingstick! And thus passed away my youth!\u201d\n\nM. Rouvi\u00e8re here threw himself back in his arm-chair, and stroked his\nbeard with a sigh.\n\n\u201cEvery king living might envy you, Tom!\u201d cried Dupuis. \u201cBut tell me\nmore. What have you been doing since then?\u201d\n\n\u201cSince then, George,\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re with nonchalance, \u201cI have not\ntravelled; I have merely made excursions. First upon the\nMediterranean\u2014but, pshaw! it was like sailing on the basin in the\nTuileries\u2019 garden! I have visited all the countries on its shore. And by\ndegrees, as I grew older, my circle became smaller, so that now I live\nentirely in Europe, going from city to city, according to the attraction\nof the moment. Indeed, I may say, my dear fellow, that Europe is my\nproperty, my domain!\u201d Here the speaker began to wax warmer and louder.\n\u201cEvery festival given by nature or man in Europe is given to amuse me.\nFor me Naples displays her bay and her volcano, and keeps open her grand\ntheatre, San Carlos; for my recreation Paris adorns her boulevards and\nbuilds her opera-house; to amuse me Madrid has a Prado and bull-fights.\nAll the great exhibitions were made for me, beginning with that of\nLondon. _Evviva la libert\u00e0!_ Let\u2019s drink!\u201d So saying, he filled for\nhimself a brimming bumper of punch, and tossed it off with a very\nself-satisfied smile.\n\n\u201cTom!\u201d cried Dupuis delightedly, \u201cyou are a genius! But you have said\nnothing about the great monuments\u2014the Alhambra, the Coliseum, the\nParthenon.\u201d\n\n\u201cPshaw! those are your friends!\u201d retorted Tom with his peculiar sneer.\n\u201cI\u2019ve said nothing about them because they are dragged about everywhere.\nWho hasn\u2019t seen _them_?\u201d\n\nThere was a minute of silence, broken by an emphatic \u201cAh!\u201d breathed not\nloudly but deeply by the excited listener. Starting from his seat, and\nthrusting his hands into his pockets, he began hurriedly to pace up and\ndown the room. His friend glanced at him uneasily.\n\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter? What annoys you?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cO Tom, Tom!\u201d cried George, still continuing his agitated walk, \u201cI blush\nwhen I compare your life with mine. While your heart has counted each\npulsation by some noble or beautiful emotion, mine has stupidly gone on\nticking off the hours and days and years as calmly as a kitchen clock!\nHave I really lived, tell me?\u201d He stopped in front of his friend,\ngesticulating violently. \u201cI was born, and I have slept, and I have\neaten; but what else? And what has been the result? My intelligence is\nextinguished; I have dried up; I have descended in the scale of being,\nuntil I have come to be on a level with the idiot of the Alps, with a\nshellfish, with an oyster!\u201d\n\n\u201cCome, come, George, you\u2019re going too far!\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re soothingly.\n\u201cEven supposing that you no longer possess as much freshness of\nimagination, as much vivacity of wit, as you used to have....\u201d\n\n\u201cI thought so! I knew it!\u201d interrupted Dupuis, resuming his hurried walk\nbackwards and forwards; \u201cyou acknowledge that you find me rusty!\u201d\n\nM. Rouvi\u00e8re rose slowly from his seat, and, after lighting a cigar,\nremained standing with his back against the chimney-piece, his eyes\nfixed on his friend, who paused in front of him at his first word.\n\n\u201cListen to me, George,\u201d said he seriously, caressing his moustache with\nhis fingers as he spoke; \u201cI will be frank with you. You know that I\nalways used to be frank with you. The impression your house made on me\nwhen I first entered it was, I must confess, a sinister one. I seemed to\nbreathe the air of a cemetery in it. I could have fancied that I was in\none of those long-buried dwellings which the patient labor of\nenthusiastic antiquaries has restored to light and life. While the\nservant went to call you I could not prevent myself from examining, with\na kind of wondering, stupid curiosity, the old-fashioned furniture, and\nthe pictures, and those dismal tapestries worthy of figuring in a\nmuseum! I remembered the delicacy of your character, the elegance of\nyour manners, your intelligent taste, your love of art; and positively I\ncould not reconcile the bright memories I retained of you with the dull,\ninsipid existence of which I had the evidence before my eyes. You came\nto me; I looked at you; you spoke. What was it? Was my sight affected,\nor my judgment biassed by the thoughts which were literally _preying_ on\nme at that moment? I can\u2019t tell what it was\u2014I can\u2019t explain\u2014but your\nlanguage astonished me! Your forehead actually seemed to me to have\ngrown narrower! I wiped away a secret tear, and I sighed as I should\nhave sighed had I been standing by your grave! I even half spoke the\nwords, \u2018This, then, is all that remains of my friend!\u2019 You\u2019re not\noffended, George?\u201d added M. Rouvi\u00e8re, stopping short and looking\ninquiringly into his victim\u2019s anxious, attentive face.\n\n\u201cNot a bit, Tom; not a bit,\u201d replied George. \u201cI tell you I felt that I\nhad sunk; at least, I suspected it, and the suspicion was intolerable. I\nprefer the certainty.\u201d He turned away with an attempt at a smile, and\nresumed his agitated walk up and down the room.\n\nRouvi\u00e8re applied himself to the fire, put on a new log of wood,\nshovelled up the glowing embers and ashes and threw them with much care\nand skill to the back, gazed on his work for a minute, and, finally\nassuming again his favorite _pose_, with his back leaning against the\nchimney-piece, started the conversation afresh in a lively, chatty tone.\n\n\u201cLet us change the subject,\u201d said he. \u201cYou have sold your business; what\ndo you think of doing now?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat do you expect me to do?\u201d cried Dupuis vehemently. \u201cI shall finish\nby dying!\u201d\n\n\u201c_Morbleu!_ you had better resuscitate. Let us talk seriously, George.\nWhen you married you created for yourself new duties, which you have\nfulfilled to the utmost, honestly and generously. You have provided\namply for the future of your wife and daughter. What is there, then, to\nprevent you now from plunging yourself for two or three years into the\nvortex of life, and so awaken and reinvigorate your benumbed faculties?\nThe facilities of travel nowadays are wonderful. In the space of two\nyears you can run over the whole of Europe, and even explore a part of\nAsia and Africa. All the freshness and vivacity of thought you once\npossessed will return to you when you find yourself in contact with the\nmost glorious creations of art and nature. In the course of two\nyears\u2014two years, mark you!\u2014you can lay at rest for ever every one of\nthose regretful feelings which are now eating out your heart and\nshortening your life! Choose now: suicide or travel? Remember that you\nare free in your choice\u2014you are free to do as you like!\u201d\n\n\u201cPish!\u201d cried George, turning on his heel and pursuing his walk. \u201cIs it\nprobable that at my time of life I shall set out alone to scour the\nhighways of Europe?\u201d\n\n\u201cBut who wants you to go alone?\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re, going up to him and\nlaying a hand on his shoulder. \u201cAm not I ready to go with you? My\nexperience, my post-chaise, my servant\u2014everything I have is at your\nservice, George!\u201d\n\n\u201cIs it possible, Tom? Are you really in earnest?\u201d exclaimed Dupuis,\ngratified beyond expression at this proof of his friend\u2019s affection.\n\u201cYou really will accompany me?\u201d\n\n\u201cI will lead you by the hand, my boy!\u201d answered Rouvi\u00e8re gaily; and,\nfalling into step with George, the two friends paced the room together.\n\u201cI will spare you the torment of guides and ciceroni, and all that\nspecies of vermin which besets the tourist. No, don\u2019t thank me,\u201d he\ncontinued, when Dupuis began to express his gratitude. \u201cThe thought\ndelights me as much as it does you. Your new impressions will revive\nmine of past days. And won\u2019t it be delicious, George, to end our lives\nas we began them\u2014participating in the same adventures, in the same\npleasures, and even sharing our purses? Come, now, is it settled?\u201d\n\n\u201cMy dear friend,\u201d replied Dupuis, with a slight hesitation in his voice,\n\u201cI will confess to you that no project was ever more agreeable to me,\nbut....\u201d\n\n\u201cNo buts! no buts!\u201d cried Rouvi\u00e8re imperatively; \u201cit _is_ settled! We\nwill go direct from this to Paris and wait there until the spring. The\nmuseums and theatres will help us to while away the time. I will take\nyou behind the scenes; you shall hear Ristori and Patti! You used to\nlove music!\u201d\n\n\u201cI love it still,\u201d said George, smiling; \u201cI play the flute!\u201d\n\n\u201cSo much the better!\u201d cried Tom with increasing animation, as they\ncontinued to pace the room side by side; \u201cso much the better! You shall\nbring your flute with you. What was I saying? Oh! yes; well, the winter\nin Paris\u2014that\u2019s settled; but at the very beginning of spring we\u2019ll cross\nthe Pyrenees and spend three glorious months in Spain. Then we\u2019ll take\nadvantage of the summer to visit all the principal cities of Germany;\nand after that we\u2019ll get down into Italy by Trieste and Venice. What do\nyou say to this programme?\u201d\n\n\u201cI say,\u201d replied Dupuis, stopping in his walk and speaking in a strong,\ndecisive tone\u2014\u201cI say that it opens Paradise to me. Give me a cigar, Tom.\nI say that you are right. I _have_ lived long enough for others. I\n_have_ offered up a sufficiently large portion of my life as a\nsacrifice. Bah! a man has duties towards himself.\u201d He lighted his cigar\nand puffed vigorously for a minute or two. \u201cProvidence has conferred\ngifts on us,\u201d he resumed, \u201cfor which we have to render an account.\nIntellect, imagination, the feeling of the beautiful\u2014these are gifts\nwhich bind us. Savages only ought to be capable of such a crime as to\nallow these sacred flames to die out for want of nourishment!\u201d\n\n\u201cWell said!\u201d exclaimed Rouvi\u00e8re exultingly; \u201cthat\u2019s my old George again!\nNow let us strike while the iron\u2019s hot. Marianne!\u201d He went towards the\ndoor to open it as he spoke.\n\n\u201cHush! hush!\u201d cried Dupuis, stopping him and speaking under his breath;\n\u201cwhat do you want with her?\u201d\n\n\u201cI want to tell her that you are going away to-night, and that she must\nlook after your portmanteau. Marianne!\u201d he called again.\n\n\u201cHush, I beg of you!\u201d repeated poor George earnestly. \u201cSurely we are not\ngoing to start to-night?\u201d\n\n\u201cAt nine o\u2019clock to-night,\u201d answered Rouvi\u00e8re decisively; \u201cyou know very\nwell that I ordered horses for nine o\u2019clock.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes, I know,\u201d said Dupuis, hesitating and embarrassed; \u201cbut the night\nis going to be deucedly cold\u2014Siberian. I think we should do better to\nwait until to-morrow morning.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, just let me tell you this, George,\u201d cried the other impatiently:\n\u201cif you\u2019re afraid of frosted fingers or toes, and of a night in a\npost-chaise, you\u2019d better pull your night-cap over your ears at once and\ngo to bed, and never talk again about travelling!\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m afraid of nothing and of nobody,\u201d replied poor Dupuis, driven to\nhis wits\u2019 end; \u201cbut the truth is this haste rather puts me out. I had\nreckoned upon two or three days to look about me and to make my\npreparations.\u201d\n\n\u201cPreparations! What preparations?\u201d cried Tom in a tone of indignant\nsurprise. \u201cYou need a portmanteau and a few shirts and stockings, and\nyou have an hour before you to get them together, and that\u2019s more than\ntime enough. Come, now, George, no childishness; if you defer your\ndeparture for two or three days, you know just as well as I do that you\nwon\u2019t go at all. I\u2019ve no need to tell you what influences will be\nbrought to bear on you, what obstacles will rise up before you, to unman\nyou and break down your resolution. Believe me, my dear fellow, in such\ncases as this, however you yourself may suffer and _make_ suffer, you\n_must_ cut down to the quick or give up....\u201d\n\n\u201cOnce more you are right, Tom,\u201d said Dupuis after a moment\u2019s silent\nthought. \u201cI\u2019m your man; there\u2019s my hand on it.\u201d\n\n\u201cMarianne!\u201d shouted Rouvi\u00e8re, shaking his friend\u2019s hand with a will.\n\n\u201cNo, no, don\u2019t call Marianne,\u201d cried Dupuis hurriedly, and getting\nbetween Rouvi\u00e8re and the door. \u201cI know better than she does what I shall\nneed. I shall pack my portmanteau myself as soon as my wife comes in.\nIt\u2019s just eight now,\u201d looking at the clock; \u201cshe\u2019ll not be long. Well,\u201d\nhe continued with some agitation, \u201cI shall have to pass a few\nminutes\u2014sad ones they will be, I know\u2014but my conscience reproaches me\nwith nothing; ... and after all, if my cup be filled with generous wine,\nwhat does it matter though the edge be a little bitter?... O Tom!\u201d he\ncontinued after a moment\u2019s pause, during which he seemed to have roused\nhis courage, \u201cwhat a perspective you have opened out before me\u2014what a\nhorizon! Granada! Venice! Naples! It is a dream!\u201d He glanced at the\nclock and his voice fell. \u201cFive minutes past eight! I would willingly\ngive twenty-five louis to be a quarter of an hour older\u2014a quarter of an\nhour! I know that I am very weak, but....\u201d\n\n\u201cShall I tell your wife for you?\u201d interrupted Rouvi\u00e8re, who was watching\nhim anxiously.\n\n\u201cWell, frankly, Tom, you would do me a service,\u201d cried Dupuis eagerly.\n\n\u201cGo and pack your trunk, then, and I\u2019ll settle the business.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s no danger of a scene,\u201d said George, stopping short near the\ndoor; \u201cyou would be quite mistaken in your estimate of her character if\nyou feared that.\u201d\n\n\u201cI shall see,\u201d returned his friend laconically.\n\n\u201cTell her that I entreat her to keep calm. Tears might unman me, but\ncould change nothing in my plans.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll tell her. Go to your trunk.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019m going, Tom.\u201d\n\nHe opened the door, hesitated, then closed it again and came back to the\nfireplace, near which Rouvi\u00e8re was still standing.\n\n\u201cMy dear friend,\u201d said he softly, laying his hand on Tom\u2019s arm, \u201cyou\nwill be very gentle with her, will you not?\u201d\n\nA kind smile gleamed in the usually cold, sharp eyes of the traveller,\nas he looked in his friend\u2019s anxious, agitated face.\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t be afraid,\u201d he replied; \u201cbut you\u2014don\u2019t you desert me when I\u2019ve\ngone to the front.\u201d\n\n\u201cDesert during the battle! You don\u2019t know me, Tom!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, you see,\u201d said Tom, \u201cI should look wondrous silly if you did!\u201d\n\n\u201cTom Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d cried Dupuis solemnly, \u201cpermit me to assure you that my\nmind is made up, and that this evening at nine o\u2019clock, come what will,\nI go with you. I pledge you my word of honor. Are you satisfied?\u201d\n\n\u201cGo and pack your trunk!\u201d laughed Rouvi\u00e8re, taking him by the shoulders\nand pushing him out of the room.\n\nLeft to himself, M. Rouvi\u00e8re returned to the chimney-piece and stood\nover the fire, rubbing his hands meditatively, and from time to time\nbreaking out into words.\n\n\u201cNow then, Mme. Dupuis, it\u2019s between you and me,\u201d said he, half-aloud,\nwith a kind of chuckle. \u201cIt\u2019s very certain that my principal object is\nto make poor George something like himself again, but I really sha\u2019n\u2019t\nbe sorry to try the effect of a thunder-bolt on that serene-looking\nlady!\u201d Here M. Rouvi\u00e8re rubbed his hands gleefully and laughed heartily;\npicturing to himself, probably, the poor wife\u2019s consternation and\ndespair when he should announce the fatal news.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m not a Turk,\u201d he muttered presently\u2014\u201cfar from it, I\u2019m sure; until\nnow I always believed, like every true Christian, that polygamy deserved\nthe gallows; but, hang it! only think of a decent man condemned to\nperpetual communion with such a disagreeable creature as that old\nvillage sauce-pan! Such a life is clearly impossible!\u201d A minute\u2019s silent\nthought followed, and then M. Rouvi\u00e8re roused himself, and sat down\nbefore the fire to warm the soles of his feet. But not for long.\n\n\u201cI understood that woman,\u201d he suddenly exclaimed, starting up from his\nseat and beginning to pace rapidly up and down the floor\u2014\u201cI understood\nher and judged her before I saw her! I knew her to be exactly what she\nis, from her cap to her shoes! She was always odious to me! Just see\nwith what stupid symmetry all this furniture is arranged: two chairs\nhere and two chairs there, everything square with its neighbor, all at\nequal distances\u2014how wearisome! That old barometer, too, and these absurd\ncuriosities\u201d\u2014he stopped, as he spoke, in front of the chimney: \u201ca\nstuffed bird, a shell-box, spun-glass, and horrid cocoanut cups carved\nby galley-slaves! They absolutely give one the height and the breadth\nand the weight of the woman, both physically and morally. Poor George!\nan intelligent man, too. I was sorry for him,\u201d he continued, taking a\nseat in front of the fire, \u201cbut I couldn\u2019t help it. How I pegged into\nher all dinnertime! Ha, ha, ha! I was as disgusting as a Kalmuck! I\nreally _was_ ashamed of myself! but, the deuce take it! every one\u2019s\nnerves are not made of bronze. M. du Luc! Mme. le Rendu! and her fish\n... and her cat ... and her _cur\u00e9_ ... hang it! I _couldn\u2019t_ stand it.\u201d\n\nHere M. Rouvi\u00e8re interrupted his monologue for a minute to examine the\ntoe of his boot; satisfied that it was intact, he resumed his train of\nthought.\n\n\u201cNo, I really don\u2019t believe that it would be possible to meet with a\nmore perfect type of the humdrum existence, the narrow-minded ideas, and\nflat conversation prevalent in these provincial mole-hills than this\ndowdy female presents! That good fellow\u2014how much he must have suffered\nbefore he learnt to bow his intellect beneath her imbecile yoke! God\nbless me! I know the whole story. He probably struggled hard at first,\nand then, little by little, he was bowed and bent and broken, as so many\nothers have been, by the continued pressure of a feminine will! Thirty\nyears\u2019 martyrdom. But, ha! ha! Mme. Dupuis, _your_ hour has come; he\nshall be avenged.\u201d\n\nHere M. Rouvi\u00e8re drew himself up straight in his chair and laughed\nmerrily. \u201cIt reminds me,\u201d continued he half-aloud, \u201cof my battle with\nthat old Indian woman when I stole her idol while she was asleep. What a\ngood-for-nothing hussy she was! Extraordinary how much old women\nresemble one another all the world over.\u201d\n\n[TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT MONTH.]\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A GLANCE AT THE INDIAN QUESTION.[40]\n\nLet us begin by considering the Indian himself. As soon as he is able to\nstand alone he commences that practice with the bow and arrow which\nmakes him a good marksman before he is well in his teens. He is tied in\nhis saddle before he can walk, and a horse becomes as much a part of his\nnature as if he were a Centaur. While yet a child he learns the\nsubterfuges of the chase: the quiet, patient, breathless watchfulness,\nthe stealthy, snake-like advance, which enable him in adult life to\ncrawl, unseen and unheard, upon his unsuspecting victim, to take him at\na disadvantage, surprise and kill him without the risk of a wound. From\nhis earliest years he hears the warriors of his tribe relate their acts\nof treachery and blood, of rapine and violence, and boast of them as\nbrave and glorious deeds. He is taught to consider treachery courage,\nrobbery and murder honorable warfare, and the most renowned warrior the\none who despatches his foe with the least possibility of danger to\nhimself. For him revenge is a sacred duty. He hears shouts of savage\nlaughter and applause greet the warrior who devises the worst tortures\nfor the miserable captive. His initiation to the order of warriors is a\nterrible ordeal of physical suffering, which must be borne without\nflinching or murmuring to ensure the success of the candidate. The\ngrossest sensuality is practised openly under his childish eyes. He\nlearns to regard cunning and falsehood as virtues, and to look upon the\nwarrior most skilled in the arts of deceit as the greatest hero of his\ntribe. Until he has committed some signal act of murder, treachery, or\nrobbery, he is without influence among the braves or attractions for the\nsquaws.\n\nAll is fair in the wars of Indians, either with the white man or foes of\ntheir own color. The Sioux kills the Crow\u2014man, woman, or papoose at the\nbreast\u2014at sight. The Crow will brain the sleeping Sioux equally without\nregard to age or sex. A small party of Minneconjon Sioux went to the\nTongue River Cantonment, last December, to surrender. They carried a\nflag of truce. Unfortunately, they rode into the camp of some Crow\nscouts which was situated within a few hundred yards of the cantonment.\nThe Crows received them in a friendly manner, shook hands with them, and\nwhile with one hand they gave the pledge of amity, with the other they\npoured the contents of their revolvers into the breasts of the bearers\nof the white flag. The Crows could not understand the indignation of the\nofficers and soldiers at such an act of treachery and cowardice (we\nregret to say that it was not without apologists and applauders among\nwhite frontiersmen), but they feared it enough to run away to their\nagency, where the leader in the bloody deed was the recipient of high\nhonors. There he was the hero of the time.\n\nHOW THE INDIAN IS CIRCUMSTANCED.\n\nNext let us consider the circumstances in which this creature, so\nsavagely nurtured and developed, is placed.\n\nWe find him in a district of country which he believes to be his by\nimmemorial right of possession. It is the land of his fathers. The white\nman formally recognizes his claim by making solemn treaties for the\ntransfer of portions of the Indian\u2019s heritage. The land being his, the\ngame is his. The Great Spirit created the buffalo for the sustentation\nof his red children. The buffalo-hunter enters the Indian\u2019s domain, and\nslaughters the buffalo by tens of thousands for the robes, leaving the\nflesh to rot upon the plain. Thousands are wantonly destroyed by wealthy\nidlers who call themselves sportsmen. The buffalo supplies the Indian\nnot only with food, but with raiment and shelter. It furnishes him the\narticle of exchange which enables him to obtain the necessaries of his\nsavage life. The diminution of the buffalo means privation, suffering,\nnakedness, starvation to the Indian and his family.\n\nThe white man by formal compact purchases from the Indian some certain\ndistrict, and solemnly binds himself to respect the Indian\u2019s remaining\nrights within certain prescribed limits, to keep trespassers from\nentering the now diminished territory, and to ensure it to him and his\ntribe for ever. But this does not stop the insatiate adventurer, who\nagain crosses the newly-defined limit.[41] The government seems\npowerless to compel its citizens to respect its treaty obligations or to\npunish their infraction. The exasperated Indian kills some of the\ntrespassers. Would it be astonishing that he should do so, even if he\nhad been reared under the influences of Christianity instead of those of\nbarbarism? Troops are now sent against the Indians. After the sacrifice\nof a greater or less number of brave soldiers the hostile tribe is\nsubjected, compelled to return to a quasi-peaceful condition, and to\nconsent to a further reduction of its territorial limits. Before the ink\nis dry with which the so-called treaty is written the adventurer again\ncrosses the newly-designated boundary. Thus the process goes on _ad\ninfinitum_, or until the Indian, driven from the last foot of his\nancestral earth, starving, naked, the cries of his suffering women and\nchildren ringing in his ears, is compelled to accept any terms which\nwill give him food and covering.\n\nTHE INDIANS ON THE RESERVATIONS.\n\nThe Indian is now taken to a reservation. Even his removal may be a\ntransportation job by which some politicaster in New York or Boston or\nfriendly Philadelphia, who never saw a hostile Indian, and who invests\nno money in the enterprise, makes a fortune. From this time on he is a\nmeans of money-making for a crowd of sharpers. A scanty supply of bad\nbeef at a high price, a little coffee and sugar of the lowest grade,\nwith sometimes indifferent flour, compose his ration. If he happens to\nbe where he can occasionally kill a buffalo, a deer, or a wolf, his\nsquaw dresses the skin, and he takes it to the trader\u2019s store, where he\nbarters it for a little sugar, coffee, or pemican to add to his meagre\nration. He gets in exchange for his peltries what the trader chooses to\ngive him. For a calf-robe or a wolf-skin he may get a few cupfuls of the\ncoarsest sugar, or a tin cup worth about ten cents in New York. For a\nfair calf-robe the trader will ask _three dollars_! \u201cWe make every white\nman rich who comes to our country,\u201d said Sitting Bull to Gen. Miles in\nthe council which preceded the fight on Cedar Creek, in Montana, last\nOctober. The remark was not without truth, so far as Indian traders and\nreservation rings are concerned.\n\nIt is alleged that Indians on reservations have been compelled to kill\nsome of their ponies to feed their families. We do not personally know\nthis to be so, but we can well believe it. We do know that not three\nyears ago the Kiowas and Comanches were without flour for months; that\nthe beef issued to them was miserable. We have seen it stated and have\nbeen told time and again that rations have been drawn for numbers\ngreatly exceeding those actually at the agencies; and, with the\ndevelopments made through the honesty and courage of Professor Marsh\nstill fresh in our memory, we can well believe it also. Is it a subject\nof special wonder that, being the victim of such a system, in addition\nto his peculiar training, the Indian should look upon deceit and robbery\nas not only justifiable but laudable?\n\nWHAT WE ASK OF THE INDIAN.\n\nAll men are naturally tenacious of their rights of property; the more\ncivilized the community the more sacred those rights. The Indian has the\ninstinct of property very strongly developed. After we have subdued,\nswindled, and reduced him to the verge of starvation we say to him: \u201cYou\nmust now surrender your horses and your arms.\u201d The earliest ambition of\nan Indian is to possess a fire-arm. He will pay thirty to forty ponies\nfor a good rifle. Ponies are his currency. If the government sells this\nrifle by auction, it will bring perhaps five to ten dollars. It is hard\nfor the Indian to see his rifle carried off and his horse ridden away by\nsome white hunter, \u201cwolfer,\u201d or trapper. He is very fond of his ponies.\nNo consideration of value will induce him to part with a favorite horse.\nA friend of the writer saw a squaw, with tears in her eyes, cut a lock\nfrom the mane of her favorite pony before surrendering the animal to the\nrepresentative of the government. Thus, we starve the Indian; we deprive\nhim of his arms, with which he might kill game to eke out a subsistence;\nwe take away his ponies, which furnish him food when he is reduced to\nextremity through our fault or failure. What Christian people would be\ncontent under such treatment? Can we be surprised that an untutored\nsavage, who cannot understand our clashing of bureaus, our shifting of\nresponsibility, or our red-tape refinements of official morality, should\nlook upon the white man as the liar of liars and the thief of thieves,\nand, when he is on the war-path, should execute the wild justice of\nrevenge on any of the race who happens to come within reach of his\nrifle? Can we be surprised if he leaves his reservation and chooses to\nfight to the last rather than be the patient victim of such a system of\ninjustice and spoliation? It is not astonishing that the Indian should\nsurrender only his poorest animals, should hide his magazine guns and\nrifles and give up only rusty old smooth-bores or arms for which he\ncannot procure fitting ammunition. In our every transaction with him we\nstrengthen by example the lessons of deception he was taught in his\nchildhood.\n\nINDIAN LIFE AT AN AGENCY.\n\nAn Indian agency is not usually a school of morality. Interpreters,\ntraders\u2019 clerks, \u201csquaw-men,\u201d have what are euphemistically termed\n\u201cIndian wives.\u201d It is scarcely necessary to say that these are nothing\nmore than concubines. These poor red slaves are usually purchased from\ntheir savage sires for a blanket, a cheap trinket, a pony, or a few\ncartridges. Sometimes they are presents given for the purpose of making\ninterest with influential underlings. Agency life has no tendency to\nelevate the Indian. He lives in idleness and inaction. He has nothing to\ndo and nothing to hope for. He has no future. He must occupy his time in\nsome way, and he becomes a slave to gambling and sexual indulgence.\nOccasionally the young men, wearied by the monotony of such a life and\nambitious of distinction, seize upon the first real or fancied wrong as\na pretext for revolt, fly the agency, and go upon the war-path.\n\nOUR INDIANS IN CANADA.\n\nWhy is it that the Indians who give us so much trouble become peaceable,\nand remain so, when they settle on the Canadian side of the border?\nThere they receive no governmental aid, and are able to procure their\nown subsistence. We read of no outrages or robberies there. It is simply\nbecause the Indian\u2019s rights are respected. He has been protected in his\nrights even against the greedy nephews of English statesmen who cast\ncovetous eyes upon his lands. If he is guilty of offence, he is promptly\nand sternly punished. The arm of the military is not held back when\noffending Indians are within reach of punishment because a million or so\nhas been appropriated to be expended for their benefit as soon as they\ncan be reported peaceable, and because the vultures of the ring are\na-hungering for the spoil.\n\nTHE FRONTIERSMAN AND THE INDIAN.\n\nIt is difficult for the honest frontiersman\u2014the hardy pioneer who, with\nan axe in one hand and a rifle in the other, hews himself a farm out of\nthe wilderness\u2014to be just toward the Indian. The memory of massacre of\nhis neighbors or relatives, of outrage on defenceless women, stirs up,\neven in gentle breasts, a hatred of the red man which prompts an undying\nvendetta, which begets a feeling that a remorseless shedding of Indian\nblood to the very last drop would not be an adequate punishment for such\natrocities. There is many a worthy and otherwise humane and law-abiding\npioneer who believes that dead Indians are the only good ones; and such\na feeling seizes even the strongest advocate of a humane policy when he\nsees the scalp of a white woman dangling from the girdle of a filthy\nsavage. There are men on the frontier, otherwise brave and\ngentle-hearted, who would have no more scruple to shoot an Indian at\nsight than to kill a prairie-wolf. Peace is difficult to keep between\ntwo opposing elements imbued with corresponding sentiments toward each\nother. For this state of things the rapacious Indian rings, the\nviolators of treaty stipulations, the ruthless adventurers, the\nhorse-thieves, the murderers, fugitives from justice, respecting no\nlaws, human or divine, who infest the Indian country, are mainly\nresponsible. An American gentleman who spent two years recently in\nManitoba told the writer that he found many of the Sioux who were\nengaged in the Minnesota massacre living there peaceful and contented.\n\u201cWearing a red coat,\u201d said he, \u201cI can travel alone from one end of the\nTerritory to the other without danger of molestation.\u201d\n\nTHE QUAKERS AND THE INDIANS.\n\nThe failure of the Quaker specific does not need to be dwelt upon. We\nhave had under the Quaker management the most serious and bloody Indian\nwars that have afflicted the frontier for many years. Besides, there is\nscarcely a wild tribe of which some portion has not been in a state of\nhostility to a greater or less extent. There are itching palms among the\nQuakers as well as among the other religious denominations. What was\nneeded was not men who made professions of peace\u2014or \u201cmade-up Quakers,\u201d\nwho put on the Friendly drab for the occasion\u2014but men who practised\nhonesty and fair-dealing.\n\nTHE ARMY AND THE INDIANS.\n\nThe worst elements of society on the frontier\u2014\u201cwolfers,\u201d\nbuffalo-hunters, trappers, guides, scouts, contractors, venders of\npoisonous whiskey, and keepers of frontier gambling-saloons\u2014may and\ngenerally do desire Indian wars; for to them they are a source of\nemployment and profit. Territorial officials, their friends and clients,\nmay desire a state of hostility, on account of the money it causes to be\nexpended in their districts, especially if authority can be obtained to\nraise special forces. This, in addition to opportunities of profit,\noffers a means of augmenting and strengthening what is delicately termed\n\u201cpolitical\u201d influence by a judicious distribution of patronage. It is\nnot very long since a force was raised, in a certain frontier State,\nwhich, during an Indian war then raging, did not kill or capture an\nIndian, inflict or receive a scratch, or fire a shot. This force, which\nwas in service only for a few months, cost the country at large nearly\ntwo hundred thousand dollars. This was very pleasant for the force, very\nprofitable to the State. No doubt a repetition of the experience would\nbe agreeable at any time. It was not very economical or beneficial to\nthe country at large. But to suppose that the regular army desires wars\nwith the Indian tribes is a very great mistake. Why should it? To the\narmy Indian wars are neither sources of honor nor of profit. To it they\nonly mean hard work, no glory, increased personal expenditures without\nadditional pay. For our hard-worked little army receives no field\nallowances. A member of the non-combatant branches of the military\nestablishment can effect more toward his advancement in one campaign in\nWashington than can the live, the real soldiers, the fighting men, in\nfive lustres of laborious and dangerous field-service in the Indian\ncountry. Operations against hostile tribes, though attended by exposure,\nhardship, suffering, and dangers to which civilized warfare presents no\nparallel, with the possibility of death by indescribable tortures in the\nevent of capture, are not considered \u201cwar\u201d by certain gentlemen who sit\nat home at ease and enjoy, if they do not improve, each shining hour.\nHundreds of brave men in blue may fall in Indian battle, crushed by the\nmere power of numbers; but this, forsooth, is not \u201cwar.\u201d It is only\nwounds, or maiming for life without hope of recognition or reward, or\ndeath upon a battle-field to which glory is denied.\n\nTHE TRANSFER OF THE INDIANS TO THE WAR DEPARTMENT.\n\nThe transfer of the Indians to the War Department would be advantageous,\nfor a time, both to the government and the Indian, but it would be\nruinous to the army. The Indian Ring would eventually either effect the\nabolition of the army altogether\u2014which would be bad enough\u2014or fill it\nwith the material of which Indian traders and reservation sharks are\nmade\u2014which would be still worse. The country cannot afford to risk the\ndeterioration or destruction of a class of officials admitted on all\nhands to be among the most honorable and trustworthy servants of the\ngovernment.\n\nCAUSES OF INDIAN WARS.\n\nThe usual cause of Indian wars is want of good faith in carrying out the\nobligations of treaties. It is scarcely too much to say that we rarely,\nif ever, carry out treaty stipulations with Indians. The great majority\nof the people of the United States wish to treat the Indian not only\nfairly, but kindly, generously, magnanimously. Money enough is\nappropriated, if it were judiciously and honestly expended. But the sums\nappropriated seem to become small by degrees and wonderfully less before\nthey reach the Indian. It is not the interest of the Indian Ring to have\nthe Indian question settled.\n\nThe transgression of limits solemnly agreed upon has been already\nmentioned. The lawless classes enumerated above steal Indian ponies and\ndo not scruple to kill an unoffending Indian occasionally. The Indian\ndoes not understand individual responsibility for crime. He holds the\nwhole race or tribe accountable for the actions of one of its members,\nand avenges the killing of his brother on the first victim presented to\nhim.\n\nIndian wars have doubtless been caused by more than usually grasping\ntraders whose rapacity has made the Indians discontented and driven them\nfrom the reservations. We have read, at least, of cases in which numbers\nhave been fed on paper in excess of the actual number present on the\nreservation. We are told that in such cases, when an impending\ninvestigation has made discovery possible, the tribe is reported hostile\nand large numbers said to have left the agency. The Indians who have\nlived quietly on the reservation, utterly unable to comprehend the\nforcible measures about to be adopted, suspicious as Indians always are,\nand supposing they are all to be killed, leave the reservation and go\nupon the war-path.\n\nTHE FIRST STEP TOWARD PEACE.\n\nThe first step toward bringing the Indian to a permanently peaceful\ncondition is to place in his country a military force strong enough to\nshow him the utter madness of keeping up the war. In general, a show of\nsufficient force is all that is necessary to bring the Indian to\nsubjection. No one understands the lesson of force better or applies it\nmore readily than he. It is the only thing he respects or fears. Instead\nof doing this, however, we place in the Indian country meagre garrisons,\nbarely able to protect themselves, and powerless for offensive\noperations. The Indian does not believe our statements of the numbers we\ncould put in the field if we would. He thinks we are boasting, or\u2014as he\nplainly calls saying anything that is not exact truth\u2014lying. With the\ndirectness of mind of a child of nature, he takes a plain, logical view\nof the situation, and cannot imagine that we have strength and do not\nuse it, or, at least, exhibit it. After the annihilation of Custer on\nthe Little Horn in 1876, and the retirement of all forces from the\ncountry between the Yellowstone and the Missouri, except four or five\nhundred infantry, the Indians at certain agencies, who sympathized and\nheld constant communication with the hostiles, thought they had\nsucceeded in killing nearly all the white soldiers, and boasted that at\nlength the Great Father in Washington would have to accede to their\nterms. There should be to-day 10,000 men in the Sioux country\u20146,000\ninfantry, 2,500 thoroughly drilled and disciplined light cavalry (not\nraw boys from the great cities who can neither ride nor shoot, mounted\non untrained horses), and 1,500 light artillery with light steel guns\neasily transportable over rough country, but possessing considerable\ncomparative length of range. Such a force would thoroughly complete the\nwork done by the infantry amid the snow and ice of the past winter. It\nwould be the most humane and least expensive mode of laying the\nindispensable foundation for further work toward the elevation and\namelioration of the Indian\u2019s condition. Such a force would drive all the\nIndians between the Yellowstone and the British line to their agencies,\nwith little, if any, loss of life. If the humanitarians would end the\nwar with the least possible shedding of blood, this is the way to do it.\nWhen such a display of force is made as makes resistance hopeless\u2014and\nthe Indian will be quick to see it\u2014there will be an end of Indian wars\nand we may begin the work of civilization in earnest.\n\nTHE MODE AND EXTENT OF INDIAN CIVILIZATION.\n\nWe must not try to push the Indian forward too fast. There is no use in\ntrying to make the adult Indian of to-day an agriculturist, or to take\nhim far out of the sphere in which he was brought up. Once the writer\nhappened to be in company with a gentleman who has given some thought to\nthe Indian question, and has had some experience of the Indian\ncharacter, when a feathered and beaded warrior made his appearance. He\nwas richly dressed\u2014scarlet cloth, eagle\u2019s feathers, profusely-beaded\nmoccasins. \u201cIt is nonsense to expect such a creature as that to dig in\nmud and dirt,\u201d said our friend. \u201cHe would spoil his fine clothes and\nruin his dainty moccasins.\u201d And there was much wisdom in the remark. The\nbest you can do with the adult Indian is to make him a stock-raiser.\nGive him good brood mares. Introduce good blood among his herds of\nponies. Then find a market for his horses. Buy them for the cavalry. Let\nhim raise a certain proportion of mules, and let the government buy them\nfor the Quartermaster\u2019s Department. Encourage him to raise beef-cattle\nenough at least for his own consumption; and if you can induce him to\nraise a surplus, buy the surplus for the Subsistence Department. Give\nthe Indian a fair price for his produce. Dash down the monopoly of\nIndian trading. Allow any merchant of good standing to trade with the\nIndian, under proper restrictions as to exclusion of ammunition and\nspirituous liquors. Let the red man have the benefit of free-trade and\ncompetition. Ammunition should be furnished, when necessary, only by the\nOrdnance Department.\n\nLet the red man also have the same liberty of conscience which is\naccorded to the white, the black, and even the yellow. Let there be no\nmore parcelling out of Indians among jarring sects. Let them have\nmissionaries of their choice.\n\nCompel all children now under fourteen years to attend schools. Vary\nschool exercises with the use of tools in the workshop or agricultural\ntraining in the field. Thus you may make some mechanics and some\nagriculturists out of the generation now rising. You will have more out\nof the next generation. But you cannot make an agriculturist out of the\ngrown-up Indian, nor a mechanic. It is folly to attempt it. You cannot\nreconcile to our nineteenth-century civilization those who have grown up\nto maturity with the ideas, manners, and morals of the heroic ages. You\ncan no more expect Crazy Horse to use the shovel and the hoe than you\ncould Achilles and Tydides Diomed to plant melons or beans.\n\nTHE ONE GREAT REMEDY, AND THE HOPELESSNESS OF ITS APPLICATION.\n\nThe remedy of remedies is common honesty in our dealings with the\nIndian, backed by a force strong enough and always ready to promptly\ncrush any attempt at revolt, and punish speedily and severely every act\nof lawlessness committed by an Indian. But too many are interested in\nkeeping up the present system to warrant even the slenderest hope of any\nradical change. To put it in crude frontier terms: \u201cThere is too much\nmoney in it.\u201d Politicasters, capitalists, contractors, sub-contractors,\nagents, traders, agency employ\u00e9s, \u201csquaw-men\u201d\u2014or degraded whites who\nlive in a state of concubinage with Indian women, and who are generally\ntools and touters for the traders\u2014hosts of sinecurists and their\nfriends, find \u201cmoney in it.\u201d The links of the ring are legion. It is too\nstrong. It can shelve or crush any man with honesty and boldness enough\nto attack the system. It is too strong for the commissioner or the\nsecretary. It is to be feared that it may prove too strong for the\ncountry.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n CHARLES LEVER AT HOME.\n\nThe man whose rollicking pen has made more dragoons than all the\nrecruiting-sergeants in her Britannic Majesty\u2019s service; who has\n\u201cpromoted\u201d the \u201cConnaught Rangers\u201d and _Faugh a ballaghs_ into _corps\nd\u2019\u00e9lite_; who has broken more bones across country than the six-foot\nstone walls of Connemara; whose pictures of that land \u201cwhich smiles\nthrough her tears like a sunbeam in showers\u201d are as racy of the soil as\nher own emerald shamrock; who has painted Irish girls pure as angels\u2019\nwhispers, bright as saucy streamlets, and the \u201cboys\u201d a bewildering\ncompound of fun, fight, frolic, and \u201cdivarshin\u201d; whose career was as\nstainless as his success was merited, and whose memory is an\nheirloom\u2014was born in the city of Dublin in the year of grace 1806.\nGraduating at Cambridge University, and subsequently at the\n_U_-niversity of G\u00f6ttingen, his student-life betrayed no symptoms of the\nmental _\u00e9lan_ which was to distinguish him later on, and, save for its\nBohemianism, was absolutely colorless, and even dull. The boy was not\nfather to the man. Selecting the medical profession as much by chance as\npredilection, he succeeded, during the visitation of cholera in 1832, in\nobtaining an appointment as medical superintendent in the northwest of\nIreland, in the districts of Londonderry and Coleraine, and for a time\ncontinued to \u201cguess at prescriptions, invent ingredients,\u201d and generally\nadminister to the requirements of afflicted humanity. But the task was\nuncongenial, the life a dead-level, flavored with no spice of variety,\nuncheckered in its monotonous routine. It was a \u201cbad billet, an\u2019 no\nChristian man cud live in it, barrin\u2019 a say-gull or a dispinsiry\ndocthor.\u201d Doctor Lever!\u2014pshaw! Charley Lever; who ever thinks of the\nauthor of _Harry Lorrequer_ as Doctor Lever? Nevertheless, his\nexperiences at this period bore him rich fruit in the after-time, and in\nBilly Traynor, \u201cpoet, peddler, and physician\u201d (_The Fortunes of\nGlencore_), we have a type of the medical men with whom he was then\nassociated. \u201cI am the nearest thing to a doctor going,\u201d says Billy. \u201cI\ncan breathe a vein against any man in the barony. I can\u2019t say that for\nany articular congestion of the aortis valve, or for a seropulmonic\ndiathesis, d\u2019ye mind, that there isn\u2019t as good as me; but for the ould\nschool of physic, the humoral diagnostic touch, who can beat me?\u201d The\nhedge-doctor and hedge-schoolmaster, pedants both, are now an\ninstitution of the past.\n\nCharles Lever, however, was not destined to blush unseen or waste his\nsweetness on a country practice. Appointed to the Legation at Brussels,\nhe bounded from the dreary drudgery of a dispensary to the glittering\ngayety of an embassy, from the hideous squalor of the fever-reeking\ncabin to the coquettish gravity of the palatial sick-room. In \u201cBelgium\u2019s\ncapital\u201d the _cacoethes scribendi_ seized him, and the result was _Harry\nLorrequer_. He awoke, and, like Lord Byron, found himself famous. The\ndistinct portraiture, the brilliant style, the thoroughly Hibernian\n_ensemble_, claimed a well-merited success for the book, and, written at\nthe right moment\u2014how many good works have perished by being floated on\nan ebb tide!\u2014the public, who had hitherto accepted Ireland through the\nclever but trashy effusions of Lady Morgan, and the more genuine metal\nof Maria Edgeworth and Samuel Lover, joyously turned towards the rising\nsun, and, seizing upon this genuine bit of shillelah, clamorously\ndemanded a fresh sprig from the same tree. The wild dash, as\nexhilarating as \u201cmountain dew,\u201d the breezy freshness, the gay _abandon_\nof society and soldiering, the \u201cmoving accidents by flood and field,\u201d\nacted upon the jaded palates of the British public like a tonic, and\n_Harry Lorrequer_, instead of being treated as an _entr\u00e9e_, became\nrespected as the _pi\u00e8ce de r\u00e9sistance_. Harry\u2019s appearance on parade\nwith the Othello blacking still upon his face; Miss Betty O\u2019Dowd\u2019s visit\nto Callonby on the \u201clow-backed car\u201d; her desire of disowning the\nnondescript vehicle, and its being announced by her shock-headed\nretainer as \u201cthe thing _you know_ is at the doore\u201d; the description of\nboarding-house life in Dublin sixty years ago; Mrs. Clanfrizzle\u2019s, in\nMolesworth Street\u2014the establishment is still in existence, and may be\nrecognized in Lisle House; the \u201camateur hotel,\u201d so graphically described\nby Mr. Lever; the picture of \u201cdear, dirty Dublin\u201d itself:\n\n\n \u201cOh! Dublin, sure there is no doubtin\u2019,\n Beats every city upon the say;\n \u2019Tis there you\u2019ll see O\u2019Connell spoutin\u2019\n And Lady Morgan making tay\u201d;\n\n\na night at Howth; the Knight of Kerry and Billy McCabe\u2014form a succession\nof sketches teeming with vivacity, humor, and wit, and dashed off with a\npen which almost makes a steeplechaser of the reader, so exciting and so\nrapid is the pace.\n\nTo Lever\u2019s official career at Brussels we are indebted for several\ndiplomatic portraits, notably those of Sir Horace Upton (_The Fortunes\nof Glencore_) and Sir Shally Doubleton (_A Day\u2019s Ride_); the former of\n\u201ca very composite order of human architecture, chivalrous in sentiment\nand cunning in action, noble in aspiration and utterly sceptical as\nregards motives, deep enough for a ministerial dinner and fast enough\nfor a party of young guardsmen at Greenwich,\u201d and the latter who could\nreceive a Foreign Office \u201cswell\u201d thus: \u201cPossibly your name may not be\nPaynter, sir; but you are evidently before me for the first time, or you\nwould know that, like my great colleague and friend, Prince Metternich,\nI have made it a rule through life never to burden my memory with what\ncan be spared it, and of these are the patronymics of all subordinate\npeople; for this reason, sir, and to this end, every cook in my\nestablishment answers to the name of Honor\u00e9, my valet is always Pierre,\nmy coachman Jacob, and all Foreign Office messengers I call Paynter.\u201d\nUpon the small-fry of diplomacy Mr. Lever is occasionally very severe,\nand his pictures of life at Hesse Kalbbratonstadt and similar\nunpronounceable principalities are as amusing as they are possibly\nrealistic.\n\nThe success of _Harry Lorrequer_ set its author at quill-driving in the\nsame direction, and _Charles O\u2019Malley, or The Irish Dragoon_, was given\nto the world. The very name sounds \u201cboot and saddle\u201d\u2014rings of the spur\nand clanks of the sabre. What a romance: the high-spirited lad who leads\nhis rival to the jaws of the grave in the hunting-field, and follows him\nin a ride of death against the unbroken front of Cambronne\u2019s battalions\non the blood-stained field of Waterloo! What a picture of the old\nPeninsular days! What portraits of _Le petit Caporal_, as the French\narmy loved to call Napoleon, of the \u201cIron Duke,\u201d the gallant Picton, and\nthe great captains of that eventful period! What glimpses of dark-eyed\nse\u00f1oritas and haughty hidalgos; of lion-hearted sons of Erin charging to\nthe cry of _Faugh a ballagh_, and leading forlorn hopes with saucy jokes\nupon their laughing lips; of \u201cConnaught Robbers,\u201d as the Connaught\nRangers were jocosely called, on account of the number of prisoners\nwhich they invariably made, and for the most part single-handed; of\nBrussels the night before Waterloo; and of the Duchess of Richmond\u2019s\ncelebrated ball:\n\n\n \u201cThere was a sound of revelry by night,\n And Belgium\u2019s capital had gathered then\n Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright\n The lamps shone o\u2019er fair women and brave men.\u201d\n\n\nWhat pictures of old Ireland\u2014of Daly\u2019s Club-House, the resort of the\nIrish members in College Green, still standing, but now converted into\ninsurance offices. \u201cI never pass the old club,\u201d said Sir Thomas Staples,\nthe last surviving member of the Irish House of Commons, to the writer,\n\u201cwithout picturing it as I remember it, when Grattan, and Curran, and\nIreland\u2019s best blood strolled in after a fiery debate, or rushed out on\nthe whisper of that awful word, \u2018division.\u2019 Very little would restore\nDaly\u2019s to its original shape; and who knows but it may yet be revived,\nif repeal of the Union be carried?\u201d Sir Thomas Staples is dead some\nyears, and the Home-Rule question had not come to the front whilst he\nwas yet numbered amongst the living. Shall we behold an Irish Parliament\nsitting once again in College Green? Shall Daly\u2019s club be restored to\nits former splendor? Shall we see Mr. Butt, Mr. Sullivan, Mr. Mitchell\nHenry, with many other earnest sons of Ireland, enrolled amongst its\nmembers?\n\nWho can forget the account of Godfrey O\u2019Malley\u2019s election, when, in\norder to avoid arrest for debt, he announced his own death in the\npapers, and, having travelled in the hearse to Connemara, reached his\nstronghold in the west, where bailiffs and process-servers foolhardy\nenough to cross the Shannon were compelled to eat their own writs under\npenalty of tar and feathers, and from whence he triumphantly addressed\nhis constituents, appealing to their sympathies and support on the very\npowerful plea of _having died for them_? There is a story extant of\nJackey Barrett which has not travelled far, if at all, beyond the walls\nof Trinity. Upon one occasion the vice-provost was dining off roast\nturkey in the glorious old Commons Hall, and next to him sat his nephew,\nthe heir expectant to his enormous wealth. The turkey was somewhat\nunderdone, and the nephew sent the drumsticks to be devilled. Some\nlittle delay occurred, which caused the vice-provost to observe to his\nkinsman with a malicious grin: \u201cThat devil is keeping you a long time\nwaiting.\u201d \u201cNot half as long as _you_ are keeping the devil waiting,\u201d was\nthe retort. Jackey never forgave him. What a creation is Mickey Free,\nthat devoted, warm-hearted, rollicking Irish follower, that son of song\nand story, who, by his own account, sang duets with the\ncommander-in-chief in the Peninsula, and wore a masterpiece of Murillo\nfor a seat to his trousers! Mickey was quoted recently, during a debate\nin the British House of Commons on the Eastern question by Major\nO\u2019Gorman, the jester-in-chief, _vice_ Mr. Bernal Osborne, the rejected\nof Irish constituencies:\n\n\n \u201cFor I haven\u2019t a janius for work\u2014\n It was never a gift of the Bradies;\n But I\u2019d make a most illigant Turk,\n For I\u2019m fond of tobacco and ladies.\u201d\n\n\nThe House roared, and even Mr. Disraeli, that was, allowed his parchment\nvisage to snap into smiling. Charles Lever informed the writer that he\noriginally intended Mickey Free for a mere stage servant, who comes on\nwith a tray or exits with a chair or a table; but upon discovering that\nMr. Free had made his mark he wrote him up. \u201cI never could give a\npublisher a complete novel all at once,\u201d said Mr. Lever, \u201calthough I\nhave been offered very large sums of money for one; I always wait to see\nhow my public like me, and write from month to month, trimming my sails\nto suit the popular breeze.\u201d\n\n_Charles O\u2019Malley_ was a brilliant success. A spirit of martial\nenthusiasm inflated the minds of the rising generation, until to be a\ndragoon became the day-dream of existence, and many an embryo warrior\nwho failed in obtaining a commission compromised with a cruel destiny by\naccepting the queen\u2019s shilling. The charm of the book is complete; and\nfor break-neck, dashing narrative, for wit, sparkle, and genuine Irish\ndrollery, interspersed here and there with tender touches of pathos and\nsoft gray tones of sorrow, _Charles O\u2019Malley_ stands unrivalled, and\nwill hold its own when hundreds of so-called Irish romances shall have\nreturned to the dust out of which they should never have emerged, even\ninto a spasmodic vitality.\n\nPerhaps the only smart thing ever uttered by King George III. was when\nhe taxed Sheridan with being afraid of the author of the _School for\nScandal_; and perhaps Lever was afraid of the author of _Charles\nO\u2019Malley_, as he published _Con Cregan_, _Maurice Tiernay_, _Sir Jasper\nCarew_, and one or two other novels anonymously; but a quickwitted\npublic, detecting the ring of the true metal, compelled \u201cHarry\nLorrequer\u201d to stand revealed. Novel followed novel in quick succession,\nIreland providing the mine from which he dug his golden ore; and\nalthough he carries his readers to fairer climes and sunnier skies,\nsomehow or other he contrives to land them safely and soundly in the\n\u201could counthry\u201d at last. We have not space, nor is it our province, to\ndeal with Lever\u2019s works in detail. No modern productions of fiction have\ngained a greater or more popular reputation for their writer. By no\nIrish author is he equalled in Irish humor, by no author is he surpassed\nin unwearying narrative. The foreign tone infused into some of his later\nproductions is due to his residence in Italy. \u201cYou wish to have nothing\nto do, Lever? There is eight hundred a year; go and do it,\u201d said the\nlate Lord Derby, bestowing the vice-consulship of Spezzia upon him.\nLater on he was promoted to Trieste.\n\nFor a time Charles Lever edited the _Dublin University Magazine_, then a\ncoruscation of all that was brilliant in literature. He resided at the\nvillage of Templeogue, situated in the lap of the Dublin mountains, with\nSugar Loaf at one extremity, and Mount Pelier, with its ruined castle\nrenowned for the orgies of the infamously-celebrated \u201cHell-fire Club,\u201d\nat the other. Templeogue Lodge was the Mecca towards which all \u201cchoice\nspirits\u201d devoutly turned, and the wit, repartee, song, jest, and story\ncirculated within its walls made the _Noctes Ambrosian\u00e6_ but dull\naffairs in comparison. \u201cOne little room rises to recollection, with its\nquaint old sideboard of carved oak, its dark-brown cabinets, curiously\nsculptured, its heavy old brocade curtains, and all its queer devices of\nknick-knackery, where such meetings were once held, and where, throwing\noff the cares of life\u2014shut out from them, as it were, by the massive\nfolds of the heavy drapery across the door\u2014we talked in all the fearless\nfreedom of old friendship.\u201d There are a few still surviving who will\nrecognize that room, and recall with a throb of painful pleasure the\nnights at the little lodge at Templeogue.\n\nLever was fond of portraying banished heroes, misanthropes\u2014men who had\ndug their own graves, or, overtaken by some whirlwind of misfortune,\n\u201cgave signs that all was lost.\u201d The character of Lord Glencore is\nadmirably drawn, and his life of torture in his mad cry for vengeance\nfearfully vivid. _Luttrell of Arran_ is the story of a disappointed\nlife, from out of which springs a bright flower of maidenhood\u2014Kate, one\nof Lever\u2019s most charming creations. Again, we have the _Knight of\nGwynne_, over whose gentle head wave after wave of hard fortune\npitilessly breaks, and, driven from the lordly home of his ancestors to\na sheeling by the sad sea-wave, he is as cheerful in adversity as he was\nnoble in prosperity. The portrait of the fire-eating Bagenal Daly is not\noverdrawn, and the introduction of Freeny the robber, although highly\nmelodramatic, is not only possible but probable. Freeny\u2019s \u201ccharacter\u201d\nstood remarkably high. He would rob a rich miser to save a poor family\nfrom starvation, and his word was as good as his bond; \u201898 turned many a\nman upon the king\u2019s highway who, but for being \u201cout,\u201d would have lived\nrespecting and respected. The _Martins of Cro\u2019 Martin_ is another\nghastly narrative of the wreck and ruin of a proud old Irish race. It is\n\u201can owre true\u201d story. A few miles outside of the town of Galway, on the\nroad to Oughterard, stand two gaunt pillars surmounted by granite\nglobes. The gates have disappeared, as also the armorial bearings; but\nthis was formerly the entrance to Ballinahinch, the seat of the \u201could,\nanshint\u201d Martins, and from that gate to Ballinahinch Castle was a drive\nof forty Irish miles. The castle, situated in one of the loneliest and\nloveliest valleys in Connemara, was maintained in a style of regal\nmagnificence, the stables, marble-stalled, affording accommodation for\nsixty hunters. On an island, in the centre of a small lake opposite the\ncastle, stands a desolate, half-ruined keep, within the four walls of\nwhich such of his retainers or neighbors as proved refractory were\nimprisoned by \u201cThe Martin\u201d of the period. Recklessness and improvidence\nscattered the broad acres, mortgage overlapped mortgage, and every inch\nof the grand old estate became the property of the London Law Life\nAssurance Society. Notably the last of the family was Richard Martin,\ncommonly known as \u201cHumanity Dick,\u201d in reference to a bill introduced by\nhim into the British House of Commons for the repression of cruelty to\nanimals. Upon the occasion of its introduction the English members\nessayed to cough him down. \u201cI perceive,\u201d said Mr. Martin, \u201cthat many of\nyou seem troubled with severe coughs; now, if any _one_ gentleman will\ncough distinctly, so that I may be able to recognize him, I can give him\na pill which may, perhaps, effectually prevent his ever being again\ntroubled with a cough on this side of the grave.\u201d Mr. Martin\u2019s\nprescription was at once effectual.\n\nWith \u201cHumanity Dick\u2019s\u201d granddaughter perished the race; and her name is\nstill breathed in Connemara as a prayer, as one \u201cwho never opened a\ncabin-door without a blessing, nor closed it but to shut hope within.\u201d\nThe farm-house where she was nursed is still fondly pointed out, and\n\u201cMiss Martin\u2019s lep\u201d\u2014she was a superb horsewoman\u2014is proudly shown to\nevery \u201cspalpeen\u201d of an Englishman who travels that wild, bleak, and\ndesolate road between Oughterard and Clifden. Mr. Lever, with that magic\nall his own, has told the sad story. _His_ Mary Martin is but the\nportrait of that fair young Irish girl who dearly loved \u201cher people\u201d\nunto the last, and who, in the bright blossom of her life, died an exile\nfrom that western home which was at once her idol and her pride. Where\nbut in Ireland could this sad and solemn gathering around the bedside of\na dying girl take place?\n\n \u201cAnd yet there was a vast multitude of people there. The whole\n surface of the lawn that sloped from the cottage to the river\n was densely crowded with every age, from the oldest to the very\n infancy; with all conditions, from the well-clad peasant to the\n humblest \u2018tramper\u2019 of the highroads. Weariness, exhaustion, and\n even hunger were depicted on many of their faces. Some had\n passed the night there, others had come long distances, faint\n and foot-sore; but, as they sat, stood, or lay in groups around,\n not a murmur, not a whisper, escaped them. With aching eyes they\n looked towards an open window where the muslin curtains were\n gently stirred in the faint air. The tidings of Mary Martin\u2019s\n illness had spread rapidly; far-away glens down the coast,\n lonely cabins on the bleak mountains, wild, remote spots out of\n human intercourse, had heard the news, and their dwellers had\n travelled many a mile to satisfy their aching hearts.\u201d\n\nThis is Ireland. This is the undying affection of the people for the\n\u201crale ould stock.\u201d This is the imperishable sentiment, as fresh at this\nhour as the emerald verdure upon the summit of Croagh Patrick.\n\nIn _A Day\u2019s Ride: a Life\u2019s Romance_, Mr. Lever has given us Algernon\nSydney Potts\u2014one of those romantic visionaries who believe in destiny,\nbow to their _Kismet_, and, going with the tide, clothe the meanest\naccidents of life in dreamy panoply. The adventures which befall the\nDublin apothecary\u2019s son, from his ride in Wicklow to his imprisonment in\nan Austrian fortress, are as varied as they are exciting, and we are\nstrongly inclined to believe that Lever, \u201cletting off\u201d a good deal of\nBohemia, is at his best in the wild vagaries of this reckless\nday-dreamer. _Tom Burke of Ours_ is a dashing military story, as is also\n_Jack Hinton, the Guardsman_. _The O\u2019Donoghue_ is charmingly written and\nis thoroughly Irish. _That Boy of Norcott\u2019s_ is unsatisfactory.\nCommencing in Ireland, it wanders from the old country with the evident\nintention of returning to it; but a change came o\u2019er the spirit of the\nauthor\u2019s dream, and it bears all the imprint of having been hastily\nwritten, a changed venue, and of being \u201churried up\u201d at its conclusion.\n_Sir Brook Fosbrooke_, on the other hand, bears traces of the utmost\ncare, the details of character being worked out with microscopic\nminuteness. The old lord chief-justice is supposed to have been meant\nfor Lord Chief-Justice Lefroy, of the Court of Queen\u2019s Bench in Ireland,\nwho died at a very advanced age a few years since, in full possession of\nthe astounding legal acumen which marked his extended career at the bar,\nand subsequently upon the bench.\n\nThe writer spent a long-to-be-remembered day with Charles Lever in the\nApril before his death. He was stopping in Dublin at Morrison\u2019s Hotel,\nDawson Street. We found him seated at an open window, a bottle of claret\nat his right hand and the proof-sheets of _Lord Kilgobbin_ before him.\nIt was a beautiful morning borrowed from the month of May; the hawthorns\nin the college park were just beginning to bloom, and nature was young\nand warm and lovely.\n\nAt the date of our visit he looked a hale, hearty, laughter-loving man\nof sixty. There was mirth in his gray eye, joviality, in the wink that\ntwittered on his eyelid, saucy humor in his smile, and bon mot, wit,\nrepartee, and rejoinder in every movement of his lips. His hair very\nthin, but of a silky brown, fell across his forehead, and when it\ncurtained his eyes he would jerk back his head\u2014this, too, at some\ntelling crisis in a narrative when the particular action was just the\nexact finish required to make the story perfect. Mr. Lever\u2019s teeth were\nall his own, and very brilliant, and, whether from habit or accident, he\nflashed them upon us in company with his wonderful eyes\u2014a battery at\nonce both powerful and irresistible. He spoke slowly at first, but\nwarming to his work, and candying an idea in a short, contagious,\nmusical laugh, his story told itself all too rapidly, and the light\nburned out with such a glare as to intensify the succeeding darkness.\nLike all good _raconteurs_, he addressed himself deferentially to his\nauditor in the beginning, and as soon as the fish was hooked, the\nattention enthralled, he would speak as if thinking aloud. Mr. Lever\nmade great use of his hands, which were small and white and delicate as\nthose of a woman. He made play with them\u2014threw them up in ecstasy or\nwrung them in mournfulness, just as the action of the moment demanded.\nHe did not require eyes or teeth with such a voice and such hands; they\ncould tell and illustrate the workings of his brain. He was somewhat\ncareless in his dress, but clung to the traditional high shirt-collar,\nmerely compromising the unswerving stock of the Brummel period. \u201cI stick\nto my Irish shoes,\u201d he said, thrusting upwards about as uncompromising a\n\u201cbit of leather\u201d as we have ever set eyes on right under our nose, \u201cand\nuntil a few years ago I got them from a descendant of the celebrated\nCount Lally, who cobbled at Letterkenny. There is no shoe in the world\nequal to the Irish brogue.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are \u2018taking time by the forelock,\u2019 as we say in the play,\u201d said the\nwriter, pointing to the rough copy of the _Cornhill Magazine_, in which\nthe story was running.\n\n\u201cAlways at the heel of the hunt,\u201d he replied. \u201cThis is the May number,\nand not corrected yet.\u201d\n\n\u201cI consider _Lord Kilgobbin_ as good as, if not better than, anything\nyou have written.\u201d\n\nThere was unutterable sadness in his tone and gesture as he said, with a\nweary sigh:\n\n\u201cAh! I have been tilting the cask so long that the lees are coming out\nvery muddy.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhich of your novels do you like best?\u201d was asked.\n\n\u201cWell, my most careful work is _Sir Brook Fosbrooke_, but I prefer the\n_Dodd Family Abroad_, and all for the sake of Carry Dodd, who is my\nideal of a pure, bright, charming Irish girl.\u201d\n\nFurther on:\n\n\u201cYou are the same reckless, rollicking, warm-hearted, improvident people\nas when I left you, and the lower orders entertain the same hatred of\nSaxon supremacy. I was walking down College Green yesterday, and as I\nstood opposite the old Parliament House, a troop of dragoons, in all\ntheir panoply of glancing helmets, blood-red coats, and prancing steeds,\ntrotted past. A ragged, tatterdemalion carman was feeding a horse only\nfit for the knacker\u2019s yard, attached to an outside car, with a wisp of\nhay.\n\n\u201c\u2018What regiment is that?\u2019 I asked, partly from curiosity, partly for the\nsake of a conversation.\n\n\u201c\u2018Sorra a know I know,\u2019 was the gruff response.\n\n\u201c\u2018Where are they going to?\u2019\n\n\u201cWithout raising his head, and giving a vicious chuck to the hay:\n\n\u201c\u2018To h\u2014l, I hope.\u2019\n\n\u201cI will give you another illustration,\u201d continued Mr. Lever, \u201cof how\ndeterminedly the lower order of my countrymen disparage anything and\neverything English. I was invited to spend some days with the late Lord\nCarlisle, twice your Lord Lieutenant, at Castle Howard, in Yorkshire. I\nhad at that time an Irish servant, a son of Corny Delany, to whom\ngrumbling was chronic. As we drove through the magnificent avenue\nbeneath the extending branches of giant oaks and lordly elms, I observed\nto my follower: \u2018What do you think of those trees?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018I see thim.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Are they not splendid?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Och! threes is threes anywhere.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018But the Howards are proud of these trees; they are the finest in\nEngland. Lord Carlisle sets great store by them.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Arrah, thin, why wudn\u2019t he have the hoighth av fine threes? Shure\nhadn\u2019t he the _pick av the Phaynix Park_?\u2019\n\n\u201cI was dining with Judge \u2014\u2014 on Sunday, who, as you know, is a very\ndiminutive, shrivelled-up-looking little man,\u201d continued Mr. Lever, \u201cand\nhe told me an amusing story. When attorney-general, he purchased an\nestate in Tipperary near Clonmel. Shortly after the purchase he resolved\nupon paying the place a visit to take a look at his recent acquisition.\nAs he was proceeding with his agent through a _boreen_ which led to\nmearings of his property, he overheard the following conversation\nbetween two old women:\n\n\u201c\u2018Wisha, thin, d\u2019ye tell me that\u2019s the new landlord, Missis Mulligan?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018Sorra a lie in it, ma\u2019am.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018That dawny little bit av a crayture?\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018A leprechaun, no less.\u2019\n\n\u201c\u2018_Why, begorra, the boys might as well be shootin\u2019 at a jacksnipe._\u2019\u201d\n\nMr. Lever\u2019s conversational powers were simply marvellous; his anecdotes\nfell like ripe fruit from an overladen tree. In London his great delight\nwas a night at the Cosmopolitan Club, Berkeley Square. This club is only\nopen upon Wednesday and Sunday nights during the Parliamentary session.\nThe members stroll in from eleven o\u2019clock at night to about three\no\u2019clock A.M. Cabinet ministers, ambassadors of all nations, members of\nthe legislature, eminent _litt\u00e9rateurs_, Royal Academicians, repair\nthither for a gossip; and here, amidst the best talkers in the world,\nCharles Lever stood pre-eminent. As the wits and _raconteurs_ at Will\u2019s\nCoffee House were silent whilst Joseph Addison talked _Spectator_, so\nthe members of the Cosmopolitan maintained a breathless attention when\nCharles Lever talked _Cornelius O\u2019Dowd_; and many a man has \u201cdined out\nconsiderably\u201d upon a _mot_, and has, perhaps, established a reputation,\nby the retailing of an anecdote recounted within the _salons_ of the\nclub by the inimitable and fascinating \u201cHarry Lorrequer.\u201d When the\nwriter parted with Lever upon that evening, he felt justifiably elated\nat being enabled to amuse, if not astonish, the most brilliant man of\nthe day, but, upon a rigid self-examination, was somewhat disappointed\nupon discovering that, instead of his having been engaged in\nentertaining Lever, Lever had been entertaining _him_, and that he had\nnot uttered a single sentence out of the veriest commonplace. Such was\nthe charm of Lever\u2019s manner that he took you, as it were, from out\nyourself, and for the time infused his own groove of thought, causing\nyour ideas to mingle with his and float joyously onward upon the\nglittering current of his conversation. Lever was a devoted worshipper\nof the \u201csad solemnities of whist,\u201d playing rubber after rubber up to any\nand all hours. It is related that an eminent wearer of the ermine, a\nfellow of Trinity College, a gallant field officer, and Lever met, dined\nearly, and played whist until the hour at which the train departed for\nKingston by which \u201cHarry Lorrequer\u201d was to leave _en route_ for London.\n\u201cCome on to Kingston,\u201d said Lever, \u201csleep at the Anglesea Arms Hotel,\nand I will not go until the morning boat.\u201d They played all night and\nuntil one o\u2019clock next day. _Si non e vero e ben trovato_, but the\nwriter has the story from unimpeachable authority.\n\nCharles Lever\u2019s _last_ novel, concluded shortly before his death, is\n_Lord Kilgobbin_. Let its unutterably sad preface speak for itself:\n\n\u201cTo the memory of one whose companionship made the happiness of a long\nlife, and whose loss has made me helpless, I dedicate this book, written\nin breaking health and broken spirits. The task that once was my joy and\nmy pride I have lived to find associated with my sorrow. It is not,\nthen, without a cause I say, I hope this effort may be my last.\u2014TRIESTE,\nJanuary 20, 1872.\u201d\n\nIt is with a pang of regret that we peruse the _Cornelius O\u2019Dowd_\npapers. They are tinged with that abominable spirit which is sending\nItaly at the present hour to perdition, and we greatly fear that Mr.\nLever wrote them for the London market. He was no bigot, however; on the\ncontrary, his life was passed amongst Catholics, and his dearest and\nbest friends were of the true church; consequently, the pain is\nintensified when we come to stand face to face with the fact that these\npapers were, if not the outcome of a pecuniary necessity, at least the\nresult of a craving for money, and the hollow effusions of a\nhirelingpen. His Italian sojourn led him gradually away from the more\nkindly tone towards Catholics which pervaded his earlier Irish novels.\n\nLever and Griffin have been compared as writers of Irish fiction. We\nwould rather have been the author of _The Collegians_ than of any work\nof Mr. Lever\u2019s. There is a virgin simplicity in Gerald Griffin\u2019s style\nthat \u201cHarry Lorrequer\u201d could not touch; an atmosphere which he could not\nbreathe; a purity which, while the _morale_ of Lever\u2019s writings is\nunimpeachable, is of that order that is so rarely attained by the most\nchaste and most elevated amongst our writers of fiction. Griffin\u2019s Irish\nis not stagy\u2014it is real; so, too, is Lever\u2019s. But while the former\npaints the portrait, leaving the imagination of the reader to put in the\nfinishing touches, the latter rubs in a laugh here or a keen thrust\nthere, so as to dramatize the picture; and, while it is more vivid\nduring perusal, the mind falls back upon the other for less exciting\n_pabulum_.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n ORDER.\n\n FROM A POEM BY ST. FRANCIS D\u2019ASSISI.\n\n _Our Lord Speaks_:\n\n\n And though I fill thy heart with warmest love,\n Yet in true order must thy heart love me;\n For without order can no virtue be.\n By thine own virtue, then, I from above\n Stand in thy soul; and so, most earnestly,\n Must love from turmoil be kept wholly free.\n The life of fruitful trees, the seasons of\n The circling year, move gently as a dove.\n I measured all the things upon the earth;\n Love ordered them, and order kept them fair,\n And love to order must be truly wed.\n O soul! why all this heat of little worth?\n Why cast out order with no thought or care?\n For by love\u2019s warmth must love be govern\u00e8d.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE LITTLE CHAPEL AT MONAMULLIN.\n\nSituated in the wildest portion of the county of Mayo, Monamullin, at\nthe date upon which this story opens, mustered about forty mud-cabins\nerected here and there, and in such positions as were deemed most\nsuitable, having regard to the cruel winds from the ocean, and the \u201cbit\no\u2019 ground\u201d for the cultivation of the potatoes.\n\nA cottage covered with a crisp amber thatch, and whitewashed to the\ncolor of the driven snow, held the post of honor in the village. It\nboasted a flower-garden in front and a vegetable patch in the rear.\nMoreover, it was guarded by a neatly-cropped privet hedge, while a\nlittle green gate admitted to a red-bricked pathway leading to a rustic\nporch adorned with roses that seemingly bloomed the whole year round,\nand a Virginia creeper whose leaves were now the hue of blood.\n\nIn the front garden, his head bared, the rays of the setting sun\nsurrounding it as with an aureole, stalked a man attired in the black\nflowing soutane of a Catholic clergyman.\n\nFather Maurice O\u2019Donnell, the parish priest, was engaged in reading his\noffice from a tattered and dog\u2019s-eared breviary. Tall and thin almost to\nemaciation, there was yet a wiry swing in his gaunt frame that spoke of\nunfaded vigor, whilst the glowing fire in the dark blue eye told its own\ntale.\n\n\u201cFather Maurice\u201d was loved and cherished by his little flock. His every\nwant\u2014and his wants were few enough\u2014was anxiously anticipated. His patch\nof oats was tilled, weeded, cut, and stacked, his cottage thatched and\nwhitewashed, his potatoes planted, his pony treated as common property\nin so far as fodder was concerned, while upon fast-days the \u201cfinest lump\nav a salmin\u201d or the \u201cilligantest\u201d turbot, ever found its way to the back\ndoor of \u201cThe House,\u201d as his humble abode was somewhat grandiloquently\nstyled.\n\nMaurice O\u2019Donnell was wrapped up in his flock. In good sooth he was\ntheir shepherd. Night, noon, and morning found him ever watchful at \u201cthe\ngate in the vineyard wall.\u201d He was the depositary of all their griefs,\nthe sharer in all their joys\u2014their guide, philosopher, and friend. In\nworldly matters he was simple as a child. Living, as he did, out of the\nworld, he was perfectly contented to learn what was whirling round\nwithin it from the pages of the _Nation_, from the columns of which it\nwas his practice to read aloud on Sunday afternoon to a very large\nmuster, if not to the entire adult population, of Monamullin\u2014in summer\ntime seated in a coign of vantage by the sad sea-wave, in winter\nopposite a rousing turf fire laid on especially for the important\noccasion, and with a great display of ceremony by his housekeeper, \u201can\nould widdy wumman\u201d rejoicing in the name of Clancy, whose husband had\nbeen lost at sea in the night of \u201cthe great storm.\u201d\n\nFather Maurice never asked for money\u2014he had no occasion for it. His\nsolitary extravagance was snuff, and the most sedulous care was taken by\nthe \u201cboys\u201d returning from Castlebar or Westport to fetch back a supply\nof \u201chigh toast,\u201d in order that his \u201criverince\u2019s box\u201d might stand\nconstantly replenished.\n\nUpon this particular August evening Father Maurice was hurrying through\nhis office with as much rapidity as the solemn nature of the duty would\npermit, as a drive of no less than seven honest Irish miles lay between\nhim and his dinner.\n\nThe even tenor of his life had been broken in upon by an invitation to\ndine and sleep at the palatial residence of Mr. Jocelyn Jyvecote, a\nYorkshire squire, who had purchased the old acres of the Blakes of\nBallinacor, and who had recently expended a fabulous sum in erecting a\ncastle upon the edge of a gloomy lake in the desolate valley of\nGlendhanarrahsheen. In his letter of invitation Mr. Jyvecote had said:\n\u201cI am extremely desirous of introducing my youngest daughter to you, as\nshe has taken it into her head to go over to your church; and, since you\nare so devoted to _her_ interests, I beg of you to accept this\ninvitation as you would undertake a little extra duty.\u201d\n\nTo decline would be worse than ungracious, especially under the peculiar\ncircumstances of the case, and it was with a heavy heart, and not\nwithout a keen debate with Mr. Lawrence Muldoon, the \u201cwarm\u201d man of the\nvillage, in which the _pros_ and _cons_ were duly and gravely weighed,\nthat the worthy priest replied in the affirmative. While Father Maurice\nwas engaged in pacing his little garden, Mrs. Clancy, his housekeeper,\nwas calmly preparing for a steady but copious enjoyment of her evening\nmeal in the kitchen, which from floor to ceiling, from fireplace to\ndresser\u2014shining again with crockery of the willow pattern\u2014was, to use\nher own expression, \u201cas nate as a new-biled egg.\u201d A large brown\nearthenware teapot had just been promoted from the hob to a table\n\u201cconvaynient\u201d to the window. A huge platter of stirabout, with a lump of\nbutter oiling itself in the middle, stood within easy reach of her right\nhand, while a square of griddle-bread occupied a like position upon her\nleft, and a wooden bowl full of jacket-bursted potatoes formed the near\nbackground.\n\nMrs. Clancy was strong upon tea, and in the village her opinion upon\nthis as upon most other subjects was unwritten law. She was particularly\nfond of a dash of green through a full-flavored Pekoe, preparing the\nmixture with her own fair hands with a solemn gravity befitting so\nserious an undertaking. She was now about to try a sample of Souchong\nwhich had just arrived from Westport, and her condition of mind was akin\nto that of an analytical chemist upon the eve of some exceedingly\nimportant result.\n\nMrs. Clancy had seated herself in that cosy attitude peculiar to elderly\nfemales about to enjoy, to them, that most inviting of all meals, and\nhad already ascertained, upon anxious reference to the teapot, that its\ncontents had been sufficiently drawn, when the door was thrust somewhat\nviolently open, and Murty Mulligan, the \u201cpriest\u2019s boy,\u201d unceremoniously\nentered the _sanctum_.\n\nMurty was handy-man and _factotum_. He \u201cswep out\u201d the chapel, rang the\nbell, attended Mass, groomed the pony, dug the potatoes, landed the\ncabbage, and made himself generally useful.\n\nAlthough designated a \u201cboy,\u201d he had allowed\u2014not that he could claim any\nparticular option in the matter\u2014some forty-five summers to roll over his\nhead, every one of which, in addition to their attendant winters, had\nbeen passed in the peaceful little village of Monamullin. His travels\nhad never extended further than Westport, which he regarded as a vast\ncommercial seaport\u2014a Liverpool, in fact\u2014and it was his habit to place it\nin comparison with any city of note that might come upon the _tapis_,\nextolling its dimensions and dilating upon its unlimited importance.\n\nMurty\u2019s appearance savored much of the stage Irishman\u2019s. His eyes\nsparkled comically, his nose was tip-tilted\u2014Mr. Tennyson will excuse the\napplication of the simile\u2014while his mouth was large and always open. His\nforehead was rather low, and his ears stood out upon either side of his\nhead like the orifices of air-shafts. He was now arrayed in his bravest\nattire, as he had been told off to drive his reverence to Moynalty\nCastle. His brogues were as highly greased as his hair, and his\nSunday\u2014last Mass\u2014clothes, consisting of a gray frieze body-coat with\nbrass buttons, a flowered silk waistcoat, corduroy knee-breeches, and\nblue worsted stockings, looked as fresh as if they had been donned for\nthe first time.\n\nNot a little vain of the importance of his office, combined with the\ngeneral effect of his appearance, he swaggered into the kitchen in a\nmanner totally at variance with his usual custom, as Mrs. Clancy was\nevery inch queen of this realm, and a potentate who exercised her\nprerogative with right royal despotism.\n\nThe \u201cconsait\u201d was considerably taken out of Murty by being met with an\nangry, contemptuous stare and \u201cWhat ails ye, Murty Mulligan?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s time for to bring round the yoke, ma\u2019am,\u201d replied Murty in an\nabashed and respectful tone, eyeing the teapot with a wistful glance, as\nhe was particularly partial to a cup of the beverage it distilled,\nespecially when brewed by Mrs. Clancy.\n\n\u201cWell, av it is, bring it round,\u201d was the tart rejoinder.\n\n\u201cI dunna how far he\u2019s upon his office,\u201d said Murty.\n\n\u201cYe\u2019d betther ax, Murty Mulligan.\u201d\n\n\u201cI dar\u2019n\u2019t disturb him, Mrs. Clancy, an\u2019 ye know that as well as I do\nmeself, ma\u2019am.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, don\u2019t bother me, anyhow,\u201d observed the lady, proceeding to pour\nout a cup of tea.\n\n\u201cIs that the tay I brought ye from Westport, ma\u2019am?\u201d demanded Murty,\nupon whom the sight of the rich brown fluid and its pungent aroma were\nproducing longing effects.\n\nMrs. Clancy took a preliminary sip with the sound of a person\nendeavoring to suck a coy oyster from a clinging shell.\n\n\u201cSorra worse tay I ever wetted,\u201d she retorted. \u201cThere\u2019s no more\nsubstance in it nor in chopped sthraw. I\u2019ll never take a grain o\u2019 tay\nout o\u2019 Westport agin\u2014sorra a wan.\u201d\n\n\u201cI done me best for ye, anyhow, ma\u2019am. I axed Misther Foley himself for\nthe shupariorest tay in the town, an\u2019 he gim me what\u2019s in that pot; an\u2019,\nfaix, it smells rosy an\u2019 well.\u201d And Murty sniffed, as if he would drive\nthe aroma up through his nostrils out to the top of his head.\n\nMrs. Clancy turned to Murty with a frowning and ominous aspect, the\nglare of an intense irritation blazing in her face.\n\n\u201cDo ye know what I think ye done, Murty Mulligan? It\u2019s me belief ye done\nit, an\u2019 if ye tuk the buke to the conthrairy I wudn\u2019t credit ye,\u201d\nplacing her arms akimbo and fixing him with her eye.\n\n\u201cWhat is it I done, Mrs. Clancy?\u201d demanded Murty boldly, flinging his\ncaubeen upon the floor and assuming a defiant attitude. \u201cWhat is it I\ndone, ma\u2019am?\u201d\n\nThe housekeeper regarded him steadily, while she said in a slow and\nsolemn tone of impeachment:\n\n\u201cYe got me infayrior tay, an\u2019 ye tuk a pint out av the change.\u201d\n\nIt was Murty\u2019s turn to become indignant now.\n\n\u201cI\u2019d scorn for to do the likes of so mane an action, Mrs. Clancy.\nThere\u2019s them that wud do the like, but I\u2019d have ye know, ma\u2019am, that me\nfather\u2019s son wud rather be as dhry as a cuckoo, ma\u2019am, nor demane\nhimself in that way. Yer sentiments, ma\u2019am, is very hurtful to me\nfeelin\u2019s, an\u2019 I\u2019d as lieve ye\u2019d call me a thief at wanst, ma\u2019am, as for\nto run down me karakter in that a-way.\u201d\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t want for to call ye nothin\u2019, but I repate that\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cDon\u2019t repate nothin\u2019, ma\u2019am. Av ye wur a man I\u2019d give ye a crack in the\ngob for daarin\u2019 to asperge me karakter, more betokin all for the sake av\nthe filthy lucre av a pint of porther. Porther, indeed!\u201d added Murty.\n\u201cI\u2019m goin\u2019 to-day, ma\u2019am, where I\u2019ll get me fill av port wine, an\u2019\nsherry wine, and Madayrial wine, ma\u2019am; an\u2019 dickins resave the word I\u2019ll\ntell ye av the goin\u2019s-on at the castle beyant for yer thratemint av me\nthis blessed evenin\u2019, Mrs. Clancy.\u201d\n\nThis threat upon the part of Murty threw the housekeeper into the\nuttermost consternation. The proceedings at Moynalty Castle were fraught\nwith the deepest interest to her; for in addition to her personal\ncuriosity, which was rampant, it was necessary that she should become\nacquainted with everything that took place, in order to retail her\nspecial knowledge to her cronies in the village, who awaited the\nhousekeeper\u2019s report in eager and hopeful expectation.\n\nHad she burnt her boats? Had she cut down the bridge behind her?\n\nMurty Mulligan\u2019s tone was resolute.\n\n\u201cMurty, Murty avic! shure it\u2019s only jokin\u2019 I was\u2014sorra a more,\u201d she said\nin a coaxing way.\n\nMurty grunted.\n\n\u201cShure yer welkim to yer pint av\u2014\u201d\n\nMurty confronted her:\n\n\u201cI tell ye, Missis Clancy, that I tuk nothin\u2019, nayther bit, bite, nor\nsup, from the time I et me brekquest till I met Misther Fogarty\u2019s own\nboy, and he thrated me. Av I tuk a pint out av yer lucre, ma\u2019am, I\u2019d say\nit at wanst, wudout batin\u2019 about the bush.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s enough, Murty; say no more about the tay. They gev ye a bad\nmatarial, Murty, an\u2019 shure that\u2019s none o\u2019 you\u2019re fault. Here,\u201d she\nadded, pouring out a saucerful\u2014the saucer being about the dimensions of\na large soup-plate\u2014and presenting it to him; \u201cput that to yer mouth an\u2019\nsay is it worth three hapence an ounce?\u201d\n\n\u201cSorra a care I care,\u201d growled Murty, but in a much softer tone.\n\n\u201cThry it, anyhow,\u201d urged the housekeeper.\n\n\u201cI don\u2019t care a _thraneen_ for tay, Mrs. Clancy,\u201d said Murty, throwing a\nglance full of profound meaning towards a small press in which Mrs.\nClancy kept a supply of cordials.\n\n\u201cAh!\u201d exclaimed that lady, \u201cI see be the twist in yer eye that ye want\nsomethin\u2019 to put betune yer shammy an\u2019 the cowld. Ye have a long road to\nthravel, Murty, so a little sup o\u2019 ginger cordial will warm it for ye,\navic.\u201d And while the now thoroughly pacified Murty gently remonstrated,\nMrs. Clancy proceeded to the cupboard, and, pouring a _golliogue_ of the\ngrateful compound into a tea-cup, handed it to Murty, who tossed it off\nwith a smack that would have started a coach and four.\n\n\u201cSo ye\u2019ll stop the night at the castle?\u201d observed the housekeeper in a\ncareless tone.\n\n\u201cYis, ma\u2019am.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a fine billet, Murty.\u201d\n\n\u201cSorra a finer. Shure it bates Lord Sligo\u2019s an\u2019 Mitchell Hinry\u2019s beyant\nat Kylemore; an\u2019 as for atin\u2019 an\u2019 dhrinkin\u2019, be me song they say that\nlamb-chops is as plentiful as cabbages is here, an\u2019 that there\u2019s as much\nsperrits in it as wud float ould Mickey Killeher\u2019s lugger.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a quare thing for Misther Jyvecote for to be axin\u2019 Father Maurice\nto a forrin\u2019 cunthry like that, Murty.\u201d\n\n\u201cTroth, thin, it is quare, ma\u2019am; but, shure, mebbe he wants for to be\nconvarted.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat must be it; an\u2019 he\u2019d be bet intirely, av Father Maurice wasn\u2019t\nthere for to back his tack. His sermon last Sunda\u2019 was fit for the Pope\no\u2019 Room.\u201d\n\n\u201cI never heerd the like av it. It flogged Europe. Whisht!\u201d suddenly\ncried Murty, \u201cwho\u2019s this comin\u2019 up the shore?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a forriner,\u201d exclaimed the housekeeper, after a prolonged\nscrutiny\u2014meaning by the term foreigner that the person who was now\napproaching the cottage was not an inhabitant of the village. \u201cA fine,\nsouple boy,\u201d she added admiringly.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a gintleman, an\u2019 he has a lump av a stick in his hand,\u201d said\nMurty.\n\n\u201cArrah! what wud bring a gintleman _here_, ye omadhawn?\u201d observed Mrs.\nClancy with some asperity.\n\n\u201cA thraveller, thin,\u201d suggested her companion. \u201cHe\u2019s a bag on his back.\u201d\n\n\u201cTroth, it\u2019s badly off he\u2019d be for thravellin\u2019, if he come here for to\ndo the like.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s makin\u2019 for the gate.\u201d\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s riz the latch.\u201d\n\n\u201cI\u2019ll run out, Mrs. Clancy, and bring ye the hard word, while ye\u2019d be\naxin\u2019 for the lind av a sack.\u201d\n\n\u201cAy, do, Murty avic; an\u2019 I\u2019ll have a cup av Dimpsy\u2019s tay wet be the time\nyer back.\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\nFather Maurice had just finished the perusal of his office, and was in\nthe act of returning to the house, when the stranger approached him.\n\n\u201cFather Morris?\u201d said the new-comer, lifting his hat.\n\n\u201cMaurice O\u2019Donnell, at your service, sir,\u201d replied the priest.\n\n\u201cI should apologize for addressing you so familiarly, reverend sir, but\nthree or four persons of whom I asked my way told me that Father Morris\nwas Monamullin, and that Monamullin was Father Morris.\u201d\n\n\u201cMy people invariably address me by my Christian name, and I beg, sir,\nas you are now within my bailiwick, that _you_ will continue to do so.\u201d\n\n\u201cAs I _am_ within your bailiwick, I must needs do your bidding, Father\nMaurice.\u201d\n\nSuch a genial, happy voice! Such frank, kind blue eyes! Such a well\nknit, strong-built figure!\n\nThe priest gazed at a young man of about five-and-twenty, six feet high,\nwith crisp brown curly hair, beard _en Henri Quatre_, broad forehead,\nand manly, sunburnt neck and face, attired in a suit of light homespun\ntweed, a blue flannel shirt very open at the throat, a scarlet silk tie\nknotted sailor fashion, and heavy shoes, broad-toed and thick-soled.\n\n\u201cMy name is Brown,\u201d he said. \u201cI am an artist. I have walked over from\nCastlebar. I am doing picturesque bits of this lovely country\u2014not your\nconfounded beaten tracks, but the nooks which must be sought like the\nviolet. I have very little money, and needs must rough it. This stick\nand knapsack constitute my _impedimenta_, and, like C\u00e6sar, I have\ncarried my Commentaries before now in my teeth while bridging a river by\nswimming it. I asked for the inn, and I was referred to Father Maurice.\u201d\n\n\u201cI can answer for it, Mr. Brown, that you will find every house in\nMonamullin willing to shelter you; and, further, that you will find this\nto be possibly the best. I am unfortunately compelled to travel seven\nmiles along the coast to-night, but will be back, please God, to-morrow;\nin the meantime my housekeeper will try what some broiled fish and a\ndish of ham and eggs can do towards appeasing what ought to be a giant\u2019s\nappetite. And I can answer for the sheets being well aired, having\npulled the lavender myself in which they are periodically enshrined.\u201d\n\nFather Maurice ushered his guest into the cottage with a welcome so\ngenuine that Mr. Brown felt at his ease almost ere the greeting had died\nupon the priest\u2019s lips, and proceeded to hang up his hat and knapsack\nwith the air of a man who was completely at home.\n\nThe neat little parlor was cosily furnished. A genuine bit of Domingo\nmahogany stood in the centre of the room, and round it half a dozen\nplump horse-haired, brass-nailed chairs, with a \u201cCome and sit on us, we\nare not for show\u201d air about them peculiarly inviting. A venerable\nbureau, black as ebony from age, and brass-mounted, ornamented one\ncorner, and opposite to it a plaster-of-paris bust of Pius IX. upon a\nfluted pedestal, while the recesses at either side of the fireplace were\nfurnished with antique book-cases containing a well-thumbed library of\necclesiastical literature, the works of St. Augustine being prominently\nconspicuous. Over the mantel-piece hung a portrait of Daniel O\u2019Connell,\nwith the autograph of the Liberator in a small frame beneath, and at his\nright and left engravings, and of no mean order either, of Henry Grattan\nand John Philpot Curran. The walls were adorned with copies of the\ncartoons of Raphael, a view of Croagh Patrick from Clew Bay, a\nbird\u2019s-eye glance at St. Peter\u2019s, and an illuminated address from the\ninhabitants of Monamullin to their beloved pastor upon the completion of\nhis thirtieth year on the mission\u2014an address the composition of which\nconferred undying renown upon Tim Rafferty, the schoolmaster, and begat\nfor the boy who wrote it a fame only second to that of the erudite\npedagogue.\n\n\u201cYou are delightfully snug here, Father Maurice,\u201d observed his guest,\nseating himself and glancing admiringly round the apartment. \u201cWhat a\ntreasure of an antique bureau! Why, the brokers in London are giving any\namount of money for such articles; we are all running mad over them. If\nyou could get it whispered that Dean Swift or Joe Addison worked at that\ndesk, it would be worth its weight in gold. It\u2019s Queen Anne now or\nnothing.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou are an Englishman?\u201d\n\n\u201cA base, bloody, and brutal Saxon!\u201d\n\n\u201cWe have one of your countrymen residing in this part of the country\u2014a\nMr. Jyvecote.\u201d\n\nThe stranger started. \u201cAny of the Jyvecotes of Marston Moor, in\nYorkshire?\u201d\n\n\u201c_The_ Jyvecote, I believe. He came over here about ten years ago to\nshoot, taking poor Mr. Bodkin Blake\u2019s Lodge in the valley of\nGlendhanarrahsheen, and\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! do say that word again, it is so delightfully soft\u2014a cross between\nItalian and Japanese,\u201d burst in the artist.\n\n\u201cGlendhanarrahsheen,\u201d repeated Father Maurice. \u201cWe have some softer than\nthat. What think you of Tharramacornigaun? But, as I was saying, Mr.\nJyvecote liked the valley so much that he brought his family over in the\nfollowing year. Mr. Jyvecote was delighted with the place, and he bought\nthe Lodge, extended it, and at length determined upon building a castle.\nThis castle\u2014Moynalty Castle he calls it\u2014was completed about three years\nago, the bare walls alone costing seventy thousand pounds. Except the\nViceregal Lodge in Dublin,\u201d added the priest, \u201cthere is nothing so grand\nin all Ireland.\u201d\n\n\u201cI must walk over there some day. Which way does it lie?\u201d\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s between us and Westport, along the coast, almost out upon a rock.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat a strange idea to put such a lot of money into such a corner!\u201d\n\n\u201cIs it not? It\u2019s completely out of the world. The nearest railway\nstation is fifty miles.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen I forgive Mr. Jyvecote. I take off my hat to him. I congratulate\nhim. O my dear Father Maurice!\u201d exclaimed the artist enthusiastically,\n\u201cyou who live in such tender tranquillity, with the moan of the sea for\na lullaby, can know nothing of the ecstatic feeling attendant upon\nleaving steam fifty miles behind one. It is simply a new, a beatific\nexistence! And so Jocelyn Jyvecote is within ten miles,\u201d he added, more\nin the tone of a person engaged in thinking aloud than by way of\nobservation.\n\n\u201cAre you acquainted with him?\u201d asked the priest.\n\n\u201cOh! yes\u2014that is, very slightly.\u201d There was a decided shade of\nembarrassment in his manner that would have struck an ordinary observer,\nbut the simple-minded clergyman failed to notice it.\n\n\u201cThe yoke\u2019s at the doore, yer riverince, an\u2019 if we don\u2019t start at wanst\nwe\u2019ll be bet be the hill beyant Thronig na Coppagh,\u201d shouted Murty\nMulligan, thrusting his shock head into the apartment.\n\n\u201cHow unfortunately this happens!\u201d exclaimed the priest. \u201cI have not\nslept out of this cottage for nearly thirty years, and the very night I\ncould have wished to be here I am compelled to go elsewhere. However,\nMr. Brown, I shall leave you in good hands, and before I start I must\nmake you acquainted with my housekeeper.\u201d\n\nMurty had returned to the kitchen considerably baffled.\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s goin\u2019 for to stop the night, Mrs. Clancy,\u201d he reported to the\nexpectant housekeeper.\n\n\u201cWho\u2019s goin\u2019 for to stop the night?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe strange gintleman above.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere is he goin\u2019 for to stop, I\u2019d like for to know? Mrs. Dooly\u2019s\nchildre is down wud maysles. The gauger is billeted at Mooney\u2019s\u2014\u201d\n\n\u201cHe\u2019s goin\u2019 to stop here in this house. I heerd his riverince axin\u2019\nhim.\u201d\n\n\u201cArrah, _baithershin_!\u201d exclaimed Mrs. Clancy incredulously.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s truth I\u2019m tellin\u2019 ye, ma\u2019am.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, may\u2014\u201d\n\nAt this moment the voice of Father Maurice was heard calling, \u201cMrs.\nClancy.\u201d\n\n\u201cYer wanted, ma\u2019am,\u201d cried Murty.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m not fit for to be seen. Slip up an\u2019 discoorse him, Murty avic, till\nI put on a clane cap an\u2019 apron.\u201d\n\n\u201cMrs. Clancy, you will take good care of this gentleman, Mr. Brown, till\nI come back. Show your skill in frying eggs and bacon, and in turning\nout a platter of stirabout. Don\u2019t let the hens cheat him of his fresh\negg in the morning, and see that his bed is as comfortable as my own.\u201d\nAnd seating himself upon one side of the low-backed jaunting-car, with\nMurty Mulligan upon the other, and with a courteous farewell to his\nguest, Father Maurice rapidly disappeared in the direction of the valley\nof Glendhanarrahsheen.\n\nMr. Brown stood in the middle of the road gazing after the car, his\nhands plunged into his breeches pockets, and a sweet little bit of\nmeerschaum stuck in his handsome mouth.\n\n\u201cWhat a turn of the wheel is this?\u201d he said to himself. \u201cI wander here\ninto the most out-of-the-way place in out-of-the-way Ireland, and I find\nmyself treading on the kibes of the very man whom of all others I would\nleast care to meet. I always thought that Jyvecote was in Kerry, near\nValentia, where the wire dives for America. However, seven miles mean\nutter isolation here, and, by Jove! I\u2019m too much charmed with this\ngenial old clergyman and his genuine hospitality to think of shifting my\nquarters; besides I\u2019ll paint him a holy picture, perhaps a Virgin and\nChild, which will in some small measure repay him. Nowhere in the world\nwould one meet with such a reception, save in Ireland. Here I am taken\nupon trust, and believed to be an honest fellow until I am found out,\ncompletely reversing the social code. He places his house, his all, at\nmy disposal, believing me to be a poor devil of an artist on tramp and\nready to paint anything for bread and butter. Hang it all! it makes me\nfeel low and mean to sail under the false colors of an assumed name, and\nyet it is better as it is\u2014much better. Suppose I meet Mr. Jyvecote? He\u2019d\nscarcely recognize me. I\u2019ve not seen him since our stormy interview at\nMarseilles. Had I my beard then? No; it was on my way out to Egypt, and\nthat\u2019s exactly three years ago this very month. He had a lot of\nwomankind with him. _Per Bacco!_ I suppose he was making for this\nplace.\u201d\n\nMr. Brown strolled over to the beach, and, seating himself upon a\ngranite boulder, smoked on and on, buried in thought. The sea was as\nstill as a sea in a dream, and gray, and mystic, and silent. The hush\nthat Eve whispers as Night lets fall her mantle was coming upon the\nearth, and the twinkling stars began to throb in the blue-black sky; not\na speck was visible on the billowy plain save a solitary fishing-boat,\nwhich now loomed out of the darkness like a weird and spectral bark.\n\nIn such scenes, and in the awful quiet of such hours, images and\nthoughts that dare not die are deposited upon the silent shore of\nmemory. The man who sat gazing out to sea with his hands clasping his\nknees was Sir Everard Noel, the fourth baronet of a good old Yorkshire\nfamily, and owner of a fine estate between Otley and Ilkley, in the\nNorth Riding of that noble county. He was five-and-twenty, and had been\nhis own master ever since he attained his majority, until which\nmomentous event he had been the victim of a peripatetic guardian and the\nCourt of Chancery, his father having died while he was yet an infant,\nand his mother when he had reached the age of nineteen. Freed from the\nyoke of his guardian, who led him a tour of the world, and placed in\npossession of ninety thousand pounds, the accumulation of his minority,\nand with an income of ten thousand a year, he plunged into the giddy\nwhirl of London fast life, and for a brief season became the centre of a\nset composed of the _cr\u00e8me de la cr\u00e8me_, the _aurati juvenes_ of that\nmodern Babylon. He was liberal to lavishness, was fascinated with\nClubland and _\u00e9cart\u00e9_, losing his money with a superb tranquillity, and\naddicted to turning night into day. He flattered the fair sex with the\n\u201chomage of a devotee,\u201d and broke hearts as he would nutshells.\nIntriguing dowagers fished for him for their \u201cpenniless lasses wi\u2019 long\npedigrees,\u201d but somehow or other, after four seasons, during which he\nhad had several hairbreadth escapes, he still was single, still healthy\nand heart-whole, but _minus_ his ninety thousand pounds.\n\nDuring his minority he had wooed Art, wisely and well, and even while\nthe daze of deviltry was upon him he never totally neglected her. He\npainted with more than the skill of a mere amateur, and had even the\nbest of it in a tussle with the art critic of the _Times_ upon the\ngenuineness of a Rembrandt which had burst upon the market, to the\nintense excitement of the _cognoscenti_. There was a good deal of the\nartist in his nature, and he was an immense favorite with the bearded\nBohemians, knights of the brush, who voted him a good fellow, with the\nsolitary drawback of being unavoidably a \u201chowling swell.\u201d\n\nFour years of wasted life brought on satiety, and he turned from the\npast with a shudder, from the present with loathing. He wanted to do\nsomething, to be interested in something, and to shake off the sickening\naimlessness of his every-day life that clung to him like a\nwinding-sheet.\n\nThere came a day when the men in the smoking-room of the club asked each\nother, \u201cWhere the doose is Noel?\u201d when wily matrons found their gushing\nnotes of invitation unanswered; when toadies, hangers-on, and sycophants\nfound his apartments in Half-Moon Street, Piccadilly, closed. There came\na day when club and matron and toady thought of him no more. The wave of\noblivion had passed over him and he was forgotten. _Sic itur ad astra._\nAway from the fatal influences that had, maelstrom-like, sucked him into\ntheir whirl, new thoughts, new impulses, new aspirations burst into\nblossom, and his old love\u2014Art\u2014turned to him with the radiant smile of\nthe bygone time.\n\nThere is red red blood in the veins at twenty-five, and white-winged\nHope ever beckons onwards with soul-seductive gesture. He determined to\nseek change of scene and of thought. As Sir Everard Noel, the president\nof the Four-in-Hand Club; the owner of Katinka, the winner of the\nChester Cup; the skipper of the _Griselda_, that won the queen\u2019s prize\nat Cowes; the best rider with the Pytchley hounds, every hotel on the\nContinent, every village in Merrie England, would recognize him, and the\nold toadying recommence; but as plain Mr. Brown, an obscure artist, with\na knapsack on his back, he would be free, free as a bird, and the summer\nmorning this idea flashed across his mind found him once again a bright,\nhappy, and joyous man.\n\nSir Everard Noel was a gentleman of warm temper and great energy, prone\nto sudden impulses and unconsidered actions. No sooner had he made up\nhis mind to go upon the tramp than he started; and, considering that he\nwould be less liable to recognition in Connemara than in Wales, made\nGalway the base of his supplies, and, knapsack on back, containing\nsketching materials and a change of flannel, a few days\u2019 walking brought\nhim to Monamullin in glorious health, splendid spirits, and prepared to\nenjoy everybody and everything.\n\n\u201cHow much more delightful all this is,\u201d he thought, \u201cthan the horrors I\nhave passed through\u2014horrors labelled pleasures! Faugh! I shudder when I\nthink of them. Let me see, it\u2019s ten o\u2019clock; at this hour I would be\nabout half-way through a miserably unwholesome dinner, spiced up in\norder to meet the requirements of a demoralized appetite, or yawning in\nan opera-box, with six or seven long, dreary hours before me to kill at\nany price, especially with brandy and soda. How delicious all _this_ is!\nHow fresh, how pure! What a dinner I ate of those rashers and eggs! And\nsuch tea! By Jove! that old lady must have a chest entirely for her own\nconsumption. If my bed is as comfortable as it looks, I shall not awaken\ntill the _padre_ returns from Jyvecote\u2019s. How disagreeable to meet\nJyvecote or any of the lot! I never knew any of them but Jasper and the\nfather. What a glorious old gentleman is Father Maurice\u2014simple as a\nchild, with the dignity of a saint. I had better get to bed now, as I\nshall begin on a Virgin and Child for him to-morrow; or, if his Stations\nare daubs, I can do him a set, though it will take me a deuce of a time.\nI must visit the chapel to-morrow; I suppose it\u2019s very dingy.\u201d And with\na good stout yawn Mr. Brown\u2014for we shall continue to call him by this\nname until the proper time comes\u2014turned towards the cottage.\n\nMrs. Clancy met him at the door.\n\n\u201cI was afraid ye wor lost, sir,\u201d she said as he entered the hall.\n\n\u201cNot lost, my good lady, but found. I suppose you lock the doors here\nearlier than this.\u201d\n\n\u201cLock!\u201d she exclaimed almost indignantly\u2014\u201clock indeed! There\u2019s not a\nbowlt nor a bar nor a lock on the whole house. Arrah! who wud rob Father\nMaurice but th\u2019 ould boy?\u2014an\u2019 he\u2019d be afeard. He daren\u2019t lay a hand on\nanything here, an\u2019 well he knows it, God be good to us!\u201d\n\n\u201cI suppose you\u2019ve been a long time with Father Maurice, Mrs. Clancy.\u201d\n\n\u201cOnly sence me man\u2014the Lord rest his sowl, amin!\u2014was lost in the night\nav the great storm, nigh fifteen year ago\u2014fifteen year come the\nfourteenth av next month, on a Frida\u2019 night. He was a good man, an\u2019 a\nfine provider, an\u2019 wud have left me warm an\u2019 comfortable but for the\nhard times that cum on the cunthry be raison av the famine. Ye might\nhave heard tell of it, sir.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! indeed I did.\u201d\n\n\u201cOch! wirra, wirra! but it was an awful time, glory be to God! whin the\npoor craythurs was dyin\u2019 by the roadsides and aitin\u2019 grass to keep the\nsowles in their bodies, like bastes.\u201d\n\n\u201cI was far away then, in China,\u201d said Brown.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s where the tay cums from; an\u2019 very infayrior tay we\u2019re gettin\u2019\nnow, sir, compared wud what we used to get. I can\u2019t rise more nor a cup\nout av two spoonfuls, an\u2019 well I remimber whin wan wud give me layves\nenough for to fill a noggin. Are ye thinkin\u2019 av Maynewth, sir?\u201d asked\nMrs. Clancy, exceedingly desirous of some clue as to the identity,\nhabits, and occupation of her guest, as it would not do to face\nMonamullin with her finger in her mouth.\n\n\u201cMaynewth?\u201d he replied. \u201cWhat is Maynewth?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe collidge.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat college?\u201d\n\n\u201cThe collidge where the young priests is med.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! dear, no, Mrs. Clancy,\u201d he replied, laughing heartily. \u201cI am a\npainter.\u201d\n\n\u201cA painther!\u201d she said in considerable astonishment.\n\n\u201cYes, a poor painter.\u201d\n\n\u201cMusha, now, but that flogs. An\u2019 what are ye goin\u2019 for to paint?\u201d\n\n\u201cAnything that turns up.\u201d\n\nShe thought for a moment, hesitated a little, scrutinized his apparel,\nhesitated again, and at length, \u201cWud ye be afther doin\u2019 his riverince a\ngood turn?\u201d\n\n\u201cI should be only too delighted.\u201d\n\n\u201cThin ye might give the back doore a cupple o\u2019 coats o\u2019 paint afore ye\ngo.\u201d\n\nThe artist burst into an uncontrollable fit of laughter, long, loud,\njoyous, and rippling as that of a schoolboy\u2019s, again and again renewed\nas the irritated puzzle written in the housekeeper\u2019s face met his\nglance. At length he burst out after a tremendous guffaw:\n\n\u201cI am not exactly that sort of a painter, Mrs. Clancy, but I dare say I\ncould do it if I tried; and I will try. I am more in that line,\u201d\npointing to the picture of Daniel O\u2019Connell suspended over the\nmantel-piece.\n\nThe cloud of anger rapidly disappeared from Mrs. Clancy\u2019s brow upon this\nexplanation, and in a voice of considerable blandishment she\nhalf-whispered:\n\n\u201cArrah, thin, mebbe ye\u2019d do me a little wan o\u2019 Dan for the kitchen,\nhoney.\u201d\n\nAfter another hearty peal of laughter Mr. Brown most cordially assented,\nand, taking his chamber candle\u2014a flaring dip\u2014retired to his bedroom.\n\n\u201c_Ma foi_,\u201d he gaily laughed, \u201cthis _is_ homely. Do I miss my valet? Do\nI miss my brandy and soda? Do I miss my Aubusson carpet, my theatrical\npictures, my Venetian mirror, or my villanous French novel? Not a bit of\nit. This is glorious; and what a tub I shall have in the morning in the\nwild Atlantic!\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\nFather Maurice\u2019s guest was up, if not with the lark, at least not far\nbehind that early-rising bird, and out in the gently-gliding wavelets,\nbuffeting them with the vigorous stroke of a skilful swimmer. The ocean\non this still, clear morning was beautiful enough to attract wistful\nglances from eyes the most _blas\u00e9_. The cloudless sky was intensely dark\nin its blue, as though the unseen sun was overhead and shining\nvertically down. The light did not seem of sea or land, but it shone\ndazzlingly on the low line of verdure-clad hills, on the cornfields in\nstubble, causing every blade to glisten like a golden spear, on the\nwhitewashed cottages, on the bright green hedges, on the line of dark\nrock, and enveloping the mountains of Carrig na Copple in the dim\ndistance in blue and silver glory. The colors of the sea were magical,\nin luminous green, purple, and blue; and out across the billowy plain\ngreat bands of purple stretched away to the sky line, as a passing cloud\nflung its shadows in its onward fleecy progress. The artist felt all\nthis beauty, drinking it in like life-wine, till it tingled and throbbed\nin every vein.\n\nAfter partaking of a breakfast the consumption of which would have\nconsiderably astonished some of his quondam London set, and having\nlighted his meerschaum, Mr. Brown set out for a stroll through the\nvillage, accompanied by half a dozen cabin curs, who, having scented the\nstranger, most courteously made up their minds to act as his escort. The\ninhabitants of the cabins _en route_ turned out to look respectfully at\nhim. Children timorously approached, curtsied, and, when spoken to,\nretreated in laughing terror. Matrons gazed and gossiped. A cripple or\ntwo touched their caps to him, and on every side he was wished\n\u201cgood-luck.\u201d He was Father Maurice\u2019s guest, and, as a consequence, the\nguest of Monamullin. Whitewash abounded everywhere; amber thatch covered\nthe roofs; scarlet geraniums bloomed vigorously, their crimson blossoms\nresembling gouts of blood spurted against marble slabs. A shebeen or\npublic-house was not to be seen; order and peace and happiness reigned\ntriumphant.\n\n\u201cA few trees planted down this street\u2014if I may call it so\u2014would make\nthis an Arcadian village. I must ask Father Maurice to let me have them\nplanted. A fountain, too, would look well just opposite that\nunpretending shop. I wonder where the church can be?\u201d\n\nA man with a reaping-hook bound in a hay rope happened to be passing, to\nwhom he addressed himself.\n\n\u201cCan you tell me where the church is?\u201d\n\n\u201cYis, yer honor; troth, thin, I can.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere is it, please?\u201d\n\n\u201cAv it\u2019s Mass ye want, Father Maurice is beyant at Moynalty Castle.\u201d\n\n\u201cI merely want to see it.\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 shure ye can, sir; it\u2019s open day an\u2019 night.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut where is it, my man?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere is it? Right foreninst ye, thin. Don\u2019t ye see the holy and\nblessed crass over the doore?\u201d\n\nThe chapel was a small, low, cruciform building, very dingy despite its\nwhitewash, and very tumble-down-looking. It was surrounded by a small\ngrass-plat and a few stunted pines. A rude cross with a real crown of\nthorns stood in one corner, at the foot of which knelt an old man,\nbare-headed, engaged in repeating the rosary aloud, and two women, who\nwere rocking themselves to and fro in a fervor of prayer. Within the\nchurch the fittings were of the most primitive description. The floor\nwas unboarded, save close to the altar-rails; a few forms were scattered\nhere and there, and one row of backed seats occupied a space to the\nright. The altar, approached by a single step, was of wood, a golden\ncross ornamenting the front panel, and a series of gilded Gothic arches\nforming its background, while the tabernacle consisted of a rudely-cut\nimitation of a dome-covered mosque. A picture of the Crucifixion hung\nover the altar suspended from the ceiling, and, as this was regarded as\na masterpiece of art by the inhabitants of Monamullin from time\nimmemorial, we will not discuss their \u00e6stheticism here. The Stations of\nthe Cross were represented by small colored engravings in mahogany\nframes, and the holy-water font consisted of a huge boulder of granite\nwhich had a large hole scooped out of it.\n\n\u201cThis will never do,\u201d said Mr. Brown, gazing ruefully at the several\nworks of art. \u201cWhat a splendid chance for me! I shall paint, as the old\nmasters did, under direct inspiration. What a sublime sensation, when my\npicture shall have been completed, to witness the reverential admiration\nof the poor devout people here! I shall be regarded as a benefactor.\nFancy _my_ being a benefactor to anybody or anything! Heigh-ho!\u201d he\nsighed, \u201cwhat a glorious little Gothic church, a prayer in stone, a\nportion of the money I so murderously squandered would have built\nhere!\u2014that four thousand I flung last March into the mire in Paris.\nFaugh!\u201d And, dragged back over the waves of Time, he sat down upon one\nof the wooden benches, overwhelmed by the rush of his own thoughts.\n\nOf the length of time he remained thus absorbed he made no count. The\ndead leaves of the misspent past rustled drearily round his heart,\nweighing him down with a load of inexpressible sadness\u2014a sadness almost\namounting to anguish\u2014and two hours had come and gone ere his reverie was\nbroken.\n\nHappening to raise his eyes towards the altar, he was startled by\nperceiving a female form kneeling at the railings, lithe, _svelte_, and\nattired in costly and fashionable raiment. As he gazed, the young girl\nfinished her prayers, and, with a deep, reverential inclination in front\nof the altar, swept past him with that graceful, undulatory motion which\nwould seem to be the birthright of the daughters of sunny Spain. She was\ntall, elegantly formed, and possessed that air of high breeding which\nmakes itself felt like a perfume. Her bright chestnut hair was brushed\ntightly back from an oval face, and hung in massive plaits at the back\nof her head. Her eyes were soft brown, her complexion milk-white.\n\n\u201cWhat a vision, and in this place, too! That is the best of the Catholic\nreligion. The churches are always open, inviting one to come in and\npray. I wonder who she can be? Some tourist. Pshaw! your tourist doesn\u2019t\ntrouble this quarter of the globe. To see, to be seen, to dress, and\nwrangle over the bills at palatial hotels, means touring nowadays. Some\ncounty lady, over to do a little shopping; but there are no shops,\nexcept that miserable little box opposite, and they apparently sell\nnothing there but marbles, tobacco-pipes, kites, and corduroy. Ah! I\nhave it: some inlander coming for a plunge in the Atlantic. I suppose I\nshall meet her pony phaeton as I pass up through the village. I\nseriously hope I shall. There is something very fetching about her, and\nit purifies a fellow to see a girl like that at prayer.\u201d\n\nSuch were the cogitations of Mr. Brown as he emerged from the dingy\nlittle chapel. Brown was not a Catholic. He had been educated at Eton,\nand, although intended for Cambridge, his guardian took him to Japan\nwhen he should have been cramming for his degree. Of the religion as by\nlaw established in England, he paid but little attention to the forms\nand merely went to church during the season to hear some \u201cswell\u201d\npreacher, or because Lady Clara Vere de Vere gave him a _rendezvous_.\nBut, with all his faults and follies, he was never irreverent, and his\nrespect for the things that belong unto God was ever honest, open, and\nsincere.\n\nHe was doomed to be disappointed. No pony phaeton disturbed the\nstillness of the village street. The curs, which had patiently waited\nfor him whilst he remained in the church, received him with noiseless\nbut cheery tail-wagging as he came out, and marched at his heels as\nthough he had been their lord and master. The children rushed from\ncabins and dropped their quaint little curtsies. The cripples doffed\ntheir caps, the matrons gazed at him and gossiped; and, although he\nlingered to say a few words to a passing fisherman, and somewhat eagerly\nscanned the surrounding country, no sign could he obtain of the fair\nyoung girl who had flashed upon him like a \u201cvision of the night.\u201d\n\n\u201cI shall never see her again,\u201d he thought; \u201cand yet I could draw that\nface. Such a mouth! such _contour_! I must ask the _padre_ if he knows\nher, though that is scarcely probable; and yet she is one of his\nflock\u2014at least, she is a Catholic, so there is some hope.\u201d\n\nHe returned to the cottage, and encountered Father Maurice in the\ngarden.\n\n\u201cI did not like to disturb you at your devotions, Mr. Brown,\u201d he said,\n\u201cbut I was only going to give you five minutes longer, as the salmon\ngrill will be ready by that time.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow did you ascertain I was in the church?\u201d asked Brown, entering the\nhall and hanging up his hat.\n\n\u201cA beautiful young lady told me.\u201d\n\n\u201cI saw her; who is she?\u201d exclaimed the artist eagerly.\n\n\u201cI shall present you to her. Here she is. Mr. Brown, Miss Julia\nJyvecote.\u201d\n\n[TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT MONTH.]\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE TWO PROPHETS OF MORMONISM.\n\nMR. T. B. H. STENHOUSE, one of the Scottish converts to Mormonism, was\nfor a quarter of a century an elder and missionary of the church of the\nLatter-Day Saints. He is the author of the most complete and careful\nhistory of the Mormons in the English language. Although he has\n\u201coutgrown\u201d the faith of Brigham Young and Joseph Smith, and disbelieves\nthe doctrines which he once preached, he writes of his former associates\nin a tone of moderation and good sense, and gives them more credit for\nsincerity than the rest of the world will be likely to concede them. In\nthe introduction to his _Rocky Mountain Saints_ he says:\n\n \u201cWhatever judgment may be passed upon the faith and personal\n lives of the Mormon Prophet and his successor, there will be a\n general recognition of a divine purpose in their history. Under\n their leadership the Mormon people have aided to conquer the\n western desert, and to transform a barren and desolate region of\n a hitherto \u2018unknown country\u2019 into a land that seems destined at\n no distant day to teem with millions of human beings, and which\n promises to stand pre-eminent among the conquests of the\n republic. It is doubtful whether any collective body of other\n citizens, unmoved by religious impulses, would ever have\n traversed the sandy desert and sage-plains, and have lived an\n age of martyrdom in reclaiming them, as the Mormons have in\n Utah. But this has been accomplished, and it was accomplished by\n faith. That was the Providence of the saints, and it must be\n conceded that, as a means subservient to an end, the Mormon\n element has been used in the Rocky Mountain region by the\n Almighty Ruler for developing the best interests of the nation,\n and for the benefit of the world at large.\u201d\n\nThe fallacies hidden in these reflections will not escape the notice of\nany thoughtful Catholic reader. Mr. Stenhouse has got a feeble hold of a\ngreat truth, but, embarrassed by the materialistic ideas which form so\nimportant a part of the Mormon philosophy, he does not know how to apply\nit. We quote the passage as a striking illustration of the spirit in\nwhich too many of our countrymen are inclined to judge the history and\ncharacter of the saints of the Great Salt Lake. Americans have a\nprofound veneration for material prosperity, and hardly find it in their\nhearts to condemn a community which has built cities in the remote\nwilderness, planted gardens in the midst of the desert, taught brooks to\nrun across the arid plains, and \u201cdeveloped the resources\u201d of one of the\nleast promising territories in our national domain. Any man, according\nto the popular theories of the emancipation of conscience, has a right\nto make a religion to suit himself; and whatever he may profess\u2014unless,\nindeed, he should chance to concur with about 160,000,000 other persons\nin professing the doctrines of the holy Catholic Church, in which case\nthere would be a fair presumption that he was dangerous to society\u2014his\nfellow-citizens are bound to treat his creed respectfully and admit the\npurity of his motives.[42] Hence the world honors the founder of a new\nstate, even though he may be also the founder of a false religion. There\nare 80,000 Mormons in Utah, and as a community they are rich and\nthrifty. It is not surprising that we have heard of late so much\nadmiring comment upon the genius of Brigham Young, so many predictions\nthat he will be reckoned hereafter among the great men in American\nhistory.\n\nIt may be worth while to clear our minds by a brief sketch of the rise\nand development of Mormonism. It is a phenomenon too important to be\npassed over, and it has a closer connection with the moral and\nintellectual tendencies of the time than most of us suspect. The general\ndirection of Protestant theology has always been towards rationalism and\nmaterialism. Founded upon the denial of everything that man cannot\nperceive by his unaided natural powers, it leads irresistibly to the\nrejection of divine interposition in worldly affairs and of all manner\nof heavenly revelation. But the human mind can no more rest without\nbelief in the supernatural than the human body can rest upon air.\nSuperstition is consequently the offspring of infidelity. The extremes\nof negation produce a reaction of credulity; the worship of Baal\nalternates with the worship of God; we see Protestantism swaying\nperpetually to and fro between a cold philosophical scepticism and the\nwildest extravagances of fanaticism and imposture. A time of general\nnegation and intellectual pride is followed by an epidemic of rhapsodies\nand convulsions. Prophets arise; spirits are seen in clouds of light;\nconventicles resound with the ravings of frenzied sinners and the\nshouting of excited saints; Swedenborg makes excursions in the body into\nheaven and into hell; the Shakers place Mother Ann on the throne of the\nAlmighty; the Peculiar People look for the direct interference of God in\nthe pettiest affairs of life, and demand a miracle every hour of the\nday. Mormonism was the product of such a season of spiritual riot. Fifty\nyears ago animal magnetism and clairvoyance were at their height. The\npride which refused to worship God stooped to amuse itself with ghosts\nand witches. The soul, emancipated from religion, became the slave of\nmagic; and superstition, rejecting the revelations of a loving Creator,\nwas almost ripe for the instructions of dancing tables and flying\ntambourines. Mesmer had excited the learned world with his mystic tubs;\nthrongs of prophetic somnambulists had prepared the way for the oracles\nof Andrew Jackson Davis. In England there was even a more chaotic\ndisturbance of minds than here. Multitudes on the one hand, disbelieving\nin a personal deity altogether, took refuge in pure scepticism.\nMultitudes on the other looked for the advent of the Lord in power and\nglory, to establish on earth in visible form the kingdom foretold by the\ninspired writers. The study of the prophecies became an absorbing\npassion of sectaries and enthusiasts. They muddled their brains with\nmuch reading of Isaias and the Apocalypse. They made it their mission to\nexplain dark sayings; and having placed their own interpretation upon\nthe divine predictions, they watched the sky for signs of their\nimmediate fulfilment, and found in contemporary events a thousand\nconfirmations of their crazy fancies, a thousand portents of the speedy\ncoming of the Lord. There was no conceivable theological vagary for\nwhich they did not seek authority among the prophets. There was a\nwide-spread revival of the ancient belief in a terrestrial millennium,\nwith a faith that it was close at hand. Edward Irving was setting\nEngland and Scotland aflame with fiery announcements of the Second\nAdvent; fashionable society left its bed at five o\u2019clock in the morning\nto hear him preach, for three hours at a stretch, on the impending\naccomplishment of what had been foretold; and although it was not until\na few years later that William Miller organized in this country the\nfirst regular congregations of those who expected the speedy end of the\nworld, and who sat in white robes listening for the judgment trump,\nthere is no doubt that the general religious ferment which preceded this\nparticular hallucination was felt simultaneously on both sides of the\nocean, and presented on both sides the same essential characteristics.\n\nNaturally this exciting period was also a season of powerful Methodistic\nrevivals. These sensational experiences belong, like spiritualism and\nthe other delusions which we have mentioned, to what has been called\n\u201cinspirational\u201d as distinguished from rationalistic Protestantism, and\nthey are apt to run their course together. Between 1825 and 1830 the\nrevival movement was carried to great lengths, and its excesses seem to\nhave been most marked in Central and Western New York just at the time\nwhen Mormonism arose there. We speak of the revivals as Methodistic only\nby way of defining their character; they were by no means restricted to\nthe Methodist denomination. The most famous revival preacher of the day\nwas the Rev. Charles G. Finney, a Presbyterian; and any one who is\ncurious about the spiritual uproar which he carried through the State\nwith him is referred to the chapter on \u201cFanaticism in Revivals\u201d in the\n_Personal Reminiscences_ of Dr. Gardiner Spring, of the Brick\n(Presbyterian) Church in New York City.[43]\n\nIt was in such a time, equally favorable to delusions and impostures,\nthat Joseph Smith, the inventor of Mormonism, made his appearance. The\naccounts of his early life are not satisfactory. His origin was obscure.\nHis neighbors were ignorant. Little is on record except his\n_Autobiography_ and a sketch by his mother, neither of which productions\nis entitled to much credit. It is evident, however, that he was caught\nup by the religious excitement which raged all around him. We are\nassured that on at least two special occasions during his boyhood he was\n\u201cpowerfully awakened\u201d by Methodist revivalists. His writings abound with\nrevival phraseology; his pretended revelations are full of the\ncant-terms of the camp-meeting; his code of doctrines bears traces of\nthe denominational controversies which were most active in Western New\nYork when he emerged upon the stage of history. In 1827 he was an\nilliterate and idle rustic of twenty-two years, living at Palmyra, in\nWayne County, New York. His parents were shiftless and visionary people,\nwho got drunk, and used the divining-rod, and dug for hidden treasures,\nand, according to their neighbors, stole sheep. Joseph was no better\nthan the rest of the family. By natural disposition he was a dreamer and\nan adventurer. According to his own account, he began to see miraculous\nappearances in the air and to hear the voices of spiritual messengers as\nearly as his fifteenth year. It was in one of his seasons of\n\u201cawakening,\u201d when, perplexed by the contradictions of rival sects, he\nwent into a grove and asked the Lord which he should follow, in the firm\npersuasion that his question would be answered by some physical\nmanifestation. We give the Mormon account of the result of his\nexperiment:\n\n \u201cAt first he was severely tempted by the powers of darkness,\n which endeavored to overcome him; but he continued to seek for\n deliverance, until darkness gave way from his mind. He at length\n saw a very bright and glorious light in the heavens above, which\n at first seemed to be at a considerable distance. He continued\n praying, while the light appeared to be gradually descending\n towards him; and as it drew nearer it increased in brightness\n and magnitude, so that by the time that it reached the tops of\n the trees the whole wilderness for some distance around was\n illuminated in the most glorious and brilliant manner. He\n expected to have seen the leaves and boughs of the trees\n consumed as soon as the light came in contact with them; but\n perceiving that it did not produce that effect, he was\n encouraged with the hopes of being able to endure its presence.\n It continued descending slowly, until it rested upon the earth\n and he was enveloped in the midst of it. When it first came upon\n him it produced a peculiar sensation throughout his whole\n system; and immediately his mind was caught away from the\n natural objects with which he was surrounded, and he was\n enwrapped in a heavenly vision, and saw two glorious personages,\n who exactly resembled each other in their features or likeness.\n He was informed that his sins were forgiven. He was also\n informed upon the subjects which had for some time previously\n agitated his mind\u2014namely, that all the religious denominations\n were believing in incorrect doctrines, and consequently that\n none of them was acknowledged of God as his church and kingdom.\n And he was expressly commanded to go not after them; and he\n received a promise that the true doctrine, the fulness of the\n gospel, should at some future time be made known to him; after\n which the vision withdrew.\u201d[44]\n\nJoseph, upon whose word alone this narrative rests, relates that when he\ncame to himself he was lying on his back looking up into the clouds. He\nseems to have accepted cheerfully the condemnation of all existing\nreligions, but the vision had no other practical effect upon him; as\nOrson Pratt confesses, his life continued to be unedifying, and his\nstory of the celestial apparition was received with stubborn incredulity\nby those who knew his character and habits. It was three years before he\nprofessed to be favored with a second visit. Then, he says, a white and\nlustrous angel came into his room while he was at prayer, and told him\nthat Heaven designed him for a great work. There was hidden in a certain\nplace, to be revealed hereafter, a book written upon gold plates, which\ncontained \u201cthe fulness of the everlasting gospel as delivered by the\nSaviour to the ancient inhabitants\u201d of the American continent. This was\nthe Mormon Bible, commonly known now as the Book of Mormon from the\ntitle of one of its divisions. In his _Autobiography_ Joseph Smith\nstates that the angel was Nephi, author of the First and Second Books of\nNephi, which stand at the head of the Mormon scriptures; but in his\n_Doctrine and Covenants_ he speaks of his visitant as Moroni, who wrote\nthe last book in the collection and placed the gold plates where they\nwere afterwards to be found. We do not know what explanation the Mormons\noffer of this singular discrepancy. The vision was repeated during the\nnight, and Joseph was directed to search for the buried treasure in a\nhill near Manchester, a village about four miles from Palmyra, in the\nadjoining county of Ontario. He saw, as if in a dream, the exact spot in\nwhich he was to dig. He went to Manchester and found the plates,\nenclosed in a sort of box formed of stones set in cement. With them\n\u201cthere were two stones in silver bows (and these stones, fastened to a\nbreastplate, constituted what is called the Urim and Thummim), and the\npossession and use of these stones was what constituted seers in ancient\nor former times, and God had prepared them for the purpose of\ntranslating the book\u201d\u2014an idea which Joseph borrowed, of course, from the\nJewish high-priest\u2019s \u201crational of judgment,\u201d described in Exodus, chap.\nxxviii. Moroni (or was it Nephi?) would not allow the plates to be\nremoved yet; but he gave Joseph a great many interesting and\ncomfortable, though rather vague, instructions. He opened the heavens\nand caused him to see the glory of the Lord. He made the devil and his\nhosts pass by in procession, so that Smith might know them when he met\nthem. Once a year Joseph was to return to the same spot and receive a\nnew revelation. On the fourth anniversary of the discovery\u2014that is, in\nSeptember, 1827\u2014the angel placed the plates and the Urim and Thummim in\nhis hands, with a caution that he should let nobody see them. But he\nseems to have talked freely about his experiences; for, according to his\nown story, the whole country-side was up in arms to get the plates away\nfrom him. He was waylaid and chased by ruffians with clubs. He was shot\nat. His house was repeatedly mobbed; and when at last he removed to\nPennsylvania in search of peace, carrying the plates in a barrel of\nbeans, he was twice overtaken by a constable armed with a\nsearch-warrant, who failed, however, to find what he was looking for.\nPossibly the plates and the constable were equally fictions of Joseph\nSmith\u2019s imagination.\n\nIncredulous historians of Mormonism offer various explanations of the\nstory which we have thus far recounted. They detect in Joseph Smith\u2019s\nalleged visions a close resemblance to the trance state sometimes\nbrought on by spiritual excitement among the Methodists and other sects\nwho make strong appeals to the emotional nature; or they refer his\nsupernatural exaltation to mesmeric clairvoyance; or they see in him\nmerely a \u201cspiritual medium,\u201d a precursor of the rappers and\ntable-tippers who became so common a few years later. Others, again,\naccount for the whole case upon the theory of demoniac possession; while\nstill others suppose that, having really discovered some sort of\nmetallic tablets, the dreams of a disordered mind supplied him with the\ninterpretation and the _dramatis person\u00e6_.[45] It seems to us hardly\nnecessary to discuss these various explanations, for there is no proof\nof the alleged facts. The whole narrative rests upon nothing but Joseph\nSmith\u2019s word. It is the story told by him in after-years to account for\nthe new gospel. There is none who shared with him the privilege of\nangelic visitations. There is none who saw the great light, who heard\nthe mysterious voices, who even beheld Joseph himself at the moment of\nthe alleged revelations. No one knows what became of the golden plates.\nThe angel, said Joseph, came and took them away again. While they\nremained in the prophet\u2019s hands they were kept from curious eyes.\nPrefixed to the Book of Mormon in the current editions is the \u201cTestimony\nof Three Witnesses\u201d\u2014Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin\nHarris\u2014that they were permitted to see the plates, and that a heavenly\nvoice assured them of the faithfulness of Smith\u2019s translation; but all\nthese three witnesses afterwards confessed that their testimony was a\nlie. To their certificate is appended the testimony of eight other\nwitnesses\u2014namely, Joseph\u2019s father and two brothers, four of the Whitmer\nfamily, and a disciple named Page\u2014who also profess to have seen the\nplates; but their connection with the beginnings of the Mormon Church\nmakes it impossible to put confidence in their statement. We do not know\nthe circumstances under which the sight may have been vouchsafed to\nthem, and we certainly have no sufficient reason to believe their\nword.[46]\n\nThus far, then, Mormonism is a mere legend. In 1828 it becomes\nhistorical fact; and whatever may be thought of the prophet\u2019s good faith\nin the matter of his early dreams and visions, we find it impossible to\nresist the conviction that henceforth he was only a conscious and daring\nimpostor. From this time to the day of his death, in his acts and his\nwritings, in his shrewdness, his ambition, and his reckless\ncourage\u2014planning new settlements, fabricating new Bibles, uttering\nforged revelations, nominating himself for President of the United\nStates, assuming to command armies, running a wild-cat bank, debauching\nwomen\u2014we can see nothing but a career of vulgar fraud. There was wild\nfanaticism in the foundation of the Mormon Church; but it was not on the\npart of Joseph Smith.\n\nThere is proof that about fifteen years before this pretended revelation\nan ex-preacher, named Solomon Spalding, a graduate of Dartmouth College,\nand a resident of Crawford County, Pennsylvania, offered for publication\nat a Pittsburgh printing-office a book called the _Manuscript Found_, in\nwhich he attempted to account for the peopling of America by deriving\nthe Indians from the lost tribes of Israel. It was a sort of Scriptural\nromance, written in clumsy imitation of the historical books of the Old\nTestament, and it contained, among its other divisions, a Book of\nMormon. Although announced for publication, it never appeared. The\nmanuscript remained in the printing-office for a number of years.\nSpalding died in 1816. The bookseller died in 1826. Sidney Rigdon, one\nof the first disciples of Mormonism, was a compositor in the\nprinting-office, and it seems to be pretty well established that he made\na copy of the book and afterwards gave it to Smith. At any rate the Book\nof Mormon, when it came from the press in 1830, was immediately\nrecognized as an adaptation of Solomon Spalding\u2019s romance. A great many\npeople had read parts of it during Spalding\u2019s lifetime, and remembered\nnot only the principal incidents which it narrated, but the names of the\nleading characters\u2014Nephi, Lehi, Moroni, Mormon, and the rest\u2014which Smith\nboldly appropriated. Spalding\u2019s only object was literary amusement, with\nperhaps a little harmless mystification. The theological teachings\nincorporated with his pretended history were the additions of Smith and\nRigdon. As it now stands the Mormon Bible purports to relate the\nwanderings of a Hebrew named Lehi, who went out from Jerusalem six\nhundred years before Christ, and, after travelling eastward eight years\n\u201cthrough a wilderness,\u201d came to the sea-coast, built a ship, got a\nmariner\u2019s compass somewhere, set sail with his wife Sariah, his sons\nLaman, Lemuel, Sam, Nephi, Joseph, and Jacob, the wives of the four\nelder sons, and six other persons, and in due time reached America.\nAfter the death of Lehi the Lord appointed Nephi to rule over the\nsettlers, but Laman and Lemuel, heading a revolt, were cursed, and\nbecame the ancestors of the Indians. We shall not waste much time over\nthis absurd and wearisome farrago, a mixture of Scriptural parodies,\nstupid inventions, and bold thefts from Shakspeare and King James\u2019\nBible. It is intolerably verbose, dragging through fifteen books,\nstuffed with gross faults of grammar, anachronisms, and solecisms of\nevery kind, and comprising as much matter as four hundred and fifty of\nthese pages, or more than three entire numbers of THE CATHOLIC WORLD.\nThere are wonderful miracles and tremendous battles. Vast cities are\ncreated in North and South America. Nations wander to and fro across the\ncontinents. Priests, prophets, judges, and Antichrists, with names\ncuriously constructed out of those in the Jewish Scriptures, appear and\ndisappear like travesties of the persons in sacred history. The Nephites\nand the Lamanites hack and slay each other. A republican form of\ngovernment is instituted, and is assailed by monarchical conspiracies.\nNephi, Jarom, Omni, Mosaiah, Mormon, Moroni, Alma, Ether, and other\nleaders of the Nephites write the records of the people upon golden\nplates, and save them for Joseph Smith to find in due season. Seers give\nlong-winded explanations of the divine purposes, and predict the\nincidents of the beginning of Mormonism, which had already taken place\nwhen Joseph Smith brought these predictions to light. The history of the\nNephites is supposed to be contemporaneous with the history of the Jews,\nbut entirely independent of it; their Scriptures are intended to\nsupplement, not contradict, the holy Bible. The crucifixion of our Lord\nwas announced to these American Jews by portents and prophecies, and\nafterwards the Saviour came to the chief city of the Nephites, showed\nhis wounded hands and feet, healed the sick, blessed little children,\nand remained here forty days teaching Christianity. Gradually the\nLamanites, or Indians, overcame the Nephites. In the year 384 a final\nbattle was fought on the hill Cumorah (Ontario County, New York), where\n320,000 Nephites were slain. This was the end of the pre-Columbian\ncivilization of America, little or nothing being left of the Nephites\nexcept Mormon and his son Moroni, who completed the records on the gold\nplates and \u201chid them up\u201d in the hill. Such, in brief outline, is the\nMormon Bible. With the narrative of the descendants of Lehi, however, it\ncontains an account of two other emigrations from Asia to\nAmerica\u2014namely, that of the Jaredites, who came here direct from the\ntower of Babel, and perished after they had stripped the continent of\ntimber, and that of a party of Jews who followed Lehi at the period of\nthe Babylonian captivity. The Jaredites came in eight small air-tight\nbarges, shaped like a covered dish, loaded with all manner of beasts,\nbirds, and _fishes_, and driven by a furious wind. The voyage lasted\nthree hundred and forty-four days, so that, in spite of the miraculous\ngale astern, it was probably the slowest on record.\n\nIt would be an endless task to point out even a tithe of the huge\nblunders in this fraudulent volume. We read of Christians a century\nbefore Christ, of the Gospel and the churches six centuries before\nChrist, of three oceans lying between Asia and America, of pious Hebrews\neating pork, of Jews long before the name of Jew was invented, of\nhorses, asses, swine, etc., running wild all over the face of this\ncontinent in the time of the Jaredites, although it is certain that they\nwere first introduced by the Spaniards. Nephi, in giving an account of\nthe emigration of his father Lehi, says: \u201cAnd it came to pass that the\nLord spake unto me, saying, Thou shalt construct a ship after the manner\nwhich I shall show thee, that I may carry thy people across these\nwaters. And I said, Lord, whither shall I go that I may find ore _to\nmolten_, that I may make tools?... And it came to pass that I did make\ntools of the ore which I _did molten_ out of the rock.\u201d Nephi, like St.\nJohn, was unable to write down all the things that Jesus taught:\n\u201cBehold, I _were_ about to write them all, but the Lord _forbid_ it.\u201d\nAlma declares: \u201cAnd it came to pass that whosoever did mingle his seed\nwith that of the Lamanites did bring the same curse upon his seed;\ntherefore _whomsoever_ suffered himself to be led away by the Lamanites\n_were called that head_, and there was a mark set upon _him_.\u201d Mormon is\none of the most eccentric in syntax of all the scribes: \u201cAnd Ammaron\nsaid unto me, I perceive that thou art a sober child, and art quick to\nobserve; therefore when _ye_ are about twenty-and-four years old I would\nthat _ye_ should remember,\u201d etc. Nephi \u201c_saw_ wars and _rumors_ of\nwars.\u201d Alma writes: \u201cAnd when Moroni had said these words, he went forth\namong the people, waving the rent of his garment in the air, that all\nmight see _the writing which he had wrote upon the rent_\u201d! The language\nof the precious records is described as \u201creformed Egyptian,\u201d and Nephi\nexplains that it \u201cconsists of the learning of the Jews and the language\nof the Egyptians,\u201d though upon what principle they are combined we are\nleft to imagine. Pressed to exhibit a specimen of the mysterious\ncharacters, Joseph Smith gave what purported to be a fac-simile of a few\nlines to one of his disciples, who came to New York and submitted it to\nProf. Anthon. \u201cIt consisted,\u201d says Prof. Anthon, \u201cof all kinds of\ncrooked characters disposed in columns, and had evidently been prepared\nby some person who had before him at the time a book containing various\nalphabets, Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses and flourishes; Roman\nletters inverted or placed sideways were arranged and placed in\nperpendicular columns; and the whole ended in a rude delineation of a\ncircle, divided into various compartments, decked with various strange\nmarks, and evidently copied after the Mexican calendar given by\nHumboldt, but copied in such a way as not to betray the source whence it\nwas derived.\u201d Mormon says he would have written in Hebrew, if the plates\nhad been large enough.\n\nIn giving the translation of the mysterious books to the world Joseph\nSmith, whose education had been sadly neglected, made use of an\namanuensis. This at first was a farmer named Martin Harris. The prophet\nsat behind a blanket stretched across the room, and, thus screened from\nprofane eyes, read aloud from the gold plates, by the miraculous aid of\nthe Urim and Thummim, the sacred text, which the confiding Harris\nreduced to writing. The sceptical, of course, believe that what Smith\nheld before him was no pile of metallic tablets, but merely the\nmanuscript of Solomon Spalding, into which he emptied from time to time\na great deal of rubbish of his own make. No one, however, succeeded in\npenetrating behind the blanket. The work had gone on for a year and a\nhalf, when Harris, tempted by his wife, embezzled the manuscript. This\nwas a serious loss. Joseph could not reproduce it in the same words, and\nit would not do to risk discrepancies. \u201cRevelation\u201d came to his aid in\nthis dilemma, and informed him that Harris had \u201caltered the words\u201d of\nthe manuscript \u201cin order to catch him\u201d in the translation. The stolen\npages were from the Book of Mormon; he must not attempt to replace them;\nhe should let them go, for a narrative of the same events would be found\nin the Book of Nephi:\n\n \u201cAnd now verily I say unto you that an account of those things\n that you have written, which have gone out of your hands, are\n engraven upon the plates of Nephi; yea, and you remember it was\n said in those writings that a more particular account was given\n of these things upon the plates of Nephi. Behold they have only\n got a part or an abridgment of the account of Nephi. Behold,\n there are many things engraven on the plates of Nephi which do\n throw greater views upon my gospel; therefore it is wisdom in me\n that you should translate this first part of the engravings of\n Nephi, and send forth in this work.\u201d[47]\n\nOliver Cowdery now became scribe, and the task was finished without\nfurther accidents, the Books of Nephi standing at the head of the\nvolume, and the remnant of the Book of Mormon, which gives its title to\nthe whole collection, coming near the end of the table of contents.\nStill, the wretched Harris was not altogether cut off for his sin. He\nowned a farm. When the translation was finished Heaven uttered, by the\nmouth of Smith, \u201ca commandment of God, and not of man, to Martin\nHarris\u201d: \u201cI command thee that thou shalt not covet thine own property,\nbut impart it freely to the printing of the Book of Mormon. And misery\nthou shalt receive if thou wilt slight these counsels\u2014yea, even the\ndestruction of thyself and property.\u201d So Harris mortgaged his farm to\npay the printer, and in 1830 appeared at Palmyra, New York, _The Book of\nMormon: an Account Written by the Hand of Mormon upon Plates taken from\nthe Plates of Nephi_. By Joseph Smith, Jr., author and proprietor.[48]\n\nInstructed by John the Baptist, Smith and Cowdery now went into the\nriver and baptized each other by immersion. Joseph then ordained Oliver\nto the Aaronic priesthood, and Oliver ordained Joseph. In April, 1830,\nthe \u201cChurch of Christ\u201d was organized at the house of Peter Whitmer in\nFayette, Seneca County, New York, the company of the faithful consisting\nonly of the prophet, his two brothers, his scribe, and two Whitmers; but\nin the course of the summer several other converts appeared, and Joseph\nbecame associated with three men of some ability and education, who gave\nthe Mormon creed a doctrinal development which the founder himself was\nquite incapable of devising. These three were Sidney Rigdon, Orson\nPratt, and Parley P. Pratt. They were devotees of the sensational and\ninspirational school, ready for any new form of spiritual extravagance,\nbelievers in visions, crack-brained students of the prophecies. Rigdon\nhad been a preacher among the Campbellites\u2014a sect whose fundamental\ndoctrine it is that no precise doctrines are necessary. Read your Bible,\nsay they, select your opinions from it, don\u2019t allow infant baptism, but\nget yourselves baptized by immersion as often as you commit sin. Upon\nthis broad foundation they can erect as many different systems of\ntheology as they have congregations. Rigdon had outgrown the\nlatitudinarianism and bibliolatry of the Campbellites, and at the time\nof Joseph Smith\u2019s appearance he was preaching a religion of his own,\nrousing his little Ohio congregation with apocalyptic dreams and\ninterpretations, and bidding them look for the instant coming of the\nLord. Although his name does not appear in the roll of the first\nconverts and apostles, it is certain that he was intimately associated\nwith Smith from the beginning; it is certain that he embodied his\npeculiar views in the Mormon creed; it is suspected that he had more\nthan a half-share in arranging the original machinery of imposture.\nParley P. Pratt was likewise a Campbellite preacher, a man of ardent and\npassionate temperament, restless, eloquent, a brilliant albeit somewhat\nrude orator. Orson Pratt, inclining rather towards metaphysical\nspeculations than prophecy and spiritual excitement, became the Mormon\nphilosopher and controversialist, and to him are attributable the\nextraordinary materialistic doctrines which form so important a part of\nthe new system.[49] When Smith and his companions began to preach it\ndoes not appear that they had any scheme of theology ready at hand.\nMoroni and the golden plates made up the sum of their first teachings.\nThere was comparatively little doctrine of any kind in the Book of\nMormon; but, as Joseph\u2019s prophetic pretensions found acceptance, it\nbecame necessary for the prophet to announce some positive creed. In\nsetting it forth, point after point, he appealed neither to history nor\nto reason; \u201crevelation\u201d taught him from day to day all that he wished to\nknow; and so, little by little, he built up a mass of dogma in which it\nis impossible to discover any regular plan. The authoritative handbook\nof Mormon theology as it existed in Smith\u2019s time is a small volume first\npublished in 1835, entitled _The Doctrine and Covenants of the Church of\nJesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, carefully selected from the\nrevelations of God_, by Joseph Smith, President of said Church. It\ncomprises two parts. The first consists of seven Lectures on Faith,[50]\nwhich need not detain us; the second and more important contains about\none hundred \u201crevelations,\u201d addressed sometimes to Smith, sometimes to\none or another of the disciples, sometimes to the church, and\noccasionally to sceptical Mormons who showed signs of becoming\ntroublesome. They embrace counsels and instructions of all kinds, for\nthe organization of the hierarchy, the preaching of the new gospel, the\nregulation of private business affairs, and the management of\ncongregations. Here is a sample of a \u201crevelation given in Kirtland,\nAugust, 1831\u201d: \u201cLet my servant Newel K. Whitney retain his store\u2014or, in\nother words, the store yet for a little season. Nevertheless, let him\nimpart all the money which he can impart, to be sent up unto the land of\nSion.\u201d A few days later the voice of heaven spoke through Joseph Smith\nagain:\n\n \u201cAnd now verily I say that it is expedient in me that my servant\n Sidney Gilbert, after a few weeks, should return upon his\n business, and to his agency in the land of Sion; and that which\n he hath seen and heard may be made known unto my disciples, that\n they perish not. And for this cause have I spoken these things.\n And again, I say unto you, that my servant Isaac Morley may not\n be tempted above that which he is able to bear, and counsel\n wrongfully to your hurt, I gave commandment that his farm should\n be sold. I willeth not that my servant Frederick G. Williams\n should sell his farm, for I the Lord willeth to retain a\n stronghold in the land of Kirtland for the space of five years,\n in the which I will not overthrow the wicked, that thereby I may\n save some.\u201d\n\nThere was a special revelation to the prophet\u2019s wife, Emma, who never\nquite relished Joseph\u2019s proceedings:\n\n \u201cHearken unto the voice of the Lord your God while I speak unto\n you, Emma Smith, my daughter; for verily I say unto you all\n those who receive my gospel are sons and daughters in my\n kingdom. A revelation I give unto you concerning my will, and if\n thou art faithful and walk in the paths of virtue before me, I\n will preserve thy life and thou shalt receive an inheritance in\n Sion. Behold, thy sins are forgiven thee, and thou art an elect\n lady whom I have called. Murmur not because of the things which\n thou hast not seen, for they are withheld from thee and from the\n world, which is wisdom in me in a time to come. And the office\n of thy calling shall be for a comfort unto my servant, Joseph\n Smith, Jr., thy husband, in his afflictions, with consoling\n words in the spirit of meekness.\u201d\n\nShe was afterwards styled by the saints the Elect Lady, or \u201cCyria\nElecta,\u201d and was \u201cordained\u201d by Joseph as his scribe in the place of\nOliver Cowdery. The dogmas to be found in this book are few and simple.\nThe saints were taught to believe in \u201cGod the Eternal Father, and in his\nSon, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost\u201d; to believe that men will not\nbe punished for original sin; that the four saving ordinances of the\nGospel are faith, repentance, baptism, and the laying-on of hands for\nthe Holy Ghost; that the church enjoys still, as it did in primitive\ntimes, \u201cthe gift of tongues, prophecy, revelation, visions, healing,\ninterpretation of tongues, etc.\u201d; that the Bible, \u201cas far as it is\ntranslated correctly,\u201d and the Book of Mormon are both the word of God;\nthat \u201cthe organization of the primitive church\u2014viz., apostles, prophets,\npastors, teachers, evangelists, etc.\u201d\u2014ought to be revived; and that\nIsrael will be literally gathered and the ten tribes restored, Sion\nbuilt on this continent, the personal reign of Christ established on\nearth, and the earth renewed in paradisaic glory. Finally, the book\ncontains elaborate instructions for the establishment of a double\npriesthood; that of Melchisedech is the higher, and embraces the offices\nof apostle, Seventy, patriarch, high-priest, and elder; the other is\nthat of Aaron, and includes bishop, priest, teacher, and deacon; it can\nonly be held by the lineal descendants of Aaron, who are designated by\nrevelation.\n\nIt will be seen how artfully this plan of a church was adapted to the\npurposes of Smith and Rigdon, supposing them to have been, as we have no\ndoubt they were, arrant and conscious cheats. There was novelty and\nmystery enough in it to attract the fanatical, and there was not so very\nmuch after all to shock their common sense; while the doctrine of\ncontinuous revelation and the prophetic office left a door wide open for\nthe introduction of other inventions as fast as they were found\ndesirable. We shall see, further on, what monstrous blasphemies and\nabsurdities were in reality adopted as the saints became strong enough\nto bear them.\n\nNoyes, in his _History of American Socialisms_, speaks of Western New\nYork as \u201cthe volcanic region\u201d of spiritual and intellectual disturbance.\nHere sprang up Mormonism; here were first heard the ghostly rappers;\nhere raged Millerism and Second-Adventism; here John Collins founded the\nSkaneateles community on the basis of \u201cno God, no government, no\nmarriage, no money, no meat\u201d; here arose the \u201cinspired\u201d Ebenezer colony,\nsince removed to Iowa; here flourished all manner of Fourierite\nphalanxes, wild social experiments, and extravagant beliefs; here at the\npresent day are found the Brocton community, with their doctrine of\n\u201cdivine respiration,\u201d and the Perfectionists of Oneida, perhaps the\nworst of all the professors of free-love. In this region of satanic\nactivity the Mormon preachers made disciples so fast that Smith was soon\nencouraged to undertake the \u201cgathering of the tribes.\u201d He had visited\nSidney Rigdon at Kirtland, Ohio, early in 1831, and had a revelation\ncommanding the saints in New York to follow him. But in June the town of\nIndependence, in Jackson County, Missouri, was revealed as the site of\nthe American Sion, and there some hundreds of the faithful, selling all\nthat they had in the East, assembled and laid the foundation of a\ntemple. With this event begins a phase of Mormonism\u2014the political\nseparation of the Latter-Day Saints from the Gentiles\u2014which at once\nillustrates most forcibly its fanaticism and accounts for its temporal\nsuccess. Henceforth the leaders had only to give the word of command,\nand the people went wherever the finger of the prophet pointed,\nsacrificed their lands and houses, broke off domestic ties, and marched\nthrough pain, starvation, and death into the parched wilderness. The\nsettlement at Kirtland, however, was retained; a revelation even\ncommanded the saints to build there a house for Joseph Smith \u201cto live\nand translate in,\u201d and another great temple for the Lord. This was\nfortunate, because the Mormons were soon expelled from Independence by a\nmob; and when Joseph, in obedience to revelation, raised an army of two\nhundred men, and, with the title of \u201ccommander-in-chief of the armies of\nIsrael,\u201d marched twelve hundred miles on foot to reinstate them, his\nexpedition was dispersed by cholera and thunder-storms as soon as it\nreached the scene of action. The saints were never restored to the homes\nfrom which they had been driven out; yet to this day they look for a\nrestoration. They refused all offers to sell their estates; they hold\nthe Missouri title-deeds as the most precious of their inheritances; the\ncity of the Great Salt Lake is only the temporary home of their exile;\nand Brigham Young, in his will, which was published the other day, after\ngiving instructions for his funeral, says: \u201cBut if I should live to get\nback to the church in Jackson County, Missouri, I wish to be buried\nthere.\u201d\n\nIt is not our purpose to follow the persecuted fanatics in all their\nearly migrations. Driven from place to place, they came, in 1840, to\nHancock County, Illinois, where the owner of a large tract of wild land\ngave Smith a portion of it, in order to create a market for the rest.\nThe prophet sold it in lots to his followers, at high prices, and there,\non the bank of the Mississippi, the Mormons built the city of Nauvoo. It\nwas revealed to them that they should build a goodly and holy\n\u201cboarding-house,\u201d and give Joseph Smith and his posterity a place in it\nfor ever, and those who had money were commanded by name to put it into\nthe enterprise (\u201cRevelation given to Joseph Smith, Jan. 19, 1841\u201d). They\nwere to build a magnificent temple also; they were to organize a\nmilitary force, known as the Nauvoo Legion; they were to create, in\nshort, within the limits of Illinois, a theocratic state, with Joseph\nSmith at its head as mayor, general, prophet, church president, and\ninspired mouthpiece of the divine will. The city grew as if by magic.\nThe legislature of Illinois granted it a charter of such extraordinary\nliberality that its officers became practically independent of all other\nauthority. The apostles, sent all over America and England, preached\nwith such zeal that in the course of six years no fewer than fifteen\nthousand believers were numbered in the Nauvoo community. Arrested\nseveral times for treason, for instigating an attempt at murder, and for\nother crimes, Joseph Smith was released by Mormon courts and set all\n\u201cGentile\u201d laws at defiance. He was absolute in everything, organizing\nthe government upon the most despotic principles, yet copying in some\nthings the system and the phraseology of the Hebrew nation. His aides\nand counsellors received names and titles imitated from the Bible.\nBrigham Young was \u201cthe Lion of the Lord,\u201d Parley P. Pratt was \u201cthe\nArcher of Paradise,\u201d Orson Pratt was \u201cthe Gauge of Philosophy,\u201d John\nTaylor was \u201cthe Champion of Right,\u201d Lyman Wight was \u201cthe Wild Ram of the\nMountains.\u201d No one could deal in land or liquor except Joseph Smith. No\none could aspire to political office or to church preferment without his\npermission. No one could travel abroad or remain quiet at home except by\nhis consent. In Kirtland, with the assistance of Rigdon, he had started\na bank and flooded the country with notes that were never redeemed. In\nNauvoo he amassed what was, for that time and that region, the great\nfortune of $1,000,000. From the first gathering of the saints into\ncommunities he had made it a practice to use them in politics. He had\ngiven their votes to one party or another as interest dictated, and in\n1844 he went so far as to offer himself for the Presidency of the United\nStates, and sent two or three thousand elders through the States to\nelectioneer for him.\n\nAs he grew in pride and prosperity the revelations multiplied, the faith\nbecame more and more extravagant, the ceremonies and ordinances of the\nchurch more cumbrous and more mystical. Moroni and Raphael, Peter and\nJohn, visited and conversed with him. He healed the possessed; he\nwrestled with the devil. The brethren began to prophesy in the temple;\nmysterious impulses stirred the congregations; \u201ca mighty rushing wind\nfilled the place\u201d; \u201cmany began to speak in tongues; others saw glorious\nvisions, and Joseph beheld that the temple was filled with angels, and\ntold the congregation so. The people of the neighborhood, hearing an\nunusual sound within the temple, and seeing a bright light like a pillar\nof fire resting upon it, came running together and were astonished at\nwhat was transpiring.\u201d[51] This diabolic manifestation, or alleged\nmanifestation, reminds us of the scenes in the Irvingite congregations\nin London six years previously, when those brethren likewise prophesied\nin an unknown language. But the specimens of the Mormon \u201cgift of\ntongues\u201d which have been preserved for us are not calculated to inspire\nawe. \u201cEli, ele, elo, ela\u2014come, coma, como\u2014reli, rele, rela, relo\u2014sela,\nselo, sele, selum\u2014vavo, vava, vavum\u2014sero, sera, seri, serum\u201d\u2014such was\nthe style of the rhapsodies which inflamed the zeal of the Mormon\nsaints.[52]\n\nIt was discovered that there was no salvation in the next world without\nMormon baptism, and, to provide for the generations which preceded\nJoseph Smith, every saint was told to be immersed vicariously for his\ndead ancestors. There was incessant dipping and sputtering; the whole\nchurch for a season was in a chronic state of cold and dampness; and the\nrecorders worked their hardest, laying up in the temple the lists of the\nregenerated for the information of the angels. The double hierarchy\nbecame so complicated that long study was needed to comprehend it. The\nchurch offices were multiplied. The authority of the president and the\napostles grew more and more despotic. A travelling showman visited the\nWest with some Egyptian mummies. Joseph Smith bought them, and, finding\nin the wrappings a roll of papyrus, he produced a miraculous translation\nof the hieroglyphics as the \u201cBook of Abraham.\u201d A fac-simile of the\npapyrus was taken to Paris in 1855 by M. R\u00e9my and submitted to the\nEgyptologist Dev\u00e9ria, who found it to consist of a representation of the\nresurrection of Osiris, together with a funerary manuscript of\ncomparatively recent date.\n\nAll who have studied the manufacture of American religions and social\nphilosophies are aware how characteristic of these moral and\nintellectual rebellions is an attack upon the Christian law of\nmarriage.[53] The inventions of Joseph Smith soon took the usual course,\nalthough it was probably not until near the end of his career that he\nbecame bold enough to contemplate the general establishment of polygamy.\nIt appears that as early as 1838 he had a number of \u201cspiritual wives\u201d\nwho cohabited with him, and Mr. Stenhouse asserts that \u201cmany women\u201d have\nboasted to him that they sustained such relations with the prophet. This\nsort of license, however, was an esoteric doctrine, for the advanced\nbelievers only, not for the common people. Indeed, in 1842, although a\npractical plurality had been for some time enjoined by the illuminated,\nthe doctrine was formally repudiated by a number of elders, apostles,\nand women, who declared that they knew of no other marriage than that of\none wife to one husband. In 1845 an appendix on \u201cMarriage\u201d was added to\nthe book of _Doctrine and Covenants_, in which occurs the following\npassage: \u201cInasmuch as this church of Christ has been reproached with the\ncrime of fornication and polygamy, we declare that we believe that one\nman should have one wife, and one woman but one husband, except in case\nof death, when either is at liberty to marry again.\u201d Yet it is beyond\nall question that Joseph long before this had been involved in serious\ndomestic difficulties on account of the jealousy of his true wife, Emma,\nand he was obliged to resort to \u201crevelation\u201d to pacify her. The\n\u201cRevelation on Celestial Marriage,\u201d which enjoins a plurality of wives\nas a service especially acceptable to God, purports to have been given\nat Nauvoo in 1843. It contains these sentences:\n\n \u201cAnd let mine handmaid Emma Smith receive all those that have\n been given unto my servant Joseph, and who are virtuous and pure\n before me. And I command mine handmaid Emma Smith to abide and\n cleave unto my servant Joseph and to none else. And again verily\n I say, let mine handmaid forgive my servant Joseph his\n trespasses, and then shall she be forgiven her trespasses.\u201d\n\nThe revelation, however, was kept secret until long after Joseph\u2019s\ndeath. Emma, if not satisfied, was quieted. The spiritual marriages went\non, and even the initiated continued to deny them. John Taylor, the\npresent head of the church, held a public discussion of Mormonism in the\nEnglish colony at Boulogne in 1850, and stoutly denied the doctrine of\npolygamy, although he had at the time five wives in Utah.\n\nIt was polygamy that brought Joseph to his violent end. He had attempted\nto take the wife of a disciple named Law. The husband rebelled, and with\none or two other malcontents established a paper called the _Nauvoo\nExpositor_, for the purpose of exposing the secret corruptions of the\nprophet and his chief associates. Only one number was printed. Joseph\nordered the press to be destroyed and the type scattered. Law and his\nparty appealed to the authorities of the county for redress. Writs of\narrest were issued, and set aside by the Mormon courts. The government\ncalled out the militia to enforce the process. An armed conflict\nappeared inevitable, when the Mormon leaders surrendered, and Joseph\nSmith, Hyrum Smith, John Taylor, and Willard Richards were lodged in the\ncounty jail at Carthage. There, on the 27th of June, 1844, they were\nattacked by an armed mob. Hyrum was shot down at the first volley and\nalmost instantly expired. Joseph, after defending himself with a\nrevolver, attempted to escape by the window, and was killed by a\ndischarge of musketry from the yard below.\n\nIn his lifetime the prophet was often denounced and resisted by his own\nfollowers; \u201crevelation\u201d repeatedly put down revolts; apostates in great\nnumbers, including the very founders of the church, were cut off and\ngiven over to Satan for questioning the truth of Joseph\u2019s inspired\nutterances. But his death healed all such quarrels. He became in the\neyes of his fanatical followers the first of saints, the most glorious\nof martyrs. To this day even those who do not believe in Mormonism argue\nthat Joseph must have believed in it, because for its sake he lived a\nlife of persecution and submitted to a cruel death. The narrative which\nwe have briefly sketched is enough to show the fallacy of this\nreasoning. Mormonism gave Joseph Smith wealth, power, flattery, and\nsensual delights. It found him a miserable, penniless country boy; it\nmade him the ruler of a state, the autocrat of a thriving community, the\nhead of a harem. There never was a time when the choice was offered him\nbetween worldly advantage on the one hand and fidelity to his creed on\nthe other. To renounce his pretensions would have been the ruin of his\nfortunes. Having once entered upon the career of imposture, he had every\ntemptation to persevere to the end. He was mobbed and exiled and\nimprisoned, not because he believed in the Book of Mormon, but because\nhe warred upon existing social and political institutions; and there was\nnothing to make his death more sacred than that of any other cheat and\nlibertine who is murdered by masked ruffians in a frontier settlement.\nAfter his death the twelve apostles ruled the church, waiting for the\nwill of Heaven to designate by inspiration a new leader.[54] Sidney\nRigdon claimed the prophetic office, but was rejected and driven forth.\nThe prime mover in his excommunication was the senior apostle, to whom\nthe accident of rank gave a practical precedence in all the affairs of\nthe church. He taught the saints to be patient and expectant, to\nreverence Joseph as their chief for all eternity, to be governed by\nJoseph\u2019s voice, to cease vexing themselves about Joseph\u2019s successor.\nThis was Brigham Young.\n\nAt length the time was ripe and the minds of the people were prepared.\nOn the 24th of December, 1847, Brigham ascended the pulpit to preach.\nThe Gentiles assert that he arranged his face and dress, modulated his\nvoice, regulated his gestures, to imitate the departed prophet. The\neffect was electrical. The people believed that Joseph stood before\nthem. Women screamed and fainted; men wept; cries resounded through the\ntemple. Here was the successor of Joseph at last, and Brigham Young was\nmade president of the church, and recognized as \u201cprophet, seer, and\nrevelator.\u201d He was a man greatly inferior in education to some of the\nother leaders, and he had done little as yet to justify the preference\nnow shown him. He was a native of Vermont, and one of the early\nconverts. Before joining the church he had been a painter and glazier.\nIn the church he was noted as a stanch, shrewd, hard-working, useful\nbrother, not much troubled with visions or theological theories, rarely\ncaught up by those tempests of spiritual madness which used to sweep\nthrough the congregations. He could not have devised the imposture which\nJoseph and Rigdon created. He could not have built up the elaborate\nsystem which they constructed out of Old-World religions and modern\npolitics. He was fierce, and perhaps fanatical, but he had little\nimagination and little inventiveness. In the case of other early Mormons\nit was sometimes doubtful whether they were not occasionally deceived by\ntheir own impostures, hurried along by a spirit which they had raised\nand knew not how to control; but Brigham offered no cause for such\nsuspicion. He left Mormonism a very different thing from what it was in\n1840, yet he added nothing to it. A change had been going on insensibly\never since the saints gathered at Nauvoo; a further change had been\nbegun by the preaching of Orson Pratt; and Joseph Smith had originated\ntwo great movements\u2014the introduction of polygamy and the removal into\nthe heart of the wilderness\u2014which Brigham was to bring to their term. He\nis the developer, therefore, of other men\u2019s ideas.\n\nThe notion that the Mormons were a chosen and inspired people, blessed\nwith revelations not given to the rest of the world, and governed by the\ndirect and special commands of Heaven, necessarily implied the\nestablishment of an independent political community, and it was their\ndisloyalty to the state rather than their immoralities which roused\nagainst them so often in the early times the anger of mobs and the\nanimosity of the civil authorities. The experiment of creating a state\nwithin a state had failed, and Joseph Smith before his death had taken\nthe first steps towards beginning a new settlement in the far West, and\nremoving the whole body of his disciples to some remote and solitary\nregion where neither the United States nor any other government would be\nlikely to interfere with them. It was Brigham\u2019s part to lead this\nextraordinary exodus. It began more than a year before his formal\nappointment as head of the church; it was hastened by the fact that\nwarrants had been issued in Illinois for the arrest of a large number of\nprominent saints on a charge of manufacturing counterfeit money, and\nthat, partly on this account, partly by reason of the prevalence of\nmurders, thefts, arsons, and various other outrages in which the Mormons\nand their opponents were about equally implicated, Nauvoo appeared\nlikely soon to be the theatre of a civil war. An exploring party had\nbeen sent to the Pacific coast in 1844. Early in February, 1846, the\ngeneral migration began. Rarely has the world witnessed such a scene.\nThe great temple at Nauvoo had just been completed with extravagant\nsplendor. The city contained 17,000 inhabitants, and only a small\nfraction of their valuable property could be disposed of at any price.\nThey abandoned all that they could not carry, sacrificed their lands and\nhouses, collected about twelve hundred wagons, and, under the command of\ncaptains of fifties and captains of hundreds, crossed the Mississippi on\nthe ice and moved into the wintry wilderness. We shrink from repeating\nthe narrative of that horrible march. For more than two years they\ntoiled westward, strewing the path with their dead. In winter they\ncamped near Council Bluffs, and thence Brigham and a body of pioneers\nmade their way across the Rocky Mountains. The first detachment reached\nthe Great Salt Lake in July, 1847; the rest followed in the summer of\n1848. It was a parched, desolate, rainless valley, but the wanderers\nhailed it as a haven of rest; they encamped on the bank of a small\nstream, rested their weary animals, and without loss of an hour began to\nplough the ground, sow the autumn crops, and build a dam and a system of\nirrigating canals. They had escaped from the United States, as they\nfondly believed, and were on the soil of Mexico, where they had no doubt\nthey could maintain themselves against the feeble Mexican government.\nBut \u201cmanifest destiny\u201d was pursuing them. The boundaries of the United\nStates were soon extended beyond this region by the treaty of Guadalupe\nHidalgo; the discovery of gold in California destroyed the isolation of\nthe new Sion; it was no longer a city hid in the desert, but a\nresting-place on a great route of travel; and the irrepressible conflict\nbetween the federal republic and the absolute theocracy has been\nsteadily growing sharper and sharper ever since. Of the great multitude\nwhich set out from Nauvoo barely four thousand ever reached the Great\nSalt Lake, the rest having deserted or dropped by the way; but thousands\nof converts soon arrived from England, and in a very short time the\ncommunity was again strong and prosperous. In 1849, just a year after\nthe treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the Mormons formally declared\nthemselves \u201cfree and independent,\u201d and decreed the erection of the\n\u201cState of Deseret,\u201d whose imaginary boundaries enclosed the whole of\nNevada and Utah, and large parts of New Mexico, Arizona, California,\nOregon, Idaho, Colorado, and Wyoming. To this political fiction they\nhave resolutely adhered; and even while recognizing, as a matter of\nprudence, the _de facto_ organization of the United States Territory of\nUtah, they have always maintained the _de jure_ existence of their free\nand independent state.[55] Brigham, of course, was chosen governor of\nDeseret, and he held that title to the day of his death, although, with\nhis usual worldly shrewdness, he also accepted from Presidents Fillmore\nand Pierce the title of governor of Utah.\n\nTo understand, however, the opposition which soon developed into such\nalarming hostility between Deseret and the United States, we must look\nat the changes which had been taking place in Mormonism itself. Possibly\nthe early disciples of Joseph Smith were in the main ignorant,\npeaceable, and well-meaning fanatics, but in twenty years their\ncharacter had undergone a transformation. They first became quarrelsome,\nthen dishonest, next licentious, and afterwards unspeakably cruel and\nbloodthirsty. Joseph Smith lived long enough to see the beginning even\nof this last stage of corruption, but it was Brigham Young who brought\nthe budding immoralities into full flower. The \u201cRevelation on Celestial\nMarriage\u201d was brought forth at a public meeting in Salt Lake City on the\n29th of August, 1852, and Brigham Young gave a history and explanation\nof it. The original manuscript was burned up by Joseph\u2019s real wife,\nEmma; but Brigham had a copy.\n\n \u201cThis revelation,\u201d said he, \u201chas been in my possession many\n years, and who has known it? None but those who should know it.\n I keep a patent lock on my desk, and there does not anything\n leak out that should not.... The principle spoken of by Brother\n Pratt this morning we believe in. Many others are of the same\n mind. They are not ignorant of what we are doing in our social\n capacity. They have cried out, Proclaim it; but it would not do\n a few years ago; everything must come in its time, as there is a\n time to all things. I am now ready to proclaim it.\u201d\n\nWe do not read that any particular sensation was created by the\nannouncement. Indeed, the practice had already become so common that a\nfederal judge, a year before this date, had denounced it in a Mormon\nassembly, and made a somewhat remarkable appeal to the women to put a\nstop to the horrible practice:\n\n \u201cThe women were excited; the most of them were in tears before\n he had spoken many minutes. The men were astonished and enraged,\n and one word of encouragement from their leader would have\n brought on a collision. Brigham saw this, and was equal to the\n occasion. When the judge sat down, he rose, and, by one of those\n strong, nervous appeals for which he is so famous among the\n brethren, restored the equilibrium of the audience. Those who\n but a moment before were bathed in tears now responded to his\n broad sarcasm and keen wit in screams of laughter; and having\n fully restored the spirits of the audience he turned to the\n judge and administered the following rebuke: \u2018I will kick you,\u2019\n he said, \u2018or any other Gentile judge from this stand, if you or\n they again attempt to interfere with the affairs of our\n Sion.\u2019\u201d[56]\n\nJudge Brocchus, finding his life in danger, resigned his office and left\nthe Territory. Once avowed, a belief in the doctrine was pronounced\nessential to salvation, and the practice of it was carried to a depth of\nbestiality which would horrify a Turk. All degrees of relationship were\npractically ignored. Incest and vicarious marriage became every-day\naffairs. The saints were taught that \u201cwhen our father Adam came into the\nGarden of Eden he came into it with a celestial body and brought Eve,\n_one of his wives_, with him\u201d;[57] and such blasphemies were coupled\nwith the holiest of all names that the Christian shudders to think of\nthem.\n\nThe formal adoption of the doctrine of polygamy, no longer as the\npersonal peculiarity of a few leaders, but as the corner-stone of Mormon\nsociety, had a result which Brigham doubtless anticipated when he\nestablished it. The separation of the saints from the rest of\nChristendom was made complete and final. Gentile civilization had forced\nitself upon their mountain retreat, and in the daily contact with\nChristianity and common sense the Mormon imposture was not likely long\nto survive. But the institution of plural marriage placed between the\nGentile and the Latter-Day Saint a barrier more formidable than\nsnow-crowned sierras and alkali deserts. Social intercourse became\nimpossible between the followers of the two rival systems. Contempt and\nhorror on the one side bred hatred on the other. For the polygamous\nsaint, moreover, judging after the manner of men, there was no\nrepentance. He was tied for ever to the church, an outlaw from all\nChristendom, liable to a long imprisonment if he re-entered the pale of\nsociety, safe even in Utah only so long as he enabled the \u201cGovernor of\nDeseret\u201d to defy the authority of the United States. The polygamist\nlearned to place in the prophet all his hopes for this world and the\nnext, and to accept all his utterances with the docility of a child. So\nBrigham became not only a more powerful man than Joseph Smith, but\nbeyond doubt the most absolute ruler in the entire world.\n\nIt was now that the Mormon theology began to assume its most repulsive\nshape. Cut off from its early connection with a form of Christianity\nwhich, however corrupt, contained at least a remnant of the ancient\nfaith, it sank with startling rapidity into the most dismal abysses of\npolytheism. To the materialistic doctrines which constituted the\nfoundation and chief characteristic of the philosophy of Orson Pratt and\nother primitive expounders of Mormonism, was added an immense mass of\ncrude and incongruous beliefs, not developed by any process of logic,\nbut simply heaped on by agglomeration. Daily \u201crevelations\u201d brought forth\ndaily inconsistencies and absurdities, under the weight of which the\ntruths once professed by Smith were gradually buried and forgotten.\nHence it is impossible to construct for Mormonism anything like a\ntheological system. We can only state the isolated and often\ncontradictory principles which are held by the saints at the present\nday, premising that although many of them can be traced more or less\ndistinctly in the early literature of the sect, the most shocking of\nthem were little, if at all, known until under Brigham Young the\nseparation of the saints was completed. The most startling of Mormon\ndogmas, relieved of extraneous complications, is that God is only a good\nman, and that men advance by evolution until they become gods. There is\nno Creator, there is no creature, there is no immaterial spirit. What we\ncall God, says one authority, is nothing but the truth abiding in man.\nWhat we call God, says Orson Pratt, is \u201ca material intelligent\npersonage, possessing both body and parts,\u201d like an ordinary man. He has\nlegs, which he uses in walking, though he can move up and down in the\nair without them. He cannot be in more than one place at a time. He\ndwells in a planet called Kolob. He was formed by the union of certain\nelementary particles of matter, self-moving, intelligent, and existing\nfrom all eternity. All matter is eternal. All substances are material.\nThe souls of men were not created; they are from eternity, like God\nhimself. God eats, drinks, loves, hates; his relations with mankind are\npurely human; he begets existences in the natural way.[58] Before he\nbecame God he was an ordinary man. He differs from other men now only in\npower. He is not omnipotent; he still increases and may continue to\nincrease infinitely. As God is only an improved man, so man may come by\ngradual progress to know as much as God. _Indeed, there are already\ninnumerable gods._ The first verse of Genesis, \u201cIn the beginning God\ncreated heaven and earth,\u201d ought to read: \u201cThe Head God brought forth\nthe gods, with the heavens and the earth.\u201d[59] Each god rules over a\nworld which he has peopled by generation, and the god of our world is\nAdam, who is only another form of the archangel Michael; \u201che is our\nfather and our God, and the only God with whom we have to do.\u201d The\nMormons believe in a vague way in the Trinity\u2014nay, in two Trinities, one\ncomposed of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; the other, and older, of\n\u201cElohim, Jehovah, and Adam.\u201d The Father and Son have bodies of flesh and\nblood; they occupy space; they require time to move from place to place;\nbut the Holy Spirit (which is the mind of the Father and the Son),\nalthough his substance is material, has no flesh and blood and permeates\neverything. After death the souls of the wicked will be imprisoned in\nthe brutes. The saints will inhabit the planets, where they will have\nhouses, farms, gardens, plantations of manna, and plenty of wives, and\nthey will go on marrying and multiplying for all eternity. When this\nplanetary system is filled up, new worlds will be called into existence,\nand in them the faithful, gradually developing into gods, will revel in\nthe sensual delights of a Moslem paradise.\n\nSurely no such mixture of pantheism, polytheism, and rank atheism was\never devised before; but we have not yet reached the worst. It was in\n1852 that Brigham proclaimed the doctrine that Adam is God, and to be\nhonored and revered as such. To this soon followed the announcement that\nJoseph Smith was God. In a year or two more the doctrine was taught, at\nfirst cautiously, but after 1856 publicly and officially, that the only\nGod to whom this generation is amenable is BRIGHAM YOUNG!\n\nThe declaration of this appalling impiety was made in the midst of a\ntempestuous \u201cReformation\u201d which historians will probably regard as the\nculminating point of Mormon fanaticism. In the autumn of 1856 one\nJedediah Grant, who stood high in the Mormon priesthood, began to preach\na revival in which the most remarkable practices were public\n\u201caccusations of the brethren\u201d and public \u201cconfessions of sin.\u201d An\nuncontrollable madness seized upon the whole community. Preachers and\npenitents vied with one another in disgusting disclosures. The meetings\nresounded with wails and curses and slanderous charges. Men, women, and\nchildren, not satisfied with laying bare their hidden sins, accused\nthemselves of crimes they had never committed, and called upon the\nchurch to punish and disgrace them. \u201cGo to President Young,\u201d was the cry\nof the preachers. \u201cGive up all that you have to President Young\u2014your\nmoney, your lands, your wives, your children, your blood.\u201d \u201cBrigham\nYoung,\u201d exclaimed Heber Kimball, \u201cis my God, is your God, is the only\nGod we shall ever see, if we do not obey him. Joseph Smith was our God\nwhen he was amongst us; Brigham Young is our God now.\u201d The church\nauthorities fanned the flame of excitement. They sent preachers into\nevery ward and every settlement. Thousands of the saints placed all\ntheir property in Brigham\u2019s hands.[60] Then they became inflamed with\npersecuting zeal. They sacked the houses of offenders, whipped and\nmutilated those who spoke evil of the church. From such outrages it was\nbut a step to murder. At Brigham\u2019s instigation the step was taken. In a\ndiscourse in the Tabernacle in February, 1857, he laid down a new law of\nlove. We must love our neighbors as ourselves. But if we love ourselves,\nwe must consent to the shedding of our own blood in order to atone for\nour sins and exalt us among the gods; so also it is true love to shed\nour neighbor\u2019s blood for his eternal salvation. \u201cI could refer you to a\nplenty of instances where men have been righteously slain in order to\natone for their sins. The wickedness and ignorance of the nations forbid\nthis principle being in full force, and the time will come when the law\nof God will be in full force. This is loving our neighbor as ourselves;\nif he needs help, help him; if he wants salvation, and it is necessary\nto spill his blood on the earth in order that he may be saved, _spill\nit_!\u201d \u201cThere are sins,\u201d said he on another occasion while the\n\u201cReformation\u201d was at its height, \u201cthat must be atoned for by the blood\nof the man. That is the reason why men talk to you as they do from this\nstand; they understand the doctrine and throw out a few words about it.\nYou have been taught that doctrine, but you do not understand it.\u201d Alas!\nunderstanding came soon enough. The Springville murders in March, 1857,\nwere followed that summer by the appalling massacre at the Mountain\nMeadows of one hundred and twenty peaceable emigrants, men, women, and\nchildren, on their way to California. The midnight assassin went his\nrounds. The church executioners were despatched upon their awful\nmissions. Sinners were sent on errands from which they never returned.\nApostasy was punished by the knife or the bullet. A Welshman named\nMorris set up as a rival prophet, and was shot down in cold blood with a\nnumber of his deluded followers. Gentiles were put to death for\npresuming to dispute with Mormons over the title to property. A husband\ntook his wife upon his knee and calmly cut her throat to atone for her\nsins.\n\n \u201cMen are murdered here,\u201d said a federal judge to the grand\n jury\u2014\u201ccoolly, deliberately, premeditatedly murdered. Their\n murder is deliberated and determined upon by church-council\n meetings, and that, too, for no other reason than that they had\n apostatized from your church and were striving to leave the\n Territory. You are the tools, the dupes, the instruments of a\n tyrannical church despotism. The heads of your church order and\n direct you. You are taught to obey their orders and commit these\n horrid murders. Deprived of your liberty, you have lost your\n manhood and become the willing instruments of bad men.\u201d\n\nClose upon the reign of terror established by the \u201cReformation\u201d came the\ngreat Mormon rebellion, and the march of an army to Utah to install the\nterritorial officers appointed by President Buchanan. Brigham thundered\ndefiance from the pulpit; but on the approach of the troops he ordered\nthe whole community to leave their homes and once more move out into the\nwilderness to build a new Sion. It is a wonderful illustration of the\nfanaticism and abject submission to which he had brought the people that\nthis order was promptly obeyed. Before the \u201cwar\u201d was settled by\nnegotiation no fewer than 30,000 poor creatures took flight, and many of\nthem, being utterly destitute, were never able to return. The frenzy of\nthe Reformation era died out; the rebellion was quelled; but the\ndoctrine of blood-atonement has not been abandoned, and to this day the\nsoil of Utah is red with human sacrifices.\n\nWith such a savage and brutal paganism as the Mormon religion thus\nbecame under Brigham Young\u2019s influence it is impossible that Christian\ncivilization should ever be at peace. The steady resistance which it has\noffered to the authority of the United States needs no further\nexplanation than we find in the constitution of the Mormon Church and\nthe fundamental doctrines of the Mormon creed. There are chapters in the\nhistory of the Latter-Day Saints upon which we have not thought it\nnecessary to linger. The organization of the Danites, and the long list\nof murders and other outrages preceding the open inculcation of human\nsacrifices, are among the most important of the events which we have\nthus passed over. They might be considered excrescences which time would\nperhaps remove. We have confined ourselves to the natural and logical\nconsequences of the preaching of the two prophets; to the circumstances\nwhich throw light upon their personal characters; to the facts which may\nenable people to place a juster valuation than now seems to be current\nupon the elements which they have introduced into American society and\nthe work which they have accomplished in the Rocky Mountain desert.\nAccepting even the most extravagant estimates of the material prosperity\nof the Mormon settlements, we think it must be admitted that their\nthrift is a curse to the world. And as for Brigham himself, cold,\ncalculating, avaricious, sensual, violent, cruel, rolling in luxury,\nstretching out his hands on every side to grasp the property of his\ndupes, and pushing them on from crime to crime, from horror to horror,\nthat he might the better amass money, he will take his place in history\nnot only as a worse man than Joseph Smith, but as one of the most\ndangerous monsters ever let loose upon the world.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n TO THE WOOD-THRUSH.\n\n\n How shall I put in words that song of thine?\n How tell it in this struggling phrase of mine?\n That strange, sweet wonder of full-throated bliss,\n The wild-wood freedom of its perfectness,\n Faint scent of flowers frail, strong breath of pine,\n The west wind\u2019s music, and the still sunshine.\n\n Could I weave sunshine into words, hold fast\n Day\u2019s sunset glow that it might ever last,\n That clothes as with immortal robe each height,\n Rugged and stern \u2018mid glare of noonday light,\n Softened beneath eve\u2019s gracious glory cast\u2014\n Like soul released, from strife to sweetness passed\u2014\n\n Were such power mine, so might I hope, perchance,\n In fitting speech to rhyme thy song\u2019s romance,\n To sing its sweetness with a note as sweet\n As thine that makes this sunset hour complete\u2014\n As voice beloved doth richest joy enhance,\n As swelling organ yearning soul doth trance.\n\n There is no sorrow set in thy pure song;\n Thy notes to realms where all is joy belong.\n Thou callest\u2014woods grow greener through thy voice,\n The stainless skies in deeper peace rejoice,\n All their best glories through thy singing throng\u2014\n Voice of a life that ne\u2019er knew thought of wrong!\n\n No martyr life of conquered grief is thine,\n Whose happiness but through old tears can shine;\n So, sure, didst thou in Eden sing ere Eve,\n Our eldest mother, learned for life to grieve,\n When thought was fresh, and knowledge still divine,\n And in love\u2019s light no shade of death did twine.\n\n Our songs to-day grow sweetest through our pain;\n Our Eden lost, we find it not again.\n Even our truest, most enduring joy\n Earth\u2019s twilight darkens with its dusk alloy.\n Soft, soft the shadow of thy heaven-dropt strain\n Only our weakness dims with sorrow\u2019s stain.\n\n Thou singst, O hermit bird! of Paradise,\n Not as lamenting its lost harmonies,\n Not as still fair through perfect penitence,\n But as unconscious in first innocence\u2014\n Token of time thou art when sinless eyes\n Were homes for cloudless thoughts divinely wise.\n\n All things that God found good seem yet to fill\n The few sweet notes that triumph in thy trill;\n All things that yet are good and purely fair\n Give unto thee their happy grace to wear.\n Sweet speech art thou for sunset-lighted hill;\n Yet day dies gladlier when thou art still.\n\n And I, O rare brown thrush! that idly gaze\n Far down the valley\u2019s mountain-shadowed ways\u2014\n Where bears the stream light burden of the sky,\n Where day, like quiet soul, in peace doth die,\n Its calm gold broken by no storm-clouds\u2019 blaze\u2014\n Hearken, joy-hushed, thy vesper song of praise\n\n That from yon hillside drops, strong carolling,\n A living echo thereto answering,\n Doubling the sweetness with the glad reply\n That drifts like argosy, joy-laden, by.\n Light grows my soul as thy uplifted wing;\n Heart knows no sorrow when it hears thee sing!\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE GOD OF \u201cADVANCED\u201d SCIENCE.\n\n\u201cThe fool hath said in his heart: There is no God.\u201d None but fools\nattempt to blind themselves to the irrefragable evidence which compels\nthe admission of a Supreme Being; and not even these can entirely\nsucceed in such an endeavor. For it is only in the frowardness of their\nheart, not in the light of their reason, that they pronounce the\nblasphemous phrase; their heart, not their intellect, is corrupted; so\nthat, notwithstanding the great number of avowed atheists who at\ndifferent times have disgraced the human family, one might be justified\nin saying that a real atheist, a man _positively convinced_ of the\nnon-existence of God, has never existed.\n\nWhat has led us to begin with this remark is an article in the _Popular\nScience Monthly_ (July, 1877) entitled \u201cThe Accusation of Atheism,\u201d in\nwhich the able but unphilosophical editor undertakes to show that\nalthough modern \u201cadvanced\u201d science may not profess to recognize the God\nof the Bible, yet we have no right to infer that this \u201cadvanced\u201d science\nis atheistical. The God of the Bible is to be suppressed altogether; but\n\u201cadvanced\u201d scientists, who have already invented so many wonderful\nthings, are confident that they have sufficient ability to invent even a\nnew God. Our good readers may find it a little strange; but we are not\ntrifling. The invention of a new God is just now the great _postulatum_\nof the infidel pseudo-philosophers. The less they believe in the living\nGod who made them, the more would they be delighted to worship a\nmock-god made by themselves, that they might not be accused of belonging\nto that class of fools who have said in their heart: There is no God.\n\nProf. Youmans starts with the bright idea that if Dr. Draper had\nentitled his book \u201ca history of the conflict between ecclesiasticism and\nscience\u201d instead of \u201cbetween religion and science,\u201d he would have\ndisarmed criticism and saved himself from a great deal of philosophical\nabuse. We cannot see, however, how criticism could have been disarmed by\nthe mere adoption of such a change. The whole of Dr. Draper\u2019s work\nbreathes infidelity; it falsifies the history of Christianity; it\ndenounces religion as the enemy of science; and from the first page to\nthe last it teems with slander and blasphemy; it is, therefore, a real\nattack upon religion. On the other hand, we must assume that Dr. Draper\nknew what he was about when he opposed \u201creligion\u201d to science; he said\njust what he meant; and this is, perhaps, the only merit of his\nproduction. If the title of the book were to be altered so as to \u201cdisarm\ncriticism,\u201d we would suggest that it should be made to read: _A\nmalicious fabrication concerning a fabulous conflict between religion\nand science_.\n\nThen Prof. Youmans proceeds to say that religious people \u201care alarmed at\nthe advancement of science, and denounce it as subversive of faith.\u201d\nThis is not the case. Religious people are not in the least alarmed at\nthe advancement of science, nor do they feel the least apprehension that\nscience may prove subversive of faith; quite the contrary. They love\nscience, do their best to promote it, accept thankfully its discoveries,\nand expect that it will contribute to strengthen, not to subvert, the\nrevealed truths which form the object of theological faith. We admit, at\nthe same time, that there is a so-called \u201cscience\u201d for which we have no\nsympathy. Such a pretended \u201cscience\u201d originated, if we do not mistake,\nin the Masonic lodges of Germany, whence it gradually spread through\nEngland and America by the efforts of the same secret organization. The\npromoters of this neoteric science boast that their cosmogony, their\nbiology, their sociology, their physiology, etc., are \u201csubversive\u201d of\nour faith; which would be true enough, if their theories were not at the\nsame time \u201csubversive\u201d of logic and common sense. But when we show that\ntheir vaunted theories cannot bear examination, when we point out the\nmanifold absurdities and contradictions they fall into, when we lay open\nthe sophisms by which their objectionable assertions are supported, and\nchallenge them to make a reply, they invariably quail and dare not open\ntheir mouths, or, if they venture to speak, they ignore criticism with a\nconvenient unconcern which is the best palliation of their defeat. As an\nexample of this we may remind Prof. Youmans that we ourselves have given\na refutation of Prof. Huxley\u2019s lectures on evolution, and that we have\nyet to see the first attempt at a reply. We have also refuted a defence\nof Prof. Huxley written by Prof. Youmans himself in answer to Rev. Dr.\nW. M. Taylor, and we have shown how his own \u201cscientific\u201d reasoning was\nat fault in every point; but of course his scientific acuteness did not\nallow him to utter a word of reply. No, we are not afraid of a \u201cscience\u201d\nwhich can be silenced with so little effort. Were it not that there is a\nprevailing ignorance so easily imposed upon by the charlatanism of false\nscience, there would be no need whatever for denouncing it: it denounces\nitself sufficiently to a logical mind.\n\nProf. Youmans pretends that the difficulty of religious people with\nregard to advanced science is simply that of \u201cnarrowness or ignorance\ninspired by a fanatical earnestness.\u201d We are greatly obliged by the\ncompliment! Prof. Youmans is, indeed, a model of politeness, according\nto the standard of modern progress; but it did not occur to him that,\nbefore speaking of the \u201cnarrowness and ignorance\u201d of his critics, he\nshould have endeavored to atone for his own blunders which we pointed\nout in our number for April. To our mind, a man whose ignorance of logic\nand of many other things has been demonstrated has no right to talk of\nthe ignorance of religious people. And as to \u201cfanatical earnestness,\u201d we\nneed hardly say that it is in the _Popular Science Monthly_ and in other\nsimilar productions of \u201cscientific\u201d unbelievers that we find the best\ninstances of its convulsive exertions. But let us proceed.\n\n\u201cAtheism,\u201d continues the professor, \u201chas now come to be a familiar and\nstereotyped charge against men of science, both on the part of the\npulpit and the religious press. Not that they accuse all scientific men\nof atheism, but they allege this to be the tendency of scientific\nthought and the outcome of scientific philosophy. It matters nothing\nthat this imputation is denied; it matters nothing that scientific men\nclaim that their studies lead them to higher and more worthy conceptions\nof the divine power, manifested through the order of nature, than the\nconceptions offered by theology. It is enough that they disagree with\ncurrent notions upon this subject, and any difference of view is here\nheld as atheism. In this, as we have said, the theologians may be\nhonest, but they are narrow and bigoted.\u201d\n\nMr. Youmans does not perceive the tendency of \u201cscientific\u201d thought to\nfoster atheism. Not he! Darwin\u2019s theory of development has for its\nprincipal object to destroy, if possible, the history of creation and to\nget rid of the Creator. This Mr. Youmans does not perceive. Tyndall, in\nhis Belfast lecture, professes atheism as the outcome of scientific\nphilosophy, and, though he has offered some explanations to screen\nhimself from the imputation, he stands convicted by his own words. Of\nthis Mr. Youmans takes no notice. B\u00fcchner ridicules the idea that there\nis a God, and teaches that such an idea is obsolete, contrary to modern\nscience, and condemned by philosophy as a manifest impossibility. Mr.\nYoumans seems to hold that this is not genuine atheism. Huxley, to avoid\ncreation, gives up all investigation of the origin of things as useless\nand unscientific, and the advanced thinkers in general are everywhere at\nwork propagating the same view in their scientific lectures, books,\njournals, and magazines. Yet Prof. Youmans wishes the world to believe\nthat the tendency of advanced scientific thought is not towards atheism!\nIs he blind? The man who writes Nature with a capital letter, who denies\ncreation, who contributes to the best of his power to the diffusion of\ninfidel thought, can hardly be ignorant of the fact that what is now\ncalled advanced science is, in the hands of its apostles and leaders, an\nengine of war against God. But he knows also that to profess atheism is\nbad policy, for the present at least. Science, as he laments in many of\nhis articles, has not yet advanced enough in the popular mind; people\nare still \u201cnarrow\u201d and \u201cignorant,\u201d and even \u201cfanatic\u201d\u2014that is, their\nreligious feelings and conscientious convictions do not yet permit a\ndirect and outspoken confession of the atheistic tendency of modern\n\u201cscientific\u201d thought. Hence he is obliged to be cautious and to put on a\nmask. Such are, and ever have been, the tactics of God\u2019s enemies. Thus\nProf. Huxley, in his lectures on evolution, while attacking the Biblical\nhistory of creation, pretends that he is only refuting the \u201cMiltonian\nhypothesis.\u201d The same Prof. Huxley, with Herbert Spencer and many others\nof less celebrity, endeavors to conceal his atheism, or at any rate to\nmake it appear less repulsive, by the convenient but absurd admission of\nthe Great Unknown or Unknowable, to which surely neither he nor any\nother scientist will offer adoration, as it would be an utterly\nsuperfluous, unscientific, and unphilosophical thing to worship what\nthey cannot know. And Prof. Youmans himself follows the same tactics, as\nwe shall see in the sequel. Hence we do not wonder that he considers Mr.\nDraper\u2019s words \u201ca conflict between religion and science\u201d as unfortunate,\nand only calculated to provoke criticism and theological abuse. It would\nhave been so easy and so much better to say \u201cbetween ecclesiasticism and\nscience.\u201d This would have saved appearances, and might have furnished a\nplausible ground for repelling the accusation of atheism.\n\nBut, says Prof. Youmans, \u201cthis imputation is denied.\u201d We answer that the\nimputation cannot be evaded by any such denial. If there were question\nof the intimate convictions of private individuals, their denial might\nhave some weight in favor of their secret belief. Men very frequently do\nnot see clearly the ultimate consequences of their own principles; and\nit is for this reason that an atheistic science does not always lead to\npersonal atheism. As there are honest Protestants who believe on\nauthority, though their Protestant principle sacrifices authority to\nprivate judgment, so also there are many honest scientists who,\nnotwithstanding their admission of atheistic theories, believe in God.\nThis is mere inconsistency after all; and it can only furnish a ground\nfor judging of the views of individual scientists.\n\nBut our question regards the tendency of \u201cadvanced scientific thought\u201d\nirrespective of the inconsistency of sundry individuals. This question\nis to be solved from the nature of the principles and of the conclusions\nof \u201cadvanced\u201d science; and if such principles and such conclusions are\nshown to lead logically to atheism, it matters very little indeed that\n\u201cthe imputation is denied.\u201d This the editor of the _Popular Science\nMonthly_ must admit. Now, that atheism is the logical outcome of\n\u201cadvanced\u201d science may be proved very easily. Dr. B\u00fcchner, in his _Force\nand Matter_, gives a long scientific argumentation against the existence\nof God. The science which led him to this profession of atheism is the\n\u201cadvanced\u201d science of which Prof. Youmans speaks. Has any among the\nadvanced scientists protested against Dr. B\u00fcchner\u2019s conclusion? Have any\nof them endeavored to show that this conclusion was not logically\ndeduced from the principles of their pretended science? Some of them may\nhave been pained at the imprudent sincerity of the German doctor; but\nwhat he affirms with a coarse impudence they too insinuate every day in\na gentler tone and in a more guarded phraseology. Their doctrine is that\n\u201cwhereas mankind formerly believed the phenomena of nature to be\nexpressions of the will of a personal God, modern science, by reducing\neverything to laws, has given a sufficient explanation of these\nphenomena, and made it quite unnecessary for man to seek any further\naccount of them.\u201d Dr. Carpenter, from whom we have borrowed this\nstatement, adds: \u201cThis is precisely Dr. B\u00fcchner\u2019s position; and it seems\nto me a legitimate inference from the very prevalent assumption (which\nis sanctioned by the language of some of our ablest writers) that the\nso-called laws of nature \u2018govern\u2019 the phenomena of which they are only\ngeneralized expressions. I have been protesting against this language\nfor the last quarter of a century.\u201d[61]\n\nMr. Youmans himself implicitly admits that \u201cadvanced\u201d science has given\nup the old notion of God; and he only contends that scientists, while\ndisregarding the God of theology, fill up his place with something\nbetter. \u201cScientific men claim that their studies lead them to higher and\nmore worthy conceptions of the divine power manifested through the order\nof nature than the conceptions offered by theology.\u201d Our readers need\nhardly be told that this claim on the part of our advanced scientists is\npreposterous and ridiculous. For if the order of nature could lead to a\nconception of divine power higher or worthier than the conception\noffered by theology, it would lead to a conception of divine power\ngreater and higher than omnipotence; for omnipotence is one of the\nattributes of the God of theology. But can we believe that Mr. Youmans\nentertains the hope of conceiving a power higher than omnipotence? How,\nthen, can he make good his assertion? On the other hand, the God of\ntheology is immense, eternal, and unchangeable, infinitely intelligent,\ninfinitely wise, infinitely good, infinitely perfect, as not only all\ntheologians but also all philosophers unquestionably admit. Must we\nbelieve that our scientists will be able to conceive a higher intellect,\nwisdom, or goodness than infinite intellect, infinite wisdom, or\ninfinite goodness? Will they imagine anything greater than immensity, or\nthan eternity? The editor of the _Popular Science Monthly_ has a very\npoor opinion indeed of the intellectual power of his habitual readers,\nif he thinks that they will not detect the absurdity of his claim.\n\nBut there is more than this. \u201cAdvanced\u201d science has repeatedly confessed\nits inability to form a conception of God. The ultimate conclusion of\n\u201cadvanced\u201d science is that the contemplation and study of nature afford\nno indication of what a God may be; so much so that the leaders of this\n\u201cadvanced\u201d science, after suppressing the God of theology, could find\nnothing to substitute in his place but what they call \u201cthe Great\nUnknown\u201d and \u201cthe Great Unknowable.\u201d Now, surely, the unknowable cannot\nbe known. How, then, can these scientists claim that their studies lead\nthem \u201cto higher and more worthy conceptions of the divine power\u201d? Can\nthey conceive that which is unknown and unknowable? Have they any means\nof ascertaining that a thing unknowable has power, or that its power is\ndivine?\n\nLet them understand that if their \u201cUnknowable\u201d is not eternal, it is no\nGod; if it is not omniscient, it is no God; if it is not omnipotent, it\nis no God. And, in like manner, if it is not self-existent, immutable,\nimmense, infinitely wise, infinitely good, infinitely perfect, it is no\nGod. And, again, if it is not our Creator, our Master, and our Judge, it\nis no God, and we have no reason for worshipping it, or even for\nrespecting it. How can we know that these and similar attributes can and\nmust be predicated of the Unknowable, since the unknowable is not and\ncannot be known? If, on the contrary, we know that such a being is\nomnipotent, omniscient, eternal, immense, and infinitely perfect in all\nmanner of perfections, then it is obvious (even to Prof. Youmans, we\nassume) that such a being is neither unknown nor unknowable. Thus the\nunknowable can lay no claim to \u201cdivine power\u201d or other divine\nattributes; and therefore the pretended worshippers of the Unknowable\nvainly attempt to palliate their atheism by claiming that their studies\nhave led them \u201cto a higher and more worthy conception of the divine\npower than the conception offered by theology.\u201d\n\nAs to Prof. Youmans himself, he tells us that the divine nature is\n\u201cunspeakable and unthinkable.\u201d This evidently amounts to saying that the\ndivine nature is unknowable, just as Herbert Spencer, Huxley, and others\nof the same sect have maintained. The professor will not deny, we trust,\nthat what is unthinkable is also unknowable, unless he is ready to show\nthat he knows the square circle. Hence the remarks we have passed on the\ndoctrine of his leaders apply to him as well as to them. It is singular,\nhowever, that neither he nor any of his sect has thought of examining\nthe question whether the \u201cUnknowable\u201d has any existence at all. For if\nit has no existence, they must confess that they have not even an\nunknown God, and therefore are absolute atheists; and if they assume\nthat it has a real existence, they are supremely illogical; for no one\nhas a right to proclaim the existence of a thing unknown and unknowable.\nThe existence of the unknowable cannot be affirmed unless it be known;\nbut it cannot be known unless the unknowable be known; and this implies\na manifest contradiction. To affirm existence is to affirm a fact; and\nMr. Youmans would certainly be embarrassed to show that science, however\n\u201cadvanced,\u201d can affirm a fact of which it has no knowledge whatever.\nHence atheism is the legitimate result of the doctrine which substitutes\nthe \u201cUnknowable\u201d in the place of the God of theology; and \u201cit matters\nnothing\u201d that this consequence is _provisionally_ denied by Prof.\nYoumans. Were it not that the horror inspired by the impious pretensions\nof his fallacious science obliges him to keep within the measures of\nprudence, it is very likely that Prof. Youmans would not only not deny\nhis \u201cscientific\u201d atheism, but even glory in its open profession. So long\nas this cannot be safely done he must remain satisfied with writing\nNature with a capital N.\n\nFrom these remarks we can further infer that Mr. Youmans\u2019 complaint\nabout the narrowness and bigotry of theologians is utterly unfounded.\nThere is no narrowness in rejecting foolish conceptions, and no bigotry\nin maintaining the rights of truth. Theology condemns your doctrines,\nnot because they \u201cdisagree with current notions,\u201d but because they are\nmanifestly impious and absurd. The views you encourage are atheistical.\nYou admit only the Unknowable; and the Unknowable, as we have just\nproved, is not God. Hence the theologians are not \u201cnarrow\u201d nor\n\u201cbigoted,\u201d but strictly logical and reasonable, when they condemn your\ndoctrines as atheistical.\n\nAnd now Prof. Youmans makes the following curious argument:\n\n \u201cIt is surprising that they (the theologians) cannot see that in\n arraigning scientific thinkers for atheism they are simply doing\n what stupid fanatics the world over are always doing when ideas\n of the Deity different from their own are maintained. And it is\n the more surprising that Christian teachers should indulge in\n this intolerant practice when it is remembered that their own\n faith was blackened with this opprobrium at its first\n promulgation.\u201d\n\nHere a long passage is quoted from _The Contest of Heathenism with\nChristianity_, by Prof. Zeller, of Berlin, in which we are reminded that\nthe primitive Christians were reproached with atheism because they \u201cdid\nnot agree with the prevailing conceptions of the Deity,\u201d and that \u201cDown\nwith the atheists\u201d was the war-cry of the heathen mob against the\nChristians. This suggests to Mr. Youmans the following remarks:\n\n \u201cIt would be well if our theologians would remember these things\n when tempted to deal out their maledictions upon scientific men\n as propagators of atheism. For the history of their own faith\n attests that religious ideas are a growth, and that they pass\n from lower states to higher unfoldings through processes of\n inevitable suffering. It was undoubtedly a great step of\n progress from polytheism to monotheism, ... but this was neither\n the final step in the advancement of the human mind toward the\n highest conception of the Deity, nor the last experience of\n disquiet and grief at sundering the ties of old religious\n associations. But if this be a great normal process in the\n development of the religious feeling and aspiration of humanity,\n why should the Christians of to-day adopt the bigoted tactics of\n heathenism, first applied to themselves, to use against those\n who would still further ennoble and purify the ideal of the\n Divinity?\u201d\n\nThus, according to the professor, as the pagans were wrong and stupid in\ndenouncing the Christians as atheists, so are the Christians both wrong\nand stupid in denouncing the atheistic tendency of \u201cadvanced\u201d science;\nand the reason alleged is that as the pagans did not recognize the\nsuperiority of monotheism to polytheism, so the Christian theologians\nfail to see the superiority of the \u201cscientific\u201d Unknowable to the God of\nChristianity. Need we answer this? Why, if anything were wanting to\nprove that Prof. Youmans is laboring for the cause of atheism, his very\nmanner of arguing may be regarded as a convincing proof of the fact.\nFor, if his reasoning has any meaning, it means that as the Christians\nrejected the gods of the pagans, so Prof. Youmans rejects the God of the\nChristians; and this is quite enough to show his atheism, as he neither\nrecognizes our God, nor has he found, nor will he ever find, another God\nworthy of his recognition; for, surely, the \u201cUnthinkable\u201d of which he\nspeaks is not an object of recognition.\n\nOn the other hand, is it true that the history of Christianity \u201cattests\nthat religious ideas are a growth, and that they pass from lower states\nto higher unfoldings\u201d? Does the history of Christianity attest, for\ninstance, that our conception of God has passed from a lower to a higher\nstate? But, waiving this, it requires great audacity to contend that the\ntheory of the \u201cUnknowable\u201d and of the \u201cUnthinkable\u201d is an unfolding of\nthe conception of God. We appeal to Prof. Youmans himself. A theory of\nnatural science which would lay down as the ultimate result of human\nprogress that what we call chemistry, geology, astronomy, mechanics,\nelectricity, optics, magnetism, is something \u201cunknowable\u201d and\n\u201cunthinkable,\u201d would scarcely be considered by him an \u201cunfolding\u201d of\nscience. For how could he \u201cunfold\u201d his thoughts in the _Popular Science\nMonthly_, if the subject of his thought were \u201cunthinkable\u201d? But, then,\nhow can he assume that his theory of the \u201cunthinkable\u201d is an \u201cunfolding\u201d\nof the conception of God? God cannot be conceived, if he is unthinkable.\nWe conceive God as an eternal, immense, omnipotent, personal Being.\nThese and other attributes of Divinity, as conceived by us, constitute\nour notion of God; and this notion is as unfolded as is consistent with\nthe limits of the human mind. But to \u201cunfold\u201d the conception of Divinity\nby suppressing omnipotence, wisdom, eternity, goodness, and all other\nperfections of the divine nature, so as to leave nothing \u201cthinkable\u201d in\nit, is not to unfold our conception, but to suppress it altogether.\n\nAs to the flippant assertion that the Christian conception of Divinity\nis not \u201cthe final step in the advancement of the human mind toward the\nhighest conception of the Deity,\u201d we might say much. But what is the use\nof refuting what every Christian child knows to be false? We conceive\nGod as the supreme truth, the supreme good, and the supreme Lord of\nwhatever exists; and he who pretends that there is or can be a \u201chigher\nconception of the Deity\u201d has himself to thank if men call him a fool.\n\nWe shall say nothing of \u201cintolerant practices,\u201d \u201cstupid fanaticism,\u201d or\n\u201cbigoted tactics.\u201d These are mere words. As to \u201cthe aspiration of\nhumanity,\u201d it may be noticed that there is a secret society that\nconsiders its aspirations as the aspirations of \u201chumanity,\u201d and, when it\nspeaks of \u201chumanity,\u201d it usually means nothing more and nothing better\nthan its \u201cfree and accepted\u201d members. This \u201chumanity\u201d has doubtless some\ncurious aspirations; but mankind does not aspire to dethrone God or to\npervert the notion of Divinity.\n\nProf. Youmans accounts for \u201cthe aspiration of humanity\u201d in the following\nmanner:\n\n \u201cIt cannot be rationally questioned that the world has come to\n another important stage in this line of its progression. The\n knowledge of the universe, its action, its harmony, its unity,\n its boundlessness and grandeur, is comparatively a recent thing;\n and is it to be for a moment supposed that so vast a revolution\n as this is to be without effect upon our conception of its\n divine control?\u201d\n\nThis manner of arguing is hardly creditable to a professor of science;\nfor, even admitting for the sake of argument that the knowledge of the\nuniverse is comparatively \u201ca recent thing,\u201d it would not follow that\nsuch a knowledge must alter the Christian conception of the divine\nnature. Let the professor make the universe as great, as boundless, and\nas harmonious as possible; what then? Will such a universe proclaim a\nnew God? By no means. It will still proclaim the same God, though in a\nlouder voice. For the harmony, beauty, and grandeur of the universe\nreveal to us the infinite greatness, beauty, and wisdom of its Creator;\nand the greater our knowledge of such a universe, the more forcible the\ndemonstration of the infinite perfection of its Creator. Now, this\nCreator is our old God, the God of the Bible, the God to whom Mr.\nYoumans owes his existence, and to whom he must one day give an account\nof how he used or abused his intellectual powers. This is, however, the\nGod whom the professor would fain banish from the universe. Is there\nanything more unphilosophic or more unscientific?\n\nBut the knowledge of the universe, from which we rise to the conception\nof God, is not \u201ca recent thing.\u201d Infidels are apt to imagine that the\nworld owes to them the knowledge of natural science. We must remind them\nthat science has been built up by men who believed in God. \u201cAdvanced\u201d\nscience is of course \u201ca recent thing,\u201d but it does not \u201cconstitute an\nimportant stage\u201d in the line of real progress; for it consists of\nnothing but reckless assumptions, deceitful phraseology, and illogical\nconclusions. Three thousand years ago King David averred that \u201cthe\nheavens show forth the glory of God, and the firmament declareth the\nwork of his hands.\u201d Has advanced science made any recent discovery in\nthe heavens or on earth which gives the lie to this highly philosophical\nstatement? Quite the contrary. It is, therefore, supremely ridiculous to\ntalk of a \u201cvast revolution\u201d whose effect must be \u201cto purify the ideal of\nDivinity.\u201d This vast revolution is a dream of the professor.\n\nBut he says:\n\n \u201cIs it rational to expect that the man of developed intellect\n whose life is spent in the all-absorbing study of that mighty\n and ever-expanding system of truth that is embodied in the\n method of Nature will form the same idea of God as the ignorant\n blockhead who knows and cares nothing for these things, who is\n incapable of reflection or insight, and who passively accepts\n the narrow notions upon this subject that other people put into\n his head? As regards the divine government of the world, two\n such contrasted minds can hardly have anything in common.\u201d\n\nThis is a fair sample of the logical processes of certain thinkers \u201cof\ndeveloped intellect.\u201d Our professor assumes, first, that Catholic\ntheologians are \u201cignorant blockheads,\u201d that they \u201cknow and care nothing\u201d\nfor natural truths, that they are \u201cincapable of reflection or insight,\u201d\nand that they \u201cpassively accept\u201d what others may put into their heads.\nWould it not be more reasonable to assume that a \u201cblockhead\u201d is a man\nwho asserts what cannot be proved, as a certain professor is wont to do?\nAnd would it be unfair to assume that the man who \u201cknows and cares\nnothing\u201d for truth is one who beguiles his readers into error, and, when\nconvicted, makes no amends? We would not say that the professor is\n\u201cincapable of reflection or insight,\u201d for we think that no human being\ncan be so degraded as to deserve this stigma; but we cannot help\nthinking that Mr. Youmans \u201cpassively accepts\u201d many absurd notions, for\nwhich he cannot account, except by saying that they \u201chave been put into\nhis head\u201d by such \u201cdeveloped intellects\u201d as Huxley\u2019s, Darwin\u2019s,\nSpencer\u2019s, and other notorious falsifiers of truth.\n\nProfessor Youmans assumes also that our intellects cannot be \u201cdeveloped\u201d\nenough to form a true conception of God, unless we apply to \u201cthe\nall-absorbing study of the method of Nature,\u201d by which he means the\nconservation of energy, the indestructibility of matter, the evolution\nof species, and other cognate theories. This assumption has no\nfoundation. To form a true conception of God it suffices to know that\nthe universe is subject to continual changes, and therefore contingent,\nand consequently _created_. This leads us directly to the conception of\na Creator, or of a First Cause which is self-existent, independent, and\neternal. Modern science and \u201cdeveloped intellects\u201d have nothing to say\nagainst this. It is therefore a gross absurdity to assume that the study\nof the method of nature interferes with the old conception of God.\n\nA third assumption of the professor is that our notion of divine nature\nis \u201cnarrow.\u201d It is astonishing that Mr. Youmans could have allowed\nhimself to make so manifestly foolish a statement. Is there anything\n\u201cnarrow\u201d in immensity? in omnipotence? in eternity? in infinite wisdom?\nor in any other attribute of the true God? And if our notion of God,\nwhich involves all such attributes, is still \u201cnarrow,\u201d what shall we say\nof the professor\u2019s notion which involves nothing but the\n\u201cunthinkable\u201d\u2014that is, nothing at all?\n\nThe professor proceeds to say that if a man is ignorant and stupid his\ncontemplation of divine things will reflect his own limitation. This is\na great truth; but he should have been loath to proclaim it in a place\nwhere we find so many proofs of his own \u201climitation.\u201d On the other hand,\nit is not from the ignorant and the stupid that our philosophers and\ntheologians have derived their notion of God; and to confound the latter\nwith the former is, on the part of a \u201cdeveloped intellect,\u201d a miserable\nshow of logic. The ignorant and the stupid, continues Mr. Youmans, \u201cwill\ncling to a grovelling anthropomorphism,\u201d and conceive of the Deity \u201cas a\nman like himself, only greater and more powerful, and as chiefly\ninterested in the things that he is interested in.\u201d To which we answer\nthat the stupid and the ignorant of divine things are those who _do not\nknow_ God, and who maintain against the universal verdict of reason that\nGod is \u201cunknowable.\u201d We defy Mr. Youmans to point out a stupidity and an\nignorance of divine things which equals that of him who pretends to\nthink of the \u201cunthinkable.\u201d This is even worse than \u201cto cling to a\ngrovelling anthropomorphism.\u201d Of course our anthropomorphism is a poetic\ninvention of the \u201cdeveloped intellect,\u201d and therefore we may dismiss it\nwithout further comment.\n\n \u201cThe profound student of science,\u201d he adds, \u201cwill rise to a more\n spiritualized and abstract ideal of the divine nature, or will\n be so oppressed with a consciousness of the Infinity as to\n reverently refrain from all attempts to grasp, and formulate,\n and limit the nature of that which is past finding out, which is\n unspeakable and unthinkable.\u201d\n\nTo understand the real meaning of this sentence we must remember that he\nwho wrote it does not accept the God of theologians. Scientific men, as\nhe has told us, claim that their studies lead them \u201cto higher and more\nworthy conceptions\u201d of the divine power than the conceptions offered by\ntheology. It is obvious, therefore, that the \u201cspiritualized and abstract\nideal of the divine nature\u201d to which the profound student of science is\nexpected to rise is not the ideal recognized by theology. This is very\nstrange; for if theology does not furnish the true ideal of divine\nnature, much less can such an ideal be furnished by the science of\nmatter. Every science is best acquainted with its own specific object;\nand since God is the object of theology, the ideal of the divine nature\nis to be found in theology, not in natural science. Hence \u201cthe profound\nstudent of science\u201d may indeed determine the laws of physical and\nchemical phenomena, speak of masses and densities, of solids and fluids,\nand of other experimental subjects without much danger of error, but he\nhas no qualification for inventing a new ideal of divine nature. The\nideal of a thing exhibits the essence of the thing; and the study of\nessences does not belong to the scientist, whose field is confined\nwithin the phenomena and their laws. The best scientists confess that\nthey do not even know the essence of matter, though matter is the proper\nand most familiar object of their study. Yet these are the men who,\naccording to Mr. Youmans, should know best the essence of God.\n\nBut we should like further to know how the \u201cprofound student\u201d of\nadvanced science will be able to rise to a \u201cspiritualized\u201d ideal of\nDivinity. The general drift of modern infidel science is towards\nmaterialism. It teaches that thought is secreted by the brain as water\nis by the kidneys, or, at least, that thought consists of molecular\nmovements, and that the admission of a spiritual substance in the\norganism of man is quite unwarranted. How, then, can a science which\nrejects spiritual substances lead its \u201cprofound student\u201d to a\nspiritualized ideal of Divinity? It is manifest, we think, that all this\ntalk is mere jugglery, and the professor himself seems to have felt that\nit was; for he admits that the profound student of science may be \u201cso\noppressed with a consciousness of the Infinite as to refrain from all\nattempts to grasp and formulate and limit the nature of what is past\nfinding out.\u201d This last expression shows that Mr. Youmans has no ground\nfor expecting that his profound student will rise to the ideal of the\ndivine nature, as what is \u201cpast finding out\u201d will never be found, and is\nnot only \u201cunspeakable,\u201d as he declares, but also \u201cunthinkable.\u201d The\nprofound student of science is therefore doomed, so far as Mr. Youmans\nmay be relied on, to remain without any ideal of God. What is this but\ngenuine atheism?\n\nMr. Youmans will reply that his profound student will not be an atheist,\nbecause he will feel \u201cso oppressed with the consciousness of the\nInfinite.\u201d But we should like to know how the profound student can have\nconsciousness of what he cannot think of. And, in like manner, if the\nInfinite is unthinkable, how can the profound student know that it is\ninfinite? These contradictions go far to prove that \u201cignorance\u201d and\n\u201cstupidity,\u201d far from being the characteristics of Christianity, find a\nmore congenial abode in the \u201cdeveloped intellects of the profound\nstudents of advanced science.\u201d\n\nAs all errors are misrepresentations of truth, we cannot dismiss this\npoint without saying a word about the truth here misrepresented. God is\nincomprehensible; such is the truth. God is unthinkable; this is the\nerror. To argue that what is incomprehensible is also unthinkable, is a\nmanifest fallacy. There are a very great number even of finite things\nwhich we know but cannot comprehend. For instance, we know gravitation,\nelectricity, and magnetism, but our knowledge of them is quite\ninadequate. We know ancient history, though numberless facts have\nremained inaccessible to our research. We know the operations of our own\nfaculties, but we are far from comprehending them. Comprehension is the\nperfect and adequate knowledge of the object comprehended. If the\ncognoscibility of the object is not exhausted, there is knowledge, but\nnot comprehension; and as our finite intellect has no power of\nexhausting the cognoscibility of things, human knowledge is not\ncomprehension, though no one will deny that it is true and real\nknowledge. In like manner, though we do not comprehend the infinite, yet\nwe conceive it, and we know how to distinguish it from the finite. We\nknow what we say when we affirm that the branches of the hyperbola\nextend to infinity, that the decimal division of ten by three leads to\nan infinite series of figures, that every line is infinitely divisible,\nthat every genus extends infinitely more than any of its subordinate\nspecies, and the species infinitely more than the individual, etc. Thus\nthe notion of the infinite is a familiar one among men; and when Mr.\nYoumans contends that the infinite is unthinkable, he commits a blunder,\nand every one of his readers has the right to tell him that such a\nblunder in inductive science is inexcusable.\n\nPerhaps it may not be superfluous to point out, before we conclude,\nanother fallacy of the \u201cdeveloped intellect\u201d of the professor. He\nassumes that to form a conception of God is to limit the divine nature;\nfor he declares that the profound student of science oppressed with the\nconsciousness of Infinity ought reverently to refrain \u201cfrom all attempts\nto grasp, and formulate, and _limit_ the nature of that which is past\nfinding out.\u201d We would inform Mr. Youmans that the notion of a thing\ndoes not limit the thing, but simply expresses that the thing is what it\nis, whether it be limited or unlimited. In all essential definitions\nsome notion is included, which expresses either perfection or\nimperfection. When we say that a being is _irrational_, we point out an\nimperfection, or a defect of further perfection; whereas when we say\nthat a being is _rational_, we express a perfection of the being. Now,\nsince all imperfection is a real limit, it follows that all denial of\nimperfection is a denial of some limit, and therefore the affirmation of\nevery possible perfection is a total exclusion of limit. Thus\nomnipotence excludes all limit of power, eternity all limit of duration,\nomniscience all limit of knowledge, immensity all limit of space. We\nneed not add that all the other attributes of God exclude limitation, as\nthey are all infinite. It is evident, therefore, that we can \u201cformulate\u201d\nour notion of God without \u201climiting\u201d the divine nature; and that those\n\u201cprofound students\u201d of nature whose \u201cdeveloped intellect\u201d is \u201coppressed\nwith the consciousness of Infinity\u201d strive in vain to palliate their\natheism by \u201creverently (?) refraining from all attempts to grasp and\nformulate\u201d the nature of the Supreme Cause.\n\nWe may be told that Prof. Youmans, though he rejects the \u201cGod of\ntheology,\u201d admits something equivalent\u2014viz., Infinity, the consciousness\nof which he feels so oppressive. He also admits that \u201creligious feelings\nmay be awakened\u201d in a mind so oppressed by the thought of Infinity, and\ninsists that \u201creligious teachers ought in these days to have liberality\nenough to recognize this serious fact, remembering that human nature is\nreligiously progressive as well as progressive in its other capacities.\u201d\nWould not this show that we cannot without injustice hold him up as a\nprofessor of atheism? We reply that the accusation of atheism preferred\nagainst the tendency of advanced science has been met by the professor\nin such a manner as to give it only more weight, according to the old\nproverb which says that\n\n\n _Causa patrocinio non bona pejor erit_.\n\n\nHe does not believe in the God of theology. In what does he believe? In\nthe \u201cunthinkable\u201d! This is sheer mockery. But the unthinkable is said to\nbe infinite. This is sheer nonsense, as we have shown. Again, the\nunthinkable is said to awaken religious feelings. This is written for\nunthinkable persons. The professor, as we have already noticed, admires\nthe grandeur of nature, and holds it to be \u201cboundless,\u201d and therefore\ninfinite. This may lead one to suspect that the material universe\u2014the\nsun, the planets, the stars, heat, light, electricity, gravity, and\ntheir laws\u2014constitute the \u201cInfinity\u201d with the consciousness of which the\nprofessor is oppressed. If this could be surmised, we might regard him\nas a pantheist. This, of course, would not better his position, as\npantheism is, after all, only another form of atheism. But if nature (or\nrather Nature, as he writes it) is his Deity, how can he affirm that\nsuch a nature is \u201cunspeakable\u201d and \u201cunthinkable\u201d? If nature is\n\u201cunthinkable,\u201d the science of nature is a dream; and if it is\n\u201cunspeakable,\u201d all the talk of the _Popular Science Monthly_ is a fraud.\n\nIf Prof. Youmans wishes us to believe that \u201cadvanced\u201d science does not\ntend to foster atheism, and that its foremost champions are not\natheists, let him come forward like a man, and show that, after\nrejecting the God of theology and of philosophy, another God has been\nfound, to whom \u201cdeveloped intellects\u201d offer religious worship, and in\nwhom their religious feelings are rationally satisfied. Let him give us,\nabove all, his \u201cscientific\u201d reasons for abandoning the God of the Bible,\nin whom we \u201cignorant blockheads\u201d have not ceased to believe; and let him\nstate his \u201cphilosophic\u201d reasons also, if he has any, that we may judge\nof the case according to its full merit. We need not be instructed about\nthe \u201creligious progressiveness\u201d of mankind, or any other convenient\ninvention of unbelievers; we want only to know the new God of \u201cadvanced\u201d\nscience, his nature and his claims. When Prof. Youmans shall have\nhonestly complied with this suggestion, we shall see what answer can\nbest meet his appeal to the \u201cliberality\u201d of religious teachers.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A LEGEND OF DIEPPE.\n\nA gloomy three days\u2019 storm has prevailed all along the French coast.\nDull gray clouds hide the blue vault of heaven and frown upon the\ntossing waters beneath. The fresh, invigorating air, remembered with\ndelight by all who have ever been in Normandy, has given place to a\ndamp, chilly heaviness, broken occasionally by fierce gusts of wind and\nrain. The fisher-boats are all in port, the small ones drawn up high on\nthe beach, the larger securely anchored. But this is not due only to the\nstorm. Even if it were the fairest of weather, no Dieppe fisherman would\nset sail to-day. It is All-Souls\u2019 day\u2014the feast of the dead, the\ncommemoration of the loved and lost; and who is there that has not loved\nand lost? But among these simple Catholic souls one feels that the loved\nare never lost. The dead live still in the tender remembrance of those\nleft behind. Tears shed in prayer for the departed have no bitterness.\n\nBut the heartless and ungrateful man who fishes to-day will be\neverywhere followed by his double\u2014a phantom fisher in a phantom boat.\nAll signs fail him, all fish escape his net. Again and again he draws it\nin empty. If he persist, at length he thinks himself rewarded. His net\nis so heavy he nearly swamps his boat in the endeavor to draw it in; and\nhorrible to say, his catch is only grinning skulls and disjointed human\nbones.\n\nAt night, tossing on his sleepless pillow, he hears the ghostly \u201cwhite\ncar\u201d rolling through the silent street. He hears his name called in the\nvoice of the latest dead of his acquaintance, and dies himself before\nthe next All-Souls\u2019 day.\n\nSpite of the bleak and rainy weather, all the good people of Dieppe, or\nrather of its fisher suburb, Le Pollet, are gathered together in church.\nRude as it is, weather-beaten, discolored, gray-green, like the unquiet\nocean it overlooks, Notre Dame du Pollet is still grand and picturesque.\nIt has suffered both from time and desecration, as is seen by its broken\ncarvings, empty niches, and ruined tombs. The altars are plain, the\nornaments few and simple. On the wall of the Lady chapel hang two rusty\nchains\u2014the votive offering, it is said, of a sailor of Le Pollet, once a\nslave to pirates. Miraculously rescued by Our Lady, he returned to his\nnative place only to sing a _Te Deum_ in her chapel and hang up his\nbroken fetters therein; then, retiring to a neighboring monastery, he\ntook upon himself a voluntary bondage which love made sweet and light.\n\nIt is the solemn Mass of requiem, and almost noon, though the sombre\nday, subdued yet more by stained-glass windows, seems like a winter\ntwilight. The church is all in deep shadow, except the sanctuary with\nits softly-burning lamp, and its altar decked with starry wax-lights.\nBlack draperies hang about the altar, black robes are upon the\nofficiating priests. The slow, mournful chant of the _Dies Ir\u00e6_, sung by\na choir invisible in the darkness, resounds through the dim, lofty\naisles.\n\nMotionless upon the uneven stone pavement kneel the people, a dark and\nsilent mass, only relieved here and there by the gleam of a snowy cap or\nbright-colored kerchief; for the fisher-folk, and, indeed, all the\npeasantry of thrifty Normandy, dress in serviceable garb, of sober\ncolors. There is one little group apart from the rest of the\ncongregation; not all one family, for they are too unlike. They seem to\nbe drawn together by some common calamity or dread. First is an old\nwoman perhaps seventy years of age, and looking, as these Norman\npeasants usually do, even older than her years. The full glow of light\nfrom the altar falls upon her white cap, with the bright blue kerchief\ntied over it. A string of large beads hangs from her bony fingers. Her\neyes, singularly bright for one so aged, are raised to the black-veiled\ncrucifix, and tears glisten upon her brown and withered cheeks. Her arm\nis drawn through that of a slender young woman, and near them is a\nlittle girl, round and rosy. All three are dressed nearly alike, and all\nsay their beads, though not with the same tearful devotion. Anxiety and\nweariness are in the young girl\u2019s pale but pretty face; and the child\nlooks subdued, almost frightened, by the gloom around her.\n\nBehind them kneels a comely matron, a little child clinging to her gown;\nnear her two fishermen, one old and gray-haired. The other, who is\nyoung, has an arm in a sling; he kneels upon one knee, his elbow on the\nother, and his face hidden in his hand.\n\nThey are two households over whom hangs the shadow of a calamity,\nperhaps all the greater because of its uncertainty. Two months ago\nJacques Payen and his son sailed for the fishery. Jacques Suchet and his\ncousin, Charles Rivaud, completed the crew; for Jean Suchet, disabled by\na broken arm, remained at home with his grandmother and sister. The\nseason proved unusually stormy. Two fishing-boats of Le Pollet narrowly\nescaped the terrible rocks of the Norman coast; and one of these\nreported seeing a vessel, resembling that of the Payens, drifting past\nthem in a fog, with broken mast and cordage dragging over the side. They\nhailed the wreck, but heard no reply, and concluded that the crew had\nbeen swept overboard, or possibly had escaped in their boat.\n\nWeeks had passed since this vague but terrible intelligence had reached\nthe stricken families. Old M\u00e8re Suchet had at once received it as\nconclusive. She wept and prayed for the bold young fishers, the hope and\ncomfort of her old age. Not so Manon Payen. No one dared condole with\nher, not even her old father, Toutain. Life hitherto had gone so well\nwith her! Her husband loved her; her son was her pride and delight; her\nrosy Marie and little toddling Pierre filled her cottage with laughter\nand sunshine. Grief was so new and strange and frightful. What! her\nhusband and son taken from her at one blow? No, it could not be! It was\ntoo dreadful! God _could_ not be so cruel! Besides, there were no better\nsailors than the Payens, father and son; none who knew the coast so\nwell, with all its perils, its hidden rocks, and dangerous currents.\nTheir vessel was new and strong; why should they be lost; they _alone_?\nJean Pinsard was not positive it was their vessel he had seen; how could\nhe tell in a fog? No; she was sure they were safe. They had put in to\none of the islands. They would not risk a dangerous journey in stormy\nweather just to tell her, what she knew already, that they were safe.\n\nTo M\u00e8re Suchet\u2019s Mathilde, the betrothed of Jacques Payen, how much\nbetter and clearer was this reasoning than the submissive grief of her\npious old grandmother! Young people cannot easily believe the worst when\nit concerns themselves. Mathilde _could_ not pray for the repose of the\nsouls of lover, brother, and cousin. With the passionate, impatient\nyearning of a heart new to affliction, she besought the Blessed Mother\nfor their safe return. Her brother Jean did not try to destroy her\nhopes, though he would not say he shared them.\n\nAs time passed on and brought no news of the absent, the hearts of these\ntwo poor women grew faint and sore; but they refused to acknowledge it\nto one another, or even to themselves. Their days passed in feverish,\nand often vain, endeavors to be cheerful and busy; their nights in\nanguish all the more bitter because silent and unconfessed. On\nAll-Souls\u2019 day old Toutain and M\u00e8re Suchet had wished to have a Requiem\nMass offered for the lost sailors, but Mathilde wept aloud at the\nsuggestion, and Manon forbade it instantly, positively, almost angrily.\n\nManon had borne up well through the sad funereal services of the church.\nShe smiled upon her little ones, and returned a serene and cheerful\ngreeting to the curious or pitying friends who accosted her. All day she\nhad carried the burden of domestic cares and duties, while her heart\nached within her bosom and cried out for solitude. Now, at night, alone\nwith her sleeping babes, the agony of fear and pain, so long repressed,\ntakes full possession of her sinking heart. Mingled with the roar of the\ntreacherous sea she hears the voices of husband and son, now calling\nloudly for help, now borne away on the fitful wind. She sees their pale\nfaces, with unclosed eyes, floating below the cruel green water, their\nstrong limbs entangled in the twisted cordage. Now great, gleaming fish\nswim around them. Oh! it is too fearful. From her knees she falls\nforward upon her face and groans aloud. But on a sudden she hears a stir\nwithout\u2014a sound of repressed voices and many hurrying feet. Hope is not\ndead within her yet; for she springs to the window with the wild thought\nthat it is her absent returned. No, \u2019tis but a group of fishermen on\ntheir way to the pier; but Pinsard stops to tell her, with a strange\nthrill in his rough voice, that there is a fishing-boat coming into\nport!\n\nManon screams to her father to watch the little ones\u2014she must go to the\npier\u2014then flies out into the night. It is not raining, and she returns\nto snatch her wakened and sobbing babe, and wrap him in his father\u2019s\nwoollen blouse. She does not know when Mathilde joins her; she is\nscarcely conscious of the warm, exultant clasp of her hand. Jean is\nthere, too, agitated but grave.\n\nAs they turn the angle of the village street, before them lies the open\nbay. It is past midnight, but the pier is crowded. There, truly, coming\non with outspread canvas, white in the struggling rays of a watery moon,\nis _the missing ship_! They know it well. Upon the broken, pebbly shore\nthe two women kneel to thank God; but they can only lift up their voices\nand weep.\n\n\u201cThey are not safe yet,\u201d says Jean shortly. \u201cThe wind takes them\nstraight upon the pier. They will need all our help.\u201d\n\nThe crowd make way instantly for the breathless women. The light-house\nkeeper stands ready with a coil of rope. The fishermen range themselves\nin line, tighten their belts, and wait to draw the friendly hawser.\nGreat waves thunder against the long pier, sending showers of spray high\nabove the pale crucifix at the end against which the women lean. Now the\nmoon, emerging from a light cloud, sends a flood of pale radiance upon\nthe vessel\u2019s deck. It is they! Jacques Payen is at the helm; young\nJacques stands upon the gunwale.\n\nThe light-house keeper throws his rope; the fishermen raise their\nmusical, long-drawn cry. Jacques catches the rope, but in silence; and\nsilently the crew make fast.\n\n\u201cIt is their vow!\u201d cries Manon, darting forward among the wondering men.\n\u201cThey will not speak until they sing _Te Deum_ at Notre Dame for their\nsafe return.\u201d\n\nReassured, the men pull in vigorously, but to no effect. Again, and yet\nagain, but the ship does not move. A moment since it came on swift as\nthe wind; now it seems anchored for ever not fifty yards away. They can\nsee plainly every object upon the deck, where the silent crew stand\ngazing towards the pier. Even Manon and Mathilde have seized the rope,\nand draw with the strength of terror. Breathless, unsteady, large drops\nof sweat standing upon their faces, they pause irresolute. Stretching\nher arms towards her husband, Manon holds out her babe.\n\nA white mist rises out of the sea and hangs like a veil between them.\nSad, reproachful voices rise out of the waves, some near at hand, others\nfar out. An icy wind lifts the mist and carries it slowly away, clinging\nfor a moment like a shroud around the crucifix. The cable falls slack in\nthe strong hands that grasp it. The ship is gone\u2014vanished without a\nsound; but far away echoes a solemn chorus, \u201cHave pity on me, have pity\non me, at least you, my friends, for the hand of the Lord hath touched\nme.\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n ROMANCE AND REALITY OF THE DEATH OF FATHER JAMES MARQUETTE, AND THE\n RECENT DISCOVERY OF HIS REMAINS.\n\nThe bold and energetic exploration by the Canadian Louis Jolliet and the\nFrench Jesuit James Marquette, in which, embarking in a frail canoe,\nthey penetrated to the Mississippi by the Wisconsin, and followed the\ncourse of the great river to the Arkansas, gives them and their\nimportant achievement a place in American history. It was an expedition\ncarried out by two skilled hydrographers familiar with the extent and\nlimit of American exploration, trained by education and long observation\nto map and describe the countries through which they passed. Their great\nobject was to determine the extent of the river, its chief affluents,\nand the nature of the tribes upon it, as well as to decide whether it\nemptied into the Gulf of Mexico or the Pacific.\n\nIn New Mexico, the advanced outpost of the Spanish colonies, some\ndefinite knowledge of the interior structure of the continent prevailed;\nbut to the rest of the world the great watershed of the Rocky Mountains,\nwith the valley of the Mississippi and Missouri to the east and a series\nof rivers on the west, was utterly unknown. Marquette and Jolliet lifted\nthe veil and gave the civilized world clear and definite ideas. The two\nlearned explorers floated alone down the mighty river, whose path had\nnot been traced for any distance since the shattered remnant of De\nSoto\u2019s army stole down its lower valley to the gulf.\n\nFather Marquette was not a mere scholar or man of science. If he sought\nnew avenues for civilized man to thread the very heart of the continent,\nit was with him a work of Christian love. It was to open the way for the\nGospel, that the cross might enlighten new and remote nations.\n\nNo missionary of that glorious band of Jesuits who in the seventeenth\ncentury announced the faith from the Hudson Bay to the Lower\nMississippi, who hallowed by their labors and life-blood so many a wild\nspot now occupied by the busy hives of men\u2014none of them impresses us\nmore, in his whole life and career, with his piety, sanctity, and\nabsolute devotion to God, than Father Marquette. In life he seems to\nhave been looked up to with reverence by the wildest savage, by the rude\nfrontiersman, and by the polished officers of government. When he had\npassed away his name and his fame remained in the great West, treasured\nabove that of his fellow-laborers, M\u00e9nard, Allouez, Nouvel, or\nDruillettes. The tradition of his life and labors in a few generations,\nwhile it lost none of its respect for his memory, gathered the moss of\nincorrectness.\n\nFather Charlevoix, travelling through the West in 1721, stopped on Lake\nMichigan at the mouth of a stream which already bore the name of \u201cRiver\nof Father Marquette.\u201d From Canadian voyagers and some missionary in the\nWest he learned the tradition which he thus embodies in his journal:\n\n\u201cTwo years after the discovery (of the Mississippi), as he was going\nfrom Chicagou, which is at the extremity of Lake Michigan, to\nMichilimackinac, he entered the river in question on the 18th of May,\n1675, its mouth being then at the extremity of the lowlands, which I\nhave noticed it leaves to the right as you enter. There he erected his\naltar and said Mass. Then he withdrew a little distance to offer his\nthanksgiving, and asked the two men who paddled his canoe to leave him\nalone for half an hour. At the expiration of that time they returned for\nhim, and were greatly surprised to find him dead. They remembered,\nnevertheless, that on entering the river he had inadvertently remarked\nthat he would end his journey there.\n\n\u201cAs it was too far from the spot to Michilimackinac to convey his body\nto that place, they buried him near the bank of the river, which since\nthat time has gradually withdrawn, as if through respect, to the bluff,\nwhose foot it now washes and where it has opened a new passage. The next\nyear one of the two men who had rendered the last tribute to the servant\nof God returned to the spot where they had buried him, took up his\nremains, and conveyed them to Michilimackinac. I could not learn, or\nhave forgotten, the name this river bore previously, but the Indians now\ngive it no name but \u2018River of the Black-gown\u2019; the French call it by the\nname of Father Marquette, and never fail to invoke him when they are in\nany peril on Lake Michigan. Many have declared that they believed\nthemselves indebted to his intercession for having escaped very great\ndangers.\u201d\n\nFather Charlevoix\u2019s fame as a historian gave this account the stamp of\nauthority and it was generally adopted. Bancroft drew from it the\npoetical and touching account which he introduced into the first\neditions of his _History of the United States_.\n\nYet this was but romance. The real, detailed account of the missionary\u2019s\nlabors, the details which let us enter the sanctuary of his pious heart,\nwere all the time lying unused in Canada. They were in the college of\nQuebec when Charlevoix was teaching in that institution as a young\nscholastic; but if he then already projected his history of the colony,\nno one of the old fathers seems to have opened to him the writings of\nthe early founders of the mission. It was the same when he returned to\nmake the tour through the country under the auspices of the government\nand with a view to its development.\n\nThe papers lay unnoticed, and when Louis XV.\u2019s neglect of his American\nempire neutralized all the genius of Montcalm and the gallantry of his\nFrench and Canadian soldiery, the mission of the Jesuit Fathers was\nbroken up. The precious archives were plundered; but some documents\nreached pious hands, who laid them up with their own convent archives,\ntill the Society of Jesus returned to the land where it could boast of\nso glorious a career.\n\nAmong these papers were accounts of the last labors and death of Father\nMarquette and of the removal of his remains, prepared for publication by\nFather Dablon; Marquette\u2019s journal of his great expedition; the very map\nhe drew; and a letter left unfinished when the angel of death sheathed\nhis sword by the banks of the Michigan River.\n\nFather Felix Martin, one of the earliest to revive the old Canadian\nmission, received these treasures with joy, and has since gleaned far\nand wide to add to our material for the wonderful mission labors of the\nJesuit pioneers. He has published many works, and aided in far more.\nWith a kindness not easy to repay he permitted the writer to use the\ndocuments relating to Marquette in preparing a work on \u201cThe Discovery\nand Exploration of the Mississippi Valley.\u201d\n\nFrom these authentic contemporary documents we learn the real story of\nFather Marquette\u2019s last labors. As he was returning from his voyage down\nthe Mississippi, he promised the Kaskaskia Indians, who then occupied\ntowns in the upper valley of the Illinois, that he would return to teach\nthem the faith which he announced. His health, broken by exposure and\nmission labor on the St. Lawrence and the Upper Lakes, was very frail,\nbut he had no idea of rest. Devoted in an especial manner to the great\nprivilege of Mary\u2014her Immaculate Conception\u2014he named the great artery of\nour continent The River of the Immaculate Conception, and in his heart\nbestowed the same name on the mission which he hoped to found among the\nKaskaskias.\n\nTo enter upon that work, so dear to his piety, he needed permission from\nhis distant superior. When the permission came he took leave of the\nMackinac mission which he had founded, and pushed off his bark canoe\ninto Lake Michigan. The autumn was well advanced\u2014for it was the 25th of\nOctober, 1674\u2014and the reddening forests swayed in the chill lake winds\nas he glided along the western shore. Before he reached the southern\nextremity winter was upon him with its cold and snows, and the disease\nwhich had been checked, but not conquered, again claimed the frail\nframe. It could not quench his courage, for he kept on in his open canoe\non the wintry lake till the 4th of December, when he reached Chicago.\nThere he had hoped to ascend the river and by a portage reach the\nIllinois. It was too late. The ice had closed the stream, and a winter\nmarch was beyond his strength. His two men, simple, faithful companions,\nerected a log hut, home and chapel, the first dwelling and first church\nof Chicago. Praying to Our Lady to enable him to reach his destination,\noffering the Holy Sacrifice whenever his illness permitted, receiving\ndelegations from his flock, the Kaskaskias, the winter waned away in the\npious foundation of the white settlement at Chicago.\n\nWith the opening of spring Marquette set out, and his last letter notes\nhis progress till the 6th of April, 1675. Two days after he was among\nthe Kaskaskias, and, rearing his altar on the prairie which lies between\nthe present town of Utica and the Illinois river, he offered up the Mass\non Maundy Thursday, and began the instruction of the willing Indians who\ngathered around him. A few days only were allotted to him, when, after\nEaster, he was again stricken down. If he would die in the arms of his\nbrethren at Mackinac, he saw that he must depart at once; for he felt\nthat the days of his sojourning were rapidly closing. Escorted by the\nKaskaskias, who were deeply impressed by the zeal that could so battle\nwith death, the missionary reached Lake Michigan, on the eastern side.\nAlthough that shore was as yet unknown, his faithful men launched his\ncanoe. \u201cHis strength, however, failed so much,\u201d says Father Dablon,\nwhose words we shall now quote, \u201cthat his men despaired of being able to\nconvey him alive to their journey\u2019s end; for, in fact, he became so weak\nand so exhausted that he could no longer help himself, nor even stir,\nand had to be handled and carried like a child. He nevertheless\nmaintained in this state an admirable resignation, joy, and gentleness,\nconsoling his beloved companions, and encouraging them to suffer\ncourageously all the hardships of this voyage, assuring them that our\nLord would not forsake them when he was gone. It was during this\nnavigation that he began to prepare more particularly for death, passing\nhis time in colloquies with our Lord, with his holy Mother, with his\nangel guardian, or with all heaven. He was often heard pronouncing these\nwords: \u2018I believe that my Redeemer liveth,\u2019 or \u2018Mary, Mother of grace,\nMother of God, remember me.\u2019 Besides a spiritual reading made for him\nevery day, he toward the close asked them to read him his meditation on\nthe preparation for death, which he carried about him; he recited his\nbreviary every day; and although he was so low that both sight and\nstrength had greatly failed, he did not omit it till the last day of his\nlife, when his companions excited his scruples. A week before his death\nhe had the precaution to bless some holy-water to serve him during the\nrest of his illness, in his agony, and at his burial, and he instructed\nhis companions how to use it.\n\n\u201cOn the eve of his death, which was a Friday, he told them, all radiant\nwith joy, that it would take place on the morrow. During the whole day\nhe conversed with them about the manner of his burial, the way in which\nhe should be laid out, the place to be selected for his interment; how\nthey should arrange his hands, feet, and face, and how they should raise\na cross over his grave. He even went so far as to enjoin them, only\nthree hours before he expired, to take his chapel-bell, as soon as he\nwas dead, and ring it while they carried him to the grave. Of all this\nhe spoke so calmly and collectedly that you would have thought he spoke\nof the death and burial of another, and not of his own.\n\n\u201cThus did he speak to them as he sailed along the lake, till, perceiving\nthe mouth of a river, with an eminence on the bank which he thought\nsuited for his burial, he told them that it was the place of his last\nrepose. They wished, however, to pass on, as the weather permitted it\nand the day was not far advanced; but God raised a contrary wind, which\nobliged them to return and enter the river which the father had\ndesignated.\n\n\u201cThey then carried him ashore, kindled a little fire, and raised a\nwretched bark cabin for his use, laying him in it with as little\ndiscomfort as they could; but they were so depressed by sadness that, as\nthey afterwards said, they did not know what they were doing.\n\n\u201cThe father being thus stretched on the shore like St. Francis Xavier,\nas he had always so ardently desired, and left alone amid those\nforests\u2014for his companions were engaged in unloading\u2014he had leisure to\nrepeat all the acts in which he had employed himself during the\npreceding days.\n\n\u201cWhen his dear companions afterwards came up, all dejected, he consoled\nthem, and gave them hopes that God would take care of them after his\ndeath in those new and unknown countries; he gave them his last\ninstructions, thanked them for all the charity they had shown him during\nthe voyage, begged their pardon for the trouble he had given them,\ndirected them also to ask pardon in his name of all our fathers and\nbrothers in the Ottawa country, and then disposed them to receive the\nsacrament of penance, which he administered to them for the last time.\nHe also gave them a paper on which he had written all his faults since\nhis last confession, to be given to his superior, to oblige him to pray\nto God more earnestly for him. In fine, he promised not to forget them\nin heaven, and as he was very kind-hearted, and knew them to be worn out\nwith the toil of the preceding days, he bade them go and take a little\nrest, assuring them that his hour was not yet so near, but that he would\nwake them when it was time\u2014as, in fact, he did two or three hours after,\ncalling them when about to enter into his agony.\n\n\u201cWhen they came near he embraced them again for the last time, while\nthey melted in tears at his feet. He then asked for the holy water and\nhis reliquary, and, taking off his crucifix, which he always wore\nhanging from his neck, he placed it in the hands of one of his\ncompanions, asking him to hold it constantly opposite him, raised before\nhis eyes. Feeling that he had but a little while to live, he made a last\neffort, clasped his hands, and, with his eyes fixed sweetly on his\ncrucifix, he pronounced aloud his profession of faith, and thanked the\ndivine Majesty for the immense favor he bestowed upon him in allowing\nhim to die in the Society of Jesus, to die in it as a missionary of\nJesus Christ, and above all to die in it, as he had always asked, in a\nwretched cabin, amid the forests, destitute of all human aid.\n\n\u201cOn this he became silent, conversing inwardly with God; yet from time\nto time words escaped him: \u2018_Sistinuit anima mea in verbo ejus_,\u2019 or\n\u2018_Mater Dei, memento mei_,\u2019 which were the last words he uttered before\nentering into his agony, which was very calm and gentle.\n\n\u201cHe had prayed his companions to remind him, when they saw him about to\nexpire, to pronounce frequently the names of Jesus and Mary, if he did\nnot do so himself; they did not neglect this; and when they thought him\nabout to pass away one cried aloud, \u2018Jesus! Mary!\u2019 which he several\ntimes repeated distinctly, and then, as if at those sacred names\nsomething had appeared to him, he suddenly raised his eyes above his\ncrucifix, fixing them apparently upon some object, which he seemed to\nregard with pleasure; and thus, with a countenance all radiant with\nsmiles, he expired without a struggle, and so gently that it might be\ncalled a quiet sleep.\n\n\u201cHis two poor companions, after shedding many tears over his body, and\nhaving laid it out as he had directed, carried it devoutly to the grave,\nringing the bell according to his injunction, and raised a large cross\nnear it to serve as a mark for all who passed....\n\n\u201cGod did not permit so precious a deposit to remain unhonored and\nforgotten amid the forests. The Indians, called Kiskakons, who have for\nnearly ten years publicly professed Christianity, in which they were\nfirst instructed by Father Marquette when stationed at La Pointe du St.\nEsprit, at the extremity of Lake Superior, were hunting last winter not\nfar from Lake Illinois (Michigan), and, as they were returning early in\nthe spring, they resolved to pass by the tomb of their good father, whom\nthey tenderly loved; and God even gave them the thought of taking his\nbones and conveying them to our church at the mission of St. Ignatius,\nat Missilimakinac, where they reside.\n\n\u201cThey accordingly repaired to the spot and deliberated together,\nresolving to act with their father as they usually do with those whom\nthey respect. They accordingly opened the grave, unrolled the body, and,\nthough the flesh and intestines were all dried up, they found it entire,\nwithout the skin being in any way injured. This did not prevent their\ndissecting it according to custom. They washed the bones and dried them\nin the sun; then, putting them neatly in a box of birch bark, they set\nout to bear them to our house of St. Ignatius.\n\n\u201cThe convoy consisted of nearly thirty canoes in excellent order,\nincluding even a good number of Iroquois, who had joined our Algonquins\nto honor the ceremony. As they approached our house, Father Nouvel, who\nis superior, went to meet them with Father Pierson, accompanied by all\nthe French and Indians of the place, and, having caused the convoy to\nstop, he made the ordinary interrogations to verify the fact that the\nbody which they bore was really Father Marquette\u2019s. Then, before they\nlanded, he intoned the _De Profundis_ in sight of the thirty canoes\nstill on the water, and of all the people on the shore. After this the\nbody was carried to the church, observing all that the ritual prescribes\nfor such ceremonies. It remained exposed under his catafalque all that\nday, which was Whitsun Monday, the 8th of June; and the next day, when\nall the funeral honors had been paid it, it was deposited in a little\nvault in the middle of the church, where he reposes as the\nGuardian-Angel of our Ottawa missions. The Indians often come to pray on\nhis tomb.\u201d\n\nWe are not writing his life, and will not enter upon the supernatural\nfavors ascribed to his intercession by French and Indians. His grave was\nrevered as a holy spot, and many a pilgrimage was made to it to invoke\nhis intercession.\n\nThe remains of the pious missionary lay in the chapel undoubtedly as\nlong as it subsisted. This, however, was not for many years. A new\nFrench post was begun at Detroit in 1701 by La Motte Cadillac. The\nHurons and Ottawas at Michilimackinac immediately emigrated and planted\nnew villages near the rising town. Michilimackinac became deserted,\nexcept by scattered bands of Indians or white bush-lopers, as savage as\nthe red men among whom they lived. The missionaries were in constant\nperil and unable to produce any fruit. They could not follow their old\nflocks to Detroit, as the commandant was strongly opposed to them and\nhad a Recollect father as chaplain of the post. There was no alternative\nexcept to abandon Michilimackinac. The missionaries, not wishing the\nchurch to be profaned or become a resort of the lawless, set fire to\ntheir house and chapel in 1706 and returned to Quebec. The mission\nground became once more a wilderness.\n\nIn this disheartening departure what became of the remains of Father\nMarquette? If the missionaries bore them to Quebec as a precious\ndeposit, some entry of their reinterment would appear on the Canadian\nregisters, which are extremely full and well preserved. Father Nouvel\nand Father Pierson, who received and interred them at the mission, were\nboth dead, and their successors might not recall the facts. The silence\nas to any removal, in Charlevoix and other writers, leads us to believe\nthat the bones remained interred beneath the ruined church. Charlevoix,\nwho notes, as we have seen, their removal to Mackinac, and is correct on\nthis point, was at Quebec College in 1706 when the missionaries came\ndown, and could scarcely have forgotten the ceremony of reinterring the\nremains of Father Marquette, had it taken place at Quebec.\n\nTaking this as a fact, that the bones of the venerable missionary,\nburied in their bark box, were left there, the next question is: Where\ndid the church stand?\n\nA doubt at once arises. Three spots have borne the name of\nMichilimackinac: the island in the strait, Point St. Ignace on the shore\nto the north, and the extremity of the peninsula at the south. The\nJesuit Relations as printed at the time, and those which remained in\nmanuscript till they were printed in our time, Marquette\u2019s journal and\nletter, do not speak in such positive terms that we can decide whether\nit was on the island or the northern shore. Arguments have been deduced\nfrom them on either side of the question. On the map annexed to the\nRelations of 1671 the words Mission de St. Ignace are on the mainland\nabove, not on the island, and there is no cross or mark at the island to\nmake the name refer to it. On Marquette\u2019s own map the \u201cSt. Ignace\u201d\nappears to refer to the northern shore, so that their testimony is in\nfavor of that position.\n\nThe next work that treats of Michilimackinac is the Recollect Father\nHennepin\u2019s first volume, _Description de la Louisiane_, published in\n1688. In this (p. 59) he distinctly says: \u201cMissilimackinac is a point of\nland at the entrance and north of the strait by which Lake Dauphin\n[Michigan] empties into that of Orleans\u201d (Huron). He mentions the Huron\nvillage with its palisade on a great point of land opposite\nMichilimackinac island, the Ottawas, and a chapel where he said Mass\nAugust 26, 1678. The map in Le Clercq\u2019s _Gaspesie_, dated 1691, shows\nthe Jesuit mission on the point north of the strait, and Father Membr\u00e9,\nin Le Clercq\u2019s _Etablissement_, mentions it as in that position. In\nHennepin\u2019s later work, the _Nouvel D\u00e9couverte_, Utrecht, 1697, he says\n(p. 134): \u201cThere are Indian villages in these two places. Those who are\nestablished at the point of land of Missilimackinac are Hurons, and the\nothers, who are at five or six arpens beyond, are named the Outtaouatz.\u201d\nHe then, as before, mentions saying Mass in the chapel at the Ottawas.\n\nThe Jesuit Relation of 1673\u20139 (pp. 58, 59) mentions the \u201chouse where we\nmake our abode ordinarily, and where is the church of St. Ignatius,\nwhich serves for the Hurons,\u201d and mentions a small bark chapel\nthree-quarters of a league distant and near the Ottawas. This latter\nchapel was evidently the one where Father Hennepin officiated in 1678\nor, as he says elsewhere, 1679.\n\nThe relative positions of the Indian villages and the church thus\nindicated in Hennepin\u2019s account are fortunately laid down still more\nclearly on a small map of Michilimackinac found in the _Nouveaux\nVoyages_ de M. le Baron de La Hontan, published at the Hague in 1703.\nMany of the statements in this work are preposterously false, and his\nmap of his pretended Long River a pure invention, exciting caution as to\nany of his unsupported statements. But the map of the country around\nMichilimackinac agrees with the Jesuit Relation and with Father\nHennepin\u2019s account, and has all the appearance of having been copied\nfrom the work of some professed hydrographer, either one of the Jesuit\nFathers like Raffeix, whose maps are known, or Jolliet, who was royal\nhydrographer of the colony. The whole map has a look of accuracy, the\nvarious soundings from the point to the island being carefully given. On\nthis the French village, the house of the Jesuits, the Huron village,\nthat of the Ottawas, and the cultivated fields of the Indians are all\nlaid down on the northern shore. In the text, dated in 1688, he says:\n\u201cThe Hurons and the Ottawas have each a village, separated from one\nanother by a simple palisade.... The Jesuits have a small house, besides\na kind of church, in an enclosure of palisades which separates them from\nthe Huron village.\u201d\n\nThe publication a quarter of a century ago of the contemporaneous\naccount of the death and burial of Father Marquette, the humble\ndiscoverer of a world, excited new interest as to his final\nresting-place. The West owed him a monument, and, though America gave\nhis name to a city, and the Pope ennobled it by making it a bishop\u2019s\nsee, this was not enough to satisfy the yearnings of pious hearts, who\ngrieved that his remains should lie forgotten and unknown. To some the\nlack of maps laying down the famous spots in the early Catholic missions\nhas seemed strange: but the difficulty was very great. Every place\nrequired special study, and the random guesses of some writers have only\ncreated confusion, where truth is to be attained by close study of every\nancient record and personal exploration of the ground. Michilimackinac\nis not the only one that has led to long discussion and\ninvestigation.[62]\n\nWhere was the chapel on the point? A structure of wood consumed by fire\na hundred and seventy years ago could scarcely be traced or identified.\nA forest had grown up around the spots which in Marquette\u2019s time were\ncleared and busy with human life. Twenty years ago this forest was in\npart cleared away, but nothing appeared to justify any hope of\ndiscovering the burial-place of him who bore the standard of Mary\nconceived without sin down the Mississippi valley. One pioneer kept up\nhis hope, renewed his prayers, and pushed his inquiries. The Rev. Edward\nJacker, continuing in the nineteenth century the labors of\nMarquette\u2014missionary to the Catholic Indians and the pagan, a loving\ngatherer of all that related to the early heralds of the faith, tracing\ntheir footsteps, explaining much that was obscure, leading us to the\nvery spot where M\u00e9nard labored and died\u2014was to be rewarded at last.\n\nA local tradition pointed to one spot as the site of an old church and\nthe grave of a great priest, but nothing in the appearance of the ground\nseemed to justify it. Yet, hidden in a growth of low trees and bushes\nwere preserved proofs that Indian tradition coincided with La Hontan\u2019s\nmap and the Jesuit records.\n\nOn the 5th day of May, 1877, the clearing of a piece of rising ground at\na short distance from the beach, at the head of the little bay on the\nfarm of Mr. David Murray, near the main road running through the town,\nlaid bare the foundations of a church, in size about thirty-two by forty\nfeet, and of two adjacent buildings. The Rev. Mr. Jacker was summoned to\nthe spot. The limestone foundation walls of the building were evidently\nthose of a church, there being no chimney, and it had been destroyed by\nfire, evidences of which existed on every side. The missionary\u2019s heart\nbounded with pious joy. Here was the spot where Father Marquette had so\noften offered the Holy Sacrifice; here he offered to Mary Immaculate his\nvoyage to explore the river he named in her honor; here his remains were\nreceived and, after a solemn requiem, interred.\n\nBut Father Jacker was a cautious antiquarian as well as a devoted\npriest. He compared the site with La Hontan\u2019s map. If these buildings\nwere the Jesuit church and house, the French village was at the right;\nand there, in fact, could be traced the old cellars and small log-house\nfoundations. On the other side was the Huron village; the palisades can\neven now be traced. Farther back the map shows Indian fields. Strike\ninto the fields and small timber, and you can even now see signs of rude\nIndian cultivation years ago, and many a relic tells of their occupancy.\n\nThe report of the discovery spread and was noticed in the papers. Many\nwent to visit the spot, and ideas of great treasures began to prevail.\nThe owner positively refused to allow any excavation to be made; so\nthere for a time the matter rested. All this gave time for study, and\nthe conviction of scholars became positive that the old chapel site was\nactually found.\n\nThe next step towards the discovery of the remains of the venerable\nFather Marquette cannot be better told than by the Rev. Mr. Jacker\nhimself:\n\n\u201cMr. David Murray, the owner of the ground in question, had for some\ntime relented so far as to declare that if the chief pastor of the\ndiocese, upon his arrival here, should wish to have a search made, he\nwould object no longer. Last Monday, then (September 3, 1877), Bishop\nMrak, upon our request, dug out the first spadeful of ground. On account\nof some apparent depression near the centre of the ancient building, and\nmindful of Father Dablon\u2019s words, \u2018_Il fut mis dans un petit caveau au\nmilieu de l\u2019\u00e9glise_,\u2019 we there began our search; but being soon\nconvinced that no digging had ever been done there before, we advanced\ntowards the nearest corner of the large, cellar-like hollow to the left,\nthrowing out, all along, two to three feet of ground. On that whole line\nno trace of any former excavation could be discovered, the alternate\nlayers of sand and gravel which generally underlie the soil in this\nneighborhood appearing undisturbed. Close to the ancient cellar-like\nexcavation a decayed piece of a post, planted deeply in the ground, came\nto light. The bottom of that hollow itself furnished just the things\nthat you would expect to meet with in the cellar of a building destroyed\nby fire, such as powdered charcoal mixed with the subsoil,[63] spikes,\nnails, an iron hinge (perhaps of a trap-door), pieces of\ntimber\u2014apparently of hewed planks and joists\u2014partly burned and very much\ndecayed. Nothing, however, was found that would indicate the former\nexistence of a tomb, vaulted or otherwise. Our hopes began to sink (the\ngood bishop had already stolen away), when, at the foot of the western\nslope of the ancient excavation fragments of mortar bearing the impress\nof wood and partly blackened, and a small piece of birch-bark, came to\nlight. This was followed by numerous other, similar or larger, fragments\nof the latter substance, most of them more or less scorched or crisped\nby the heat, not by the immediate action of the fire; a few only were\njust blackened, and on one side superficially burned. A case or box of\nbirch-bark (_une quaisse d\u2019escorce de bouleau_), according to the\nRelation, once enclosed the remains of the great missionary. No wonder\nour hopes revived at the sight of that material. Next appeared a small\nleaf of white paper, which, being quite moist, almost dissolved in my\nhands. We continued the search, more with our hands than with the spade.\nThe sand in which those objects were embedded was considerably\nblackened\u2014more so, in fact, than what should be expected, unless some\ndigging was done here _after the fire_, and the hollow thus produced\nfilled up with the blackened ground from above. Here and there we found\nsmall particles, generally globular, of a moist, friable substance,\nresembling pure lime or plaster-of-paris. None of the details of our\nsearch being unimportant, I should remark that the first pieces of\nbirch-bark were met with at a depth of about three and a half feet from\nthe present surface, and nearly on a level, I should judge, with the\nfloor of the ancient excavation. For about a foot deeper down more of it\nwas found, the pieces being scattered at different heights over an area\nof about two feet square or more. Finally a larger and well-preserved\npiece appeared, which once evidently formed part of the bottom of an\nIndian \u2018mawkawk\u2019 (_wigwass-makak_\u2014birch-bark box), and rested on clean\nwhite gravel and sand. Some of our people, who are experts in this\nmatter, declared that the bark was of unusual thickness, and that the\nbox, or at least parts of it, had been double, such as the Indians\nsometimes, for the sake of greater durability, use for interments. A\nfurther examination disclosed the fact that it had been placed on three\nor four wooden sills, decayed parts of which were extracted. All around\nthe space once occupied by the box the ground seemed to be little\ndisturbed, and the bottom piece lay considerably deeper than the other\nobjects (nails, fragments of timber, a piece of a glass jar or large\nbottle, a chisel, screws, etc.) discovered on what I conceived to have\nbeen the ancient bottom of the cellar. From these two circumstances it\nseemed evident that the birch-bark box had not (as would have been the\ncase with an ordinary vessel containing corn, sugar, or the like) been\nplaced on the floor, but sunk into the ground, and perhaps covered with\na layer of mortar, many blackened fragments of which were turned out all\naround the space once occupied by it. But it was equally evident that\nthis humble tomb\u2014for such we took it to have been\u2014had been disturbed,\nand the box broken into and parts of it torn out, after the material had\nbeen made brittle by the action of the fire. This would explain the\nabsence of its former contents, which\u2014what else could we think?\u2014were\nnothing less than Father Marquette\u2019s bones. We, indeed, found between\nthe pieces of bark two small fragments, one black and hard, the other\nwhite and brittle, but of such a form that none of us could determine\nwhether they were of the human frame.[64]\n\n\u201cThe evening being far advanced, we concluded that day\u2019s search,\npondering over what may have become of the precious remains which, we\nfondly believe, were once deposited in that modest tomb just in front of\nwhat, according to custom, should have been the Blessed Virgin\u2019s altar.\nHad I been in Father Nouvel\u2019s place, it is there I would have buried the\ndevout champion of Mary Immaculate. It is the same part of the church we\nchose nine years ago for Bishop Baraga\u2019s interment in the cathedral of\nMarquette. The suggestion of one of our half-breeds that it would be a\nmatter of wonder if some pagan Indian had not, after the departure of\nthe missionaries, opened the grave and carried off the remains _pour en\nfaire de la medicine_\u2014that is, to use the great black-gown\u2019s bones for\nsuperstitious purposes[65]\u2014this suggestion appeared to me very probable.\nHence, giving up the hope of finding anything more valuable, and\nawaiting the examination by an expert of the two doubtful fragments of\nbone, I carried them home (together with numerous fragments of the bark\nbox) with a mixed feeling of joy and sadness. Shall this, then, be all\nthat is left us of the saintly missionary\u2019s mortal part?\n\n\u201cI must not forget to mention a touching little incident. It so happened\nthat while we people of St. Ignace were at work, and just before the\nfirst piece of bark was brought to light, two young American\ntravellers\u2014apparently Protestants, and pilgrims, like hundreds of others\nall through the summer, to this memorable spot\u2014came on shore, and,\nhaving learned the object of the gathering with joyful surprise,\ncongratulated themselves on having arrived at such a propitious moment.\nThey took the liveliest interest in the progress of the search, lending\ntheir help, and being, in fact, to outward appearances, the most\nreverential of all present. \u2018Do you realize,\u2019 would one address the\nother with an air of religious awe, \u2018where we are standing? This is\nhallowed ground!\u2019 Their bearing struck us all and greatly edified our\nsimple people. They begged for, and joyfully carried off, some little\nmemorials. Isn\u2019t it a natural thing, that veneration of _relics_ we used\nto be so much blamed for?\n\n\u201cSome hundred and fifty or two hundred of our people witnessed the\nsearch, surrounding us in picturesque groups\u2014many of them, though nearly\nwhite, being lineal descendants of the very Ottawas among whom Father\nMarquette labored in La Pointe du St. Esprit, and who witnessed his\ninterment in this place two hundred years ago. The pure Indian element\nwas represented only by one individual of the Ojibwa tribe.\n\n\u201cOn Tuesday our children were confirmed, and in the afternoon I had to\nescort the bishop over to Mackinac Island. Upon my return, yesterday\nevening, a young man of this place entered my room, with some black dust\nand other matters tied up in a handkerchief. He had taken the liberty to\nsearch our excavation for some little keepsake, taking out a few\nhandfuls of ground at a little distance from where the box had lain, in\nthe direction of what I presume to have been the Blessed Virgin\u2019s altar,\nand at about the height of the ancient cellar-floor. The result of his\nsearch was of such a character that he considered himself obliged to put\nme in possession of it. What was my astonishment when he displayed on my\ntable a number of small fragments of bones, in size from an inch in\nlength down to a mere scale, being in all thirty-six, and, to all\nappearances, human. Being alone, after nightfall, I washed the bones.\nThe scene of two hundred years ago, when the Kiskakons, at the mouth of\nthat distant river, were employed in the same work, rose up before my\nimagination; and though the mists of doubt were not entirely dispelled,\nI felt very much humbled that no more worthy hands should have to\nperform this office. So long had I wished\u2014and, I candidly confess it,\neven prayed\u2014for the discovery of Father Marquette\u2019s grave; and now that\nso many evidences concurred to establish the fact of its having been on\nthe spot where we hoped to find it, I felt reluctant to believe it. The\nlonger, however, I pondered over every circumstance connected with our\nsearch, the more I became convinced that we have found what we, and so\nmany with us, were desirous to discover. Let me briefly resume the train\nof evidence.\n\n\u201cThe local tradition as to the site of the grave, near the head of our\nlittle bay; the size and relative position of the ancient buildings,\nboth in the \u2018French Village\u2019 and the Jesuits\u2019 establishment, plainly\ntraceable by little elevated ridges, stone foundations, cellars,\nchimneys, and the traces of a stockade; all this exactly tallying with\nLa Hontan\u2019s plan and description of 1688\u2014so many concurring\ncircumstances could hardly leave any doubt as to the site of the chapel\nin which Marquette\u2019s remains were deposited.\n\n\u201cThe unwillingness of the proprietor to have the grave of a saintly\npriest disturbed proved very opportune, not to say providential. Within\nthe three or four months that elapsed since the first discovery many\nhundreds of persons from all parts of the country had the opportunity to\nexamine the grounds, as yet untouched by the spade. We had time to weigh\nevery argument _pro_ and _con_. Among those visitors there were men of\nintelligence and historical learning. I will only mention Judge Walker,\nof Detroit, who has made the early history of our Northwest the subject\nof his particular study, and who went over the grounds with the English\nedition of La Hontan in his hand. He, as well as every one else whose\njudgment was worth anything, pronounced in favor of our opinion. The\nbalance stood so that the smallest additional weight of evidence would\nmake it incline on the side of certainty as absolute as can be expected\nin a case like this.\n\n\u201cThe text of the _Relation_, it is true, would make us look for a vault,\nor small cellar (_un petit caveau_), in the middle (_au milieu_) of the\nchurch. But if anything indicating the existence of a tomb in the hollow\ntowards the left side and the rear part of the chapel were discovered,\ncould we not construe those words as meaning \u2018_within_ the church\u2019?\nBesides, it must be remembered that Father Dablon, who left us the\naccount, was not an eye-witness at the interment; nor did he visit the\nmission after that event, at least up to the time of his writing.\n\n\u201cWe know, then, that Marquette\u2019s remains were brought to this place in a\nbirch-bark box; and there is nothing to indicate that, previously to\nbeing interred, they were transferred into any other kind of receptacle.\nIn that box they remained under the _catafalco_ (_sous sa\nrepresentation_) from Monday, June 8, to Tuesday, 9 (1677), and in it,\nundoubtedly, they were deposited in a vault, or little cellar, which may\nhave previously been dug out for other purposes. The box was sunk into\nthe ground on that side of the excavation which was nearest to the\naltar, or, at least, the statue of the Blessed Virgin, the most\nappropriate spot for the interment of the champion of Mary Immaculate.\nAn inscription, on paper, indicating whose bones were contained in the\nbox, might have been placed within it; of this the piece of white paper\nwe found among the bark may be a fragment. The poor casket rested, after\nthe Indian fashion, on wooden supports. It may have been covered with\nmortar or white lime, or else a little vault constructed of wood and\nmortar may have been erected over it. When the building was fired,\ntwenty-nine years after the interment, the burning floor, together with\npieces of timber from above, fell on the tomb, broke the frail vault or\nmortar cover of the box, burned its top, and crisped its sides. Some of\nthe pagan or apostate Indians remaining in that neighborhood after the\ntransmigration of the Hurons and Ottawas to Detroit, though filled with\nveneration for the departed missionary (as their descendants remained\nthrough four or five generations), or rather for the very reason of\ntheir high regard for his priestly character and personal virtues, and\nof his reputation as a _thaumaturgus_, coveted his bones as a powerful\n\u2018medicine,\u2019 and carried them off. In taking them out of the tomb they\ntore the brittle bark and scattered its fragments. The bones being first\nplaced on the bottom of the cellar, behind the tomb, some small\nfragments became mixed up with the sand, mortar, and lime, and were left\nbehind.\n\n\u201cSuch seems to me the most natural explanation of the circumstances of\nthe discovery. Had the missionaries themselves, before setting fire to\nthe church, removed the remains of their saintly brother, they would\nhave been careful about the least fragment; none of them, at least,\nwould have been found scattered outside of the box. That robbing of the\ngrave by the Indians must have taken place within a few years after the\ndeparture of the missionaries; for had those precious remains been there\nwhen the mission was renewed (about 1708?), they would most certainly\nhave been transferred to the new church in \u2018Old Mackinac\u2019; and had this\nbeen the case, Charlevoix, at his sojourn there in 1721, could hardly\nhave failed to be taken to see the tomb and to mention the fact of the\ntransfer in his journal or history.\n\n\u201cOur next object, if we were to be disappointed in finding the entire\nremains of the great missionary traveller, was to ascertain the fact of\nhis having been interred on that particular spot; and in this, I think,\nwe have fully succeeded. Considering the high probability\u2014_\u00e0 priori_, so\nto say\u2014of the Indians\u2019 taking possession of the bones, the finding of\nthose few fragments under the circumstances described seems to me, if\nnot as satisfactory to our wishes, at least as good evidence for the\nfact in question as if we had found every bone that is in the human\nbody. Somebody\u2014an adult person\u2014was buried under the church; buried\nbefore the building was destroyed by fire; and buried under exceptional\ncircumstances\u2014the remains being placed in a birch-bark box of much\nsmaller size than an ordinary coffin\u2014who else could it have been but the\none whose burial, with all its details of time, place, and manner, as\nrecorded in most trustworthy records, answers all the circumstances of\nour discovery?\n\n\u201c_Sept. 7th._\u2014Went again to the grave to-day, and, after searching a\nlittle while near the spot where that young man had found the bones, I\nwas rewarded with another small fragment, apparently of the skull, like\ntwo or three of those already found. Two Indian visitors who have called\nin since declared others to be of the ribs, of the hand, and of the\nthigh-bone. They also consider the robbing of the grave by their pagan\nancestors as extremely probable. To prevent profanation and the carrying\noff of the loose ground in the empty grave, we covered the excavation\nwith a temporary floor, awaiting contributions from outside\u2014we are too\npoor ourselves\u2014for the purpose of erecting some kind of a tomb or\nmortuary chapel in which to preserve what remains of the perishable part\nof the \u2018Guardian-Angel of the Ottawa missions.\u2019\n\n\u201cI shall not send you this letter before having shown some of the bones\nto a physician, for which purpose I have to go outside.\n\n\u201c_Sheboygan, Mich., Sept. 11._\u2014M. Pommier, a good French surgeon,\ndeclared the fragments of bones to be undoubtedly human and bearing the\nmarks of fire.\u201d\n\nThe result is consoling, though not unmixed with pain. It is sad to\nthink that the remains of so saintly a priest, so devoted a missionary,\nso zealous an explorer should have been so heathenishly profaned by\nIndian medicine-men; but the explanation has every appearance of\nprobability. Had the Jesuit missionaries removed the remains, they would\nhave taken up the birch box carefully, enclosing it, if necessary, in a\ncase of wood. They would never have torn the birch-bark box rudely open,\nor taken the remains so carelessly as to leave fragments. All the\ncircumstances show the haste of profane robbery. The box was torn\nasunder in haste, part of its contents secured, and the excavation\nhastily filled up.\n\nThe detailed account of the final interment of Father Marquette, the\npeculiarity of the bones being in a bark box, evidently of small size\nfor convenient transportation, the fact that no other priest died at the\nmission who could have been similarly interred, leads irresistibly to\nthe conclusion that Father Jacker is justified in regarding the remains\nfound as portion of those committed to the earth two centuries ago.\n\nIt is now for the Catholics of the United States to rear a monument\nthere to enclose what time has spared us of the \u201cAngel Guardian of the\nOttawa Missions.\u201d\n\n JOHN GILMARY SHEA.\n\nNEW PUBLICATIONS.\n\n\nMISCELLANIES. By Henry Edward, Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster. First\n American Edition. New York: The Catholic Publication Society Co., 9\n Barclay Street. 1877.\n\nThe various papers contained in this assortment of miscellaneous\narticles from the pen of Cardinal Manning consist of addresses before\nseveral _Academias_ or other societies, contributions to the _Dublin\nReview_, and short essays, most of which, we believe, have been before\npublished in English magazines or newspapers, or in the form of\npamphlets. They are on current topics of immediate interest, well\nadapted to the times, and written in a plain, popular style. One general\ntone of defence and explanation of the Catholic cause in respect to\nmatters now of conflict and controversy between the Catholic Church and\nher opposers runs through them all, giving a real unity of purpose and\nobjective aim to the collection, various and miscellaneous as are its\ntopics. The most important and interesting papers, in which the force of\nthe whole volume, of all the cardinal\u2019s principal works, of the efforts\nof his entire career as a prelate in the church, is concentrated and\nbrought to bear upon the central point of anti-Catholic revolution, are\nthe first and last. The first one is entitled \u201cRoma \u00c6terna: a Discourse\nbefore the _Academia_ of the Quiriti in Rome on the 2615th anniversary\nof this city, April 21, 1863.\u201d The last one is entitled \u201cThe\nIndependence of the Holy See,\u201d and we do not know whether or not it was\npublished before it appeared in the present collection. It has always\nbeen characteristic of the cardinal\u2019s mind, and of the doctrinal or\npolemic expositions of Catholic truth put forth by him, to perceive and\nseize the principle of unity. While he was still an Anglican archdeacon\nhe embraced and advocated general principles of Catholic unity, so far\nas he then apprehended them, with remarkable clearness and precision.\nThese principles led him into the bosom of Catholic unity, and their\ncomplete and consequent development in all their conclusions and\nharmonious relations has been the one great aim and effort of his\nluminous and vigorous mind since he became a Catholic ecclesiastic, both\nas an orator and as a writer. This clear, direct view of the logical\norder and sequence of constitutive, Catholic principles made him one of\nthe most thorough and firm advocates of the spiritual supremacy of the\nHoly See, before and during the sessions of the Vatican Council. The\nPapacy, as the very centre and foundation of Christianity, and therefore\nthe principal point of attack and defence in the war between the\nChristian kingdom and the anti-Christian revolution, has been the\ndominant idea in the mind of Cardinal Manning. The indissoluble union of\nthe papal supremacy with the Roman episcopate, and therefore the\ndependence of Christendom on the Roman Church as its centre, its head,\nthe great source of its life, is the topic to which at present his\nattention is more specially directed. The Roman Church, and, by reason\nof its near and close connection, the Italian Church, as the permanent,\nimmovable seat of the sovereign pontificate, is identified with the\nprosperity of Christendom. The head and heart of the Catholic Church are\nthere, whereas other members of the great, universal society of\nChristians are only limbs, however great and powerful they may be. The\nlogical and juridical mind of Cardinal Manning grasps in its full import\nthe whole Roman and Italian question of present conflict as the vital\none for all Christendom. And, as we have said, the first and last papers\nin his volume of _Miscellanies_ are of permanent value and importance,\non account of his clear and masterly exposition of this great\ncontroversy. We will quote a few salient paragraphs in illustration and\nconfirmation of our opinion on this head:\n\n\u201cIt is no wonder to me that Italians should believe in the primacy of\nItaly. Italy has indeed a primacy, but not that of which some have\ndreamed. The primacy of Italy is the presence of Rome; and the primacy\nof Rome is in its apostleship to the whole human race, in the science of\nGod with which it has illuminated mankind, in its supreme and world-wide\njurisdiction over souls, in its high tribunal of appeal from all the\nauthorities on earth, in its inflexible exposition of the moral law, in\nits sacred diplomacy, by which it binds the nations of Christendom into\na confederacy of order and of justice\u2014these are its true, supreme, and,\nbecause God has so willed, _its inalienable and incommunicable primacy\namong the nations of the earth_.... The eternity of Rome, then, if it be\nnot an exact truth, is nevertheless no mere rhetorical exaggeration. It\ndenotes the fact that Rome has been chosen of God as the centre of his\nkingdom, which is eternal, as the depository of his eternal truths, as\nthe fountain of his graces which lead men to a higher life, as the\nwitness and guardian of law and principles of which the sanctions and\nthe fruit are eternal.... I shall say little if I say that on you, under\nGod, we depend for the immutability not only of the faith in all the\nradiance of its exposition and illustration, and of the divine love in\nall its breadth and purity and perfection; you are also charged with the\ncustody of other truths which descend from this great sphere of\nsupernatural light, and with the application of these truths to the\nturbulent and unstable elements of human society.... You are the heirs\nof those who renewed the face of the world and created the Christian\ncivilization of Europe. You are the depositories of truths and\nprinciples which are indestructible in their vitality. Though buried\nlike the ear of corn in the Pyramids of Egypt, they strike root and\nspring into fruit when their hour is come. Truths and principles are\ndivine; they govern the world; to suffer for them is the greatest glory\nof man. \u201cNot death, but the cause of death, makes the martyr.\u201d So long\nas Rome is grafted upon the Incarnation it is the head of the world. If\nit were possible to cut it out from its divine root, it would fall from\nits primacy among mankind. But this cannot be. He who chose it for his\nown has kept it to this hour. He who has kept it until now will keep it\nunto the end. Be worthy of your high destiny for His sake who has called\nyou to it; for our sakes, who look up to you as, under God, our light\nand our strength\u201d (\u201cRom. \u00c6tern.,\u201d pp. 3\u201323). These words were spoken\nfourteen years ago, but they are reaffirmed now by their new\nrepublication, and the similar language of the closing paper of the\nvolume.\n\nIn this last paper, on \u201cThe Independence of the Holy See,\u201d the cardinal\nspeaks more particularly and definitely of the temporal sovereignty of\nthe Holy See. As the spiritual supremacy of the Pope, in his office as\nVicar of Christ and successor of St. Peter, is closely bound to his\nRoman episcopate, and the unity of the church depends on the Roman\nChurch, the \u201cmother and mistress of churches,\u201d so the peaceful and\nuncontrolled exercise of the supremacy depends on the freedom of the\nPope in Rome. This freedom is secured only by complete independence,\nwhich requires the possession of both personal and political sovereignty\nas its condition. This citadel of all Catholic and Christian interests\nbeing now the very object of the most resolute and uncompromising attack\nand defence\u2014the Plevna of the war between the Catholic religion and the\nanti-Christian revolution\u2014the cardinal, as a wise leader and strategist,\ndirects his principal efforts to sustain and advocate the right and\nnecessity of the Pope\u2019s temporal sovereignty. The spoliation of this\ntemporal sovereignty has for its necessary effect, says the cardinal,\n\u201cthe disintegration and the downfall of the Christian world\u201d (p. 860).\nConsequently, as the cardinal continually affirms, the redintegration\nand reconstruction of the Christian world require the restitution of\nthat same sovereignty. \u201cThere is one hope for Italy. It is this: that\nItaly should reconcile itself to the old traditions of the faith of its\nfathers, and should return once more to the only principle of unity and\nauthority which created it\u201d (p. 848). \u201cIf the Christian world is still\nto continue, what is happening now is but one more of those manifold\ntransient perturbations which have come through these thousand years,\ndriving into exile or imprisoning the pontiffs, or even worse, and\nusurping the rightful sovereignty of Rome. And as they have passed, so\nwill this, unless the political order of the Christian world itself has\npassed away\u201d (p. 804).\n\nIn these last words is presented an alternative of the utmost\nconsequence and interest. Is the perturbation and disintegration final\nor transient? If final, the church goes back to the state of\npersecution, the reign of Antichrist is at hand, and the end of the\nworld draws near. _When Rome falls, the world._ If the Roman and Italian\npeople, as such, have apostatized, or are about to apostatize, then the\nRoman Church, the foundation, sinking in the undermined and caving soil\nbeneath it, will bring down the whole crumbling fabric of Christendom\nand of the universal world. If, therefore, there is any ground to hope\nthat this evil day is not yet, but that there is a triumphant epoch for\nthe church to be awaited, it is of the utmost consequence not to\nexaggerate the present revolution in Italy and Europe into a national\nand international apostasy, but to show that it is a revolution of a\nfaction whose power is but apparent and temporary. This is the\ncardinal\u2019s conviction, and a large part of his argumentation is directed\nto its proof and support. \u201cWhy, then, is this gagging law necessary in\nItaly? Because a minority is in power who are conscious that they are\nopposed by a great majority who disapprove their acts. They know, and\nare afraid, that if men speak openly with their neighbors the public\nopinion of Catholic Italy would become so strong and spread so wide as\nto endanger their power. And this is called _disturbing the public\nconscience_. The public conscience of Italy is not revolutionary, but\nCatholic; the true disturbers of the _public conscience_ of Italy are\nthe authors of these Italian Falck laws.... I know of nothing which has\nimposed upon the simplicity and the good-will of the English people more\nthan to suppose that the present state of Italy is the expression of the\nwill of the Italian people\u201d (pp. 842\u201347).\n\nWe cannot exceed the limits of a notice by adding more extracts or\ngiving the cardinal\u2019s proofs and reasons. We trust our readers will seek\nfor them in the book itself. As there is no one more intelligently and\nconsistently Catholic and Roman in all his ideas than the cardinal, so\nthere is no one who can so well explain and interpret the same to the\nEnglish-speaking world. He is not only a prince of the Roman Church by\nhis purple, but an intellectual and moral legate of the Holy See, by his\nwisdom, eloquence, and gentleness of manner, to all men speaking the\nEnglish language, a sure teacher and guide to all Catholics, whose words\nthey will do well to read and ponder attentively.\n\nBefore closing we cannot omit indicating one paper quite different from\nanything we have before seen from the cardinal\u2019s pen. It is the one on\nKirkman\u2019s _Philosophy without Assumptions_, in which the eminent writer\nshows how much he has studied and how acutely he is able to discuss\nmetaphysical questions. We may remark that this volume has been\nrepublished in a very handsome style and form, and we cannot too\nemphatically recommend it to an extensive circulation. The appendix,\ncontaining in Latin and English the late splendid allocution of Pius IX,\nwhose thunder has shaken Europe, adds much to its value. This great\ndocument is one of the most sublime utterances which has ever proceeded\nfrom the Holy See. St. Peter never had a more worthy successor than Pius\nIX. He watches by the tomb of the Prince of the Apostles, by God\u2019s\ncommand, as the angels watched by the sepulchre of Christ. What better\nguarantee could we desire that the sovereignty and splendor of the\nPapacy will come forth in glory from the tomb of St. Peter when the long\nwatch is ended?\n\n\nBIBLIOTHECA SYMBOLICA ECCLESI\u00c6 UNIVERSALIS. THE CREEDS OF CHRISTENDOM.\n With a History and Critical Notes. By Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D.,\n Professor of Biblical Literature in the Union Theological Seminary,\n New York. In three volumes. New York: Harper & Brothers. 1877.\n\nIn respect to the literary and typographical style of execution, this is\na work worthy of commendation. Its intrinsic value for students of\ntheology is chiefly to be found in the contents of the second and third\nvolumes, where the author has collected the principal symbolical\ndocuments of the Catholic Church, both ancient and modern, of the\nOrthodox Orientals, and of the Protestant denominations classed under\nthe generic term \u201cEvangelical.\u201d The original text is given, with English\ntranslations of documents from other languages. Among these documents,\nthose appertaining to the Eastern Christians have a special interest and\nimportance, because more rare and not so easily obtained as the others.\nAs a book of reference, therefore, the _Bibliotheca Symbolica_ deserves\na place in every Catholic theological library. The author is a scholar\nof extensive erudition, and a very painstaking, accurate compiler, after\nthe manner of the Germans, and he has fulfilled a laborious and\nserviceable task in gathering together and editing with so much\nthoroughness and accuracy the collection of authentic documents\ncontained in these two bulky volumes, so well arranged and clearly\nprinted as to make them most convenient and easy for reading or\nreference.\n\nThe first volume is not without some value as a historical account of\nthe origin and formation of the symbolical documents contained in the\nother parts of the work, especially so far as relates to those emanating\nfrom Orientals and Protestants. One important service his scholarly\naccuracy has rendered to the cause of truth deserves to be particularly\nnoted\u2014the distinct light in which he has placed the agreement of the\northodox confessions of the East with the doctrine of the Catholic\nChurch, _exceptis excipiendis_, and their diversity from the specific\ndoctrines of Protestantism.\n\nIn his treatment of topics relating to the Catholic Church the partisan\npolemic appears, as we might expect. The author professes to follow the\nmaxim that \u201chonest and earnest controversy, conducted in a Christian and\ncatholic spirit, promotes true and lasting union. Polemics looks to\nirenics\u2014the aim of war is peace.\u201d He expresses the wish to promote by\nhis work \u201ca better understanding among the churches of Christ.\u201d He\ndeclares his opinion that \u201cthe divisions of Christendom bring to light\nthe various aspects and phases of revealed truth, and will be overruled\nat last for a deeper and richer harmony of which Christ is the key-note\u201d\n(preface). This sounds very well in general terms; yet when the author\ndescends to particulars and practical questions, it is evident that\nwhatever meaning his terms have is only equivalent to the truism that\nincrease of knowledge is favorable to the cause of truth alone, and that\nthe prevalence of truth over error through genuine science, sincere\nconviction, and conscientious obedience to known truth produces peace,\nharmony, and charity by uniting the minds of men in one faith.\n\u201cIrenics,\u201d in any proper sense, can refer only to parties who agree in\nsubstantials, but, through mutual or one-sided misunderstanding, are not\naware of it, or to those who are in controversy about matters which do\nnot really break unity of essential doctrine between the contending\nsides, but are carried on with too little moderation and candor by\nvehement disputants. There is no \u201cirenics\u201d in matters essential and\nobligatory between the right side and the wrong side, except the irenics\nof combat, and no peace except that which follows the victory of the one\nover the other. That an advocate of the truth of Christ should be honest\nand candid in his argumentation against error, and charitable toward the\npersons whose errors he attacks, is of course indisputable. Practically,\nwhen Dr. Schaff finds himself in face of the Roman Church, he is obliged\nto recognize that this view of the case is the only one possible. If the\nCatholic hierarchy, and all the heads or representatives of the\ndifferent bodies of the so-called orthodox Christians, would consent to\nmeet together and adopt a confession in which all should agree as\nembracing the essentials of Christianity, with a law and order which all\nshould likewise consent to establish, a visionary believer in progress\nand the church of the future might with some plausibility argue that the\nevolution of a higher form of Christianity would be the result. But Dr.\nSchaff\u2019s historical mind is too much accustomed to look at facts to be\ndeluded by such a chimera. \u201cThe exclusiveness and anti-Christian\npretensions of the Papacy, especially since it claims infallibility for\nits visible head, make it impossible for any church to live with it on\nterms of equality and sincere friendship.\u201d We suppose that the view of\nthese pretensions which claims for them a divine origin and sanction,\nand that which considers them \u201canti-Christian,\u201d can hardly be called\n\u201cvarious aspects and phases of revealed truth.\u201d The \u201cexclusiveness\u201d of\nthe claims is a point in which we both take the same view. The\necclesiastical friendship to which the doctor alludes he justly regards\nand proclaims an impossibility. While the Roman Church, and any other\nchurch not in her obedience, co-exist, there must be polemics. Irenics\ncan succeed only when the Roman Church abdicates her supremacy, or any\nother church or churches, refusing submission to it, yield to her\nclaims. The practical issue, therefore, is reduced to this: the old and\nlong-standing controversy between Rome and Protestantism. Dr. Schaff\ncomes forward as a champion of Protestantism and an assailant of what he\nis too wary to call by its legitimate name of Catholicism, and therefore\nnicknames after the manner of his predecessors in past ages, calling it\n\u201cRomanism\u201d and \u201cVatican Romanism.\u201d\n\nWe agree, then, on both sides, that the polemics and controversy must be\ncarried on. Yet, on the part of Dr. Schaff and those who fight with him,\nit appears that a considerable part of the ground we have been\nheretofore contending for is evacuated and given up to our possession.\n\u201cAnd yet we should never forget the difference between Popery and\nCatholicism.\u201d The issues, it appears, are a good deal narrowed, and that\nwill facilitate our coming to close quarters and to decisive, polemical\ndiscussion, which we desire above all things. Dr. Schaff continues: \u201cnor\nbetween the system and its followers. It becomes Protestantism, as the\nhigher form of Christianity, to be liberal and tolerant even toward\nintolerant Romanism\u201d (p. 209). Probably the collective terms in this\nclause are used distributively, as required to make it agree with the\npreceding sentence. This is graceful and dignified in Dr. Schaff. Our\nexclusiveness is indeed something hard to bear; we freely admit it. Our\napology for it is that we are acting under orders from above and have no\ndiscretionary powers. Our own personal and human feelings would incline\nus to open the doors of heaven to all mankind indiscriminately, and give\nall those who die in the state of sin a purgatory of infallible efficacy\nto make them holy and fit for everlasting beatitude. Yet as we have not\nthe keys of heaven, which were given to St. Peter with strict orders to\nshut as well as to open its gates, we can do nothing for the salvation\nof our dear friends and fellow-men, except to persuade them to take the\nking\u2019s highway to the gate of the celestial city, and not follow the\nexample of green-headed Ignorance in the _Pilgrim\u2019s Progress_, who came\nby a by-road to the gate, and, on being asked by the Shining Ones for\nhis certificate, \u201cfumbled in his bosom and found none.\u201d\n\nWe consider that we have not only the higher but the only genuine form\nof Christianity. Dr. Schaff thinks Protestantism is the higher form\nsimply, and, therefore, that Protestants ought to be tolerant of our\nintolerance. This is the most dignified attitude he could assume. On our\npart, we agree with Ozanam that, in a certain sense, we ought to be\ntolerant of error\u2014_i.e._, in the concrete, subjective sense, equivalent\nto tolerant of those who are in error, charitable, and, to those\nespecially who are themselves honorable and courteous in their warfare,\nrespectful.\n\nDr. Schaff himself evidently intends to act upon his own principles.\nToward individuals whom he mentions he is careful to observe the rules\nof courtesy. In respect to his historical and polemical statements and\narguments on Catholic matters in his first volume, we presume he speaks\naccording to his opinion and belief; and if that were correct, his\nstrong expressions would be justifiable, even though they might\nsometimes, on the score of rhetoric and good taste, lie open to\ncriticism. To call the Papacy \u201ca colossal lie\u201d is not very elegant or\neven forcible, and is irreconcilable with the author\u2019s own statements\nregarding medi\u00e6val Catholicism, as well as with the views of history\npresented by such men as Leo and other enlightened Protestants. All the\nefforts of the Jesuits to bring back schismatics to their former\nobedience to the Holy See are called \u201cintrigues.\u201d The author relies a\ngreat deal on strong language, vehement assertion, and a vague style of\ndepreciation of the mental and moral attitude of Catholics, which is not\nsustained by reasoning, and, in our view, indicates the presence of much\nprejudice, as well as a want of adequate knowledge and consideration.\nMen who have a great aptitude for history and what may be called\nbook-knowledge, among whom Dr. D\u00f6llinger is a notable instance,\nfrequently fail signally in treating of matters where logic, philosophy,\nand accurate theology are required. Dr. Schaff seems out of his proper\nline when he leaves his purely literary work and begins to reason. His\npolemical argument against infallibility and the Immaculate Conception\nis a pretty good _r\u00e9sum\u00e9_ of what has been said by others on that side,\nand of what can be said. It is all to be found in Catholic theologies,\nunder the head of objections, and has all been answered many times over.\nThe author adds nothing to his own cause by his own reasoning, and\nrequires no special confutation. On the contrary, he weakens his cause\nand detracts from its plausibility by the futility of his assertions. We\nwill cite one instance of this as an example. Speaking of the Immaculate\nConception, he says: \u201cThis extraordinary dogma lifts the Virgin Mary out\nof the fallen and redeemed race of Adam, and _places her on a par with\nthe Saviour_. For, if she is really free from all hereditary as well as\nactual sin and guilt, she is above the need of redemption. Repentance,\nforgiveness, regeneration, conversion, sanctification are as\ninapplicable to her as to Christ himself\u201d (p. 111). This is one of the\nmost illogical sentences we have ever met with. Let it be given, though\nnot conceded as true, that the dogma places the Virgin Mary above the\nneed of redemption. The illusion that she is therefore placed _on a par\nwith the Saviour_ is illogical and false. Adam, before the fall, was\nabove the need of redemption, and the angels are above it. Are they _on\na par with the Saviour_? He is God, they are creatures. Whatever he\npossesses, even in his humanity, he has by intrinsic, personal right;\nthey possess nothing except by a free gift. Moreover, it would not\nfollow that regeneration would be as inapplicable to her as to Christ\nhimself. By the hypostatic union the human nature of Christ shares with\nthe divine nature the relation of strict and proper filiation toward the\nFather, for he is the natural and only-begotten Son of God. But angels\nand men are only made sons by adoption, and by a supernatural grace\nwhich in men is properly called regeneration, because the human\ngeneration precedes, which merely gives them human nature. The Virgin\nMary received only her human nature by her natural generation, and\ntherefore needed to be born of God by spiritual grace to make her a\nchild of God, and a partaker with Christ in that special relation to the\nFather which belonged to him as man by virtue of his divine personality.\nMoreover, sanctification is not inapplicable even to Christ, whose soul\nand body were made holy by the indwelling Spirit, and therefore, _\u00e0\nfortiori_, not to Mary, on the hypothesis that she needed no redemption.\nRepentance, forgiveness, conversion, are indeed inapplicable to her.\nThey are, likewise, inapplicable to the angels, were so to Adam and Eve\nbefore the fall, and would have been so to their posterity, if the state\nof original justice had continued, unless they sinned personally and\nwere capable of restoration to grace.\n\nThe freedom from original sin does not, however, imply that the Virgin\nMary was above the need of redemption. The covenant of the first Adam\nwas abolished, and therefore no right to grace could be transmitted from\nhim to his descendant, the Virgin Mary. The attainder by which he and\nall his descendants were excluded from the privileges of children and\nthe inheritance of the kingdom of heaven was reversed only by the\nredemption. If Christ had not redeemed mankind from the fall, the\nkingdom of heaven could not have been open to Mary. She owes, therefore,\nall her privileges as a child of God and an inheritor of the kingdom of\nheaven to the redemption. Some of these are special and peculiar to\nherself, and one of these special privileges is that she was prevented\nfrom incurring the guilt of original sin by receiving sanctifying grace\nsimultaneously with her conception and the creation of her soul. She\nwas, therefore, redeemed in a more sublime mode than others, and is more\nindebted to the cross and Passion of Christ and the free grace of God\nthan any other human being, and not at all on a par with Christ, who is\nindebted to no one but himself. Let this suffice in respect to the\npolemics of Dr. Schaff\u2019s work. The reunion of all who profess\nChristianity on a new basis is as far off as ever\u2014as remote as the\ndiscovery of a way of transit to the fixed stars. The learned doctor has\nprepared a valuable collection of documents useful to the student, but\nhe has not proposed any substitute for the faith and law of the Catholic\nChurch which is likely to supplant them, or even to prove acceptable to\nany large number of Christians under any name. Nevertheless, we regard\namicably both himself and his work, and we are confident that it will\nhave the good effect of promoting a wider and more catholic range of\ninvestigation among Protestant students of theology.\n\n\nTHE STANDARD ARITHMETIC, FOR SCHOOLS OF ALL GRADES AND FOR BUSINESS\n PURPOSES. No. 1. By James E. Ryan. New York: The Catholic Publication\n Society Co.\n\nImportant changes have been made in arithmetical text-books within the\nlast twenty years. Each new series of books presented a special claim\nfor patronage. One contained several chapters previously omitted;\nanother divided the subject into mental and written arithmetic; others\nfollowed the inductive to the exclusion of the analytic method. Each\nseries may have been an improvement in some respects; but the gain has\nbeen theoretic and artistic rather than practical. The result has been\nto separate oral from written arithmetic; to increase the average number\nof books in a series to five; and to load the elementary works with\nintricate detail and useless puzzles.\n\nAs a rule, a child spends an hour a day of school-life in the study of\narithmetic. This amount of time should suffice to teach the arithmetical\nprocesses necessary in ordinary business. Yet the majority of pupils\nnever advance beyond the ground rules. This results from making the\ntext-book the guide. So general is this custom that few teachers desire\nto run the risk of changing it, and the pupil is compelled to leave\nschool before fractions have been reached. He carries with him the\nbelief that there are two kinds of arithmetic, one mental, the other\nwritten; and while he may be able to explain an oral example, he can\nsimply tell how the written example is done. The small number of pupils\nwho reach the higher branches suffer from an overdose of commercial\neconomy which can only be mastered when they come face to face with\nbusiness affairs.\n\nThe text-books prepared by Mr. James E. Ryan afford a remedy for most of\nthese defects. The elementary course contains all that can be taught to\nthe mass of pupils. It includes the fundamental rules, fractions,\ndecimals, denominate numbers, and percentage. Each division contains\noral and written work, the same analysis being used in both cases. The\nmode of treatment is excellent. The book includes no more practice work\nthan is absolutely necessary to secure facility and accuracy in\ncalculation, while the analysis of each step is so clear that any pupil\ncan easily comprehend it.\n\nThe chapters treating of fractions are cleared of obscure subdivisions,\nthereby dispensing with a mass of unnecessary rules for special cases.\nIn addition to this improvement the rules for common and decimal\nfractions are made to correspond. Denominate numbers are treated with\nmarked ability. Obsolete weights and measures are excluded. The various\ntables of the metric system are introduced in connection with the\nEnglish standards.\n\nA close examination of Mr. Ryan\u2019s treatise will convince the most\nexacting teacher that it is an excellent arithmetic.\n\n\nTHE STANDARD ARITHMETIC, FOR SCHOOLS OF ALL GRADES AND FOR BUSINESS\n PURPOSES. No. 2. By James E. Ryan. New York: The Catholic Publication\n Society Co., 9 Barclay St.\n\nThis volume begins with simple numbers and carries the pupil through the\ncommercial rules. The amount of arithmetical knowledge requisite for\nbusiness purposes has grown with the enormous growth of insurance,\nannuities, etc., so that it has become necessary to define the limits of\nschool instruction. The author includes percentage, interest, discount,\npartial payments, exchange, profit and loss, commission or brokerage,\ninsurance, duties, taxes, equation of payments, proportion, involution,\nevolution, mensuration, and progression in the regular course. The\ndiscussion of the equation, mechanics, specific gravity, builders\u2019\nmeasurements, gauging, alligation, life insurance, annuities, stocks and\nbonds, freights and storage, etc., is reserved for the appendix.\n\nIn the advanced portions of the work analysis and synthesis, or\ninduction, as it is now called, are combined. The treatment of each\nsubdivision is so unique that it is hardly fair to single out one for\nspecial praise. Equation of payments, however, is made somewhat\nconspicuous by the amount of condensation it has undergone. In six pages\nwe obtain the information which is usually spread over twenty. It is\nsafe to say that the best scholars leave school without a clear\ncomprehension of this subject, partly because of the senseless rules\nlaid down, but chiefly because of the number of them. The chapter on\nmensuration is remarkable. By it the author proves that a student may\nobtain all the knowledge of mensuration requisite for surveying without\nstudying geometry.\n\nOral and written exercises are given under every rule, and the examples\nare so shaped as to test the pupil\u2019s knowledge of principles. The\nappendix contains a mass of important work of the highest value to\nstudents qualifying themselves for active business. For this reason the\nvolume is well adapted to the wants of high-schools and academies.\n\n\nRECUEIL DE LECTURES, A L\u2019USAGE DES ECOLES. Par une S\u0153ur de St. Joseph.\n New York: The Catholic Publication Society Co. 1877.\n\nThis is a very useful addition to the Catholic Publication Society\u2019s\nexcellent series of school literature. There is probably no living\nlanguage from which so much pleasure and profit can be derived as the\nFrench. Even if a person does not speak it with ease and fluency, it\nrequires no vast amount of study to be able to read it as readily as\none\u2019s native tongue. The first requisite towards a knowledge of French\nis a good text-book and grammar. The little volume before us answers\nadmirably the first of these requirements. It is interesting, clear, and\nconstructed on an intelligent plan. The instructions for pronunciation\nat the beginning are short but excellent, and likely to rest in the\nmemory. The exercises begin in a very simple manner. They are always\nsensible, and do not confuse words and phrases, and jumble them together\nafter the Ollendorff plan, although they effect the same end, so far as\nthe interchange of words, phrases, and ideas goes. As the lessons\nproceed, they gradually increase in difficulty, as they do in interest,\nthe simpler exercises giving place to extracts from the best French\nauthors.\n\nWe think the book in every way well adapted for youthful students of\nFrench who have a teacher.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n THE\n\n CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n ---------------------\n\n VOL. XXVI., No. 153.\u2014DECEMBER, 1877.\n\n ---------------------\n\n\n MR. FROUDE ON THE \u201cREVIVAL OF ROMANISM.\u201d[66]\n\n\n\u201cWhy is Protestantism standing still while Rome is advancing? Why does\n Rome count her converts from among the evangelicals by tens, while\n she loses to them, but here and there, an exceptional and unimportant\n unit?\u201d (\u201cRevival of Romanism,\u201d sect. i. p. 95).\n\nThese questions, asked by Mr. Froude in his latest-published volume, are\nnot new. They have been asked by many any time within the last quarter\nof a century. They are being asked with more urgency, if not more alarm,\nevery day. They are questions worthy of an answer, if an answer can be\ngiven to them; worthy, certainly, of all consideration from\nserious-minded men. For, if founded in fact, they point towards a\nreversal of the three centuries of Protestant history; to the failure of\nProtestantism as a satisfactory system of belief; and, if not to a\ngeneral return of Protestant nations to the Catholic Church, at least to\nthe speedy and final approach to what keen writers and observers have\nlong seen coming\u2014to wit, the general recognition that between\nCatholicity and infidelity there stands no debatable ground for\nChristian men.\n\nThe suspicion has been gradually growing up in the Protestant thinking\nworld\u2014a suspicion that is fast hardening into a certainty\u2014that\nCatholicity is advancing with giant strides, while Protestantism is\nsurely, if sullenly, receding; worse still, that in spite of all\nProtestantism can do, in the pulpit, in the press, in the government, in\nthe world at large, Catholicity is bound to advance, and the process of\ndamming it up and shutting it off seems hopeless. \u201cHow to compete with\nthe aggressions of Romanism\u201d was, in various forms, one of the chief\nsubjects of debate before the Evangelical Alliance assembled a few years\nback in this city. A similar subject excited the recent Pan-Presbyterian\nassembly at Glasgow. Indeed, it is safe to say that, wherever a\nProtestant assembly of any kind meets for amicable consultation and\ndiscussion, that everlasting skeleton in the closet, \u201cRomanism,\u201d will be\nexposed to view to remind the pleasant gentlemen assembled that they are\ndoomed to die.\n\nThis is only a sign of the times. The times were, half a century ago,\nwhen such a sign was not visible; when Catholicity, as a real, living,\nactive power, was, so far as Protestant countries were concerned, dead\nand damned beyond hope of redemption. There was a horror at the very\nmention of the name of Rome; a universal Protestant shudder at the\nthought of the pope; but Rome and the pope were things exploded with the\nGunpowder Plot and other dark horrors of a by-gone day. In England the\nchief vestige of Catholicity and Catholic memories left showed itself in\nthe annual celebration of Guy Fawkes\u2019 day and the loyal burning of the\npope in effigy.\n\nTo-day how changed is the position of Catholicity, not in England\nonly, but in all English-speaking peoples; not in all English-speaking\npeoples only, but throughout the civilized world! Catholicity has\nexperienced a vast \u201crevival,\u201d to use Mr. Froude\u2019s expression; and to\nany one who has read Mr. Froude it will be easy to imagine how that\nwriter would handle such a theme. Mr. Froude dislikes many things in\nthis world, but of all things he dislikes Catholicity. It is hard for\nhim to write calmly on any subject; on this particular subject he\nraves, even if he raves eloquently. His admirers, among whom for many\nthings\u2014particularly for the good service his peculiarly violent temper\nhas done the Catholic cause\u2014we beg to be numbered, will scarcely\naccuse him of that passionless tone that is supposed to belong to\nblindfolded and even-balanced justice. It is not passing beyond the\nbounds of fair criticism, but simply stating what ought now to be a\nsufficiently-established fact, to say that whenever Catholicity or\nanything belonging to it crosses Mr. Froude\u2019s vision that vision is\nseared; the man is at once attacked by a species of literary\ninsanity\u2014a _Popomania_, so to say\u2014that renders him incapable of cool\njudgment, and leads him to play havoc with all the instincts of good\nsense, the laws of logic, the impulses of good nature, and, we are\nsorry to add, the rules of honesty. Indeed, no man better than he\naffords an example of the remark of a keen French writer that \u201cit is\nthe happiness and the glory of Catholicity to be always served by its\nadversaries; by those who do not believe in it; ay, by those who\npursue it with the bitterest animosity.\u201d[67]\n\nThese, however, are only so many assertions on our part. Mr. Froude will\nafford us ample opportunity of justifying them.\n\nWe have no desire to be unjust to Mr. Froude. Indeed, he is so unjust to\nhimself that an avowed enemy could wish for no better weapons of attack\nthan those supplied by Mr. Froude against himself. It is singularly true\nthat Mr. Froude is generally the best refutation of Mr. Froude. Still,\nto a man of his way of thinking, the questions set at the head of this\narticle, which he so boldly puts and honestly attempts to face, must be\nin the last degree not only exasperating but seriously alarming. To a\nman who can see nothing more fatal in this world than Catholicity, the\nconfessed advance of Catholicity, in face of, in spite of, and over all\nobstacles, must seem like the spread of a pestilence of the deadliest\nkind\u2014a mental and moral pestilence: a darkness of the understanding, a\ndeadening of the heart, a numbing of all man\u2019s fine, free, and ennobling\nqualities, a wilful renouncing of\n\n\n \u201cThe mighty thoughts that make us men.\u201d\n\n\nOf course we laugh at so preposterous an idea; but Mr. Froude has\npersuaded himself that Catholicity is all this, and we are trying our\nbest to regard him honestly and as being honest. Nor does he stand alone\nin his persuasion. There are many who go with him in his estimate of\nCatholicity, and we have them in view quite as much as he in whatever we\nmay have to say. And the first thing we have to say is this: Is there\nreally a \u201crevival of Romanism\u201d? In what and where is it reviving? Of\ncourse we reject the term Romanism, as applied to Catholicity. Still, a\nwilful man may as well have his way, especially where his wilfulness\ncosts nothing. We have a more important controversy with Mr. Froude than\na quarrel over names and a haggling over words. If Romanists we must be\nfrom his point of view, why Romanists, in the name of peace, let us be,\nto the extent at least of an article. Some statisticians estimate us at\n200,000,000. We can afford to be called names once in a while.\n\nSurely Mr. Froude is mistaken. If it be true, as a very high\nauthority[68] assured us a few years ago, that \u201cin the kingdom of this\nworld the state has dominion and precedence,\u201d Catholicity, as a whole,\nfares very badly in the kingdom of this world, however high it may rank\nin the next. And strange as it may appear to Mr. Froude and to Prince\nBismarck, Catholics have a singular liking for their own place in this\nworld; they lay claim to at least as lawful a share of the things of\nthis world as do Protestants; and they utterly and stubbornly refuse to\nlive on sufferance. The attempt to make Catholics exist on sufferance,\ngo a-begging for their lives, so to say, and eat and drink, and work and\nsleep, and play and pray by the gracious favor of certain princes of\nthis world, occasions all the trouble between Catholics and the states\ngoverned by such princes. So when a \u201crevival of Romanism\u201d is talked\nabout we naturally look to see how Catholics stand in the world; and the\nlook is not encouraging.\n\nThe \u201ckingdoms of this world\u201d are all, or mostly all, dead-set against\nCatholicity. The Catholic Church is proscribed in Germany; proscribed in\nRussia; tied down in Austria and Italy; hounded in Switzerland; vexed\nand tormented in Spain and the states of South America. Looked at with\nthe eyes of ordinary common sense, and from a merely worldly\nstandipoint, the Catholic Church, under these governments, which are so\nstrong and powerful, and play so large and important a part in the\nworld, is in about as bad a condition as its worst wisher could desire.\nBy the governments mentioned, with some inequality in the degree of\nseverity, Catholicity is regarded and treated as at once a secret and an\nopen foe, whom it requires every device and strain of the law and the\nresources of government to put down. What Emerson, in one of his latest\nand best utterances, has said of the assertion of \u201cmoral sentiment\u201d is\nhere exactly true of Catholicity: \u201cCities go against it; the college\ngoes against it; the courts snatch at any precedent, at any vicious\nforms of law to rule it out; legislatures listen with appetite to\ndeclamations against it, and vote it down. Every new assertion of the\nright surprises us, like a man joining the church, and we hardly dare\nbelieve he is in earnest.\u201d[69]\n\nThe press is not only against it of its own accord, but is suborned to\nbe against it. Its supreme Pastor has literally scarcely a roof to cover\nhim in the states that through almost all the centuries of the Christian\nera belonged to the church, and such a roof as he has hangs on the word\nof a royal[70] robber, who, in turn, holds what he has and what he has\nso ill-gotten by the slenderest of tenures\u2014the breath of a mob. The city\nthat witnessed the divinization of paganism, its awful and just\noverthrow, the long agony of the Catacombs, the building up of\nChristendom on the pagan ruins, the glories of the \u201cages of faith,\u201d is\nto-day one of the chief centres of the new paganism, which has for its\ndeity nihilism. In all the world to-day no royal crusader is to be found\nto draw his sword for Christ and Christ\u2019s cross. The race of Charles\nMartel, of Pepin, of Charlemagne, of Pelayo, of Godfrey de Bouillon, of\nSt. Louis of France, of Scanderbeg, of Sobieski, of Don Juan of Austria,\nthe race of heroes whose swords wrought miracles at Poitiers, at\nJerusalem, at Acre, at Rhodes, at Malta, at Vienna, at Lepanto, seems to\nhave died out, though a foe as terrible to Christianity as was ever the\nold pagan North and the Moslem South and East besieges and threatens now\nthe citadel of the city of God. It is, perhaps, characteristic of the\nage that the only one to assume the title of royal champion of the cross\nshould be the present Russian emperor. It is, perhaps, equally\ncharacteristic of the wicked assumption that it should have met with so\nfearful and unexpected a response at the hands of the wretched remnant\nof a power that true Christianity had crippled, and would have smote to\nthe dust had not the division of Christendom lent allies from within the\ncamp to the ancient foe. Does it not look like a just retribution?\n\nThe Catholic Church stands between two revolutions\u2014the revolution from\nabove and the revolution from below. Both alike have decreed its death.\nThe Herods, the Pilates, and the rabble, foes in all else, are friends\nin this. _Delenda est Roma Catholica!_\n\nThis is no fancy picture. We are not speaking now of the church in\nherself\u2014that consideration will come later\u2014but of the church as she\nstands towards governments, or rather as they stand towards her. Even\nwhere some comparative freedom is allowed her it is doled out gingerly\nand grudgingly, or given under silent or open protest. The erection of a\nfree Catholic university in France\u2014that is, a university independent of\nthe government: a government accused, too, of \u201cclericalism\u201d\u2014is the\nsignal for the French \u201crepublicans,\u201d as writers on this side of the\nwater insist on calling them, to be up in arms. Men laugh to-day at the\nEnglish Ecclesiastical Titles Act and the turmoil created by it. Yet it\nmoved liberal England in 1850 till the country rocked with the tumult of\nit. Its author was a liberal leader. He is still living, we believe,\nthough it is hard to think of Earl Russell living and not using his\nwell-remembered voice. At all events he was living a few years ago, and\nwe heard him then\u2014liberal as ever. He had promised to preside at a\nmeeting at Exeter Hall, London, to express sympathy with Prince Bismarck\nand the German government in their contest with the Catholic Church\u2014a\ncontest that we shall have occasion to refer to in another place. At the\nlast moment Earl Russell \u201ccaught a bad cold\u201d and could not appear, but\nhis place as chief speaker was nobly taken\u2014by whom? By a free American\ncitizen, the Rev. Joseph P. Thompson, D.D., formerly of the Church of\nthe Tabernacle in this city; and his closing advice to Prince\nBismarck\u2014an advice thrice repeated\u2014was to \u201cstamp out\u201d Catholicity.\n\nThese individual instances are only straws, but straws that betoken a\ngreat deal of wind somewhere. Such liberty as the Catholic Church has is\nonly conceded to it when and where the very character and stability of\nthe governments necessitate its concession. Under such circumstances,\nthen, does it not sound strange and startling to be alarmed at a\n\u201crevival of Romanism\u201d?\n\nSo much for the dark side of the picture; and there is no denying that\nit is dark indeed. There is light, however, and the light is very strong\nand lovely. If the race of royal men and heroes whose swords were ever\nready to be drawn in the cause of Christ seems to have quite died out,\nthe race of true Catholics has not died with them. Royalty, at its best\neven, was generally and almost necessarily a treacherous ally to the\nchurch. The kings have gone from the church, but the people remain. In\nface of this universal, protracted, bitter, and resolute opposition to\nCatholicity on the part of so many great states, we find the church, as\nin the days of the apostles, adding daily to her number \u201cthose that\nshould be saved.\u201d Here, too, we find, as in all Christian history, the\ngreatest and sharpest contrasts\u2014those contrasts that it baffles human\ningenuity to explain. The Catholic Church is to-day strongest where,\naccording to human calculation, she ought to be weakest, and weakest\nwhere she ought to be strongest. She flourishes best in what three\ncenturies of almost total estrangement have made to her foreign soil.\nThis it is that so puzzles Mr. Froude.\n\n \u201cThe proverb which says that nothing is certain but the\n unforeseen was never better verified than in the resurrection,\n as it were out of the grave, during the last forty years of the\n Roman Catholic religion. In my own boyhood it hung about some\n few ancient English families like a ghost of the past. They\n preserved their creed as an heirloom which tradition rather than\n conviction made sacred to them. A convert from Protestantism to\n Popery would have been as great a monster as a convert to\n Buddhism or Odin worship. \u2018Believe in the Pope!\u2019 said Dr.\n Arnold. \u2018I should as soon believe in Jupiter\u2019\u201d (p. 93).\n\nThis is undoubtedly, in the main, a true picture of the result of three\ncenturies of apostasy in England. As for Dr. Arnold, that learned\ngentleman probably understated his belief. He would, if anything, much\nsooner have believed in Jupiter than in the Pope. It would be\ninteresting to know what he thought of, say, George IV., as the supreme\nhead of the church of which Dr. Arnold was so distinguished an ornament,\nor of Queen Victoria. He is as good an example as any of modern refined\nand intellectual paganism, and his distinguished son is but the natural\noutcome of the influence of such a man\u2019s character and teachings, as in\nanother way was John Stuart Mill of _his_ father.\n\n\u201cThe singular change which we have witnessed and are still witnessing,\u201d\npursues Mr. Froude, \u201cis not due to freshly-discovered evidence of the\ntruth of what had been abandoned as superstition\u201d (p. 93). In this, of\ncourse, we quite agree with Mr. Froude, though, perhaps, not exactly in\nthe manner he would wish. The truth is the same to-day as it ever was.\nSuperstition is the same to-day as it ever was. Without going into the\nmatter very deeply just here, we merely hint that Mr. Froude\u2019s \u201csingular\nchange\u201d may not be quite so singular as he imagines. The change to which\nhe alludes is the return of a great body of the English-speaking people\nto or towards what for three centuries England and England\u2019s colonies\nhad been educated to consider superstition, darkness, idolatry even.\nCertainly Rome has not changed within this period, as it will be seen\nMr. Froude, with passionate vehemence, insists. We only throw out the\nhint, then, that possibly what was abandoned as superstition turns out\non closer inspection not to have been superstition at all. Truth may be\nslow in coming, but once come it is very hard to close one\u2019s eyes to it.\nFor men who have eyes there is no exercise so healthy and manful as\nhonestly to face a great difficulty. The modern keen spirit of\ninvestigation we are far from considering an unmixed evil, if, indeed,\nit be an evil at all. The closest inquiry is compatible with the firmest\nand most whole-hearted faith. The objections of sceptics to the\ndoctrines of the church are, when not borrowed from the objections of\nthe doctors of the church, puny in comparison with them. On men,\nhowever, who do not believe at all, the spirit of inquiry, when united\nto earnestness of purpose, is working good. Many nowadays, who have\nevery whit as profound a distrust of Catholicity as Mr. Froude, are not\ncontent with taking for granted all that they have been taught to\nbelieve of Catholics and Catholicity. They go to Rome; walk about in it,\nread it, study it, much as they would enter upon the investigation of a\ndisputed question in science; and, having examined to their hearts\u2019\ncontent, many of them stay in Rome, while most come back with at least\nrespect for what they formerly detested and abhorred.\n\nIt is impossible even to mention a few of the names of distinguished\nCatholics within the century, many of them converts, and not be struck\nby their mental and moral eminence. The world cannot afford to sneer at\nmen like G\u00f6rres, Count von Stolberg, Frederic Schlegel, H\u00fcrter, Ozanam,\nLacordaire, Montalembert, Louis Veuillot, Balmez, O\u2019Connell, Brownson,\nIves, Anderson, Bayley, Wiseman, Newman, Manning, Faber, Ward, Marshall,\nAllies, Mivart, and a host of others almost equally eminent, who were\nborn leaders of men or of thought, who came from many lands, who filled\nevery kind of position, and who, led by many different lights,\ntraversing many stormy and dark and difficult ways, came at last to\nRome, to rest there to the end as loyal and faithful children of the\nchurch. It is men like these who ennoble the human race and who leave a\nrich legacy of thought and act to all peoples and to all time. To say\nthat such men, most of whom came from without, went deliberately over to\nthe old \u201csuperstition\u201d because it was superstition will not do. They\nfound what they had esteemed darkness to be light.\n\nThis modern spirit of investigation has done and is doing another great\nservice to the Catholic cause: it is helping to unravel the tangled\nskein of history, to explore dark places and drag buried truth to light.\nLingard\u2019s _History of England_, for instance, really worked, or more\nproperly began, a revolution in English thought\u2014a revolution which,\nunconsciously, Scott\u2019s novels and poems helped greatly to popularize.\nThe work set on foot by Lingard and the method adopted have been well\nfollowed up by others, and by non-Catholics. Men came to try and look at\nthings dispassionately and fairly. The result was that certain rooted\nEnglish opinions and prejudices began slowly to give way. The \u201cglorious\nReformation,\u201d for instance, and the \u201cgreat Reformers\u201d in England\nappeared on closer inspection to be neither quite so \u201cglorious\u201d nor\nquite so \u201cgreat\u201d as before. It requires very exceptional mental, not to\nsay moral, courage nowadays to present Henry VIII. as a reformer of\nreligion, or \u201cgood Queen Bess\u201d as really good, or as one whose \u201clordly\nnature was the pride of all true-hearted Englishmen.\u201d[71] And like in\ncharacter to the leaders were those who went with them in their measures\nof reform. The Reformation itself has come to be regarded by all\nintelligent minds, whatever be their estimate of Catholicity, as at\nleast not an unmixed good. \u201cThe religious reform,\u201d says Guizot,[72]\n\u201cwhich was the revolution of the sixteenth century has already been\nsubmitted to the test of time, and of great social and intellectual\nperils. It brought with it much suffering to the human race, it gave\nrise to great errors and great crimes, and was developed amidst cruel\nwars and the most deplorable troubles and disturbances. These facts,\nwhich we learn both from its partisans and opponents, cannot be\ncontested, and they form the account which history lays to the charge of\nthe event.\u201d The constant revelations coming to light through the\npublication of secret papers and such like make it perfectly plain that\nreform, to have been at all effectual, should have begun with the\n\u201cReformers\u201d themselves. As an evidence of how thoroughly the sham and\nrottenness of the Reformation have been exposed, we find Sanders\u2019\nmuch-derided _Rise and Growth of the Anglican Schism_ now accepted on\nall sides as only too true.\n\nCertain it is that a great idol of English Protestantism, if not quite\noverthrown, has been very much battered and bruised of late by\niconoclasts who in other days would have knelt and worshipped before it.\nProtestant England is built on the Protestant Reformation; but if that\nturns out to have been on its religious side so very bad an affair, what\nbecomes of those who pinned their faith to it? That is a thought that is\nworking in men\u2019s minds, and working good. That reform was needed in the\nchurch and kingdom of England prior to the Reformation no man will\ndispute. But real reformation should not be a sweeping out of one devil\nto introduce seven more unclean.\n\nWhile the truth of history was thus slowly forcing its way out, there\ncame a sudden shock to the mind of the English people\u2014a shock so severe\nand stunning in its first effects as almost to lead to a reaction and a\nturning again into the old ruts. This was the deliberate desertion of\nall pretensions to alliance with the early church by some of the\nleaders\u2014\u201cthe ablest\u201d Mr. Froude styles them\u2014of the Tractarian movement.\nThese became converts to the Catholic faith, and, in the slang of the\nday, \u201cwent over to Rome.\u201d\n\nThe falling away of these men from the Anglican Church can only be\nlikened to a revolution, a yielding of some buttress of the British\nConstitution, which was thought to be as impregnable, as solid, as\nlasting as England itself. And yet \u201cthe intellect which saw the\nfalsehood of the papal pretensions in the sixteenth century sees it only\nmore clearly in the nineteenth,\u201d says Mr. Froude. Possibly enough; a\ndistinction, however, is to be drawn at \u201cintellect.\u201d\n\n\u201cMore than ever the assumptions of the Holy See are perceived to rest on\nerror or on fraud. The doctrines of the Catholic Church have gained only\nincreased improbability from the advance of knowledge. Her history, in\nthe light of critical science, is a tissue of legend woven by the devout\nimagination.\u201d\n\nWe have thus far only quoted from the first of fifty-four pages, and\nalready we pause to take breath. Mr. Froude has a peculiar manner of\nputting things. Such wholesale and sweeping assertions are only to be\nanswered in a volume or by a simple denial. Of course, if the Catholic\nChurch _is_ all that Mr. Froude unhesitatingly sets her down to be,\nthere is an end of the whole question. In that case the \u201crevival of\nRomanism\u201d is really a grave danger to the world; nay, the very existence\nof \u201cRomanism\u201d\u2014_i.e._, of Catholicity\u2014is a menace to human society. If\nthe \u201cpapal pretensions\u201d are \u201cfalsehood\u201d; if \u201cthe assumptions of the Holy\nSee\u201d \u201crest on error and fraud\u201d; if \u201cthe doctrines of the Catholic Church\nhave gained only increased improbability from the advance of knowledge\u201d;\nand if \u201cher history is a tissue of legend,\u201d men who commit themselves to\nthe defence of such a monstrosity set themselves at once beyond the pale\nof civilization. Were Mr. Froude writing of the Turks or of the Mormons\nhe could scarcely use language more strongly condemnatory. It is\nprobable that, with his generous impulses, he would find \u201cextenuating\ncircumstances,\u201d did he think any needed, for Mormon or Turk, which he\ncould not concede to a Catholic.\n\nWhen Mr. Froude visited this country recently on his ill-judged and, to\nhim, disastrous mission\u2014for a mission he called it\u2014a critic (in the New\nYork _World_, we believe) described his style, very happily it seemed to\nus, as feminine. Women are not supposed to sit down to serious questions\nof wide and general import as calmly and judiciously as men. They argue\nfrom the heart rather than the head. They like or they dislike, and woe\nbetide the person or the cause that they dislike! Argument is thrown\naway on them. They make the most astounding statements with the easiest\nconfidence; they have a happy faculty of inventing facts; they\ncontradict themselves with placid unconsciousness, and everybody else\nwith scornful rigor; for logic they have not so much a disregard as a\nprofound contempt, and take refuge from its assaults in thin-edged\nsatire. This, of course, is only true of them when they are out of their\nsphere and dealing with matters for which they have a constitutional\nincapacity.\n\nMr. Froude, however, is just this. Take any one sentence of those last\nquoted; look at it calmly; weigh it in the balance, and what do we find?\nTake this one: \u201cThe doctrines of the Catholic Church have gained only\nincreased improbability from the advance of knowledge.\u201d With this\nconfident statement he leaves the matter. There is no doubt, no\nhesitation, no reservation at all on his part. A reasonable man will ask\nhimself, however: \u201cIs this stupendous statement true?\u201d \u201cThe doctrines of\nthe Catholic Church! What! all of them?\u201d Apparently so; Mr. Froude, at\nleast, makes no exception. \u201cI believe in God, the Father Almighty,\nCreator of heaven and earth,\u201d is the primary article of the Catholic\nCreed. Has that only \u201cgained increased improbability from the advance of\nknowledge\u201d? Mr. Froude would hardly say so; indeed, in more places than\none he takes occasion to sneer at the modern scientific gospel. Even if\nMr. Froude himself said so, his Protestant readers who make any\npretensions to Christian faith would scarcely agree with him. Belief in\nthe Trinity of God is another doctrine of the Catholic Church; in Jesus\nChrist the God-Man, the Redeemer of the world; in the Holy Ghost; in the\nresurrection of the body and life everlasting. All these are doctrines\nof the Catholic Church. Does Mr. Froude pretend to say that they have\nall been swept away by \u201cthe advance of knowledge\u201d? If he did not mean to\nsay this\u2014as, indeed, we believe he did not\u2014why did he say it? What are\nwe to think of him? Is this sober writing and a right manner of\napproaching a serious question? In p. 93 he tells us that \u201cthe doctrines\nof the Catholic Church have gained only increased improbability from the\nadvance of knowledge.\u201d In p. 95 he has already forgotten himself, and\ntells us that \u201cthe Protestant churches are no less witnesses to the\nimmortal nature of the soul, and the awful future which lies before it,\n_than the Catholic Church_,\u201d which is the strongest kind of concession\nof what he had just before denied; and forgetting himself again, he\ntells us in a third place (p. 141) that the Protestant ministers \u201care at\npresent the _sole_ surviving representatives of true religion in the\nworld.\u201d This is only one of a multitude of instances in which Mr. Froude\nallows himself to run away with himself. Passion and prejudice narrow\nhis mental vision, until at times it becomes so diseased as to result in\nmoral as well as mental obliquity.\n\nThe same thing is observable in the sentence immediately following the\npassage last quoted: \u201cLiberty, spiritual and political, has thriven in\nspite of her [the Catholic Church\u2019s] most desperate opposition, till it\nhas invaded every government in the world, and has penetrated at last\neven the territories of the popes themselves\u201d (p. 94).\n\nEven Mr. Froude cannot absolutely blind himself to facts; at least, he\ncannot alter them. He may hate the Catholic Church as much as he\npleases\u2014and it pleases him to hate her very much\u2014but the fact of his\nhatred cannot convert the persecution of her children into \u201cliberty,\nspiritual and political.\u201d Nor are we at all begging the question in\ngiving the name of persecution to the treatment that Catholics are\nreceiving at the hands, if not of \u201cevery government of the world,\u201d at\nleast of those previously enumerated. It is the word, as we shall show,\napplied to the anti-Catholic legislation in Germany by candid\nProtestants, countrymen of Mr. Froude, too, who hate the church and the\nPope just as resolutely as he, but with more apparent show of reason. It\nis too late in the day to argue about this matter. There is no longer\nquestion to an honest mind as to whether the Catholics in Germany are or\nare not persecuted. There may still be question as to whether or not the\npersecution be necessary, but there is no dispute as to the fact. To\ntalk of the \u201cspiritual liberty\u201d of Catholics in Germany to-day is simply\nto talk nonsense. But, lest there should be any possible doubt regarding\nthe matter, it may be as well to freshen men\u2019s memories a little on a\npoint that is intimately connected with our whole subject; for what\ncovers Germany covers every land where the struggle between the Catholic\nChurch and the state is being waged.\n\nThe organs of English opinion have been very faithful in their\nallegiance to Prince Bismarck, who is such an experienced cultivator of\npublic opinion. They are the bitter foes of the Papacy and the Catholic\nChurch. Nevertheless, they have some pretensions to principle, and, when\nthere is no escape out of the difficulty, call white white, and black\nblack. At all events they do not always call black white. In Germany,\nthen, according to Mr. Froude, \u201cliberty, spiritual and political, has\nthriven in spite of the Catholic Church\u2019s most desperate opposition.\u201d\nWhile the struggle of the German government with the Catholics had as\nyet not much more than half begun the English _Pall Mall Gazette_\ndiscovered that\n\n \u201cThere is no parallel in history to the experiment which the\n German statesmen are resolutely bent on trying, except the\n memorable achievement of Englishmen under the guidance of Henry\n VIII.... Like all these measures, the new law concerning the\n education of ecclesiastical functionaries, which is the most\n striking of the number, will apply to all sects indifferently,\n but, in its application to the Roman Catholic priesthood, it\n almost takes one\u2019s breath away.\u201d\n\nIt may be only natural to find the apologist of Henry VIII. and\nElizabeth describing the revival in modern times of \u201cthe memorable\nachievement of Englishmen\u201d under Henry VIII. as \u201cliberty, spiritual and\npolitical.\u201d Yet the same \u201cexperiment\u201d takes away the breath, not only of\nso cool a journal as the _Pall Mall Gazette_, but of a much cooler and\nmore influential journal still.\n\n \u201cThe measures now in the German Parliament, and likely to become\n law,\u201d says the London _Times_, \u201camount to a secular organization\n so complete as not to leave the Pope a soul, a place, an hour,\n that he can call entirely his own. Germany asserts for the civil\n power the control of all education, the imposition of its own\n conditions on entrance to either civil or ecclesiastical office,\n the administration of all discipline, and at every point the\n right to confine religious teachers and preachers to purely\n doctrinal and moral topics. Henceforth there is to be neither\n priest, nor bishop, nor cardinal, nor teacher, nor preacher, nor\n proclamation, nor public act, nor penalty, nor anything that man\n can hear, do, or say for the soul\u2019s good of man in Germany,\n without the proper authorization, mark, and livery of the\n emperor.\u201d\n\nMr. Froude is perfectly correct in saying that such measures have been\ncarried \u201cin spite of the church\u2019s most desperate opposition,\u201d but\nwhether he is equally correct in styling the same thing \u201cliberty,\u201d\nspiritual or political, we leave to the judgment of honest readers. The\nLondon _Spectator_, writing at the same period, was in sore trouble as\nto the event.\n\n \u201cIs an age of the world,\u201d it asks, \u201cin which few men know what\n is truth or whether there be truth, one in which you would ask\n statesmen to determine its limits? We suspect that a race of\n statesmen armed with such powers as Prussia is now giving to her\n officials would soon cease to show their present temperance and\n sobriety, and grow into a caste of civilian ecclesiastics of\n harder, drier, and lower mould than any of the ecclesiastics\n they had to put down.... To our minds the absolutism of the\n Vatican Council is a trifling danger compared with the growing\n absolutism of the democratic temper which is now being pushed\n into almost every department of human conduct.\u201d\n\nWe shall have occasion to show the results of the work of these\n\u201ccivilian ecclesiastics\u201d on the Protestant Church in Germany,\nparticularly in Prussia. Even at this early stage of the struggle the\nLondon _Times_ confessed:\n\n \u201cWe do not anticipate any retrogression in the development of\n Prussia, but it seems inevitable that there should be some check\n in the progress of change, some slackening in the audacity of\n legislation, some disposition to rest and be thankful.\u201d\n\nOf the same measure the Prussian correspondent of the London _Times_\nwrote:\n\n \u201cThe Catholic dignitaries are not the only ecclesiastics opposed\n to the bill. The new measures applying not only to the Catholic\n Church, but to all religious communities recognized by the\n state, the Ober-Kirchenrath, or Supreme Consistory of the\n Protestant Church in the old provinces, has also thought fit to\n caution the crown against the enactment of these sweeping\n innovations.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe official papers openly accuse the Protestant clergy of\n becoming the allies of the Ultramontanes,\u201d says the _Pall Mall\n Gazette_ (April 12, 1873). \u201cHerr Von Gerlach no longer stands\n alone as a Protestant opponent of the chancellor\u2019s policy.\u201d\n\n \u201cThis rough-and-ready method of expelling Ultramontane\n influences \u2018by a fork\u2019 can hardly fail to suggest to a looker-on\n the probability that, like similar methods of expelling nature,\n it may lead to a reaction. Downright persecution of this sort\n (we are speaking now simply of the Jesuit law), unless it is\n very thorough indeed\u2014more thorough than is well possible in the\n nineteenth century\u2014usually defeats itself,\u201d says the _Saturday\n Review_.\n\nBut why multiply quotations? Surely those given are enough to show that\nthe leading organs of English opinion, representing every stripe of\nthought, are quite agreed as to what name should be given to what Mr.\nFroude calls the \u201cliberty, spiritual and political,\u201d in Germany. We\nleave the case confidently in their hands; and Mr. Froude apparently\nthinks the verdict has gone against him. He deplores the fact that \u201cfree\nEngland and free America ... affect to think that the Jesuits are an\ninjured body, and clamor against Prince Bismarck\u2019s tyranny. Truly, we\nare an enlightened generation\u201d (p. 136).\n\nWhat is here true of Germany is true also of Russia, Austria (in great\nmeasure), Italy, Switzerland, and other lands. So that if Catholicity is\nreally reviving, as Mr. Froude alleges, it is reviving under the very\nshadow of death, and in face of the combined opposition of the most\npowerful governments. A revival under such circumstances ought to extort\nthe admiration of Mr. Froude, who is as true a hero-worshipper as\nCarlyle, even if he be about equally happy in his selection of heroes.\nIn the \u201cPreliminary\u201d to _The English in Ireland_ Mr. Froude propounds\nhis theories of might and right:\n\n \u201cA natural right to liberty, irrespective of the ability to\n defend it, exists in nations as much as, and no more than, it\n exists in individuals.... In a world in which we are made to\n depend so largely for our well-being on the conduct of our\n neighbors, and yet are created infinitely unequal in ability and\n worthiness of character, _the superior part has a natural right\n to govern; the inferior part has a natural right to be\n governed_; and a rude but adequate test of superiority and\n inferiority is provided in the relative strength of the\n different orders of human beings. Among wild beasts and savages\n might constitutes right. Among reasonable beings right is for\n ever tending to create might\u201d (vol. i. pp. 1, 2).\n\nAs we are not now examining Mr. Froude\u2019s theories on government, we only\ncall attention to the very hazy nature of the views here expressed on a\nsubject which of all things should be clear and definite. He uses the\nword _right_ without telling us what he means by it, whether or not it\nhas an absolute meaning and force. He speaks of \u201cthe superior part\u201d and\n\u201cthe inferior part\u201d without informing us in what sense the terms are\nused. Superior in what? Inferior in what? To any rational mind it is\nplain that, just because of the inequality of human beings \u201cin ability\nand worthiness of character,\u201d there must, under a divine dispensation,\nwhich Mr. Froude does not deny, be absolute rules of right and wrong for\nall alike, a moral code which shall extend to and determine all rights,\nnatural or acquired. If not this, right and wrong become convertible\nterms, and right and might of course follow suit, which is really the\noutcome of Mr. Froude\u2019s theory\u2014a doctrine that impregnates and inspires\nall his writings.\n\n \u201cThere neither is nor can be an inherent privilege in any person\n or set of persons to live unworthily at their own wills, _when\n they can be led or driven into more honorable courses_; and the\n rights of man\u2014_if such rights there be_\u2014are not to liberty, but\n to wise direction and control\u201d (p. 2).\n\nA very plausible-looking doctrine, but a very dangerous one as here laid\ndown. An example will serve to show the mischievous and vicious nature\nof it. According to Mr. Froude, to be a Catholic is \u201cto live\nunworthily.\u201d The comment suggests itself.\n\n\u201cIndividuals cannot be independent, or society cannot exist.... The\nindividual has to sacrifice his independence to his family, the family\nto the tribe,\u201d etc. Why so? Would it not be truer as well as nobler to\nsay that the individual _uses_ his independence for his family?\n\n \u201cNecessity and common danger drive families into alliance for\n self-defence; the smaller circles of independence lose\n themselves in ampler areas; and those who refuse to conform to\n the new authority are either required to take themselves\n elsewhere, or, if they remain and persist in disobedience, may\n be treated as criminals\u201d (p. 4).\n\nQuite independent of the nature and claims of the \u201cnew authority,\u201d so\nfar as Mr. Froude enlightens us.\n\n \u201cOn the whole, and as a rule, superior strength is the\n equivalent of superior merit.... As a broad principle it may be\n said that, as nature has so constituted us that we must be ruled\n in some way, and as at any given time the rule inevitably will\n be in the hands of those who are then the strongest, so nature\n also has allotted superiority of strength to superiority of\n intellect and character; and in deciding that the weaker shall\n obey the more powerful, she is in reality saving them from\n themselves, and then most confers true liberty when she seems\n most to be taking it away\u201d (pp. 4, 5).\n\nWe hold that \u201csuperiority of strength\u201d belongs to \u201csuperiority of\nintellect and character,\u201d but not in Mr. Froude\u2019s sense. This sense is\nobviously that expounded by the third Napoleon in the preface to his\n_Julius C\u00e6sar_\u2014viz., that once C\u00e6sar is established, it is a crime to go\nagainst him under any circumstances; which is equivalent to saying that\nwhatever is, is right. It is forgotten by, or not known to, these\nwriters that man is prone to evil from childhood; that the good has\nalways a hard battle to fight; that it does conquer by force of\n\u201csuperiority of intellect and character,\u201d but that it is often, and for\na long time, borne down by the physical superiority of brute strength.\nThe history of Christianity is the strongest instance we can offer of\nthe truth of our position. Christianity has been struggling upwards for\nnineteen centuries; to human eyes it was often at the point of death; on\nthose whom it subdued it conferred superiority of intellect and of\ncharacter\u2014a superiority which they sometimes turned against itself\u2014and\nto-day it is struggling as fiercely as ever.\n\nHowever, let us gauge Mr. Froude by his own standard: that superiority\nof strength goes with superiority of intellect and of character. It is a\nvery convenient theory as so stated; but it is apt to work two ways. So\nlong as it works for Mr. Froude it is very natural and explicable. As\nsoon, however, as it turns to the opposite side it is to Mr. Froude a\n\u201cphenomenon.\u201d We are as little inclined to underrate as to overrate\nsuccess, though very far from accepting it as the standard of right. One\nthing, however, will be conceded by all men: what succeeds in face of\nthe most strenuous, long-sustained, and powerful opposition; in face of\nwealth, position, possession, numbers, resources, education,\ntradition\u2014in a word, of all that goes to form and mould and fix peoples\nand their character, their history, their mode of thought, their\nnational bent\u2014what, we say, succeeds in face of all this must have\nsomething in it very much resembling Mr. Froude\u2019s \u201csuperiority of\nintellect and of character.\u201d It must have an immense vital force and\nstrength and reality within it. It is hard for any man not to\nacknowledge that under such circumstances success approves itself; that\nit came because it deserved to come.\n\nBut this is just Mr. Froude\u2019s \u201crevival\u201d of Catholicity\u2014a fact which for\nhim has no adequate explanation.\n\n \u201cThe tide of knowledge and the tide of outward events,\u201d he says,\n \u201chave set with equal force in the direction opposite to\n Romanism; yet in spite of it, perhaps by means of it, as a kite\n rises against the wind, the Roman Church has once more shot up\n into visible and practical consequence. While she loses ground\n in Spain and Italy, which had been so long exclusively her own,\n she is gaining in the modern energetic races, which had been the\n stronghold of Protestantism. Her numbers increase, her\n organization gathers vigor. Her clergy are energetic, bold, and\n aggressive. Sees long prostrate are re-established; cathedrals\n rise, and churches, with schools, and colleges, and convents,\n and monasteries. She has taken into her service her old enemy,\n the press, and has established a popular literature. Her\n hierarchy in England and America have already compelled the\n state to consult their opinions and respect their pleasure;\n while each step that is gained is used as a vantage-ground from\n which to present fresh demands. Hildebrand, in the plenitude of\n his power, was not more arrogant in his claim of universal\n sovereignty than the present wearer of the tiara.\u201d\n\nThis glowing passage suggests a variety of comments. In the first place,\ntaking it as a statement of facts, it is, coming from Mr. Froude, a most\nmarvellous testimony to the power and growth of the Catholic Church\nwithin the present century. Let us venture to paraphrase his outburst,\nand see how it runs:\n\nHere are you whom we thought dead and buried under your weight of\nsuperstition, idolatry, absurdity, and fraud, an old fossil of medi\u00e6val\ntimes, deserted, neglected, despised, and contemned by the intelligence,\nwealth, and worth of the age, suddenly leaping into new life, and by a\nsingle miraculous stride coming right abreast of, if not ahead of, your\nfoes. What have we that you have not? Energy is ours, yet you surpass\nus. Numbers are ours; you are stealing them from us. Knowledge and\nlearning are ours; your teachers put ours to shame. We stole your sees,\nyour cathedrals, your monasteries, your convents, your schools, your\nuniversities\u2014all that you had of beautiful, and holy, and intellectual.\nYou ask them not back, but set to work to build them anew. Ours is\nstolen property; yours is built on the free offerings of the poor. We\ninvaded the domain of English literature; it was all ours; we poisoned\nits wells to you; we invented the newspaper to perpetuate the falsehoods\nthat we wove about you. You have found an antidote to the poison; you\nwin over our brightest intellects; you make a literature of your own\nwhich we are compelled to admire and read. You face us at every turn,\nand we may as well confess that you beat us at many.\n\nThis is really Mr. Froude\u2019s picture, not ours. His words mean this or\nnothing. Will it not occur to anybody that for a church built on\n\u201csuperstition,\u201d \u201cfalsehood,\u201d \u201cfraud,\u201d \u201cerror,\u201d \u201ca tissue of legend,\u201d\netc., etc., Mr. Froude\u2019s is indeed a strange showing\u2014so strange that if\nthe church were the direct opposite of all that he asserts it to be, it\ncould hardly hope for more signal or deserved success? Does it ever\noccur to Mr. Froude that he may by some remote possibility be mistaken\nin his estimate of the Catholic Church? that it, if not right\naltogether, may at least be righter than he thinks?\n\nTo some minds, to many and to greater and broader minds than Mr.\nFroude\u2019s, the doubt has suggested itself. Some, like Macaulay, face it,\nacknowledge the wonder of it, make no attempt to explain the wonder, and\nstand without for ever, still wondering. Others draw nearer and examine\nmore closely, and finally enter in. Here is how Mr. Froude views it:\n\n \u201cWhat is the meaning of so strange a phenomenon? Is the progress\n of which we hear so much less real than we thought? Does\n knowledge grow more shallow as the surface widens? Is it that\n science is creeping like the snake upon the ground, eating dust\n and bringing forth materialism? that the Catholic Church, in\n spite of her errors, keeps alive the consciousness of our\n spiritual being and the hope and expectation of immortality? The\n Protestant churches are no less witnesses to the immortal nature\n of the soul, and the awful future which lies before it, than the\n Catholic Church. Why is Protestantism standing still while Rome\n is advancing? Why does Rome count her converts from among the\n evangelicals by tens, while she loses to them, but here and\n there, an exceptional and unimportant unit?\u201d (p. 95).\n\nMr. Froude has put questions here each of which would take a volume to\nanswer. We leave them to be pondered over by those for whom they are\nchiefly intended, and of whose conscientious consideration they are well\nworthy. For ourselves, we can have no doubt as to the answer to be given\nto each, but we are more concerned at present with Mr. Froude\u2019s reply.\n\nFirst among the causes which he assigns as having \u201cunited to bring about\nsuch a state of things\u201d is the Tractarian movement in the Anglican\nChurch, resulting from the \u201clatitudinarianism of the then (1832) popular\nWhig philosophy.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe Whigs believed that Catholics had changed their nature and\n had grown liberal, and had insisted on emancipating them. The\n Tractarians looked on emancipation as the fruit of a spirit\n which was destroying Christianity, and would terminate at last\n in atheism. They imagined that, by reasserting the authority of\n the Anglican Church, they could at once stem the encroachments\n of popery and arrest the progress of infidelity. Both Whigs and\n Tractarians were deceiving themselves. The Catholic Church is\n unchanging as the Ethiopian\u2019s skin, and remains, for good and\n evil, the same to-day as yesterday.\u201d\n\nYes; \u201cthe same yesterday, to-day, and for ever\u201d is the church of God. It\ncannot be the church of God and be otherwise. If there was any deception\nMr. Froude lays it at the right door. These men were \u201cdeceiving\nthemselves.\u201d The church gave no intimation of change, made no promises,\nheld out no concessions, thought of no compromise in matter of teaching.\nShe cannot do so; it is not in her power to do so.\n\nIt was the liberal philosophy that was chiefly instrumental in bringing\nthe change about. Men had to choose between the fixed doctrines of the\nCatholic Church and the shifting doctrines and intolerable pretensions\nof the Anglican Church. They rejected both; they rejected revelation;\nthey looked at man himself, and attached to him certain natural rights\nwhich are as well expressed in our Declaration of Independence as\nanywhere. They would, if they could, strike out the Catholics, as was\nattempted here. But it was impossible. They could not do it and be true\nto themselves and their principles. If liberty of thought, freedom of\nconscience, and the right to worship or not to worship God in your own\nway be natural rights of man, they necessarily attach to all, whether a\nman call himself Catholic, Protestant, Jew, or Nihilist. It is a\npolitical and practical impossibility in these days of divided and\nclashing beliefs to profess liberty, yet seal the door to any special\nform of worship; and Catholicity of all beliefs is dreaded, because,\nwhen free and untrammelled, it has the tendency and the force to\nassimilate and receive all into its bosom. The result of this partial\nconcession of freedom to Catholicity in England is thus pictured by Mr.\nFroude:\n\n \u201cThe Tractarians\u2019 principles led the ablest of them into that\n very fold against which they had imagined themselves the most\n efficient of barriers. From the day in which they established\n their party in the Anglican communion a steady stream of\n converts has passed through it into the Catholic ranks; while\n the Whigs, in carrying emancipation, gave the Catholics\n political power, and with power the respect and weight in the\n outer world which in free countries always attends it.\u201d\n\nIt is the attainment of this power by Catholics that Mr. Froude so\nbitterly resents. It would be more satisfactory if he told us plainly\nwhat he would have done to Catholics. Would he deny them votes? To deny\nthem votes is to deny them political life. And would he deny votes to\nCatholics only? Or would he grant votes, but compel them to use them in\none way, and, if in one way, in which way? In a word, would he allow\nCatholics to exist at all as Catholics, would he force them into the old\nstate of political slavery, or would he openly force them into\nProtestantism under the persuasion that Protestantism, no matter of what\nstripe, was better for them? Though he shrinks from saying so himself,\nthe latter seems to be the only fair practical conclusion to be drawn\nfrom his words, and in passages already quoted he has given us the\ngrounds on which he would act, and feel justified in acting: \u201cThe\nsuperior part has a natural right to govern the inferior part.\u201d It is\nplain as between Protestantism and Catholicity which Mr. Froude\nconsiders \u201cthe superior part.\u201d \u201cThe inferior part has a natural right to\nbe governed.\u201d \u201cThere neither is nor can be an inherent privilege in any\nperson or set of persons to live unworthily at their own wills, _when\nthey can be led or driven into more honorable courses_.\u201d\n\nWe must interpret Mr. Froude by himself, and, judging him by his own\nwords, we are led irresistibly to the conclusion that had he the power\nhe would do all that has been done in the past, and even go beyond\nit\u2014for all measures have thus far proved ineffectual\u2014to destroy\nCatholicity from the face of the earth.\n\nAnd here we come to our final consideration in the present article. Mr.\nFroude\u2019s observations amount practically to this: Set Catholicity and\nProtestantism side by side; give them each perfect freedom; Catholicity\nwill infallibly gain, Protestantism will as infallibly lose. \u201cThe\nphenomenon,\u201d he says plaintively, \u201cis not confined to England.... In\nAmerica, in Holland, in Switzerland, in France, _wherever there is most\npolitical freedom_, the power of Catholics is increasing.\u201d\n\nWell, what of it? The fault, still following Mr. Froude, if fault there\nbe, must rest either with Catholicity, or with Protestantism, or with\npolitical freedom. If with Catholicity, it is its fault that \u201cwherever\nthere is most political freedom\u201d its \u201cpower is increasing.\u201d\n\nIf with Protestantism, it is _its_ fault that, where Catholicity is\nplaced on an equal political footing with it, its power decreases, while\nthe power of Catholicity proportionately increases; and it is to be\nborne in mind that the power of numbers in the distinctively Protestant\ncountries is altogether against the Catholics.\n\nIf the fault lie with political freedom itself, that with it the power\nof Catholics increases, what are we to say or do? That political freedom\nand Catholicity go hand in hand is the obvious comment, and that it is\nimpossible to check the advance of Catholicity without at the same time\ncontracting political freedom. We submit that this is the plain and\nlogical deduction to be drawn from Mr. Froude\u2019s words. It is no trick of\nverbiage. The fact is to himself a \u201cphenomenon.\u201d We are giving now no\nopinion of our own, but simply translating Mr. Froude, when we say that\nby his concession\u2014Protestantism cannot stand by the side of Catholicity\nin a free air. It must go to the wall. This we have to reconcile with\nhis other statement that \u201cliberty, spiritual and political, has thriven\nin spite of her [the Catholic Church\u2019s] most desperate opposition, till\nit has invaded every government in the world.\u201d Where it has really\ninvaded governments, by his own confession, \u201cthe power of Catholics is\nincreasing.\u201d Where it is cut off, there is Catholicity strangled, so far\nas human power can strangle it. But we shall show that even there it is\nthe only religion with any vitality in it, and that all forms of\nreligion which claim the name of Christian suffer with the Catholic\nChurch and lose by her losses. We have thus far only treated the\n\u201crevival\u201d in a general way. In a future article we shall, in company\nwith Mr. Froude, examine the specific causes which he assigns for the\n\u201crevival.\u201d sp 2\n\n Copyright: Rev. I. T. HECKER. 1877.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n TO F. W. FABER.\n\n\n Amico, io vivendo cercava conforto\n Nel monte Parnasso;\n Tu, meglio consigliato, cercalo\n Nel Calvario.\n\n\n \u2014Chiabrera\u2019s epitaph at Savona. From the title-page of Father Faber\u2019s\n _Poems_.\n\n\n I.\n\n\n True poet of all mountain sight and sound,\n Of barren glen where mighty echoes wake,\n Of eagle-haunted, crag-o\u2019ershadowed lake\n Where loneliness in silent state sits crowned\n And shares her kingdom with no shallow heart:\n True lover of all nature\u2019s solemn ways,\n The columned forest\u2019s wind-waked song of praise\u2014\n Sad chords wherein all deepest joy hath part\u2014\n True reader of the primrose\u2019 golden tale,\n Finding its glow but shadow of a light\n Wherein who seeks may find the Infinite,\n That doth its mystery so in least things veil\u2014\n A seer thou seem\u2019st in thy high mountain place,\n E\u2019er with all holiest visions face to face.\n\n\n II.\n\n\n Yet wandering content in lowlier ways,\n By brambly lane and lawn-embroidered mere,\n By quiet river in whose waters clear\n The clustering willows and tall towers gaze\n Of minster-town whose ancient bells ring out\n And trail their music through thy thoughtful rhyme\n Like far-off echoes of an older time\n When trembled in their peal no note of doubt.\n Landless, yet holder of a royal fief\n In all the beauty by rich nature wrought\u2014\n Each blossoming hedge-row with an earldom fraught,\n Wide duchies bound in every golden sheaf\u2014\n Thine the unchallenged tenure of the whole,\n By right divine of unstained poet-soul!\n\n\n III.\n\n\n Still hearkening ever to that low heart-beat\n Of sorrowing earth, whose flowers fade in death,\n Whose silver-threaded rills grow faint for breath,\n Whose wounded birds cry out beneath thy feet.\n Not deaf thy human ear to any plaint\n Of our sad mother whom her sons make weep\u2014\n Breaking with cries of hate her quiet sleep,\n Crowding in sunless ways their brothers faint.\n Nor dumb thy poet-voice to speak her woe\u2014\n She that hath shivered when mankind stood mute\n Or flung harsh words of evilest repute,\n Veiling her face her Maker\u2019s cross below.\n With filial love thy heart \u2019gainst hers is laid\n Who rears the hills, in keeping holds the dead.\n\n\n IV.\n\n\n Like cleansing waters touched with heavenly grace\n Thy mountain-consecrated words are shed,\n Lifting our souls to light unshadow\u00e8d,\n Guiding our footsteps in the holy trace\n Of Him who yet shall make the hills a way\u2014\n Exalted paths trod by the clean of heart,\n Shrines for the holy-minded set apart\n Wherein profaner feet unheeding stray.\n All nature wins true loving from thy song\u2014\n Fair not alone with her e\u2019er-changing grace,\n But, lighting each dear feature of her face\n The thought of love enduring, pure and strong\u2014\n True poet, in Parnassus\u2019 shadow still\n Feeling the loadstone of blessed Calvary\u2019s hill.\n\n\n V.\n\n\n To that sad mount how eloquent a guide!\n Not Hybla\u2019s blossoms could so fair beguile\n The wandering bees as thy entreating wile\n Faint souls to climb that seeming arid side.\n With strength thou lead\u2019st from seraph-haunted cave\n Where Infinite Might with infinite loving smiled\n From frail, sweet lips of Holy Mary\u2019s Child;\n Anon where pitying palm-trees shadow gave\n To ease the weary exile of their Lord;\n On through the humble toil of patient years\u2014\n Till, mingling with the Magdalen our tears,\n Our heart\u2019s poor vase of precious ointment poured\u2014\n We stand, God\u2019s Mother near, with woe beside\n The love-pierced feet of Jesus Crucified.\n\n\n VI.\n\n\n The sweetest refuge any soul can know!\n Where all complaining stills its idle voice,\n And trembling joy bids sorrow soft rejoice\n Finding the living wand, whose staff below\n The living waters lie like mountain spring\n Defiled not in its source, whose shining face\n Gives to e\u2019en homely herbs a resting-place,\n With heaven\u2019s blue for their bright shadowing.\n Pure, living source! wherein who drinks shall thirst\n Not any more. Blest cup of Love Divine!\n About whose stem the thorny wreath doth twine,\n Grown soft for us since He hath borne it first.\n Cool draught! wherein no hidden drop of gall\n Makes heaven bitter, and earth\u2019s promise all.\n\n\n VII.\n\n\n Shall poets change for bay the crown divine\n Wreathing the head of Him about whom throng\n Life\u2019s tenderest flowers, who holds art\u2019s perfect song\n In his pierced hands?\u2014pure gift in holiest shrine!\u2014\n From whose rent side the consecrating flood\n Doth cleanse the poet\u2019s thought from earthly stain,\n Him king anointed o\u2019er a grand domain\n By true inheritance of royal blood;\n In whose wide heart, broken for very love,\n Lies master-key to all true harmonies,\n So tuned, no base, discordant melodies\n Shall jar earth\u2019s music saints shall sing above;\n So tuned, may wake in sweetness weakest string,\n Immortal anthems loyal echoing.\n\n\n VIII.\n\n\n So keyed thy sacred song, O poet true!\n With holy joy its very sorrow light,\n So glorified with that love infinite\n That shines as stars in heaven\u2019s darkest blue:\n Washed clean thy earth-born lays in that pure flood\u2014\n Thy cloudy mountains hide no fear save one\n Of loving awe; though in dark gorge the sun\n Falls not, e\u2019en there the Eternal Dove doth brood.\n Thy mountain springs are pure, wherein we dare\n Drink as we will, not fearing, so bent down,\n We shall lose sight of heaven\u2019s fairer crown\n And find but our own likeness resting there.\n Fresh with a dew bearing no stain of earth,\n Thy hill-paths lead unto our Father\u2019s hearth.\n\n\n IX.\n\n\n With thee, my poet, lie our souls at rest\n In the soft glory of our Mother\u2019s smile\u2014\n The Maid Immaculate, who could beguile\n Her God to be a child on her pure breast.\n With thee we labor that our little life\n Shall learn to lose itself, that it be found\n In that far, other life eternal crowned\n \u2018Mid hero-saints whose prayers were ours in strife;\n Humbly with thee, our dearest Lord before,\n Veiled in the little, pale, and helpless round\n Wherewith on earth he chooseth to be crowned,\n We bend with love that yearneth to love more.\n Fond children, at the Father\u2019s feet we kneel,\n Finding the love his Spirit doth reveal.\n\n\n X.\n\n\n O poet! more than Crashaw, saint! forgive,\n If break my singing in unworthy praise;\n Pardon, if uncouth love in stammering lays,\n Seeking to thank, but give thee cause to grieve.\n Unspoken gratitude is burden sore\n When debt so passing strong of love is owed;\n Unworthy speaking but augments the load,\n Forgiveness making so love\u2019s burden more.\n So much to thee I owe! Along my life\n Thy words like patient, wing\u00e8d seeds are sown,\n So long amid the dark and brambles grown,\n Yet winning bloom at last despite the strife.\n As once for him of Ars thy heart was shrine,\n So mine holds thee, O blessed of Love Divine!\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n AMONG THE TRANSLATORS.\n\n VIRGIL AND HORACE\u2014II.\n\n\u201cTraduire Horace, et surtout le traduire en vers, est m\u00eame devenu,\ndepuis soixante ou quatre-vingts ans, et chez nous et en d\u2019autres pays,\nune sorte de l\u00e9g\u00e8re infirmit\u00e9 morale, et de douce maladie qui prend\nr\u00e9guli\u00e8rement un certain nombre d\u2019hommes instruits au retour d\u2019\u00e2ge;\nc\u2019est une envie de redevenir enfant, adolescent, de se reporter au temps\ndes \u00e9tudes qui nous \u00e9taient ch\u00e8res.\u201d To translate Horace, says\nSainte-Beuve, above all to translate him in verse, has become within the\nlast sixty or eighty years, both in France and abroad, a kind of venial\nmoral infirmity, a sort of mild fever, which periodically seizes a\ncertain number of educated men as they find themselves growing old; and\nit has its source in the longing to renew our youth, to live over again\nthe time of studies we were fond of.\n\nLike all the sayings of that most delicate and _spirituel_ of critics,\nthis is so far true that most translations of Horace will be found, we\nthink, to be the work of men advancing in life, and, in the majority of\ncases, to have grown up insensibly through a number of years. One does\nnot sit down to a version of the _Odes_ as to a version of the _\u00c6neid_,\nbeginning at the first line and going religiously through in order to\nthe end. No; but we pick out an ode here and there, as the mood takes us\nand that fits the mood\u2014some gay _Ad Amphoram_ or _Ad Asterien_ when we\nare young and sprightly, _calidus juvent\u00e2_; a nobler _Ad Augustum_ or\n_Ad Calliopen_ when we are older and graver, in the time of whitening\nlocks\u2014riding in the cars, it may be, walking in the street, smoking the\nafter-dinner cigar; everywhere, in fact, that solitude gives us a chance\nto entertain the best of all good company. We turn it into such English\nas we can muster, and print it perhaps, or, better still, put it away in\nour portfolio; Horace must have had a prophetic eye on his coming\ntranslator when he gave that soundest of poetic counsels\u2014unless\n_Punch\u2019s_ \u201cDon\u2019t\u201d be sounder still:\n\n\n \u201cNonumque prematur in annum\n Membranis intus positis\u201d\u2014[73]\n\n\nwe put it away to be taken up again and again, lingered over fondly,\ntouched up and polished, until the exact word is found for every elusive\nepithet, the precise equivalent for every tantalizing phrase, and the\nentire ode lies before us, its foreign garb bagging, indeed, a little\nhere and there, but fitting as snugly as our art can make it, and we are\ncontent. That is a moment of such supreme satisfaction, of such tranquil\ntriumph, as life but rarely yields. Less than any other that dabbles in\nink has your true Horatian the fever of the type. His virtue is\nreally\u2014what virtue, alas! so seldom is in this perverse world\u2014its own\nreward. Like Joubert, _il s\u2019inqui\u00e8te de perfection bien plus que de\ngloire_; to have hit upon what he feels to be a happy rendering is glory\nenough; enough that he and Horace should share his exultation; a\nfelicitous adjective will put him in good-humor for a week. And so,\nbefore he well knows it, his portfolio is nearly full, and the notion\nfirst dawns upon him\u2014the duty it almost seems\u2014of sharing his good\nfortune with his fellows. \u201cRather would I have written the _Quem tu\nMelpomene semel_ or the _Donec gratus eram tibi_,\u201d cried Scaliger, \u201cthan\nto be king of Aragon.\u201d Rather would I make a perfect translation of\nthese or any other of the _Odes_, cries our Horatian, than to be king of\nall Spain, with all _Cuba libre_ to boot\u2014\n\n\n \u201cQuam si Libyam remotis\n Gadibus jungas et uterque P\u0153nus\n Serviat uni.\u201d[74]\n\n\nSomewhat in this wise, we fancy, have most versions of Horace come to be\nand to be printed; certainly, we incline to think, all the best\nversions. Thus, too, partly for the reason M. Sainte-Beuve gives, partly\nfrom the poet\u2019s universality and the charm which lies in the very\ndifficulty of the task\u2014an impossibility Johnson called it, but it is one\nof those \u201csweet impossibilities\u201d which ennoble failure\u2014do we count so\nmany renderings of single odes by famous men. There are few names\neminent in English letters or statesmanship that are not thus allied to\nthe genial Venusian\u2014names, too, of the most diverse order. Not only\npoets like Cowper and Montgomery, Chatterton and Byron,[75] essayists\nlike Addison, or dramatists like Congreve, Rowe, and Otway, but grave\nhistorians such as Mitford and Merivale, judges like Lord Thurlow and\nSir Jeffrey Gilbert, philosophers like Atterbury and Sir William Temple,\nbitter satirists like Swift, tender sentimentalists like \u201cNamby Pamby\u201d\nPhillips, professors and prime ministers, doctors and divines, lords and\nlawyers, archdeacons and archtraitors, have joined in paying court to\nthe freedman\u2019s son. In his ante-room, or _atrium_, prim John Evelyn is\njostled by tipsy Porson humming somewhat huskily one of the bacchanalian\nlyrics to a tune of his own (perhaps the _Ad Sodales_, i. 27, which that\nlearned Theban has rendered with true Porsonian zest\u2014a little too much\nso to quote); Warren Hastings there meets Edmund Burke in friendlier\ncontest than at the bar of the House of Commons; Dr. Bentley takes issue\nwith Archdeacon Wrangham over a doubtful reading; Mr. Gladstone leads a\npoetic opposition to Lord Derby in Englishing the _Carmen Amab\u0153um_. In\nthat modest _c\u0153naculum_ we can greet these great men all on a familiar\nand equal footing, made one of them for the nonce by the fellowship of a\ncommon taste\u2014nay, may even flatter ourselves that here, at least, we are\nat their level; that our poet\u2019s door may even be opened to us sooner\nthan to the tallest and wisest among them. It is true greatness has no\nprerogative in Horace; the meanest may win to his intimacy, be admitted\nto his _penetralia_, sooner than the mightiest. Of all the distinguished\nnames we have quoted, few would have had much distinction as translators\nalone, though Bishop Atterbury\u2019s versions, especially that of the _Ad\nMelpomenen_, iv. 2, are deservedly famous. Hastings\u2019 translation of the\n_Ad Grosphum_, written during his passage from Bengal to England in 1785\n(he was going home to the famous trial), merits notice for its curious\nadaptation to his Indian experiences:\n\n\n \u201cFor ease the slow Mahratta spoils\n And hardier Sikh erratic toils,\n While both their ease forego....\n\n \u201cTo ripened age Clive lived renowned,\n With lacs enriched, with honors crowned,\n His valor\u2019s well-earned meed.\n Too long, alas! he lived, to hate\n His envied lot, and died too late\n From life\u2019s oppression freed.\u201d\n\n\nAnother verse had perhaps a still more personal application; there is\nbut a trace of it in the Latin:\n\n\n \u201cNo fears his peace of mind annoy\n Lest printed lies his fame destroy\n Which labor\u2019d years have won;\n Nor pack\u2019d committees break his rest,\n Nor avarice sends him forth in quest\n Of climes beneath the sun.\u201d\n\n\nThe fashion of fitting Horace to contemporary persons and events was\nmuch in vogue in Hastings\u2019 time and earlier. Creech tells us in his\npreface that he was advised \u201cto turn the Satyrs to his own times.\u201d It\nwas carried out to the fullest extent in the well-known _Horace in\nLondon_ of Horace and James Smith.\n\nWithin the past twenty-five or thirty years many complete versions of\nthe _Odes_ have been put forth, including those of H. G. Robinson, the\nRev. W. Sewell (printed in Bohn\u2019s Library), Lord Ravensworth, Mr. Whyte\nMelville, Mr. Theodore Martin, the late Prof. Conington, and the late\nLord Lytton. Of these, Mr. Martin\u2019s, which we should feel inclined to\npronounce upon the whole the best, and the most notable Lord Lytton\u2019s,\nhave alone been reprinted here. In giving this pre-eminence to Mr.\nMartin\u2019s work we are perhaps influenced by a strong individual liking,\namounting even to a prepossession, in its favor, dating from that very\npotent time Sainte-Beuve speaks of\u2014\u201c_le temps des \u00e9tudes qui nous\n\u00e9taient ch\u00e8res_.\u201d When it first fell into our hands it was the only\nversion we had yet seen which at all reproduced, even to a limited\ndegree, for us its original\u2019s charm. By many Prof. Conington\u2019s\ntranslation, easy, fluent, and in the main faithful\u2014just what, from his\n_\u00c6neid_, one might expect it to be\u2014will be preferred to Mr. Martin\u2019s,\nwhich it certainly surpasses in single odes. As to the worst there need\nbe no such doubt. The Rev. Mr. Sewell\u2019s is not, perhaps, the worst\npossible version of the _Odes_, as one is half tempted to believe who\nremembers how it was recommended to the readers of the _Dublin\nUniversity Magazine_ long ago\u2014how we relished that literary execution\nwith all boyhood\u2019s artless delight in slaughter! Time, alas! soon sobers\nthat youthful vivacity of temper, and, better than \u00c6sop, teaches us to\nrespect the frogs whom it loves to revenge in kind. No; the\npossibilities and varieties of badness in this direction are unhappily\ntoo great for that; but it is as bad as need be\u2014as need be, let us say,\nfor admission to Bohn\u2019s Library.[76] Great indulgence is certainly to be\nextended to translators of Horace; much is to be forgiven them; but one\nmust finally draw the line, and probably most Horatians would feel like\ndrawing the line at the Rev. Mr. Sewell.\n\nIt was in the process of pointing out this fact to that gentleman, in a\nreview of his book in the magazine mentioned, that Mr. Martin some\ntwenty years ago put forth, we believe, the first specimens of his own\ntranslation, which was completed and published some years later. Its\nsuccess was immediate and deserved; for its positive no less than its\ncomparative merits were great. Mr. Martin was one of the first to\ndiscern, or at least to put in acceptable practice, the true theory of\ntranslating the lighter odes\u2014\u201ca point of great difficulty,\u201d as he truly\nsays. \u201cThey are,\u201d he adds, \u201cmere _vers de soci\u00e9t\u00e9_ invested by the\nlanguage, for us, with a certain stateliness, but which were probably\nregarded with a very different feeling by the small contemporary circle\nto whom they were addressed. To catch the tone of these, to be light\nwithout being flippant, to be playful without being vulgar, demands a\ndelicacy of touch which it is given to few to acquire, even in original\ncomposition, and which in translation is all but unattainable.\u201d The\ngraver odes have their own difficulties; but the skilful translator\nhandles them more easily, we fancy, than the gay fluttering swarm of\nlaughing Lydias and Ne\u00e6ras that flash athwart their statelier pomp like\ngolden butterflies through the Gothic glooms of summer woods\u2014butterflies\nwhose glossy wings, alas! lose something of their down and brilliance at\nevery, even the lightest and most loving, touch. The thought of a poem\nis always easier to transplant into other speech than its form. Ideas\nare essentially the same, whatever tongue interprets them\u2014Homer\u2019s Greek\nor Shakspeare\u2019s English; but the infinite delicate shades of beauty or\nsignificance added to them by the subtle differences of words, by that\nbeauty of their own and intrinsic value which, as Th\u00e9ophile Gautier puts\nit\u2014himself a master of language\u2014words have in the poet\u2019s eyes apart from\ntheir meaning, like uncut and unset jewels, the deftest, most patient\nart of the translator toils in vain to catch. They vanish in his grasp\nlike the bubble whose frail glories dazzle the eyes and mock the\nlonging, chubby fingers of babyhood; to render them is like trying to\npaint the perfume of a flower.\n\nNow, it is true enough, whatever iconoclasts like Stendhal may pretend,\nthat in poetry thought cannot be divorced from form; it is the\nindissoluble union of both that makes the poem. Try to fancy any really\ngreat passage of verse expressed in other words, even of the same\nspeech, and you see at once how important form is. Take once more\nShakspeare\u2019s\n\n\n \u201cDaffodils\n That come before the swallow dares, and take\n The winds of March with beauty,\u201d\n\n\nand try to change or misplace a single word. One feels instantly that\nany change would be fatal; it almost seems, with such passages, as\nthough noble thought and perfect word had been waiting for each other\nfrom all time until the high-priest of Apollo should come to wed them.\nTo quote Sainte-Beuve again\u2014the critic who wishes to instruct his\nreaders can scarcely quote him too often: \u201cJe con\u00e7ois qu\u2019on ne mette pas\ntoute la poesie dans le m\u00e9tier, mais je ne con\u00e7ois pas du tout que quand\nil s\u2019agit d\u2019un art on ne tienne nui compte de l\u2019art lui-m\u00eame et qu\u2019on\nd\u00e9pr\u00e9cie les parfaits ouvriers qui y excellent.\u201d[77] Yet it is none the\nless true that a poem in which the idea is paramount is more susceptible\nof translation than one whose form is the chief element of its charm.\nOne can imagine Wordsworth\u2019s fine sonnet on Milton, \u201cMilton, thou\nshouldst be with us at this hour,\u201d being turned into Latin with\ncomparatively little loss; indeed it has been so turned by one of the\nmost accomplished of English scholars\u2014Dr. Kennedy\u2014into Alcaics of which\nthe purity and finish make a fitting casket for that gem of poetry;\nthough even here one feels the wide difference between the original of\nthat immortal line,\n\n\n \u201cThy soul was like a star, and dwelt apart,\u201d\n\n\nand the Latin\n\n\n \u201cMens tua lumine\n Fulgebat, ut sidus, remote,\u201d\n\n\nmissing, as we do, the \u201clovely marriage of pure words,\u201d that in the\nEnglish is itself a poem. But take such a bit of verbal daintiness as\nGeorge Darley\u2019s \u201cSweet in her green dell the flower of beauty slumbers,\u201d\nwith its peculiar and _saisissant_ rhythm, the perfection of verbal\nmusic; or Tennyson\u2019s \u201cBreak, break, break,\u201d where the poetry\u2014and\nundeniable poetry it is\u2014lies in a certain faint aroma of suggestion that\nseems to breathe from the very words, and try to reproduce the effect of\nthem in other speech. As well try with earthly tools to rebuild\nTitania\u2019s palace of leaf shadows and the gossamer, to weave her mantle\non any mortal loom out of moonbeams and the mist.\n\nMuch the same is it to attempt to transfer to an English translation\naught of the peculiar grace which invests Horace\u2019s lightest lyrics with\na charm we feel but cannot analyze, which resides in the choice of\nepithets, the arrangement of words, the cadence of the rhythm, the\nmetrical form, and which yet is something more than any or all of these.\nThe noble thought which lies embodied in the _Justum et tenacem\npropositi virum_ we may not despair of rehabilitating, with somewhat of\nits proper majesty, in our own vernacular; but the shy, fugitive\nloveliness of that wildwood picnic to which the poet bids us, to forget\nthe cares of life,\n\n\n \u201cQuo pinus et ingens albaque populus\n Umbram hospitalem consociare amant\n Ramis, et obliquo laborat\n _Lympha fugax trepidare rivo_\u201d\n\n\n\u2014what art can coax away from its native soil? Do we find it in Francis?\u2014\n\n\n \u201cWhere the pale poplar and the pine\n Expel the sun\u2019s intemperate beam;\n In hospitable shades their branches twine,\n And winds with toil, though swift, the tremulous stream\u201d;\n\n\nor in Creech\u2014though Creech is here luckier than usual?\u2014\n\n\n \u201cWhere near a purling Spring doth glide\n In winding Streams, and softly chide\n The interrupting Pebble as it flows\u201d;\n\n\nor in Prout?\u2014\n\n\n \u201cWhile onward runs the crooked rill,\n Brisk fugitive, with murmur shrill\u201d;\n\n\n or in Lord Lytton?\u2014\n\n\n \u201cWherefore struggles and murmurs the rill\n Stayed from flight by a curve in the shore.\u201d\n\n\n Even Mr. Martin gives it up, and presents us, instead of a translation,\n with a couplet which is very pretty English verse, but about as far\n from Horace as can be:\n\n\n \u201cWhere runs the wimpling brook, its slumb\u2019rous tune\n Still murmuring as it runs to the hush\u2019d ear of noon.\u201d\n\n\n It is passages such as this especially which have caused Horace to be\n called the untranslatable.\n\n To come from theory to practice, it is in the lighter odes, and in\n those parts of all the odes the beauty of which in the original lies\n chiefly in expression, that all Horace\u2019s translators have most\n conspicuously failed. Take Milton\u2019s _Ad Pyrrham_, for example (Ode v.).\n The _Ad Pyrrham_ is not only one of the most charming but also one of\n the most difficult of the minor odes, and for that reason among the\n oftenest translated. It is one of the many _mitten_-pieces wherein the\n inconstant bard seems to have taken a somewhat ostentatious delight in\n celebrating the numerous snubbings he had to put up with from the no\n less inconstant fair who were the objects of his brief and fitful\n homage. In it, as in the _Ad Ne\u00e6ram_ (_Epod._ xv.) and the _Ad Barinen_\n (_Carm._ ii. 8), reproaches to the lady for her perfidy are mingled\n with self-gratulations on the poet\u2019s own lucky escape and sinister\n warnings to his rival\u2014the time-old strategy and solace of the discarded\n lover the world over. He has been shipwrecked, he says, on that\n treacherous sea of love; but having, the gods be praised! made shift to\n scramble ashore in safety, and got on some dry duds, sits in gleeful\n expectation of seeing his successor get a like ducking. The poem is\n simply a piece of mock heroics, for the counterpart of which we must\n look to such minglings of cynicism and sentiment as we find in the\n poetry of Praed and Thackeray and Locker, or, to a less degree, in many\n of B\u00e9ranger\u2019s lighter songs. The difference between the modern poets\n and the ancient is that in the former the sentiment is real, veiled\n under an affectation of cynicism: in the latter it is precisely the\n reverse. But, bearing that difference in mind, the translator may find\n in the methods of the poets named some hints for the handling of such\n odes as the _Ad Pyrrham_.\n\n But how do the translators treat it? Take Milton\u2019s famous version,\n which everybody knows:\n\n\n \u201cWhat slender youth bedewed with liquid odors\n Courts thee on roses in some pleasant cave,\n Pyrrha? For whom bind\u2019st thou\n In wreaths thy golden hair?\n\n \u201cPlain in thy neatness,\u201d etc.\n\n\n \u2014\u2019tis as solemn as a Quaker conventicle. Nor, with reverence be it said\n _en passant_, is it altogether free from graver faults; undeniably\n elegant as it is, this translation has had quite as much praise as it\n deserved. It is full of those Latin constructions Milton loved\u2014\u201con\n faith and changed gods complain\u201d for _fidem mutatosque deos flebit_,\n \u201calways vacant\u201d for _semper vacuam_, \u201cunwonted shall admire\u201d for\n _emirabitur insolens_, etc.\u2014which are nowhere more out of place than in\n a translation from the Latin. Some, indeed, claim that they carry with\n them and impart a certain flavor of the original to those unacquainted\n with it; but this seems to us a view at once fallacious and\n superficial. The office of translation into any language is surely to\n reproduce the original in the idiom of that language as nearly as may\n be; and though the theory, like all theories, may be pressed to an\n excess\u2014as we think Mr. Morris has pressed it, for example, in his\n translation of the _\u00c6neid_\u2014better that than such deformities as\n\n\n \u201cAlways vacant, always amiable\n Hopes thee.\u201d\n\n\n It is the suggestion not of Horace but of Milton here that is pleasant;\n it is because Milton\u2019s natural English style is a highly Latinized and\n involved style that these oddities of his translation strike us less\n than in another. Sometimes, too, oddly enough for so good a scholar, he\n falls short of the full sense of his original. _Potenti maris deo_, the\n commentators tell us, means, not \u201cthe stern god of sea,\u201d but \u201cthe god\n potent over the sea\u201d; and \u201cplain in thy neatness\u201d for _simplex\n munditiis_ misses the entire significance of the latter word, which\n implies something of grace and beauty. \u201cPlain in thy neatness\u201d suggests\n rather \u201cPriscilla the Puritan maiden\u201d than Pyrrha of the dull-gold\n hair. Ben Jonson\u2019s\n\n\n \u201cGive me a look, give me a face\n That makes simplicity a grace,\u201d\n\n\n hits Horace\u2019s meaning exactly, and certainly far more poetically.\n Indeed, we often find in original English poetry much apter renderings\n than the translators give us. Prof. Conington knew this when he went to\n Shakspeare for \u201cfancy free\u201d as an equivalent for this very word\n _vacuam_ we have been talking of\u2014a perfect equivalent of its\n association did not make it a little un-Horatian\u2014and to Matthew\n Arnold\u2019s \u201csalt, unplumbed, _estranging_ sea\u201d for the very best version\n we have seen of that most puzzling phrase (i. 3), \u201c_oceano\n dissociabili_.\u201d\n\n This is, perhaps, a digression; but as we set out for a ramble, we have\n no apologies to make. Conington\u2019s version, in the same metre as\n Milton\u2019s, only rhyming the alternate lines, is not all so good as\n \u201cfancy free,\u201d though it gains from its rhyme a certain lightness\n lacking in that of Milton\u2019s:\n\n\n \u201cWhat slender youth besprinkled with perfume\n Courts you on roses in some grotto\u2019s shade,\n Fair Pyrrha? Say for whom\n Your yellow hair you braid.\n\n \u201cSo true, so simple! Ah! how oft shall he\n Lament that faith can fail, that gods can change,\n Viewing the rough black sea\n With eyes to tempests strange,\u201d etc.\n\n\n So true, so simple! We are not much nearer to _simplex munditiis_ than\n before. Martin is not here at his best, and Francis is unusually\n successful: \u201cdress\u2019d with careless art\u201d and \u201cconsecrate the pictured\n storm\u201d are felicities he does not always attain. Prout is chiefly\n noticeable for yielding to the almost irresistible temptation of a\n false beacon in _intentata nites_:\n\n\n \u201cI the false light forswear,\n A shipwreck\u2019d mariner\u201d;\n\n\n and Leigh Hunt\u2019s, though but a paraphrase, is surely a very happy one:\n\n\n \u201cFor whom are bound thy tresses bright\n With unconcern so exquisite?\u201d\n\n\n and\n\n\n \u201cThough now the sunshine hour beguiles\n His bark along thy golden smiles,\n Trusting to see thee for his play\n For ever keep smooth holiday,\u201d\n\n\n admirably elude, if they do not meet, the difficulties of the Latin.\n But in none of these, nor in any other rendering we have seen, is there\n any trace of that _nuance_ of sarcasm or polite banter we seem to taste\n in the original. The only American version we remember to have met with\n is not in this respect more successful:\n\n\n \u201cIn thy grotto\u2019s cool recesses,\n Dripping perfumes, lapped in roses,\n Say what lissome youth reposes,\n Pyrrha, wooing thy embrace?\n Braid\u2019st for whom those tawny tresses,\n Simple in thy grace?\n\n \u201cAh! how oft averted heaven\n Will he weep, and thy dissembling.\n And, poor novice, view with trembling\n O\u2019er the erewhile tranquil deep,\n By the angry tempest driven,\n Billowy tumult sweep;\n\n \u201cNow who in thy smile endearing\n Basks, with foolish fondness hoping\n To his love thou\u2019lt e\u2019er be open,\n To his wooing ever kind,\n Knowing not the fitful veering\n Of the faithless wind?\n\n \u201cHapless they rash troth who plight thee!\n On the sacred wall my votive\n Picture, set with pious motive,\n Shows I hung in Neptune\u2019s fane\n My wet garments to the mighty\n Monarch of the main.\u201d\n\n\n It may be said that this sly spirit of badinage which lurks, or to us,\n at least, seems to lurk, in the shadows of the lighter odes, like some\n tricksy Faun peering and disappearing through the thickets of\n Lucretilis, it is impossible to seize; that when we try it \u201cthe\n stateliness of the language\u201d interposes itself like a wall, and we find\n ourselves becoming vulgar where Horace is playful, flippant where\n Horace is light. Doubtless this is so; what then? Because it is an\n impossibility, shall any loyal Horatian balk at it? It is just because\n of these impossibilities that translations are always in order, and\n will, to a certain extent, always be in demand. Translations of other\n poets pall; it is conceivable that a version of Virgil might be\n produced which human skill could not better. But no such thing being\n conceivable of Horace, every fresh version is a whet to curiosity and\n emulation; each separate ode hides its own agreeable secret, every\n epithet has its own individual surprise. Let there be no talk, then, of\n impossibilities; for our own part, to paraphrase what Hallam says of\n Lycidas, we look upon the ability to translate such odes as the _Ad\n Pyrrham_, so as to demonstrate their impossibility, a good test of a\n man\u2019s capacity to translate Horace at all.\n\n Another nice consideration for the translator of Horace is in respect\n of metre. Undoubtedly the translator who can retain the metrical\n movement of his original has gained so much towards reproducing his\n general effect. But with Horace this attempt may as well be abandoned\n at once. The Alcaic and the Sapphic stanza, much less the Asclepiad or\n the Archilochian, have never yet been, and for obvious reasons never\n will be, naturalized in our English verse, though poor Percival thought\n differently, and added one more to a life of failures. Tennyson, in his\n ode to Milton,\n\n\n \u201cWhose guardian-angels, Muriel, Abdiel,\n Starred from Jehovah\u2019s gorgeous armory,\n Tow\u2019r, as the deep-domed empyrean\n Rings to the roar of an angel onset,\u201d\n\n\n gives us, perhaps, as good Alcaics as we have any right to look for in\n English (though \u201cg\u014drg\u0115o\u016ds\u201d is not a very gorgeous dactyl); yet how\n different from the Horatian cadence:\n\n\n \u201c\u00c6quam memento rebus in arduis\n Servare mentem, non secus in bonis\n Ab insolenti temperatam\n L\u00e6titia, moriture Delli.\u201d[78]\n\n\n As for Sapphics, whether we take Canning\u2019s _Knife Grinder_ for our\n model or Mr. Swinburne\u2019s\n\n\n \u201cAll the night sleep came not upon my eyelids,\n Shed not dew, nor shook nor unclosed a feather,\n Yet with lips shut close, and with eyes of iron,\n Stood and beheld me,\u201d\n\n\n we are not much nearer to Horace\u2019s melody:\n\n\n \u201cScandit \u00e6ratas vitiosa naves\n Cura, nec turmas equitum relinquit\n Ocior cervis, et agente nimbos\n Ocior Euro.\u201d[79]\n\n\n But, at least, following that rule of compensation with which all good\n translators are familiar, some attempt may be made to suggest the\n metrical variety and richness of the _Odes_ by a corresponding variety\n and grace in the English measures of the translation. It is here that\n the modern translators excel; indeed, it may be said that only within\n the last hundred years have translators had this adjunct at their\n command, for it is only during that period that English poets have\n begun to comprehend and master fully the resources and possibilities of\n English metre. Not that the earlier poets were at all deficient in the\n metrical sense; that their ears were not quick to catch the finest\n delicacies of verbal harmony. Not to mention a host of minor bards who\n knew how to marry \u201cperfect music unto noble words,\u201d Milton\u2019s lyrics are\n melody itself. There is scarcely a more tunable couplet in the language\n than his\n\n\n \u201cSweetest Shakspeare, fancy\u2019s child,\n Warbles his native woodnotes wild.\u201d\n\n\n The open vowels and liquid consonants fairly sing themselves. Nor was\n it for lack of experiment that they failed of\n\n\n \u201cUntwisting all the chains that tie\n The hidden soul of harmony\u201d\n\n\n in words, as Shelley and Tennyson and Swinburne learned to do later.\n The attempt to naturalize the classical metres, for example, began at a\n very early period of our literary history, and many learned treatises\n were written to prove them your only proper vehicle for English poetry.\n Perhaps it was the ill-success of these efforts that made our poets so\n long shy of wandering in their metres away from the beaten track and\n the simplest forms. Up to the time of Campbell we may say that the\n iambus and the trochee reigned supreme in English verse; the anapest\n and the dactyl, of which such effective use has been made by the later\n poets, were either unknown or contemned. Suckling\u2019s _Session of the\n Poets_, the metrical intention of which appears to be anapestic, shows\n what desperate work even the best lyrists could make when they strayed\n after strange metrical gods.[80]\n\n It may be said, then, that until within a comparatively recent period\n Horace could not be properly translated into English verse at all.\n English verse was not yet ready to receive so noble a guest. Compare\n Martin\u2019s or Conington\u2019s versions with one of the earlier translations,\n and the truth of this, we think, will be apparent at once. Creech,\n indeed, seems to have had a dim notion of the truth, and his version\n shows a perceptible striving for metrical effect, at least in the\n arrangement of his stanza; but Creech had too little of the poetical\n faculty to make the effort with taste or success. Francis for the most\n part is content with the orthodox measures, and Father Prout was\n perhaps first to bring to the work this essential accomplishment of the\n Horatian translator. Prout\u2019s metrical inventions are bold, and often\n elegant; and his versions, though free, are always spirited, and often\n singularly felicitous. Among the most striking of his metres is the one\n he employs for the _Solvitur acris hiems_ (_Carm._ i. iv.):\n\n\n \u201cNow Venus loves to group\n Her merry troop\n Of maidens,\n Who, while the moon peeps out,\n Dance with the Graces round about\n Their queen in cadence;\n While far \u2019mid fire and noise\n Vulcan his forge employs,\n Where Cyclops grim aloft their ponderous sledges poise.\u201d\n\n\n A paraphrase that, not a translation; but not even Horace could find it\n in his heart to gainsay so graceful a paraphrase. Another effective\n metrical arrangement which shows off well Prout\u2019s astonishing\n copiousness of rhyme is that of the _Quum tu Lydia_ (i. 13):\n\n\n \u201cBut where meet (thrice fortunate!)\n Kindred hearts and suitable,\n Strife comes ne\u2019er importunate,\n Love remains immutable;\n On to the close they glide \u2018mid scenes Elysian,\n Through life\u2019s delightful vision.\u201d\n\n\n Mr. Martin is here somewhat closer and not less skilful in handling his\n metre:\n\n\n \u201cOh! trebly blest, and blest for ever,\n Are they whom true affection binds,\n In whom no doubts or janglings sever\n The union of their constant minds;\n But life in blended current flows\n Serene and sunny to the close.\u201d\n\n\n Compare with these Francis, who is scarcely more literal than Prout,\n and not so literal as Martin:\n\n\n \u201cThrice happy they whom love unites\n In equal rapture and sincere delights,\n Unbroken by complaints or strife\n Even to the latest hours of life.\u201d\n\n\n Is not the advantage in point of poetry altogether on the side of the\n moderns, and is it not largely due to their superior mastery of rhythm?\n The passage, it may be said, has been paraphrased by Moore in the\n lines,\n\n\n \u201cThere\u2019s a bliss beyond all that the minstrel has told,\n When two that are linked in one heavenly tie,\n With heart never changing and brow never cold,\n Love on through all ills, and love on till they die.\u201d\n\n\n Both Mr. Martin and Prof. Conington have given close and successful\n attention to this part of their task. But it was left for Lord Lytton\n to attempt something like a systematic imitation of the Horatian\n metres. His plan, as set forth in his preface, \u201cwas in the first\n instance to attempt a close imitation of the ancient measure\u2014the\n scansion being, of course (as in English or German hexameters and\n pentameters), by accent, not quantity\u2014and then to make such\n modifications of flow and cadence as seemed to me best to harmonize the\n rhythm to the English ear, while preserving as much as possible that\n which has been called the type of the original.\u201d Something of this\n kind, no doubt, Milton had in view in the measure he took for his _Ad\n Pyrrham_, and which the Wartons and Professor Conington adapted to the\n same purpose after him, the latter, however, adding the embellishment\n or, as Milton himself had called it, the \u201cbarbarous jingle\u201d of rhyme.\n Milton\u2019s measure (well known as that of Collins\u2019 \u201cOde to Evening\u201d),\n which consists of two unrhymed iambic pentameters, followed by two\n unrhymed iambic trimeters\u2014or, to be \u201cmore English and less nice,\u201d of\n two ordinary blank-verses followed by two three-foot verses\u2014resembles\n Horace\u2019s metre, which the grammarians would tell us is the third\n Asclepiadian strophe, \u201crather,\u201d says Prof. Conington, \u201cin the length of\n the respective lines than in any similarity of the cadences.\u201d Lord\n Lytton attempted something more, and with only partial success, though\n the task, it must be owned, was not an easy one. Horace, in the _Odes_\n and _Epodes_, uses eighteen different varieties of metre, ranging from\n the grave sadness of what is called the first Archilochian strophe, the\n lovely measure in which one of the loveliest of all the _Odes_ is\n written (iv. 7)\u2014\n\n\n \u201cDiffugere nives; redeunt jam gramina campis\n Arboribusque com\u00e6,\u201d[81]\n\n\n to the quick sharpness of the first iambic strophe in which the poet\n mauls the unsavory M\u00e6vius. And not only this, but each of these metres\n is used by Horace to express widely differing moods of feeling. Thus,\n the same measure which in the beautiful lament for Quinctilius breathes\n the tenderest spirit of grief and resignation, serves equally well to\n guy Tibullus on his luckless loves, to sound \u201cstern alarums\u201d to the\n absent C\u00e6sar, or to bid Virgil or Varius to \u201cdelightful meetings.\u201d The\n Sapphic rises to the lofty height of the _Carmen Seculare_ or stoops to\n chide a serving-boy for his super-serviceable zeal; is equally at home\n with an invocation to the gods or an invitation to dinner; while the\n Alcaic\u2014what subject is there that in Horace\u2019s hands the Alcaic cannot\n be made to sing?\n\n This flexibility of the Latin metres Lord Lytton has recognized, and\n sought to meet by a corresponding variation of his own, \u201caccording as\n the prevalent spirit of the ode demanded lively and sportive or serious\n and dignified expression.\u201d Thus, for the Alcaic stanza he employs \u201ctwo\n different forms of rhythm\u201d; one as in i. 9:\n\n\n \u201cSee how white in the deep fallen snow stands Soracte;\n Laboring forests no longer can bear up their burden;\n And the rush of the rivers is locked,\n Halting mute in the gripe of the frost\u201d;\n\n\n the other as in i. 34:\n\n\n \u201cWorshipper rare and niggard of the gods,\n While led astray, in the Fool\u2019s wisdom versed,\n Now back I shift the sail,\n Forced in the courses left behind to steer,\u201d\n\n\n or, with a slight modification, as in i. 35:\n\n\n \u201cGoddess who o\u2019er thine own loved Antium reignest,\n Present to lift Man, weighted with his sorrows\n Down to life\u2019s last degree,\n Or change his haughtiest triumphs into graves.\u201d\n\n\n For the Sapphic, likewise, he has two varieties; for the statelier odes\n three lines of blank-verse and what may be called an English Adonic;\n for \u201cthe lighter odes a more sportive and tripping measure.\u201d Thus, for\n iv. 2 he gives us:\n\n\n \u201cJulus, he who would with Pindar vie\n Soars, with D\u00e6dalian art, on waxen wings,\n And, falling, gives his name unto the bright\n Deeps of an ocean\u201d;\n\n\n for iii. 14 a nearer approach to the _Knife Grinder_ jingle:\n\n\n \u201cNothing cools fiery spirits like a gray hair;\n In every quarrel \u2019tis your sure peacemaker:\n In my hot youth, when Plancus was the consul,\n I was less patient.\u201d\n\n\n Lord Lytton\u2019s experiment is full of interest to Horatians\u2014as, indeed,\n what translation is not?\u2014even the worst, even the Rev. Mr. Sewell\u2019s,\n may be of use in teaching the translator how not to do it\u2014and his\n failures, which are many, are scarcely less instructive than his\n successes, which seem to us fewer than for so bold an essay could be\n wished; but both alike are suggestive of many possibilities. It is in\n the lighter odes that he is least satisfactory, and we doubt if these\n can be done full justice to without the aid of rhyme. Horace\u2019s grace of\n form in these is so delicate and exquisite that it taxes all the\n resources and embellishments of our English verse to give any adequate\n idea of it. Take, as an illustration of Lord Lytton\u2019s method, and as\n giving, perhaps, the measure of his success, his version of that\n delicious little landscape, _Ad Fontem Blandusi\u00e6_ (iii. 13):\n\n\n \u201cFount of Blandusia, more lucid than crystal,\n Worthy of honeyed wine, not without flowers,\n I will give thee to-morrow a kid\n Whose front, with the budded horn swelling.\n\n \u201cPredicts to his future life Venus and battles;\n Vainly! The lymph of thy cold running waters\n He shall tinge with the red of his blood,\n Fated child of the frolicsome people!\n\n \u201cThe scorch of the Dogstar\u2019s fell season forbears thee;\n Ever friendly to grant the sweet boon of thy coolness\n To the wild flocks that wander around,\n And the oxen that reek from the harrow.\n\n \u201cI will give thee high rank and renown among fountains,\n When I sing of the ilex o\u2019erspreading the hollows,\n Of rocks whence in musical fall\n Leap thy garrulous silvery waters.\u201d\n\n\n This is better because more literal than Joseph Warton\u2019s unrhymed\n version in the Miltonian stanza, with which it may be compared:\n\n\n \u201cYe waves that gushing fall with purest streams,\n Blandusian fount! to whom the products sweet\n Of richest wines belong,\n And fairest flowers of spring,\n To thee a chosen victim will I slay\u2014\n A kid who, glowing in lascivious youth,\n Just blooms with budding horn,\n And, with vain thought elate,\n Yet destines future war; but, ah! too soon\n His reeking blood with crimson shall enrich\n Thy pure, translucent flood\n And tinge thy crystal clear.\n Thy sweet recess the sun in midday hour\n Can ne\u2019er invade; thy streams the labor\u2019d ox\n Refresh with cooling draughts\n And glad the wand\u2019ring herds.\n Thy name shall shine, with endless honors graced,\n While in my shell I sing the nodding oak\n That o\u2019er thy cavern deep\n Waves his embowering head.\u201d\n\n\n It would almost seem as if the author of this version had taken pains\n to rub out every Horatian characteristic. The pretty touch of the\n _loquaces lymph\u00e6_ is thus omitted, unless the first line be meant to do\n duty for it, while by such padding as \u201cchosen victim\u201d and \u201cendless\n honors\u201d Horace\u2019s sixteen lines are diluted into twenty\u2014a danger to\n which the unrhymed translator, constantly seeking by inversions and\n paraphrases to cover the baldness of his medium, is peculiarly liable.\n Whatever may be said to the contrary, rhyme compels conciseness, and\n helps to point quite as often as it entices to expansion. Prof.\n Conington\u2019s version, in the same metre as Warton\u2019s, but rhymed in\n alternate lines, will be found greatly superior to it, and is perhaps,\n on the whole, the best we have seen\u2014better even than Mr. Martin\u2019s, who\n cannot get his Latin into less than twenty-four octosyllabic lines.\n Instead of giving either, let us see if all that is essential in Horace\n cannot be given in the same number of lines of what is known as the\n Tennysonian stanza, which is somewhat less capacious than the Alcaics\n of the original, though, by a certain pensive grace, peculiarly fitted\n to render the sentiment of this delightful ode:\n\n\n \u201cBlandusian fount, as crystal clear,\n Of garlands worthy and of wine,\n A kid to-morrow shall be thine,\n Whose swelling brows, just budding, bear\n\n \u201cThe horns that presage love and strife;\n How vainly! For his crimson blood\n Shall stain the silver of thy flood\n With all the herd\u2019s most wanton life.\n\n \u201cThe burning Dogstar\u2019s noontide beam\n Knows not thy secret nook; the ox\n Parched from the plough, the fielding flocks,\n Lap grateful coolness from thy stream.\n\n \u201cThee, too, \u2018mid storied founts my lay\n Shall shrine: thy bending holm I\u2019ll sing,\n Shading the grottoed rocks whence spring\n Thy laughing waters far away.\u201d\n\n\n Though terseness and fidelity are two of the chief merits claimed by\n the advocates of the unrhymed measures, it is just here that they\n oftenest fail; and Lord Lytton is no exception. Space permits us to\n give but few instances. \u201cTrodden by all, and only trodden once,\u201d is\n Lord Lytton\u2019s version of _calcanda semel_, i. 28\u2014seven English words\n for two Latin, and the sense then but vaguely given at best.\n _Feriuntque summos Fulgura montes_ is in like manner diluted into\n\n\n \u201cThe spots on earth most stricken by the lightning\n Are its high places.\u201d\n\n\n Awkwardness of style, too, is a much more frequent characteristic of\n Lord Lytton\u2019s renderings than we should look for either from his own\n command of style or the freedom which disuse of rhyme is claimed to\n ensure. For instance, in ii. 2:\n\n\n \u201cHim shall uplift, and on no waxen pinions,\n Fame, the survivor,\u201d\n\n\n might surely have been bettered; and in the same ode a line in the\n stanza already quoted above, _Latius regnes avidum domando Spiritum_,\n is translated, \u201cWider thy realm a greedy soul subjected,\u201d which would\n be scarcely intelligible without the Latin. \u201cBosom _more seen through_\n than glass\u201d is by no means the neatest possible equivalent for _per\n lucidior vitro_, and such expressions as \u201cclosed gates of Janus vacant\n of a war,\u201d \u201clest thou owe a mock,\u201d \u201cbut me more have stricken with\n rapture,\u201d are scarcely English.\n\n Nevertheless, with all its faults and shortcomings, Lord Lytton\u2019s essay\n is in some respects the most interesting translation of Horace that has\n yet appeared, and may pioneer the way to more fortunate results in the\n same direction. It has, at least, the _raison d\u2019\u00eatre_ which Mr. Matthew\n Arnold denies to such translations as Wright\u2019s and Sotheby\u2019s Homer; it\n has a distinct and novel method of its own, and does not simply repeat\n the method and renew the faults and virtues of any predecessor. The\n American edition, it is worthy of remark, is printed in the\n old-fashioned way, with the Latin text to face the English\u2014an\n innovation, or, more properly, a _re_novation, which will no doubt be\n welcome to lovers of the Venusian, whose love has outlived their\n memory, and who, though loyal to the spirit of our poet, are no longer\n so familiar with his letter as in the days, the far-off sunny days,\n when Horace was the heaviest task that life had yet laid upon us.\n\n We have dwelt upon this subject at somewhat greater length than we\n intended; for to us it is full of a fascination we should be glad to\n hope we had made our readers in some sort share. But it has also a\n practical side which the most fanatical opponent of the classics, the\n most zealous upholder of utilitarian education, must recognize and\n admit. As a means of training in English composition, as an aid to\n discover the resources of our own tongue, there is no better practice\n than translating Horace into English verse, with due attention to his\n epithets. That, perhaps, may serve in some degree to reconcile the\n practical mind to his retention in the modern curriculum, even though\n Homer be kicked out of doors and Virgil sent flying through the window;\n for a practical man is none the worse equipped for business in being\n able to say what he means in \u201cgood set phrase.\u201d To be sure it does not\n ask the pen of an Addison to write an order for a \u201chnd. trces. lard,\u201d\n but we dare say if Mr. Richard Grant White were called upon to make out\n a bill of lading, he would do it none the worse for knowing all about\n the English language that is worth knowing, if not more than is worth\n telling. There are mysteries in our English speech that the _Complete\n Letter-Writer_, or even the \u201ceditorials\u201d of the daily newspaper, do not\n quite explore, and some of these our old friend Horace may help us to\n find out. _Fas est ab hoste doceri._\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE LITTLE CHAPEL AT MONAMULLIN.\n\n CONCLUSION.\n\n Father Maurice sped upon his journey to Moynalty Castle. The dinner\n hour was eight o\u2019clock, but he had delayed so long with his guest that\n it took the little pony her \u201clevel best\u201d to do the seven miles within\n the necessary time.\n\n \u201cAv we wor wanst beyant the Mouladharb berrin\u2019 groun\u2019 I wudn\u2019t care a\n thraneen; but sorra a step the little pony\u2019ll pass it afther dark,\u201d\n observed Murty Mulligan, bestowing a liberal supply of whip upon the\n astonished nag, whose habit it was to proceed upon her travels at her\n own sweet will, innocent of lash, spur, or admonition.\n\n \u201cTut, tut! Nonsense, Murty! Push on.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s thruth I\u2019m tellin\u2019 yer riverince. We\u2019re at it. See that,\n now\u2014curse of Crummell on her! she won\u2019t put wan foot afore the other,\u201d\n adding, in a whisper full of consternation: \u201cMebbe she sees ould Casey,\n that was berried a Munda. He was a terrible naygur\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cJump down and take her head,\u201d said the priest.\n\n \u201cBe the powers! I\u2019ll have for to carry her, av we want to raich the\n castle to-night.\u201d\n\n Father Maurice dismounted, as did Murty, and, by coaxing and\n blandishment of every description, endeavored to induce the pony to\n proceed; but the animal, with its ears cocked, and trembling in every\n limb, refused to budge an inch.\n\n \u201cOch, wirra, wirra! we\u2019re bet intirely. It\u2019s Missis Delaney he sees,\n that died av the horrors this day month,\u201d growled Mulligan.\n\n \u201cSilence, you jackass!\u201d cried Father Maurice, \u201cand help me to blindfold\n the pony.\u201d\n\n This _ruse_ eventually succeeded, and they spun merrily along the road,\n the terrified animal clattering onwards at racing speed.\n\n \u201cThis pace is dangerous, Murty,\u201d said the priest.\n\n \u201cSorra a lie in it, yer riverince.\u201d\n\n \u201cPull in.\u201d\n\n \u201cI can\u2019t hould her. She\u2019s me hands cut aff, bad cess to her!\u201d\n\n \u201cIs the road straight?\u201d\n\n \u201cBarrin\u2019 a few turns, it\u2019s straight enough, sir.\u201d\n\n The words had hardly escaped his lips when the wheel attached to the\n side of the car upon which the priest was sitting came into contact\n with a pile of stones, the car was tilted upwards and over, Father\n Maurice shot into a thorn hedge, and Murty Mulligan landed up to his\n neck in a ditch full of foul and muddy water, while the pony, suddenly\n freed from its load, and after biting the dust, quietly turned round to\n gaze at the havoc it had made.\n\n \u201cAre ye kilt, yer riverince? For I\u2019m murdhered intirely, an\u2019 me\n illigant Sunda\u2019 shuit ruined complately. Och, wirra, wirra! how can I\n face the castle wud me duds consaled in mud? How can I uphould\n Monamullin, an\u2019 me worse nor a scarecrow? Glory be to God! we\u2019re safe\n anyhow, an\u2019 no bones bruck. O ye varmint!\u201d shaking his fist at the\n unconscious cause of this disaster, \u201cits meself that\u2019ll sarve ye out\n for this. Won\u2019t I wallop ye, ye murdherin\u2019 thief, whin I catch a hould\n of ye!\u201d\n\n \u201cHold your nonsense, Murty. How near are we to the castle?\u201d\n\n \u201cSorra a know I know, yer riverince; the knowledgeableness is shuk out\n o\u2019 me intirely.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe shafts are broken.\u201d\n\n \u201cAv course th\u2019 are.\u201d\n\n \u201cHere, help me to shove the car over to the ditch and pile the cushions\n under this hedge. God be praised! neither of us is even scratched.\u201d\n\n A carriage with blazing lamps came along.\n\n \u201cHi! hi! hi!\u201d roared Murty, \u201cwe\u2019re wracked here. Lind us a hand! We\u2019re\n desthroyed be a villain av a pony that seen a ghost, an\u2019 we goin\u2019 to\n dine at Moynalty Castle.\u201d\n\n The carriage belonged to Mr. Bodkin, the senior member for the county,\n who was only too delighted to act the Good Samaritan; and as he, with\n his wife and daughter, was bound for the castle, which still lay two\n miles distant, the meeting proved in every respect a fortunate one.\n\n The worthy priest was received by his host and hostess with the most\n flattering courtesy, and by Miss Julia Jyvecote as though he formed\n part and parcel of her personal property. He took Mrs. Jyvecote into\n dinner, and said grace both before and after.\n\n Father Maurice was positively startled with the splendor and exquisite\n taste of the surroundings. The room in which they dined\u2014not _the_\n dinner-room, but a delightful little snuggery, where the anecdote was\n the property of the table, and the _mot_ did not require to be handed\n from plate to plate like an _entr\u00e9e_\u2014was richly decorated in the\n Pompeiian style, with walls of a pale gray, while the hangings were of\n a soft amber relieved by red brown. The dinner was simply perfect, the\n _entourages_ in the shape of cut glass, flowers, and fruit\u2014veritable\n poems\u2014while the quiet simplicity and easy elegance lent an\n indescribable charm which fell upon the simple priest like a potent\n spell.\n\n Every effort that good breeding combined with generous hospitality\n could make was called into requisition in order to render the timid,\n blushing clergyman perfectly at home; and so happily did this action on\n the part of his entertainers succeed that before the lapse of a few\n moments he felt as though he had lived amongst them for years.\n\n Mrs. Jyvecote promised to send him flowers for the altar, and Julia to\n work an altar-cloth for him.\n\n \u201cI must go over and pay you a visit, father,\u201d she said. \u201cI am one of\n your parishioners, although I go to Mass at Thonelagheera.\u201d\n\n \u201cI wish you would, my dear child; but I have no inducements to offer\n you, although at present perhaps I have.\u201d And he narrated the arrival\n of the guest to whom Mrs. Clancy was playing the _r\u00f4le_ of _ch\u00e2telaine_\n during his absence.\n\n \u201cWhy, this is quite a romance, Father Maurice. I must see your artist\n _co\u00fbte que co\u00fbte_, and shall drive over next week.\u201d\n\n But fate determined that she should drive over the next day.\n\n When, upon the following morning, Father Maurice came to examine the\n condition of his pony, he found both the knees barked and the luckless\n animal unfit to travel.\n\n \u201cWe couldn\u2019t walk her home, Murty, could we?\u201d he asked of his\n _factotum_.\n\n \u201cOch, the poor crayture couldn\u2019t stir a step wudout tears comin\u2019 to her\n eyes. Me heart is bleedin\u2019 for her this minnit,\u201d replied the wily\n Mulligan, sagaciously perceiving that so long as the pony remained at\n the castle he should abide with her; and as his reception in the\n servants\u2019 hall had been of the same flattering description as that of\n his master up-stairs, he resolved to continue in such delightful\n quarters as long as he possibly could.\n\n \u201cPoor Rosy!\u201d he cried, affectionately scratching the pony\u2019s forehead,\n \u201cshure it\u2019s yerself that wud dance on yer head for his riverince, av ye\n wor able; but yer bet up, poor little wumman, an\u2019 it\u2019s rest ye want for\n a cupple o\u2019 days, anyhow.\u201d\n\n When Father Maurice mentioned the predicament he found himself in, Mrs.\n Jyvecote instantly proposed sending him home in the carriage, since he\n could not be induced to prolong his stay; but Julia insisted upon\n driving him herself to Monamullin in her basket phaeton; and so, laden\n with flowers, hot-house pines, grapes, a hamper of grouse and a brace\n of hares, and under solemn promise to make another visit at no distant\n date, Father Maurice turned homewards under the \u201cwhip\u201d of his\n newly-found and exceedingly charming parishioner.\n\n As they jogged along by the sad sea-wave she told him the entrancing\n history of her conversion\u2014of her meeting with Cardinal Manning at a\n garden party at Holland House, and of a casual conversation which led\n to so much.\n\n Father Maurice felt as if he had a white-robed angel by his side, and\n revelled in the absorbing narrative until the phaeton stopped at the\n cottage gate. The pony was duly stabled, and, while the priest set\n forth to attend to a sick-call, Miss Jyvecote proceeded to the chapel,\n where she encountered his artist guest.\n\n Brown started, despite himself, when Father Maurice mentioned her name.\n\n \u201cA parishioner of mine, Mr. Brown.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2014I saw you in the church just now,\u201d muttered the artist. \u201cIt\u2019s an\n awfully seedy\u2014I mean it\u2019s a very quiet little place.\u201d\n\n \u201cI could pray more fervently in a church like that than in the\n Madeleine,\u201d she replied in a soft, silvery voice.\n\n \u201cThe Madeleine is too rowy, too many chairs creaking, too many swells,\n and all that sort of thing, you know.\u201d\n\n Insensibly the drawl of society had come upon him, and the slanginess\n of expression which passes current in Mayfair and Belgravia.\n\n \u201cMiss Jyvecote is going to brighten me up, Mr. Brown; she is going to\n work me an altar-cloth,\u201d exclaimed the delighted priest.\n\n \u201cAnd I am going to paint you an altar-picture, a copy of Raphael\u2019s\n Virgin and Child\u2014that is, if you will kindly accept it,\u201d he added,\n blushing to the roots of his hair.\n\n \u201cOh! how charming, how generous,\u201d cried Miss Jyvecote.\n\n \u201cMy dear Mr. Brown,\u201d said Father Maurice, crossing the room and taking\n his guest by the hand, \u201cI am deeply, _deeply_ sensible of the kindly,\n the noble spirit which actuates you to make this offer; but you are a\n young man, with a grand future before you, with God\u2019s help, and by and\n by, when you have leisure, perhaps you will get a stiff letter from me\n calling on you to fulfil your promise. You\u2019ll find me a very tough\n customer to deal with, I assure you.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe thinks I cannot afford it,\u201d said Brown to himself; \u201cand how\n delicately he has refused me!\u201d\n\n The entrance of Mrs. Clancy with a smoking dish of salmon cutlets\n turned the tide of the conversation, and in a few moments the artist\n found himself with Miss Jyvecote discussing the Royal Academy pictures\n of the last season, glorifying Millais, extolling Holman Hunt, raving\n over Leslie and Herbert, and ringing the changes over the pearly grays,\n changeful opals, amaranths, and primrose of Leighton. From London to\n the _salon_ is easy transition, and from thence to the galleries of\n Dresden, Munich, and Florence. She had visited all, and to a purpose.\n He had lingered within their enchanting walls until every canvas became\n more or less a friend. There was a wonderful charm in this meeting. To\n Brown Miss Jyvecote was a listener freshly intelligent, _na\u00efvely_\n sensible. To her the clever _critiques_ of this high-bred yet humble\n artist savored of a romance written but unreal. It is scarcely\n necessary to say that when people drop thus upon a subject so charming,\n so inexhaustible, so refreshing the old Scytheman is utterly\n disregarded, and the sun was already sinking towards the west when Miss\n Jyvecote\u2019s phaeton came to the gate.\n\n \u201cHave you any of your sketches here, Mr. Brown?\u201d she asked, as she drew\n on her yellow dogskin driving-gloves.\n\n \u201cOnly a few that I dashed off on my walk hither from Castlebar.\u201d\n\n They were glorious little bits of weather-worn granite, brilliant with\n gray, green, and orange lichens; luminous green seas and black rocks\n basking in the sunlight; fern-crowned inlets and cliffs glittering with\n bright wild flowers. She gushed over them. What girl does not gush over\n the sketches of a tall, handsome, earnest artist?\n\n \u201cOh! if I might dare to ask you for one of them, Mr. Brown.\u201d\n\n \u201cTake all,\u201d he said.\n\n She would not hear of this.\n\n \u201cThey are your working-drawings, Mr. Brown?\u201d selecting one, possibly\n the least valuable.\n\n \u201cWill you not require an escort, Miss Jyvecote, on your lonely drive?\u201d\n\n \u201cEscort! No. In the first place, I shall probably not meet a human\n being; and, in the next, I should only meet a friend were I to\n encounter any one. I fear my prolonged visit has spoiled your work for\n to-day, Mr. Brown.\u201d\n\n \u201cMy work! You will hardly guess what I am pledged to do and the work I\n am about to commence. It is nothing less than a copy of the picture of\n Daniel O\u2019Connell which hangs over the mantel-piece. It is for Mrs.\n Clancy, who is to adorn her kitchen wall with it.\u201d\n\n \u201cSurely you are not in earnest?\u201d\n\n \u201c_H\u00e9las!_ I am always in earnest, and so is Mrs. Clancy,\u201d he added,\n laughingly narrating that worthy lady\u2019s anxiety with reference to the\n artistic adornment of the back door.\n\n \u201cMay we not hope to have the pleasure of seeing you at Moynalty? Father\n Maurice has promised us a visit. I\u2019m sure my father will call and\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cPray do not trouble him. I never visit, and, as my stay here is only\n one of sufferance, I know not the moment I may be evicted by my\n ruthless landlord.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou should make an exception in our favor, Mr. Brown. We can show you\n a Claude, a doubtful Murillo, and a charming Meissonier. Our flowers,\n too, are worth coming to see\u2014that is, they are wonderful for Connemara.\n Father Maurice, you must ask Mr. Brown to come over with you on\n Monday.\u201d\n\n \u201cOf course, my dear child, of course. He\u2019ll be enchanted with the\n castle. You\u2019ll come, of course, Mr. Brown?\u201d turning to our hero, who,\n however, remained silent, although brimming over with words he dared\n not speak.\n\n \u201cThen it\u2019s _au revoir, messieurs_!\u201d gaily exclaimed Miss Jyvecote, as\n she whirled rapidly away.\n\n It would have surprised some of the artist\u2019s London friends could they\n have peeped behind the scenes of his thoughts and gazed at them as\n naturalists do at working bees. It would have astonished them to hear\n him mutter as he watched the receding vehicle: \u201cThis is just the one\n fresh, fair, unspotted, and perfect girl it has been my lot to meet.\n Such a girl as this would cause the worst of us to turn virtuous and\n eschew cakes and ale.\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\n Mr. Brown had confided in one man ere dropping out of Vanity Fair. To\n this individual he now addressed himself, requesting of him to \u201cdrop\n down to O\u2019Connor\u2019s, the swell ecclesiastical stained-glass man in\n Berners Street, Oxford Street, and order a set of Stations of the\n Cross. You don\u2019t know what they mean, old fellow, but the O\u2019Connors\n will understand you. Let them be first class and glowing in the reds,\n yellows, blues, and greens of the new French school of colors. I don\u2019t\n mind the price. Above all things let them have especially handsome\n frames of the _Via Dolorosa_ pattern.\u201d The letter went on to tell Mr.\n Dudley Poynter of his doings and the calm throb of the heart of his\n daily life. \u201cThere is not much champagne in it, Dudley, but there is a\n body that ne\u2019er was dreamed of in your philosophy, or in that of the\n wild, mad wags of the smoking-room _clique_.\u201d\n\n Mr. Brown completed his copy of the Liberator, to the intense\n admiration of Father Maurice and the ecstasy of Mrs. Clancy. The worthy\n priest would not permit its being hung in the kitchen, though, but gave\n it the place of honor in the snug little sitting-room. It is needless\n to say that the entire population of Monamullin, including the cabin\n curs\u2014who were now on terms of the closest intimacy with the\n artist\u2014turned in after last Mass to have a look at the \u201cpicther o\u2019\n Dan.\u201d\n\n \u201cBe me conscience! but it\u2019s Dan himself\u2014sorra a wan else,\u201d cried one.\n\n \u201cI was at Tara, an\u2019 it\u2019s just as if he was givin\u2019 Drizzlyeye [Disraeli]\n that welt about his notorious ancesthor, the impinitent thief on the\n crass,\u201d observed another.\n\n \u201cFaix, it\u2019s alive, it is. Look at the mouth, reddy for to say\n \u2018Repale.\u2019\u201d\n\n \u201cThere\u2019s an eye!\u201d\n\n \u201cThrue for ye; there\u2019s more fire in it than in ould Finnegan\u2019s chimbly\n this minit.\u201d\n\n \u201cTroth, it\u2019s as dhroll as a pet pup\u2019s.\u201d\n\n \u201cStan\u2019 out o\u2019 that, Mr. O\u2019Leary, or ye\u2019ll get a crack av his fist.\u201d\n\n \u201cThree cheers for the painther, boys!\u201d\n\n These and kindred comments flung a radiated pleasure into the inner\n heart of the artist\u2014that _sanctum_ which as yet was green and fresh and\n limpid\u2014while the eulogies, however quaintly and coarsely served up,\n bore the delicious fragrance which praise ever carries with it like a\n subtle perfume.\n\n\n \u201cThe love of praise, howe\u2019er concealed by art,\n Reigns more or less, and glows in every heart.\u201d\n\n\n Mr. Brown was enamored of his new existence\u2014possibly with the child\n passion for toyland; but the passion endured, nevertheless,\n strengthening with each successive sunrise and maturing with every\n gloaming. An invitation, accompanied by a card, had arrived by special\n messenger for the artist, requesting the favor of his company, _et\n c\u00e6tera, et c\u00e6tera_, to which that gentleman responded in a polite\n negative, assigning no particular reason, but indulging in vague\n generalities. He had thought a good deal of Miss Jyvecote, and sat\n dreaming about her by the sea, his hands clasped around his knees and\n his beloved meerschaum stuck in his mouth\u2014sat dreaming, and fighting\n against his dreams\u2014fights in which fancy ever got the uppermost of the\n rude and real. A longing crept up out of the depths of his heart to see\n her once again, and to travel in the sunlighted path of her thoughts.\n One thing he was firmly resolved upon\u2014not to leave Monamullin without\n another interview; though how this was to be brought about he did not\n very well see. Yes, he would see her just once more, and then stamp the\n whole thing out of his mind. He had been hit before, and had come\n smilingly out of the valley of desolation, and so he should again,\n although this was so utterly unlike his former experiences.\n\n Father Maurice was charmed with his guest. He had never encountered\n anything like him\u2014so bright, so genial, so cultured, so humble and\n submissive, and so anxious to oblige.\n\n \u201cImagine,\u201d said he in cataloguing his virtues to Larry Muldoon\u2014\u201cimagine\n his asking me to let him ring the bell for five o\u2019clock Mass, and he a\n Protestant!\u201d\n\n The priest and his guest had long talks together, the latter drawing\n out his host\u2014digging for the golden ore of a charming erudition, which\n lay so deep, but which \u201cwas all there.\u201d Night after night did Father\n Maurice unfold from germ to bud, from bud to flower, from flower to\n fruit the grand truths of the unerring faith in which he was a\n day-laborer, the young artist drinking in the sublime teachings with\n that supreme attention which descends like an aureole. Father Maurice\n was, as it were, but engaged in thinking aloud, yet his thoughts fell\n like rain-drops, refreshing, grateful, and abiding.\n\n The good priest, although burning with curiosity with regard to the\n antecedents of his guest, was too thorough a gentleman, had too great\n respect for the laws of broken bread and tasted salt, to ask so much as\n a single question. A waif from the great ocean of humanity had drifted\n into this little haven, and it should be protected until the ruthless\n current would again seize it to whirl it outwards and onwards. Miss\n Jyvecote betrayed her disappointment in various artless ways when\n Father Maurice arrived at the castle without the artist. \u201cI\u2019m sorry you\n didn\u2019t fetch him along _bon gr\u00e9 mal gr\u00e9_, father,\u201d said Mrs. Jyvecote,\n \u201cas papa goes to Yorkshire next week, and Juey can talk of no person\n but Mr. Brown.\u201d\n\n Miss Jyvecote blushed rosy red as she exclaimed: \u201cWhat nonsense, mamma!\n You have been speaking a good deal more about him than I have. You rave\n over his sketch.\u201d\n\n \u201cI think it immense.\u201d Mrs. Jyvecote affected art, and talked from the\n pages of the _Art Journal_ by the yard. \u201cHis aerial perspective is full\n of filmy tone, and his near foreground is admirably run in, while his\n sense of color would appear to me to be supreme.\u201d\n\n \u201cCome, until I show you where I have hung it,\u201d exclaimed Miss Juey,\n leading the priest up a winding stair into a turret chamber fitted up\n with that exquisite taste which a refined girl evolves like an\n atmosphere.\n\n \u201cYou have really hung my guest most artistically. And such a frame!\n Where on earth did you get it?\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2014I sent to Dublin for it\u2014to Lesage\u2019s, in Sackville Street.\u201d\n\n \u201cI have no patience with the fellow for not coming over to see this\n joyous place,\u201d said the priest, \u201cand I really can\u2019t understand his\n refusal.\u201d\n\n Miss Juey couldn\u2019t understand it either, but held her peace.\n\n According to Murty Mulligan\u2019s veterinary opinion, the pony was still\n unfit to travel.\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s meself that\u2019s watchin\u2019 her like a magpie forninst a marrabone;\n but she is dawny still, the crayture! an\u2019 it wud be a sin for to ax her\n to thravel for a cupple o\u2019 days more, anyhow, your riverince.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy, her knees are quite well, Murty.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut she\u2019s wake, sir\u2014as wake as Mrs. Clancy\u2019s tay on the third\n wettin\u2019\u2014an\u2019 I\u2019m afeard for to thrust her; more betoken, yer\n riverince\u201d\u2014in a low, confidential tone\u2014\u201cshe\u2019s gettin\u2019 a bellyful av the\n finest oats in the barony, that will stand to her bravely while she\u2019s\n raisin\u2019 her winther coat.\u201d\n\n Mr. Brown asked Father Maurice a considerable number of questions anent\n his visit, and was particularly anxious in reference to the departure\n of Mr. Jyvecote.\n\n \u201cHe told me himself that he would leave Westport to-morrow by the night\n train for Dublin, in order to catch the early boat that leaves Kingston\n for Holyhead.\u201d\n\n Upon the following morning the artist, slinging his knapsack across his\n back, started in the direction of the Glendhanarrahsheen valley.\n\n \u201cI want to make a few sketches of the coast scenery about May Point,\u201d\n he observed.\n\n \u201cThere is better scenery in the Foil Dhuv, about two miles farther on;\n and, bless my heart! you\u2019ll be quite close to Moynalty Castle, and why\n not go in and see their pictures, your own especially, in such a grand\n gilt Dublin frame?\u201d\n\n Simple priest! Artful artist!\n\n It was a delightful morning that was shining over Monamullin as the\n artist quitted it _en route_ to\u2014May Point, of course. The sea, like a\n great sleeping monster, lay winking at the sun, and but one solitary\n ship was visible away in the waste\u2014a brown speck in a flood of golden\n haze. If young gentlemen would only put the single \u201cwhy?\u201d to themselves\n in starting upon such expeditions, it might save them many a heartache;\n but they will not. Any other query but this one. What a talisman that\n small word in every effort of our lives!\n\n Brown felt unaccountably joyous and brave, charmed with the present,\n and metaphorically snapping his fingers at the future. A morning walk\n by the deep and dark blue ocean summons forth this sensation. You bound\n upon air; champagne fills your veins; all the ills the flesh is heir to\n are forgotten, all the phantoms of care and sorrow are laid \u201ca full\n fifty fathom by the lead.\u201d\n\n It is a glorious seed-time, when every thought bears luscious fruit.\n\n He travels merrily onward, now humming a barcarolle, now whistling a\n fragment of a _bouffe_, until he reaches the gloomy defile known as the\n Valley of Glendhanarrahsheen. A turn of the sylvan sanded road brings\n him in sight of the lordly turrets of Moynalty; another turn, and lo!\n he comes upon no less a personage than Miss Jyvecote, who, with her\n married sister, a Mrs. Travers, are driving in the direction whence he\n had come. Juey was Jehu, and almost pulled the ponies upon their\n haunches on perceiving our hero.\n\n \u201cThis _is_ a condescension, Mr. Brown,\u201d she said, presenting him to her\n sister. \u201cWill you take a seat?\u201d\n\n \u201cThanks, no; I am about to ascend that mountain yonder,\u201d pointing\n vaguely in the direction of the range known as the Twelve Pins.\n\n \u201cThen we shall expect you to luncheon at two o\u2019clock.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m afraid not. I purpose returning by the other road.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat road? There is no other road.\u201d\n\n \u201cAcross country.\u201d\n\n \u201cThen you do not intend honoring us with a visit?\u201d Her tone was vexed,\n if not haughty.\n\n Now, he had quitted Monamullin with no other intention than that of\n proceeding straight to the castle, and yet he replies in the negative.\n Let those better versed in the mysteries of the human heart than I am\n analyze his motives. I shall not endeavor to do so.\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t you think you are acting rather shabbily?\u201d she said, preparing\n to resume her drive.\n\n He laughed.\n\n \u201c_Au plaisir_, then!\u201d And with a stately salutation, courteous enough\n but nothing more, she swept onwards.\n\n He watched the phaeton go whirling along the white road and disappear\n round a huge fern-covered boulder, and his vexation with himself grew\n intolerable.\n\n \u201cWhat an ass, what a brute I have been! What could I have been thinking\n about? Was I asleep or mad? Invited to the house, I actually refuse to\n pay the stereotyped visit. Why a counter-jumper would know better. How\n charming she looked! And that delicious blush when she met me! She\n seemed really pleased, too. What can she think of me? My chance is\n gone.\u201d\n\n He seated himself on the stump of a felled tree in his favorite\n attitude, having lighted his pipe.\n\n \u201cMight I thrubble yer honner for a thrifle o\u2019 light or a bit of a\n match?\u201d asked a passing peasant.\n\n \u201cWith pleasure; take a dozen!\u201d\n\n The man looked puzzled; he had never seen wax vestas till now.\n\n \u201cThey look mighty dawny, yer honner.\u201d\n\n \u201cDo you belong to the castle?\u201d asked our hero. Somehow or other the\n castle and its inmates were ever uppermost in his thoughts now.\n\n \u201cYis, sir.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs Mr. Jyvecote at home?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, yer honner. I met him this mornin\u2019 at Billy\u2019s Bridge, makin\u2019 hard\n for Westport.\u201d\n\n The cards all in his favor, and he wouldn\u2019t play his hand! What did it\n mean? Would he go up to the castle, and, announcing himself to the\n _ch\u00e2telaine_, pay that visit which conventionality demanded? No; he had\n swung into another current, and he would not alter his course. It was\n better as it was\u2014ay, far better. And there came a sort of desolate\n feeling upon him, smiting him drearily like a dull ache. Had he seen\n the last of her? Was his life henceforth to be unlighted by the\n radiance of her presence? Here, in the mystic silence of\n Glendhanarrahsheen, came the revelation. Here did his own secret\n surprise him. He had allowed the image of this fair young girl to twine\n itself around his heart, till he now felt as if he could fling aside\n pride, reserve, past and future, just to hear her voice once more, to\n feel the tender pressure of her tiny hand.\n\n And so he sat there dreaming, and fighting with his dreams, until his\n tobacco \u201cgave out,\u201d and until, shaking himself together, he summoned a\n supreme effort to help him on his road.\n\n \u201cIt won\u2019t do to be caught skulking here,\u201d he thought.\n\n The soft white shingle drawn from the brown-black waters of the lake\n muffle the sound of approaching wheels, and, ere he can return to a\n coign of vantage, the phaeton flashes past.\n\n I have already stated that my hero was a young gentleman of warm\n temper, great energy, and prone to sudden impulses and unconsidered\n actions, and on this occasion he was true to his nature, for he shouted\n \u201cStop!\u201d with the authoritative tone of a post-captain on a\n quarter-deck.\n\n Miss Jyvecote pulled up.\n\n The artist, glowing with a fierce excitement, plunged down the road and\n came up to the vehicle.\n\n \u201cMiss Jyvecote,\u201d he pants, his handsome face flushed, his eyes\n flashing, \u201cI don\u2019t want you to think me a brute. I do not know why I\n acted so rudely this morning. I left Monamullin on purpose to come and\n visit you. Father Maurice says that open confession is good for the\n soul. You have it now. _Do_, please _do_ forgive me.\u201d\n\n \u201cHand and glove,\u201d she exclaims, holding out her coquettishly-gloved\n hand.\n\n He jumped into the back seat, and, in a flutter of joyous commotion,\n was whirled to the grand entrance of the castle.\n\n \u201cYou must first come and see _my_ picture, Mr. Brown,\u201d exclaimed Miss\n Jyvecote, leading the way to the turret chamber.\n\n There was a courteous flattery in this that caused the heart of the\n artist to swell in admiring gratitude.\n\n Later on they visited the gardens and the conservatories, tasting green\n figs and toying with luscious bunches of bursting grapes; and by and by\n came the presentation to Mrs. Jyvecote, who complimented him in\n pre-Raphaelite terms upon his greens, grays, opals, and blues.\n\n \u201cWe want some one to continue the fascinating pages of Hook,\u201d she said,\n \u201cand I feel assured, Mr. Brown, that next year\u2019s Academy will see you\n \u2018on the line.\u2019\u201d\n\n After luncheon they repaired to the drawing-room, where Mrs. Travers\n indulged in chromatic fireworks upon a superb Erard piano; and when she\n had risen the artist seated himself unasked, and sang a little\n love-song of Shelley\u2019s in a baritone that would have pushed Mr. Santley\n _a l\u2019outrance_. Song was one of Mr. Brown\u2019s gifts, and his voice was\n cultivated to perfection. A deep, rich voice, sweet, sad words, with\n perfect enunciation of every syllable\u2014_ma foi_, there are moments, and\n there _are_ moments, and this was one of the latter in the life of\n Julia Jyvecote.\n\n He sang Gounod\u2019s _Ave Maria_ as that sublime hymn has been rarely sung\n in a drawing-room\u2014sang it with a religious fervor, and with a simple\n intensity of feeling that wrought its own magic. He _felt_ his success,\n and smiled gravely to himself as he bent over the instrument, playing\n the closing chords ever so softly, until note after note fainted in\n sheer melody.\n\n He was asked for _Annabel Lee_\u2014for \u201cthat love that was more than\n love\u201d\u2014but refused. He possessed Tom Moore\u2019s secret, and, having\n produced the desired effect, faded out like his own last notes. Mrs.\n Jyvecote tackled him upon art, Mrs. Travers upon music, and Miss\n Jyvecote was silent. Somehow or other in talking to _her_ he was stupid\n and confused, while in conversing with the others he was at his best.\n\n Pressed on all sides to stop for dinner and remain the night, he could\n scarcely refuse, although pleading dress and the probable anxiety of\n his host. The first point was settled by a declaration upon the part of\n his entertainers that it would be a treat to sit down in morning\n toilettes; the second by the despatching of a boy to Monamullin. Mr.\n Brown resigned himself to his fate and went with the stream.\n\n How beautiful Miss Jyvecote looked in the mild radiance of the\n wax-lights which lit up the rooms at night\u2014wax-lights everywhere\u2014in the\n hands of Ninive dancing-girls, Dresden shepherdesses, oxidized silver\n sconces, and girandoles of quaint and cunning design. What rapture in\n being seated beside her, engaged in turning over the pages of a superb\n photographic album too heavy for her dainty lap, and resting upon his\n knees!\n\n Why does he start and turn pale?\n\n Why does Miss Jyvecote gaze at him, and with a merry laugh exclaim:\n\n \u201cWhy, Mr. Brown, this photo is the very image of you.\u201d\n\n Beneath the photograph were the words:\n\n \u201cTo Jasper Jyvecote from Ernest Noel.\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\n \u201cThree days away from me! Why, it appeared three weeks,\u201d exclaimed\n Father Maurice, as the artist returned to the cosy cottage of the amber\n thatch and snow-white walls. \u201cI knew you would appreciate the\n Jyvecotes, and I felt that they would appreciate _you_. Have you taken\n any sketches?\u201d\n\n \u201cOne, the lake of Glendhanarrahsheen, which I mean to finish; and then,\n _padre_, I must say _adios_ to Monamullin for many a long day.\u201d\n\n \u201cTut, tut, tut, man! we can\u2019t do without you,\u201d said the priest; \u201cand\n mind you, Mr. Brown, I\u2019m sure the ladies at Moynalty would have their\n likenesses done, and give you a good deal of money for them,\n too\u2014probably as much as five pounds apiece.\u201d\n\n \u201cFive pounds apiece,\u201d thought the artist, \u201cand Millais getting two\n thousand guineas for a single portrait!\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd I\u2019m delighted to tell you, my dear friend, that your O\u2019Connell has\n already got you a job. Mr. Muldoon\u2014you might have noticed his shop\n nearly opposite the chapel, a most flourishing concern\u2014is anxious to\n have his likeness done, and will have his wife and mother painted also,\n as well as his five children and his collie; and if his maiden aunt\n comes over from Castlebar he\u2019ll throw her in, provided you can draw her\n chaise. So I think,\u201d added Father Maurice triumphantly, \u201cI have been\n doing good business for you in your absence.\u201d\n\n \u201cSplendid, my valued host! But before I can touch these commissions I\n must finish the lake.\u201d\n\n \u201cOf course, of course; there\u2019s no hurry. But, mind you, Muldoon is\n ready money, and all you young fellows in the world require a little of\n that\u2014not that you want it here,\u201d he cried hastily, lest his guest might\n suppose that anything was required of him; \u201cbut when you take a day in\n Westport, or perhaps as far as Sligo, you\u2019ll want many little things\n that couldn\u2019t be had here for all the gold in the Bank of Ireland.\u201d\n\n The three days Mr. Brown had spent at Moynalty completely riveted the\n fetters which might have been easily burst ere the iron had grown cold.\n He endeavored to persuade himself that this visit was a mere romantic\n episode in the career of an artist\u2014a thing to be talked of in the sweet\n by-and-by, and to be remembered as a delightful halting-place in the\n onward journey. He tried to fling dust in his mind\u2019s eye, and but\n succeeded in closing the eye to everything save the glorious inviting\n present. He floated on from day to day in a sort of temporary\n elysium\u2014why call it a fool\u2019s paradise?\u2014so tranquil that it was\n impossible pain or sorrow could be its outcome. An intimacy sprang up\n in this wild, strange, isolated place that a decade of London seasons\n could never have brought to ripeness, and he felt in the _entourages_\n of the palatial dwelling as though he was in his own old home. He rode,\n walked, boated, drew, and sang with Julia Jyvecote. She, too, would\n seem to live in the present, in the subtle, delicious consciousness of\n being appreciated\u2014ay, and liked. The small chance of ever enjoying a\n repetition of his visit lent a peculiar charm to every circumstance,\n and forbade those questionings as to who\u2019s who with which the favored\n ones of fortune probe the antecedents of the standers at the gates\n which enclose the upper ten thousand.\n\n From the accident of the photograph he was playfully christened Sir\n Everard, and it became a matter of amused astonishment how readily he\n accepted the title and how unvaryingly he responded to a call upon the\n name.\n\n He quitted Moynalty in a strange whirl of conflicting thought.\n\n \u201cMay we not hope to see you in London, Mr. Brown?\u201d said Mrs. Jyvecote,\n graciously coming upon the terrace to bid him adieu. \u201cWe go over in\n April, and our address is 91 Bruton Street, Mayfair. I know how sorry\n Mr. Jyvecote will be to have missed you, especially as he arrives here\n to-morrow; and I am also confident that he would be anxious to serve\n you\u2014although,\u201d she added, with a caressing courtesy, \u201ca gentleman of\n Mr. Brown\u2019s gifts requires no poor service such as we could render\n him.\u201d\n\n \u201cHow long do you remain in Monamullin, Mr. Brown?\u201d asked Mrs. Travers.\n\n \u201cUntil I finish a sketch of the lake here which Miss Jyvecote intends\n to honor me by accepting.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! then we shall see _much_ more of you.\u201d\n\n \u201cI am compelled to raise the drawbridge and drop the portcullis upon\n the hope, Mrs. Travers. My working-drawing is here, and\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cThen if Mohammed will not come to the mountain, the mountain must come\n to Mohammed. I\u2019ll drive my sister over to service next Sunday, and see\n how the priest, the painter, and the picture are getting on.\u201d\n\n It was a great wrench to the artist to tear himself away, and the _sans\n adieux_ that fluttered after him on the evening breeze seemed sad and\n mournful. Was the barrier between Mr. Jyvecote and himself utterly\n impassable? Could it not be bridged over? He could not assume the\n initiative. _He_ would see Jyvecote and his whole race in\u2014Yokohama\n first; and yet what would he not do to gain the love of the youngest\n daughter of the house! Anything, everything. Pshaw! any chance of\n wooing and winning such a girl should be through the medium of his\n title, his position, and by passing beneath the yoke of society. What\n sheer folly to think of her from the stand-point upon which he had been\n admitted to her father\u2019s house! As the artist he was patronized, as the\n baronet he could be placed; and yet to win her as the artist would just\n be one of those triumphs which lay within the chances occasionally\n vouchsafed by the rosy archer. She had been silent, reserved, and had\n seemed shy of him. She spoke much of a man in the Guards, a chum of her\n brother Jasper; possibly this Guardsman was _the_ man.\n\n In musings such as these did Mr. Brown pursue his work, and the picture\n came to life beneath his glowing hands. The canvas, with all the\n necessary _et c\u00e6teras_, had arrived from Dublin, the good priest\n marvelling considerably at the pecuniary resources of his guest. \u201cHis\n little all,\u201d he thought, \u201cand he\u2019s going to make it a present to my\n sweet parishioner.\u201d\n\n But a great surprise was in store for Father Maurice.\n\n Mr. Brown had issued instructions to his London friend to forward the\n Stations of the Cross, free of all carriage, to the Rev. Maurice\n O\u2019Donnell, P.P., Monamullin, Ballynaveogin, County Mayo.\n\n This order was promptly complied with, and a lovely autumnal evening\n beheld the whole village, curs and all, turn out to speculate upon the\n nature of the contents of four gigantic wooden cases which were\n deposited in the little garden attached to the priest\u2019s cottage. It\n were utterly useless to endeavor to describe the _furore_ occasioned by\n the opening the boxes; the excitement rose to a pitch never realized in\n Monamullin since the occasion of the visit of the Archbishop of\n Tuam\u2014the Lion of the Fold of Juda. Father Maurice fairly wept for joy;\n Mrs. Clancy insisted upon doing the Stations there and then; and as\n each picture was brought to light, from the folds of wrappers as\n numerous as those surrounding the body of an Egyptian mummy, a hum of\n admiration was raised by the assembled and reverential multitude. The\n good priest, never guessing the source from whence the splendid gift\n had emanated, endeavored to trace it to Miss Jyvecote\u2014a belief which\n Mr. Brown sedulously sustained\u2014and Father Morris, full of the idea,\n chanted whole litanies in her praises, scarcely ever ceasing mention of\n her.\n\n \u201cI\u2019ll drive over to-morrow and tender her my most devoted gratitude.\n I\u2019ll offer up Masses for her. I\u2019ll\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cShe will be here to-morrow, father. Mrs. Travers is to drive her over.\n Don\u2019t you think we ought to see about hanging the Stations? It will\n please her immensely to see them in their places in the church.\u201d\n\n A hanging committee was appointed and the work of suspending the\n pictures carried into instant execution. The mouldy little edifice was\n soon ablaze with gilding and glorious coloring, which, alas! but seemed\n to display its general dinginess more glaringly.\n\n \u201cMy poor little altar may hide its diminished head,\u201d said Father\n Maurice mournfully, brightening up, however, as he added: \u201cBut, sure,\n I\u2019ll soon have Miss Jyvecote\u2019s beautiful altar-cloth.\u201d\n\n The \u201ccastle people\u201d arrived upon the following morning and were\n escorted by the artist to the church.\n\n \u201cYou have come over upon an interesting occasion, Miss Jyvecote,\u201d he\n said; \u201cFather Maurice has received an anonymous gift of a set of\n Stations of the Cross, and he thinks that you can tell him something\n about them.\u201d\n\n Great was the astonishment of the simple priest when Miss Jyvecote\n disclaimed all knowledge of the presentation.\n\n \u201cWhy, father, you must think me as rich as Miss Burdett-Coutts,\u201d she\n cried. \u201cThese beautiful works of art have cost hundreds of pounds. Mr.\n Brown here will tell you how much they cost,\u201d turning to that\n gentleman. How often a stray shot hits home! Mr. Brown had the\n receipted bill in his pocket at that particular moment.\n\n \u201cThey are French,\u201d he said, evading the question.\n\n \u201cConsequently more expensive, _n\u2019est ce pas_?\u201d\n\n \u201cThey are not badly done.\u201d\n\n \u201cThey are on the borderland of high art, Mr. Brown. Why do you\n pooh-pooh them?\u201d\n\n Poor Father Maurice was fairly nonplussed. All his guesses anent the\n donor fell short, while his surmises died from sheer inanition. It\n could not be the cardinal. Might it be little Micky O\u2019Brien, that ran\n away to sea and was now coming home a rich man? or Paudheen Rafferty,\n who was a thriving grocer in Dublin? For the first time in his life the\n parish priest of Monamullin felt uneasy, if not unhappy. What did it\n portend? Who could possibly take so serious an interest in the affairs\n of his little parish? Mr. Malachi Bodkin might have done so in the\n olden time, but the famine of \u201848 left him barely able to keep up\n Corriebawn. Sir Marmaduke Blake was a scamp who racked his tenants and\n spent his money in debauchery.\n\n \u201cI suppose I shall learn some day,\u201d sighed the priest. \u201cI must be\n patient, but I wish it was to-day.\u201d\n\n After luncheon\u2014Father Maurice\u2019s breakfast\u2014the artist and Miss Jyvecote\n strolled along the shore. The sun seemed to shine with a certain\n sadness, the gray ocean to moan as if in pain, and the shadow of the\n \u201cwe shall not meet again\u201d to hang over Julia and her companion as they\n seated themselves in a secluded nook surrounded by huge rocks\u2014a spot in\n which the world seemed to cease suddenly.\n\n \u201cAnd so you think of leaving?\u201d she said after a long silence, during\n which she drew eccentric circles in the sand with the tip of her\n parasol.\n\n \u201cMy _kismet_ says \u2018yes,\u2019 Miss Jyvecote.\u201d\n\n \u201cDoes your _kismet_ say whither?\u201d\n\n \u201cIt points to that little village on the Thames called London.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe go to London next month, _en route_ to Egypt. My sister Gussie\u2014you\n never met her\u2014who has been in Italy with my uncle, is recommended Egypt\n for her chest. Papa received letters yesterday.\u201d\n\n \u201cHow long do you think you will remain in London?\u201d\n\n \u201cOnly a day or two.\u201d\n\n \u201cMight I hope to see you?\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy not? Our address is 91 Bruton Street, Mayfair.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs\u2014is Mr. Delmege, of the Guards, going to Egypt?\u201d\n\n She looked gravely at him, full into his eyes, as she replied, somewhat\n coldly:\n\n \u201cNot that I am aware of.\u201d\n\n His heart gave one great bound, as though a dull, dead weight had been\n suddenly removed.\n\n \u201cI hope to see your handicraft on the walls of the Academy when we\n return.\u201d\n\n \u201c_Sabe Dios_!\u201d he said, clasping his knees with his hands, and gazing\n out across the moaning sea.\n\n \u201cIf you try you will succeed.\u201d\n\n \u201cI have a very poor opinion of my own power of success in anything. I\n am colorless, purposeless.\u201d\n\n \u201cNeither one nor the other. You have a noble profession, a glorious\n talent, and Father Maurice says you have a good heart. With three such\n friends as companions life is a garden of flowers.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd yet till within the last few days I have found it but a desert.\u201d\n\n Then silence fell upon both.\n\n \u201cFather Maurice will miss you dreadfully,\u201d she murmured. She was very\n pale, and her dark eyes turned upon him with mournful earnestness. \u201cHe\n has become so much attached to you; and the poor little altar will miss\n your artistic grouping of the flowers. Do you know,\u201d she added, \u201cI\n shall say an _Ave Maria_ when I visit the little church, and for your\n conversion?\u201d\n\n \u201cIs that a promise, Miss Jyvecote?\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is.\u201d\n\n \u201cWill you also\u201d\u2014he stopped suddenly short, and dug his heel into the\n sand.\n\n \u201cThe shay is waitin\u2019 for ye, Miss Jewel, and Missis Thravers is roarin\u2019\n murdher,\u201d cried Murty Mulligan, thrusting his shock head between a\n cleft in the rocks.\n\n Brown sprang to his feet and offered Miss Jyvecote his arm. Neither\n spoke during the walk to the cottage. \u201cIf you should hear of me through\n your brother, do not think ill of me,\u201d he whispered, as he handed her\n into the phaeton.\n\n \u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d she asked in as low a tone.\n\n \u201cPromise me that you will not forget Brown, the poor artist.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is scarcely necessary,\u201d she murmured, as she gave him her hand.\n\n There was a blank at the priest\u2019s home when the artist left. Father\n Maurice missed him sadly\u2014missed his hit at backgammon, his gay gossip,\n and his cheery company.\n\n \u201cHe was a rale gintleman,\u201d said Mrs. Clancy; \u201che wanted for to give me\n a goolden soverin\u2014mebbe th\u2019 only wan he had\u2014but I tuk a crukked\n ha\u2019penny for luck, an\u2019 it\u2019s luck I wish him wherever he goes.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe was the nicest man, an\u2019 the nicest-mannered man, I ever seen,\u201d\n chimed in Murty; \u201can\u2019 I\u2019m in dhread that I spoke too rough whin he\n offered me menumeration.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe promised to come here next summer, and he will keep his promise,\u201d\n said the priest.\n\n * * * * *\n\n Mr. Jocelyn Jyvecote was seated in the study at 91 Bruton Street,\n engaged in perusing the columns of the _Times_. He had slept well,\n breakfasted well, and was thoroughly refreshed after his journey, as he\n had arrived in town from the East upon the previous day.\n\n A servant entered with a card upon a silver salver.\n\n Mr. Jyvecote adjusted his eyeglass and leisurely lifted the tiny bit of\n pasteboard. \u201cWhat does this mean?\u201d he cried, letting it fall again. \u201cIs\n the gentleman waiting?\u201d\n\n \u201cIn the \u2018all, sir.\u201d\n\n \u201cShow him in.\u201d\n\n A tall, high-bred-looking young man entered. His face was pale and he\n somewhat nervously stroked a _Henri Quatre_ beard.\n\n \u201cMay I ask to what I am indebted for this visit from Sir Everard Noel?\u201d\n demanded Mr. Jyvecote haughtily.\n\n \u201cI shall explain the purport of my visit in a few words.\u201d\n\n \u201cPray be seated.\u201d\n\n \u201cThanks! Mr. Jyvecote, there was bad blood and bitter feud between you\n and my poor father about the Ottley Farm.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou need scarcely remind me of that, Sir Everard.\u201d\n\n \u201cThere is bad blood between us, Mr. Jyvecote. You claimed it in right\n of an old lease that could not be discovered when the case came before\n the court, and I retain possession of it by law. The last time that we\n met we met in hot anger, and\u2014and I used expressions for which I am very\n seriously sorry. So long as that farm is in possession of either of us\n it will lead to bad feeling, and I came here to-day to tell you what I\n mean to do about it.\u201d\n\n A somewhat less stern frown appeared upon Mr. Jyvecote\u2019s features as he\n listened.\n\n \u201cLast autumn accident threw me into the wildest portion of the west of\n Ireland, a place not unknown to you\u2014Monamullin.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is within seven miles of Moynalty Castle.\u201d\n\n \u201cI am aware of that. I was the guest of one of the purest men that God\n Almighty ever made\u2014Father Maurice O\u2019Donnell.\u201d\n\n \u201cYour estimate is just, Sir Everard.\u201d\n\n \u201cHis soul is in his work, and his simple heart is fragmentarily divided\n amongst his little flock. I found his church dingy, dilapidated,\n falling. He is worthy of a better building; he is worthy of anything,\u201d\n cried the young man enthusiastically.\n\n Mr. Jyvecote bowed assent.\n\n \u201cWell, sir, I purpose selling Ottley Farm, and devoting the proceeds\n towards building a new church for Father Maurice O\u2019Donnell. I have an\n offer of three thousand pounds for the farm, and here are the plans,\n prepared by Mr. Pugin\u2014pure Gothic,\u201d extracting a roll of papers from\n his pocket and eagerly thrusting them into the hands of the other.\n\n Mr. Jyvecote leisurely surveyed them, while the young man regarded him\n with the most eager scrutiny. Suddenly flinging them upon the table,\n Mr. Jyvecote rose, and, taking Sir Everard Noel\u2019s hand, shook it\n warmly.\n\n \u201cNoel, you are a fine-hearted fellow, and a chivalrous one. There are\n not ten\u2014pshaw! there are not two men in London who would patch up a\n feud as you are doing to-day. I am better pleased to see you in this\n fine form than the acquisition of ten farms. Give the dear old priest\n his church, and for my daughter\u2019s sake\u2014I am as stanch a Protestant as\n yourself\u2014I\u2019ll put up an altar. Come up-stairs now, and I\u2019ll present you\n to her.\u201d\n\n At this particular moment Miss Jyvecote entered the study. Upon\n perceiving our hero she grew deadly pale and then flushed up to the\n roots of her hair.\n\n \u201cMr. Brown,\u201d she said holding out her hand.\n\n \u201cYou are mistaken, Juey; this is an old enemy and a new friend\u2014Sir\n Everard Noel.\u201d\n\n * * * * *\n\n The church was erected at Monamullin and is a perfect gem in its way,\n the talent of \u201call the Pugins\u201d being thrown into the design. At its\n altar Everard Noel received his First Communion, and at its altar he\n was united to Julia Jyvecote by the proud, happy, and affectionate\n Father Maurice O\u2019Donnell.\n\n \u201cAn\u2019 only for to think o\u2019 me axin\u2019 a rale live baronet for to paint the\n back doore,\u201d is the constant exclamation of the worthy Mrs. Clancy.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n RECENT POLEMICS AND IRENICS IN SCHOLASTIC PHILOSOPHY.\n\n It is not always easy to draw the line, either in theology or\n philosophy, that divides the part which has been dogmatically or\n scientifically defined from that which remains open ground of\n discussion in the Catholic schools. Occasionally we are aided and\n favored by a new definition, made with supreme and final authority by\n the Holy See, which adds something, not to the immutability of truth\n itself, which is eternally incapable of the slightest alteration, but\n to the quantity of science as fixed and immutable in the conceptions of\n the understanding intellect. The authority of reason may also suffice\n to add to the quantity of certain science by inductions from facts made\n evident by experience, which have the force of demonstration. But the\n dogmatic definitions are not so numerous and frequent as some minds,\n impatient of discussion and difference of opinion, may desire. Rational\n demonstration, though fully sufficient to define scientific truth and\n terminate doubt in the understanding of those who clearly and\n distinctly apprehend it, is not always understood sufficiently for this\n purpose even by all intelligent, educated minds, at least for a\n considerable period. Discussion on important points is not, therefore,\n terminated between different Catholic schools, and agreement in\n doctrine established, as completely and speedily as might be desired by\n those who have a strong sense of the importance of unity in theological\n and philosophical doctrine. Some, who are animated by a polemical\n spirit, are disposed to claim for the doctrines of their own particular\n school a greater amount of dogmatic or scientific authority than that\n which is generally conceded to them. They are disposed to amplify the\n import of decisions or declarations made by the authority of the\n church, to magnify the authority of great doctors and masters in\n Catholic science, and to extend as far as possible the claim of\n metaphysical or moral certitude for the doctrines which they advocate.\n Others are animated by a more irenical spirit. They desire to moderate\n polemical ardor; to control the zeal for the triumph of particular\n systems, and the exaltation of individual masters in wisdom, within\n reasonable bounds; to harmonize all branches of science with each\n other; to observe the just limitations of dogmatic or scientific\n certainty; to extend the range of rational science by calm discussion\n which has only the attainment of truth in view; and, without\n compromising orthodox doctrine, to leave open and free to argument all\n that domain which has not been closed in by any final definition of\n competent authority. The polemical and irenical tendencies are not in\n real opposition. They are elements capable of combination with each\n other. We do not believe that differences of opinion among Catholic\n schools will ever be entirely terminated or controversy cease. Yet\n there is always an increasing approximation toward unity, and the\n irenical spirit aids this movement by diminishing misunderstandings and\n moderating controversial ardor. The Holy See not only at times decides\n and terminates controversies by a judgment, but also, at other times,\n refuses to pronounce judgment, and admonishes those who seek to stretch\n too far the import of her decisions to respect the liberty of opinion\n and discussion which she allows.\n\n We have an instance of this in the subjoined documents respecting the\n philosophy of the venerable and holy Father Rosmini\u2014a system which has\n at present a considerable following and is in very decided opposition\n to the ideological doctrine of the Thomist school, as well as to other\n parts of the common, scholastic teaching.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n ROSMINI\u2019S WORKS, AND THE JUDGMENT OF ROME UPON THEM.\n\n (The following is a translation of the official communication which\n appeared in the _Osservatore Romano_ of June 20, 1876.)\n\n MOST ILLUSTRIOUS MARQUIS:\n\n In No. 136 of your esteemed journal, June 14, 1876, I have read\n with pain an article on a little work entitled \u201c_Antonio\n Rosmini and the Civilt\u00e0 Cattolica before the Sacred\n Congregation of the Index_, by Giuseppe Buroni, Priest of the\n Mission.\u201d\n\n You are well aware that the works of the distinguished\n philosopher Antonio Rosmini were made the subject of a most\n rigorous examination by the Sacred Congregation of the Index\n from 1851 to 1854, and that at the close of this examination\n our Holy Father, Pope Pius IX., still happily reigning, in the\n assembly of the most reverend consultors and the most eminent\n cardinals, whose votes he had heard, and over whom he deigned,\n with a condescension seldom shown, to preside in person, after\n invoking with fervent prayers the light and help of Heaven,\n pronounced the following decree: \u201cAll the works of Antonio\n Rosmini-Serbati, concerning which investigation has been made\n of late, must be dismissed; nor has this same investigation\n resulted in anything whatever derogatory to the name of the\n author, or to the praiseworthiness of life and the singular\n merits towards the church of the religious society founded by\n him.\u201d\n\n The author of the article referred to undertakes to discuss the\n meaning of the words _Dimittantur opera_, but, while professing\n to admit their force, he reduces it well-nigh to nothing. For\n he says: \u201cWe do not deny that _Dimittantur_ is in a _certain\n respect_ equivalent to _Permittatur_; but to permit that a work\n may be published and read without incurring ecclesiastical\n penalty has nothing whatever to do with declaring the work\n itself uncensurable.\u201d Now, by these words one is led to suppose\n that the Sacred Congregation, or rather the Holy Father, by\n pronouncing that judgment, did nothing more than permit that\n the works of Rosmini may be published and read without\n incurring a penalty.\n\n But I ask: What penalty did the editors and readers of\n Rosmini\u2019s works incur before those works were subjected to so\n lengthened and accurate a scrutiny? None whatever. What, then,\n would the Sacred Congregation of the Index have done by such\n grave study and labors so protracted? Nothing whatever. And to\n what purpose would the judgment of the Holy Father have been\n given? To no purpose whatever. If, then, we do not wish to fall\n into these absurdities, we must say that the accusations\n brought against the works of Rosmini were false; that in these\n works nothing was found contrary to faith and morals; that\n their publication and perusal are not dangerous to the\n faithful. Who can ever suppose that the Holy Father has set\n free for publication works containing erroneous doctrines, and\n liberated the readers of them from penalty? To liberate from\n penalty the readers of books infected with error would be an\n act productive of greater injury than if a penalty were imposed\n or (assuming its previous existence) were maintained in full\n vigor.\n\n I might touch on other points of the article in question, and\n show that its author has presumed to dive further than he ought\n into a matter which does not belong to him. But what I have\n said suffices to make it imperative on me to address this\n letter to you. As it may not be known to every one that the\n Master of the Sacred Palace does not, under existing\n circumstances, revise the journals, and as the character and\n fame of the _Osservatore Romano_ might lead to a belief that he\n (the Master of the Sacred Palace) has approved of the article\n in question, I think it necessary to declare to you that I\n should never have given my consent to the publication of the\n same. Nay, I have to request that you will not, in future,\n receive any articles either on the sense of the judgment\n _Dimittatur_, or against the learned and pious Rosmini, or\n against his works, examined and dismissed.\n\n I take this opportunity to remind all concerned that the Holy\n Father, from the time of the issuing of the _Dimittantur\n opera_, enjoined silence, and this in order that no new\n accusations should be put forward, nor, under any pretext, a\n way made for discord among Catholics: \u201cThat no new accusations\n and discords should arise and be disseminated in future,\n silence is now for the third time enjoined, on either party, by\n command of His Holiness.\u201d\n\n Who does not see that the seeds of discord are sown by\n traducing the works of Rosmini either as not being yet\n sufficiently examined, or as suspected of errors which were not\n seen either before or after so extraordinary an examination, or\n as dangerous; or by using expressions which take away all the\n value or diminish excessively the force and authority of a\n judgment pronounced with so much maturity and so much solemnity\n by the supreme Pastor of the church?\n\n By this it is not meant to affirm that it would be unlawful to\n dissent from the philosophical system of Rosmini, or from the\n manner in which he tries to explain some truths, and even to\n offer a confutation of them in the schools; but if one does not\n agree with Rosmini in the manner of explaining certain truths,\n it is not on that account lawful to conclude that Rosmini has\n denied these truths; nor is it lawful to inflict any\n theological censure on the doctrines maintained by him in the\n works which the Sacred Congregation has examined and dismissed,\n and which the Holy Father has intended to protect from further\n accusations in the future.\n\n Believe me, etc., etc.,\n\n Your most obedient servant,\n FR. FRANCIS VINCENZO MARIA GATTI,\n Of the Order of Preachers,\n Master of the Sacred Apostolical Palace.\n\n JUNE 16, 1876.\n\n The following appeared in the _Osservatore Cattolico_ of Milan, July 1,\n 1876:\n\n The Sacred Roman Congregation of the Index, by a letter\n addressed to His Grace the Archbishop of Milan under date of\n June 20, 1876, and signed by His Eminence Cardinal Antonio de\n Luca, Prefect of the Congregation, and the Very Reverend Father\n Girolamo Pio Saccheri, of the Friars Preachers, Secretary, and\n delivered by his grace in person to one of the responsible\n editors of this journal in the afternoon of Wednesday, July 28,\n has enjoined us:\n\n \u201c1. To maintain in future the most rigorous silence on the\n question of the works of Antonio Rosmini; because, in\n consequence of the authoritative decree of the Holy Father\n (_That no new accusations and discords should arise and be\n disseminated in future, silence is for the third time enjoined\n on either party by command of His Holiness_), it is not\n lawful\u2014in matters pertaining to religion and relating to faith\n and sound morals\u2014to inflict any censure on the works of Rosmini\n or on his person; _the only thing upon which freedom is allowed\n being to discuss in the schools and in books_, and within\n proper limits, his philosophical opinions and the merits of his\n manner of explaining certain truths, even theological. 2. To\n declare in an early issue of this journal that we have not\n rightly interpreted the sentence _Dimittantur_, which the\n Sacred Congregation of the Index thinks fit sometimes, after\n mature and diligent examination, to pronounce upon works\n submitted to its authoritative judgment.\u201d\n\n Full of reverence for the supreme authority of the Holy See,\n and wishing to be faithful to our duty as well as to the\n programme of this journal, we, the undersigned, responsible\n editors of the _Osservatore Cattolico_, in our own behalf and\n of all who have written in our columns on the question\n aforesaid, intend to declare and do hereby declare in the most\n docile and submissive manner possible, that\n\n 1. As to the silence now imposed we repeat and confirm what we\n said on occasion of reproducing in this journal the letter of\n the Master of the Sacred Palace to the editor of the\n _Osservatore Romano_\u2014viz., that it shall be observed.\n\n 2. The sentence _Dimittantur_, as used by the Sacred\n Congregation of the Index was not rightly interpreted by us.\n\n ENRICO MASSARA, Priest,\n DAVIDE ALBERTARIO, Priest,\n Editors of the _Osservatore Cattolico_.\n\n MILAN, June 30, 1876.\n\n Another and more recent instance is that of the controversy concerning\n the constitution of bodies. A letter of the Pope to Dr. Travaligni,\n president of a scientific society in Italy, commending the effort to\n bring physical and medical science into harmony with the scholastic\n philosophy, was interpreted as giving authoritative sanction to a\n certain doctrine of the Thomist school. A professor in the University\n of Lille wrote a letter to the Pope on the subject, setting forth the\n differences of opinion and the continued controversies respecting the\n constitution of bodies, and praying for a positive decision. In reply\n to this the professor and all others interested in these questions were\n instructed, in a letter written and published by order of the Holy\n Father, that the Holy See had defined nothing in the premises, and that\n a solution of difficulties should be sought for by scientific\n investigation and discussion. We have not space for the publication of\n this letter, but it may be found in one of the back numbers of the\n _Catholic Review_ of Brooklyn (Sept. 22, 1877).\n\n As for the Rosminian philosophy, we agree personally with Liberatore\n and the Thomist school in rejecting it as scientifically untenable.\n Nevertheless, we have heretofore distinctly avowed that in a dogmatic\n aspect it is free from censure, and we are glad to see the matter\n placed beyond question, and the controversy relegated to its proper\n sphere as one debatable only on purely rational grounds. The other\n question is one which has been extensively discussed in our pages, and\n which we regard as extremely interesting and important.\n\n The doctrine proposed and elaborately discussed in the articles\n formerly published under the title \u201cPrinciples of Real Being\u201d has been\n attacked by a very learned and able writer in a German periodical\n published at St. Louis, on dogmatic as well as philosophical grounds.\n This is a convenient opportunity to state that we have in manuscript a\n very long and minute defence and vindication of the doctrine advocated\n in these articles, written by their distinguished author, who is well\n versed not only in scholastic theology and metaphysics, but also in\n mathematical and physical science. We refrained from publishing his\n reply to the attack of his antagonist, partly because the discussion\n was too subtle and abstruse for our readers, and still more from\n unwillingness to engage in dogmatic controversy when there is a risk of\n perplexing pious minds. In matters really dogmatic and pertaining to\n Catholic doctrine we want no compromise or attenuation. We desire only\n the restriction of the argument from authority within its actual\n limits, that the discussion of matters purely philosophical may be\n carried on by rational arguments alone, without accusations of\n heterodoxy on either side. In respect to the essence and integrity of\n the scholastic philosophy according to the system of the two great\n doctors, Aristotle and St. Thomas, we are in hearty concurrence with\n the great intellectual movement of the revival and restoration of this\n philosophy as the only true and scientific metaphysics to its ancient\n dominating position. We do not, however, consider that a blind\n submission to the authority even of St. Thomas is reasonable. An author\n who, like Liberatore, professedly aims at nothing more than an exact\n exposition of the doctrine of St. Thomas undoubtedly renders a service\n to metaphysical science and its students. The writer of this article\n esteems very highly all the philosophical works of this distinguished\n Jesuit, and has used by preference, for several years, his\n _Institutiones Philosophic\u00e6 ad triennium Accommodat\u00e6_ as a text-book of\n instruction. Yet we cannot approve of such a complete abdication of\n original and independent investigation and reasoning as a rule to be\n followed in philosophical teaching. We do not find that the system of\n the strict Thomists is proved in a manner entirely satisfactory and\n conclusive, in some of its details, particularly in that part which\n relates to the harmony of physical with metaphysical science. There is\n such a thing as progress and development in theology and philosophy.\n The opinions of private doctors are not final. Neither St. Augustine in\n dogmatic theology, St. Alphonsus in moral theology, nor St. Thomas in\n both these sciences and metaphysics, though declared by the Holy See\n doctors of the universal church, were competent to pronounce final\n judgments; since they were not rendered infallible by the superiority\n of their genius and wisdom, from which alone their authority is\n derived. Their private doctrine, inasmuch as it passes beyond the line\n of the Catholic doctrine contained in their works and having its own\n intrinsic authority, has only a claim to a respectful consideration,\n with a presumption in its favor. In the last analysis all its weight\n consists in the rational evidence or proof sustaining it, which is\n lessened or destroyed by probable or demonstrative proof to the\n contrary. The Jesuit school has always insisted on these principles.\n While recognizing St. Thomas as master, it has diverged from the\n teaching of the Dominican commentators on St. Thomas, both in theology\n and metaphysics. Whether Suarez and others diverged or not from the\n genuine doctrine of St. Thomas, in their controversy with writers of\n the Thomist school, is a matter of dispute. The question as to what is\n the real sense and import of the doctrine of St. Thomas or of Aristotle\n is distinct from the question of the material truth and evidence of any\n controverted proposition. The latter is much the more important of the\n two, and reason alone must decide it, so far as it can be decided, in\n the absence of any authoritative definition. If philosophy, therefore,\n is to make any progress, and if there is to be any real approximation\n to unity in philosophical doctrine among Catholics, the authority of\n reason and evidence must prevail over all human authority, and\n exclusive devotion to systems or great names must be abandoned, that\n truth may be investigated and brought to light.\n\n The great motive urged by those who write in a specially irenical\n spirit is to strengthen the combination of forces in the Catholic\n intellectual army for the polemical contest against error and doubt.\n That the sophists of heresy and infidelity may be confuted and\n vanquished, that those who are erring and out of the way may be\n reclaimed, that honest seekers after truth may be guided to a\n successful discovery of this hidden treasure, is the great object of\n Catholic polemics. The great field of contest is the philosophical\n domain. It springs to view at once that agreement in philosophical\n doctrine is of the utmost importance for the success of the Catholic\n cause in this holy warfare. Among those who have labored most zealously\n and successfully toward this end, the distinguished Jesuit Father\n Rami\u00e8re stands pre-eminent. In his most recent publication, _L\u2019Accord\n de la Philosophie de St. Thomas et de la Science moderne au sujet de la\n composition des corps_, prepared with the aid of another Jesuit\n specially versed in the physical sciences, he has made a deeply-studied\n and masterly effort at harmonizing the peripatetic system with the\n results of experiment and induction in modern chemical science. It is\n the most subtile and acute piece of argumentation which has ever\n proceeded from his pen. The doctrine of Aristotle and St. Thomas has\n hitherto been generally supposed to be in a diametrical contradiction\n to that of modern chemistry in respect to the combination of elements\n in the compound substances. The peripatetic theory has been, on this\n account, abandoned by most of our modern authors and professors in\n philosophy. A few, however, among whom Liberatore and the editor of the\n _Scienza Italiana_ are conspicuous, have exerted all their power of\n subtile analysis to defend the Thomist opinion. Another recent writer,\n Dr. Scheid of Eichst\u00e4dt, has endeavored to maintain the same thesis in\n the most exclusive sense, and attempts to prove that the Thomist theory\n alone is either compatible with the dogmatic definitions of the church\n or adequate to give a satisfactory explanation of the facts established\n by chemical and physical experiments. On the contrary, Dr. Fr\u00e9dault,\n who is a French physician and an advocate of the general doctrine of\n the Thomist school on form and matter, maintains that it is\n inadmissible in respect to the constituent elements of compound\n substances. In order to facilitate the understanding of the subject of\n controversy, we will cite from Father Rami\u00e8re\u2019s appendix a part of the\n _Expos\u00e9 parall\u00e8le des deux syst\u00e8mes_ prepared by a distinguished\n professor in a Catholic college of France at Father Rami\u00e8re\u2019s request.\n\n\n _Peripatetic _Chemical School._\n School._\n\n I. WHAT IS A SIMPLE BODY?\n\n It is a composition of It is a material\n first matter and substance endowed with\n substantial form. determinate forces.\n\n\n II. WHAT IS A CHEMICAL BODY\u2014FOR INSTANCE, WATER?\n\n It is a composition of It is oxygen and hydrogen\n first matter and the combined in the\n aqueous substantial proportions of 88 to\n form. 11. The forces of the\n two components remain\n identical in the\n composition, although\n in the state of\n combination they do not\n manifest all their\n special\n characteristics.\n\n\n III. HOW ARE THE SIMPLE BODIES EXTRACTED FROM A CHEMICAL COMPOUND?\n\n At the moment of The force of the chemical\n decomposition the re-agent destroys the\n substantial form of the combination and union\n compound is destroyed of the simple bodies,\n and replaced by the dies, which return to\n substantial form of the their primitive state,\n components, which are and manifest anew their\n produced from their own proper forces in all\n proper non-existence their integrity.\n (_ex nihilo sui_); and\n the simple bodies\n recover their former\n proportions.\n\n\n IV. WHAT IS AN ANIMAL BODY\u2014THE BODY OF A MAN, FOR EXAMPLE\u2014OR A PART OF\n SUCH A BODY, AS A BONE, ETC.?\n\n This body is a The human body, like all\n composition of first bodies, is a\n matter and a composition of\n substantial form. In molecules and of parts\n man this substantial endowed with chemical\n form is the rational forces which are united\n soul, which gives to together by the mutual\n the matter its action of these forces;\n _corporeity_, or but, during life, these\n corporeal being. In forces are subjected\n such a way that a body, and subordinated to the\n taken in the vital force of the\n reduplicative soul, which penetrates\n sense\u2014that is, inasmuch them, dominates them,\n as it is considered and unifies them in\n simply as body\u2014is a their vital functions,\n composition of first and which gives to the\n matter and the soul, entire body the form of\n which latter gives to a human body, life, and\n the body its specific sensibility.\n material being. NOTE.\u2014Form does not\n mean _figure_ but the\n determining principle\n of the specific nature\n which this organized\n body possesses as a\n human body.\n\n\n V.\u2014WHAT PRODUCES DEATH IN THE ANIMAL BODY AND THE HUMAN BODY?\n\n At the moment when the Death consists simply in\n soul departs from the the separation of the\n body there is produced soul and body, and does\n in it a new substantial not exact the\n form, the _cadaverous_ production of any\n form, which by its substantial form. The\n union with the first chemical forces, which\n matter constitutes the are no longer dominated\n corpse. But when the by the soul, act\n dissolution of the freely, and the\n corpse proceeds dissolution of the\n gradually by the effect corpse is nothing but\n of corruption, the the natural result of\n cadaverous form is their action.\n succeeded by new\n substantial forms,\n produced from previous\n non-existence (_ex\n nihilo sui_), as\n numerous and different\n as are the substances\n resulting from\n corruption, the\n mephitic particles\n dispersed in the air\n being included.\n\n\n The theory here presented under the name of the peripatetic, and\n claiming to be the genuine doctrine of Aristotle and St. Thomas, is\n frequently called the theory of _substantial generations_. Under that\n name it has been examined and opposed in the series of metaphysical\n articles in this magazine already referred to. It is necessary to\n explain, before proceeding further, that the term _matter_ in\n scholastic philosophy denotes, not the complete material being or body,\n whether simple or compound, such as oxygen, water, iron, etc., but\n merely one element or component of the material substance\u2014viz., the\n common, indeterminate element, which is the same in all, having a\n potency or receptivity for every possible determination, but no fixed\n and necessary union with any. It is the principle of extension, but not\n extended; the source of inertia and all that is passive, yet not a\n solid atom; the subject of qualities and active forces, but itself\n possessing no quiddity or quality, and not having existence, or the\n possibility of existence, except as joined with its compart, the active\n and determining element, joined with it in order to make any single\n material substance. This active element is called the substantial form,\n which is equally incapable of subsisting alone, and therefore has no\n separate being, yet is capable of giving its first being to matter, and\n thus constituting with it material substance. According to the\n peripatetic theory, as stated above, in chemical combinations which\n produce a new, compound substance, such as water, nothing remains of\n the components except the material substratum or first matter. The\n determining form which gave this matter its specific being as oxygen\n and hydrogen are destroyed, and a new form, the aqueous, springs forth\n to give the matter a new first being and constitute the substance\n water. There is, consequently, in this and every similar case, the\n generation of a new substance, in which the matter is pre-existent, but\n the substantial form is educed from the passive potency of the matter,\n [ex nihilo sui], or from utter previous non-existence.\n\n Father Rami\u00e8re maintains that this theory is the creation of the\n commentators on Aristotle and St. Thomas, but does not properly belong\n to the system of either, and can be refuted by arguments drawn from the\n works of both these great doctors. This is rather startling and\n contrary to the prevalent supposition. The Thomist writers, many of\n whom are men of the most remarkably acute power of analysis and\n thoroughly conversant with the works of these great masters, honest\n also and candid withal, have certainly not imputed a theory to\n Aristotle and St. Thomas which is a pure invention, or without\n plausible grounds and apparent reasons. Father Rami\u00e8re gives an\n explanation which is at least ingenious and merits consideration. In\n the first place, he argues that the two doctors of peripatetic\n philosophy did not reason from _\u00e0 priori_ principles respecting the\n composition of bodies. They both taught that celestial bodies are\n composed of what they called _materia quinta_, which is incorruptible\n by reason of the inseparability of its form from the matter. The\n separability of matter and form in earthly bodies, therefore, belongs\n to them as a peculiar kind of bodies, composed from what were supposed\n to be the four simple elements of earth, air, fire, and water. The fact\n that these elements are transformed one into the other in the\n transmutation of substances led to the conclusion that there was a\n common substratum underlying all, which remained under different\n substantial forms. But since chemistry has discovered the really simple\n bodies which are not susceptible of mutual transmutation, and cannot be\n resolved into other substances by mechanical or chemical agents, Father\n Rami\u00e8re argues that the very principles enunciated by Aristotle and St.\n Thomas respecting _materia quinta_ require that oxygen, hydrogen, etc.,\n should be placed with it under the same category. Moreover, he\n maintains that the permanence of what we now know to be simple\n substances and irresolvable in combination, was really taught under\n another concept and with different terms by Aristotle and St. Thomas;\n that is, that certain virtualities were recognized as remaining and\n exercising an active force in the compound or transformed substance,\n which is incompatible with the supposition that only nude matter\n remains, acted upon by a wholly different and entirely new active\n force. In regard to the human body, in particular, he shows an\n incompatibility between the explanation of the cause of death which St.\n Thomas gives and the peripatetic theory. The reason of death given by\n St. Thomas is that contrary forces are combined in the human body which\n are dominated by the vital force of the soul only to a limited extent\n and with a limited duration. When, by the laws of nature, these\n contrary forces begin to free themselves from the dominating vital\n force, decay commences, and is continued until they have freed\n themselves to such an extent that they destroy the aptitude of the body\n for receiving the mode of being from the soul which is called sensitive\n life. The soul then necessarily ceases to inform the body, and the two\n comparts of the human substance or essence are separated. The soul,\n being a self-subsisting, incorruptible form, an immortal spirit,\n departs to the sphere of spirits, and the body is dissolved by the\n force of natural decomposition. Now, according to the peripatetic\n theory, the soul, being the only substantial form or active force in\n the body, giving to the nude first matter of the body its first being\n or physical, corporeal existence, must be itself the active cause of\n decay and death. This is contrary to the teaching of St. Thomas that\n the soul gives only life to the body, and, so far from ceasing of\n itself the vital influx, would continue to exert it for all eternity,\n and thus make the body immortal, if other and contrary forces did not\n work within the body to make it incapable of receiving this influx, and\n thus force the soul to abandon it to itself and to the power of death.\n\n Father Rami\u00e8re acknowledges that it is difficult to make all the texts\n of Aristotle and of St. Thomas harmonize with each other, and to bring\n out a completely distinct and finished theory from their writings. He\n advances a conjecture, with some plausible appearance of probability,\n that some texts found in the works of St. Thomas have been interpolated\n by disciples who were more zealous than honest in their efforts to\n maintain their own system. The same conjecture has been made heretofore\n in regard to passages relating to the doctrine of the Immaculate\n Conception. Be this as it may, we think it is quite sufficient to\n explain obscurities of any kind which are found in the dogmatic or\n philosophical system of the Angelic Doctor, that he either had not time\n or any pressing motive for a thorough investigation and elucidation of\n the matters in question, or had not the requisite data before him for\n the deductions and conclusions pertaining to the case. It is more to\n the purpose to discuss the doctrine of the composition of bodies on its\n own merits, using all the facts discovered by experiment, and rational\n argumentation, aided by the light of all previous investigations, both\n physical and metaphysical. Left to its own intrinsic probability, the\n peripatetic theory is sustained by a kind of argumentation which seems\n to be more ingenious than conclusive. Several of its ablest advocates\n have acknowledged that it is incapable of demonstration. It rests its\n claim to acceptance chiefly on _aliunde_ considerations. And on the\n other side there are certain arguments which have not yet, so far as we\n know, received a satisfactory answer.\n\n Father Rami\u00e8re advances some of these with his usual subtlety and\n force, and at the same time with the most courteous moderation and\n respect toward his opponents.\n\n It is admitted\u2014as it indeed must be, for there is no escape from\n evident facts\u2014that a chemical re-agent applied to a composite substance\n like water brings back the component elements in their former\n proportions. Water gives up its eighty-eight parts of oxygen and its\n eleven parts of hydrogen. What is the producing cause of these\n so-called new substantial forms which invariably make their appearance\n _ex nihilo sui_? When the soul, which is said to be the only\n substantial form of the body, leaves it in its nudity as first matter,\n without first being, quiddity, or quality, and, as it would seem,\n doomed to annihilation, what is the cause which produces the cadaverous\n form, that suddenly appears to actuate the matter and give it being as\n a corpse? Here Father Rami\u00e8re has made one of his most dexterous\n logical passes\u2014one which it will require great dialectical skill to\n parry. The editor of the _Scienza Italiana_ replies thus to the\n question as to where these forms come from:\n\n \u201cCertain forms do not come to the subject from an extrinsic cause, but\n spring up within the subject, by educing them (_traendole_) from the\n potentiality of the same subject.\u201d Father Rami\u00e8re desires to be\n informed \u201cwhat is the object to which the active verb _traendole_ is\n referred; what is that which educes these forms from the potentiality\n of the subject?\u201d If no sufficient cause can be assigned by which\n substantial forms are educed, the theory becomes untenable.\n\n Father Rami\u00e8re devotes a considerable part of his treatise to a\n consideration of the important question, What is the true sense of the\n proposition that the rational soul is the form of the human body? This\n proposition, maintained by Aristotle and received by sound scholastic\n philosophy, has been defined as Catholic doctrine by the Council of\n Vienne and by Pius IX. Father Rami\u00e8re refers to Father Palmieri, S.J.,\n the author of a recent philosophical text-book of high repute, who\n \u201cproves that the Council of Vienne by no means intended to condemn a\n doctrine maintained at that time and since by perfectly orthodox\n theologians. The error proscribed by the council is that which ascribes\n to the human body another vital principle besides the rational soul.\u201d\n The Catholic doctrine is that the soul is _forma corporis_, in the\n sense that it is the life-giving principle of the composite, corporeal,\n organic structure which constitutes the human body in its physical\n though incomplete nature, as one compart of the total human composite,\n or complete human nature. Father Palmieri calls the bodily part a\n complete substance but an incomplete nature, as likewise the spiritual\n part, which is the soul. Father Rami\u00e8re adheres to the common\n terminology which denominates each part an incomplete substance. As\n considered in distinction from the soul, it lacks its due complement,\n the vital principle which makes it a living body and sentient. The soul\n also, as distinct from the body, lacks the complement of its inferior\n vital force, which is an eminent kind of sensitive and vegetative\n principle contained in the same subject to which the attribute of\n rationality belongs, and giving to the subject\u2014that is, to the soul\u2014an\n exigency for a body as its essential compart. The soul and body\n complete each other in the human essence or nature. The body is passive\n and inert in respect to every vital force and function, without the\n soul. The soul remains in a merely potential state in respect to its\n inferior faculties, when separate from the body. In the composite\n essence, the human nature composed of soul and body, the body stands in\n the relation of _materia_ to the soul, the soul in the relation of\n _forma_ to the body. Thus is constituted the human, rational\n _suppositum_ or _persona_, and the specific essence and unity of the\n human being, of man, according to his logical definition as _animal\n rationale_. We will let Father Rami\u00e8re speak for himself, and explain\n at length in his own language what his own view is on this important\n topic:\n\n \u201cBetween spiritual substance and body there is a complete\n opposition, and it is consequently absurd to suppose that a\n body can borrow from a spirit that by which it becomes body.\n Since the substantial form of a being is that which makes it\n formally to exist as such, the soul cannot be the substantial\n form by which a body exists as body, unless it is itself\n corporeal. It is the same with all forms essentially material,\n and consequently with all those which belong to the essence of\n the elementary substances. These forces, not being in the soul,\n cannot be destroyed when the elements pass into the body;[82]\n yet they no longer exist in their former state of independence.\n They are seized upon and controlled by the superior force of\n the soul, elevated in a certain sort above their natural\n condition, and employed as instruments of the vivification of\n the matter of the body. Heretofore these elements formed so\n many independent unities; henceforth they become fractions of a\n whole to which the soul must give the specific determination.\n Their entire force continues to subsist; their being is not\n destroyed; but, under the domination of a new form, it acquires\n a new formal existence. It is thus that the soul is the\n principle of the substantial unity of man. It does not destroy\n the variety of the elements, but it unites them; it does not\n suppress completely their mutual opposition, but tempers it so\n far as to establish a condition of harmony. There is really but\n one substantial form in man\u2014the reasonable soul, because this\n soul alone gives to the entire totality of the human being its\n substantial determination; it alone reduces the diversity of\n elements to unity. It confers upon the body, by its union with\n the same, something which is not a mere accident but a new\n being, the being of humanity, which raises it above all purely\n corporeal beings, and constitutes it within the generic class\n of rational substances.\n\n \u201cThe modern theory, understood in this sense, is in perfect\n agreement as to its substance with the peripatetic doctrine,\n and safe from all the dangerous tendencies imputed to it. There\n is no just cause for repeating any longer the accusation\n heretofore made against this theory that it suppresses the\n substantial unity of bodies, since, as we have shown, so far\n from destroying this unity it presents it as it subsists in\n various grades, proportioned to the relative degrees of\n perfection in substances, much better than the other systems.\n There is even less foundation for the pretext that the theory\n in question is in opposition to the definitions of the church\n regarding the union of soul and body in man. What, in fact, do\n these definitions affirm? That the soul is the true form of the\n human body, which it informs and vivifies, not accidentally or\n mediately, but immediately and essentially. Now, all this is\n perfectly verified in our theory, which supposes that the body\n receives its life, its specific nature, its existence as human\n body, without any interposing medium, from the soul. Moreover,\n its union with the soul, so far from being regarded as\n accidental, is shown to be, on the contrary, substantial, in\n whatever aspect it is considered, whether on the side of the\n soul or on the side of the body: on the side of the soul, which\n without this union would be unable to exercise several\n faculties proceeding from its essence; on the side of the body,\n which receives from this union the substantial complement of\n its elements. When, therefore, we examine closely that argument\n which is the strongest, if not the only, one sustaining the\n contrary theory,[83] we perceive that it resolves itself into a\n mere equivocation. The partisans of this theory, who sometimes\n reproach their adversaries with equivocating in respect to the\n words \u2018substantial and accidental,\u2019 do not perceive that they\n themselves commit this fault. They confound that which is\n indispensable to a being that it may exist, with that which is\n indispensable to it that it may possess the integrity of its\n nature. Union with the body is not essential to the soul in the\n former sense, as all acknowledge, but it is certainly not\n allowable to conclude from this that it is purely accidental to\n it. We may very justly call substantial, and even essential,\n all that which is exacted by the nature of anything. Now, union\n with the body is certainly exacted by the nature of the soul,\n which differs mainly from pure spirits by this exigency.\n Nothing could be more contrary to the principles of scholastic\n philosophy than to regard that property pertaining to the soul\n which adapts it to be the form of the body as a simple\n accident; but if this is an essential property, union with the\n body cannot be considered as purely accidental, even admitting\n that the body is composed of elements endowed with their proper\n forms. Let us apply the same reasoning to the elements, which\n are themselves made in order to unite themselves with other\n elements, as the soul is made in order to unite itself with the\n body; and by this simple distinction of the two senses of the\n word _substantial_ we shall eliminate the doctrinal\n misunderstanding which makes a division between us.\n\n \u201cHow, then, could it happen that this division has been so long\n continued? It is because the distrust of the defenders of\n traditional philosophy has been provoked by the presentation of\n the theory at the present day generally adopted by scientists,\n as an innovation. This distrust will have no longer any object,\n and harmony cannot fail to be re-established, from the moment\n when it shall be recognized that the modern experimental\n science is in perfect harmony with the principles laid down by\n Aristotle and accepted by St. Thomas.\u201d\n\n The professor of physics who prepared the _Expos\u00e9_ given in Father\n Rami\u00e8re\u2019s appendix presents very distinctly and strongly what is the\n common sentiment, especially of those who are devoted to the study of\n physical science, in our modern Catholic schools:\n\n \u201cThe peripatetic system on the composition of bodies is\n rejected by the greater number of Catholic philosophers,\n because this system, considered metaphysically, sustains itself\n solely on _equivocations and the begging of questions_ (Card.\n Tolomei), and _has no demonstrative_ _force_ (P. Zigliara);\n considered psychologically, it gives a handle to materialism;\n considered in the aspect of the chemical sciences, it is in\n evident contradiction to their experimental facts; considered\n historically, it has been, so far as its psychological part is\n concerned, always combated by the school of Alexander de Hal\u00e8s,\n St. Bonaventure, Scotus, and the Franciscans; was condemned in\n the thirteenth century by all the doctors of the English\n universities, together with a majority of those of the\n Sorbonne; and in the eighteenth century was commonly repudiated\n by all the schools, with the exception of the most rigid\n Thomists.\u201d\n\n There is certainly no chance whatever that this theory will ever regain\n any considerable sway from the mere weight of authority which belongs\n to it from the traditions of the past. As Father Rami\u00e8re justly\n remarks:\n\n \u201cWe must not forget that the present discussion appertains to\n the purely scientific order, and must consequently be\n definitively decided _not by authority but by reason_. So long\n as the rational arguments which overturn the theory contrary to\n our own have not been refuted, nothing will be gained by the\n effort to prove from a literal interpretation of some texts\n that this theory belongs to St. Thomas. The only interpretation\n admissible in this case is the rational interpretation, which\n clears up obscure texts by the perfectly clear principles which\n the holy doctor loudly proclaimed. It is thus that we explain\n many difficult passages in the works of the eagle of Hippo; and\n those who act otherwise, far from proving in this way their\n respect for him, really inflict an outrage on his memory by\n putting him in opposition to himself and to the truth. Let us\n not do a similar wrong to St. Thomas. As he was always\n attentive to correct himself even to the end of his short\n career, we can be sure that, if his mortal existence had been\n prolonged to our day, he would not have failed to clear up that\n which remained in obscurity in his writings, and to complete,\n by the aid of new discoveries in science, what was necessarily\n incomplete in his theories. Let us act in the same manner, and\n not fear to show ourselves more faithful to the spirit of the\n doctrine of St. Thomas than to the letter of a certain number\n of texts found in his writings.\u201d\n\n Father Rami\u00e8re could not have expected to put an end to the controversy\n by his short essay, and, in fact, the only immediate result of Dr.\n Fr\u00e9dault\u2019s larger work and his own briefer piece of argument has been\n to call forth rejoinders from the _Scienza Italiana_ and the _Civilt\u00e0\n Cattolica_. Some of the advocates of the peripatetic theory are\n unquestionably as well versed in the physical sciences as their\n opponents. Their studies in chemistry and other branches of science\n have made them dissatisfied with the prevalent modern theories on the\n constitution of bodies, and they have for this very reason sought for a\n more philosophical doctrine in the ancient metaphysics. It is not to be\n supposed that they will yield to anything short of cogent reasoning, or\n that any agreement in unity of doctrine can be produced, unless some\n really solid, satisfactory, and conclusive theory is presented with\n such convincing proof and evidence that it must command general assent.\n Until this is done there is no choice except to continue the\n discussion. If it is interminable, then all sides must agree to differ,\n and in such a case it is quite natural to fall back on the authority of\n great men who are supposed to have been gifted with extraordinary\n perspicacity of intellect, and to have seen into things more clearly\n and deeply than modern men are able to do, perhaps by the aid of\n supernatural light. If the constitution of bodies is an impenetrable\n mystery, we must be content to remain in our ignorance, and accept\n whatever formulas of metaphysical or physical statement seem to us the\n best expression of the vague and confused notions we possess. We are\n not quite prepared to accept this situation as inevitable, and it is\n certain that not only on the European continent, but in England and\n America also, the reviving interest in metaphysical studies and the\n necessity of combating materialism will stimulate an effort toward a\n more perfect evolution of the truth contained in the ancient philosophy\n by the help of mathematical and experimental science. It may be asked\n what metaphysics and theology have to do with these matters, which seem\n to belong to the domain of physics. We reply to this question in the\n words of Father Rami\u00e8re:\n\n \u201cThe question what is in general the nature of material beings,\n and what is in particular the nature of man as appertaining by\n his corporeal part to the material world, does not belong, at\n least exclusively, to physics; it is also within the domain of\n philosophy and theology. The special object of physics is the\n study of the sensible properties of bodies, the observation of\n the phenomena by which the different forces with which they are\n endowed manifest themselves, and the determination of the laws\n which regulate the exercise of these forces. The investigation\n of the essential properties which enter into the very idea of\n body and distinguish it from spiritual being belongs to\n metaphysics. And since, in man, the body, united with the\n spirit, participates in its destiny; since, in Jesus Christ,\n the corporeal world has been associated to the divine dignity,\n theology cannot give us a perfect knowledge of our destiny and\n our deification by the divine Person who assumed humanity,\n without availing itself of the aid which is furnished by an\n exact notion of the nature of bodies.\u201d\n\n It seems to us that the real point of difficulty and of controversy\n respecting the \u201cnature of bodies\u201d lies deeper than any of the questions\n proposed by Father Rami\u00e8re, and that the whole discussion must start\n from this point in order to be thorough and decisive. It is no solution\n at all of the question, What is the nature of corporeal being? to tell\n us that bodies are material substances endowed with determinate forces,\n or composites of such substances. The drop of water, mechanically\n divided, gives us only minuter and minuter molecules of water. But\n since, chemically divided, it gives oxygen and hydrogen in composition\n with each other to form these minutest molecules, there must be in each\n of these molecules others of such minute quantity as to elude\n experiment, which are composed of still smaller distinct molecules of\n oxygen and hydrogen. One of these molecules of oxygen, considered apart\n from all other corporeal beings, must be itself constituted by smaller\n molecules or of some more simple elements. We must come at last to\n these simple elements, and ask the question, What constitutes the\n entity and first actuality of these elements? Boscovich and Leibnitz,\n two of the most original thinkers of modern times, both of them well\n versed in mathematics as well as eminent in metaphysics, have presented\n the theory of simple monads, which are dynamic centres radiating in\n space upon each other the active forces which produce extension,\n quality, motion, and every kind of material substance with all their\n specific differences. Father Bayma, in his remarkable work _Molecular\n Mechanics_, has presented the hypothesis that these simple elements are\n each separately endowed with only one force\u2014that is, either the\n attractive or repulsive. The laws of molecular mechanics have been\n exposed in this treatise with rigid and complicated mathematical\n demonstrations. The metaphysical part of this hypothesis has been fully\n developed, so far as its primary and essential principles are\n concerned, in the pages of this magazine. The arguments by which this\n hypothesis is sustained and the contrary ones overturned we have never\n seen fairly and distinctly answered. Certain objections are made, such\n as these: that a force is not a being in itself, but needs a substance\n to support it; that dynamism takes away the reality of matter, that it\n makes material substance like spiritual substance, that it gives no\n basis for extension and continuous quantity, etc. We think there is\n some misunderstanding of terms and concepts in the minds of those who\n make these objections. We understand in this theory such terms as\n \u201cactive force\u201d to denote not an attribute or product without subject or\n cause, but a principle from which force proceeds, which is also a\n passive principle upon which active force terminates. It is a real\n being, simple, unextended, not a body or a spirit, having position but\n not quantity, marking by its existence a point in space, the first\n element of the primary composite body or molecule, distinguishable in\n respect to its matter and form, but not separable, any more than the\n centre and circumference of a circle are separable. It is a substance,\n standing _in se et per se_, in respect to existence, but expressly\n created for entering into composition with similar entities, in order\n to make bodies with the various attributes and accidents, active powers\n and passive potencies, which experience shows them to possess. It is\n not a spirit, because it has no capability of consciousness,\n intelligence, or volition, but is simply determined by its grade of\n being to act in space by means of motion. It is _ens mobile_, and the\n beginning of physical quantity, as the point is the beginning of\n abstract quantity in geometrical science. As to the difficulty of\n conceiving how extension arises without a first material _continuum_ to\n begin with, we think this objection is counteracted by the arguments\n proving that such a _continuum_ is an absurdity and an impossibility.\n\n The great desideratum in the question of matter is to find the\n invariable and indestructible element, which remains, and will forever\n remain, the same amid all transmutations of bodies, the ultimate\n substance endowed with a perpetual existence _in se_, and competent\n from its potency and active power to be the principle of every possible\n combination and mode of being within the limits of the purely corporeal\n essence. Such a principle seems to be furnished by the theory of\n Boscovich and Leibnitz, as corrected and developed by Father Bayma. The\n simple beings endowed with attractive or repulsive force proceeding\n from a centre which marks a point in space, and having both a form and\n a material principle which are naturally inseparable, are capable of\n existing, each one alone by itself, and absolutely indestructible,\n except by annihilation. Though utterly useless and inoperative, except\n as existing in multitude and mutually acting on each other in their\n chemical and mechanical combinations they furnish the substratum of\n every kind of matter and form which can be predicated of corporeal\n being as _ens mobile_. The primary molecules of the simple bodies\n formed by the first combinations of simple elements are so firmly bound\n together that no power of which man can avail himself suffices to\n separate them, and we may suppose there is no power in nature which can\n break up their unity. Nor is there any difficulty in supposing that God\n can make bodies of any magnitude or composite perfection which are\n likewise incorruptible, in accordance with the ancient conception of\n _materia quinta_, or celestial, incorruptible bodies. The reasoning by\n which this dynamic hypothesis is sustained and contrary theories\n refuted seems to be extremely probable, and even, in certain parts,\n demonstrative, from its premises and _data_. If these include all which\n must be included, and nothing pertaining to the essence and integrity\n of the matter of demonstration is left out, the hypothesis is\n sufficient to account for all which must be accounted for, and by its\n simplicity recommends itself to the mind as proposing enough, and no\n more than enough, for a distinct notion of the nature of body and its\n specific difference from soul and spirit. Just here, it seems to us,\n comes in the need for more full explanation and evolution of the\n theory, and a more minute discussion between its advocates and those\n who advocate the theories of the rigid peripatetic system or the system\n favored by Father Rami\u00e8re. We would like to see a more complete proof\n given that all which can be predicated of material substance, as such,\n can be referred to its nature as _ens mobile_, and accounted for by the\n two primitive forces of attraction and repulsion.\n\n Especially when we consider the phenomena of organized, living bodies,\n vegetable and animal, the most important questions arise, demanding\n from each one of the different philosophical schools the answers which\n they are able to furnish, and an exposition of the way in which they\n seek to harmonize this particular portion of their respective systems\n with the first principles of philosophy, of physics, and of theology.\n The notions of potential matter and substantial form assume here a new\n import and present difficulties of the first magnitude, the solution of\n which in one way or another introduces most considerable modifications\n into the metaphysics and the theology of each different party in the\n controversy.\n\n What is the principle of vegetable life and reproduction? If all the\n facts and phenomena of vegetable life can be explained by the laws of\n molecular mechanics and chemistry, the need for a distinct, simple\n form, vital principle, or vegetable soul, is removed; otherwise the\n hypothesis fails to meet the exigency of the case, and the reasoning of\n the peripatetic philosophers remains, in this respect, unanswered.\n\n The question of the animal soul stands by itself, and is more\n important. Molecular mechanics and chemical combinations cannot produce\n a sentient subject or account for the sensible cognition which animals\n possess. There is certainly in the animal a distinct form giving to\n animal nature a potency and a power not reducible to attraction and\n repulsion between molecules, not a modification of mobility and motion.\n The ingenious scholastic theory gives us a formula which answers very\n well as a verbal statement of the difference between the irrational and\n the rational soul, between the brute and man. According to this theory,\n the animal soul is not a substance, is not capable of existing _in se_,\n depends on the body and is destroyed by its death, is not immediately\n created, but is educed, _ex nihilo sui_, from the potentiality of\n matter by the physical agencies and laws of generation. What is\n startling and puzzling about this theory is that it makes an organized,\n material body exercise sensible cognition. The soul is a mere\n substantial form, higher than the aqueous or igneous or cadaverous\n form, but of the same genus. It is educed from the potentiality of\n matter, and therefore matter is in potency to the sentient faculty, as\n it is in potency to have quantity, figure, color, and weight. Second\n causes suffice to evolve from its potency this new form of being in\n which it can see, hear, feel, imagine and remember, simulate many of\n the processes and actions of rational beings, enjoy and suffer,\n recognize friends and enemies, invent stratagems, play tricks, exercise\n courage, fidelity, fortitude, and constancy in affection, and show\n forth all those remarkable phenomena which make the animal, in one\n point of view, the greatest marvel of creation. If the animal soul is\n not a distinct substance, immediately created and having existence _in\n se_, the peripatetic theory, pure and simple, with all its\n mysteriousness, is preferable to any other, and its failure to give\n demonstration and satisfy the _ingenium curiosum_ of many searchers\n into the secrets of nature is a necessary consequence of the\n impenetrable mystery which shrouds the essence of material being.\n\n If the animal soul is a substance, we must admit a grade of being\n between the corporeal and the rational natures, an inferior kind of\n spirit, similar to the human soul in respect to that which makes it fit\n to be the animating principle of an organic body, destitute of\n intelligence and incapable of activity independent of its bodily\n organs, yet, as a substance in itself and a simple being, not\n destructible by corruption. It is a maxim in philosophy that there is\n no destruction of anything once created by annihilation. It continues\n to exist, therefore, after the death of its bodily compart. If the\n _anima belluina_ is imperishable, what becomes of it when the animal\n dies? Even the human spirit, though capable by its intellectual\n faculties of living a separate life, has an intrinsic exigency for a\n body which it can animate; much more, then, the _anima belluina_, which\n is a principle of animal life and activity, and nothing more. There is\n nothing superfluous or useless in nature, yet this kind of soul,\n continuing to exist without a body, is a useless thing. Moreover,\n although the more perfect animals manifest qualities which can easily\n be taken to indicate the presence of a vital principle which is a\n distinct substance, what shall we say of those which can be divided\n into sections, each of which continues to live; and of those which\n approach so near to the line of demarcation between animal and\n vegetable life that the difference between the two seems to reach a\n vanishing-point, and they shade into each other by nearly imperceptible\n gradations?\n\n This is enough to show how serious is the task of reconciling\n philosophical parties, and settling the disputes about the constitution\n of bodies, matter and form, and all their cognate topics, and making a\n perfect synthesis of physics and metaphysics. Mathematics come in also,\n with the consideration of quantity, space, infinites and\n infinitesimals, demanding a place in a really complete synthetical\n exposition of fundamental and universal philosophy. There is room\n enough for a great genius who shall be a continuator of the work of St.\n Thomas. If such a man should arise, he would need to have all the\n intellectual gifts and all the knowledge of a great metaphysician, a\n great mathematician, and a great physicist, combined under one form.\n There has been but one Aristotle and one St. Thomas, and we cannot tell\n whether or no any other man like them, or even equal to Suarez, will be\n granted to the science of philosophy. It seems that we need some man of\n that kind to deal with the obscurities and ambiguities, the new aspects\n and new relations of scholastic metaphysics, and with the peculiar\n mental attitude and habits of thought and expression belonging to our\n own time. The English-speaking part of the educated world certainly\n needs the service of some really original thinker, as well as learned\n and acute expositor, to make all that is certain or highly probable in\n the Thomistic philosophy thoroughly intelligible, and to accomplish\n whatever is requisite and possible in advancing this philosophy toward\n a desirable completion. Able and learned expositors of the ancient\n philosophy are not lacking in Italy and Germany, but it seems to us\n that some higher degree of original power of thought and expression\n than is found even in the most eminent of these authors is desirable\n for the masterly handling of certain questions of present controversy.\n\n Father Rami\u00e8re considers that the time has come to hope for and attempt\n the construction of \u201cthe majestic temple of Catholic science, whose\n base is laid in the infallible dogmas of faith and the immovable\n principles of reason, whose stories are erected by the co-operating\n labor of observation and reasoning, whose circuit embraces the entire\n expanse of human knowledge, in which facts and laws, experimental and\n abstract sciences, the truths of the natural and those of the\n supernatural order, complete, strengthen, and embellish each other by\n their mutual agreement.\u201d That \u201ccomplete synthesis, to which all the\n particular sciences are attached as branches of a tree to the trunk,\u201d\n he considers to have been fifty years ago apparently impossible, though\n the conception of it may have been latent in some minds, but at present\n to be really within the power of combined and rightly-directed\n intellectual effort to achieve.\n\n So far as essentials are concerned, we are convinced that the learned\n and pious Jesuit is not without a solid ground for his enthusiastic\n prognostication of the advancement of Catholic science. In respect to\n the special topics of which we have been writing in the present\n article, we are not very sanguine of a speedy adjustment of the\n controversies which divide Catholic philosophers and others, whether\n physicists or metaphysicians, who investigate and argue upon the nature\n of material substance. There is yet a good deal of discussion and\n controversy to be gone through, and we confess we are in doubt how far\n it will ever terminate in a conclusive and final result. There are\n limitations to human knowledge which are not precisely determined. The\n space of the unknowable lies around our restricted sphere of the known\n and the knowable. Happily, it is not necessary for the substantial\n solidity and practical utility of rational metaphysics and ethics, much\n less for theological certainty in the matters of real moment, that all\n the interesting and abstruse questions of controversy between different\n schools should be decided. Apparent \u201cantinomies of reason\u201d may furnish\n a pretext to the sceptical and captious, but they prove only the\n limitation of intellect and reason, our imperfect and inadequate\n conceptions of the terms and premises which we reason about and from\n which we draw conclusions, and the defectiveness of language as the\n medium of thought. The certainties of reason, of history and\n experience, of the judgments of the human conscience, of divine\n revelation, of Catholic authority, of the common sense of mankind, are\n amply sufficient for refuting every kind of infidel or heretical error\n which cloaks itself under a scientific pretext, and for proving and\n defending all that belongs to sacred dogma in faith or morals, or is in\n proximate connection with it. Unity and harmony in these things need\n not be disturbed by differences and discussions respecting all manner\n of scientific questions. We understand that this is what Father Rami\u00e8re\n principally aims at, and he himself gives a good example of free and\n earnest controversial discussion conducted in the irenical spirit. We\n have always found his writings luminous, interesting, and profitable.\n We trust that he and his _confr\u00e8res_ will continue their labors in the\n same direction. We shall look also with great interest for the\n arguments by which the learned writers for the _Civilt\u00e0 Cattolica_ and\n _Scienza Italiana_ and other advocates of strict Thomism maintain their\n own opinions. The Sovereign Pontiff, in his recent letter to the rector\n of the University of Lille, has declared that he desires all learned\n Catholics \u201cshould with one accord, _although they follow different\n systems_, turn all their energies to put down materialism and the other\n errors of our age.\u201d This shows that, in the judgment of the Holy\n Father, agreement in these matters of actual difference is not a\n necessary condition precedent to combined and successful polemics\n against materialism and the other dangerous errors of our time. The\n Holy Father also exhorts \u201call whom it may concern\u201d not to \u201cscatter\n their forces by disputing with one another on questions which are\n matters of free opinion.\u201d We understand this to mean that discussions\n should not degenerate into disputes of that kind which is hostile to\n the spirit of unity and charity, and not that discussion should be\n altogether abandoned. For, in another paragraph, he exhorts learned\n Catholics to \u201ckeep within the bounds of moderation and observe the laws\n of Christian charity while they discuss or attack systems in nowise\n condemned by the Apostolic See.\u201d This may suffice for the present, and\n we trust that our readers who hold metaphysical articles in aversion\n will tolerate this one, in consideration of the long time they have\n been spared a similar trial of their patience.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n TOTA PULCHRA.[84]\n\n\n Can God so woo us, nor, of all our race,\n Have formed one creature for his perfect rest?\n Must the Dove moan for an inviolate nest,\n Nor find it ev\u2019n in thee, O \u201cfull of grace\u201d\u2014\n In thee, his Spouse? Or could the Word debase\n His Godhead\u2019s pureness when he fill\u2019d thy breast,\n Tho\u2019 Moses treasured up, at his behest,\n The typical manna in a golden[85] vase?\n Who teach that sin had ever aught in thee,\n Utter a thought the demons may not share\u2014\n Not tho\u2019 they prompt it in their fell despair:\n For these, while sullenly hating the decree\n That shaped thee forth Immaculate, \u201cAll Fair,\u201d\n Adore it still\u2014and must eternally.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE MYSTERY OF THE OLD ORGAN.\n\n In one of the least-visited churches of Ghent stands the most curious\n and characteristic thing in it\u2014its organ: a contrast to the defaced\n wood-work and mouldering Renaissance plaster, to the unused and\n deserted chests in the vestry and the few benches in the choir. The\n paintings, the removable carvings, even some of the monuments, the\n choir-stalls and the stained-glass windows, disappeared long ago; the\n very name by which the church goes in the popular speech is ill-omened\n and mysterious. Old women cross themselves and shake their heads as\n they whisper the name of the Apostate\u2019s church, and tradition tells the\n rare inquirer that this was a private chapel, the property of a once\n renowned family, noble and brave, but fierce and fanatical, well known\n in the town annals for centuries, and only struck from the roll of\n citizens and householders at the end of the great Flemish struggle of\n the sixteenth century, when the Protestants left Spanish ground for\n ever and found a new country in Holland. The disappearance of all\n valuable objects in the deserted church is ascribed\u2014and perhaps\n truly\u2014to many combining causes. Some were destroyed during the\n occasional image-breaking raids that distinguished the wars of the\n Reformation; some were sold or carried off by the family whose property\n they were, some confiscated or stolen by the triumphant Spanish\n government, or by no less indignant relations of the family, who,\n remaining behind, were anxious to prove by deeds their freedom from\n complicity with the apostate and fugitive Stromwaels. Such were the\n fragments of information to be picked up by any one in whom the simple\n people of the neighborhood had confidence; but whether every fragment\n was historical is another question. The church was in a lonely quarter\n of the town, the least altered by progress, where stood only small\n shops supplying the local wants, which in such populations and such\n places vary very little from those of five or six generations ago. A\n few spacious, comfortable houses showed among more cramped and less\n ornamented ones, but the aspect of all, if rather dead-alive, was very\n picturesque. The church stands in a narrow street and far from the\n house of its patrons, now used as a storehouse by the few wholesale\n dealers of this quarter, who each have one floor. In the attics live a\n few workmen and one or two nondescript, eccentric, and inoffensive\n persons, supposed to be pensioners of one of the dealers. One of these\n is a bookworm and supposed to know much of local legends and history.\n Being very poor, he frequents only the public library and such private\n ones as are accessible gratis to students; and when he wants to\n preserve information which he cannot purchase in the shape of printed\n books, he copies it assiduously on miscellaneous paper, recruited from\n old ledgers, bank and register books, large parcels, etc., besides the\n little he buys or has been given to him. His notes thus present a very\n curious appearance, which he sometimes complacently connects with the\n possible researches and comments of scholars of two hundred years\n hence. One of his many little sheaves of manuscript came into my hands\n not long ago while I was poking about the neighborhood, looking for\n anything out of the way, and I was induced to go and see him. He was\n very shabby and commonplace, and a good deal smeared with snuff;\n neither his appearance nor his home was in keeping with the outward\n look of the houses, and there were no artistically-dilapidated\n surroundings to fill out the romantic sketch which my imagination had\n made before I was introduced to him. Travellers seldom mention their\n disappointments, and always make the most of their agreeable surprises,\n so that stay-at-home people are often deluded into a belief that every\n one on the European continent is more or less like a Dresden figure or\n an actor in a medi\u00e6val play. My friend, however substantial the\n entertainment might be which his manuscript and his narrative gave me,\n was decidedly a failure personally, but none the less was he to me a\n very important and, in a degree, even an interesting vehicle of\n information. A free translation of his manuscript is all that I can\n give; as to his absorbed manner in speaking, his evident interest in\n the past, and his self-forgetfulness when he got upon the subject of\n the stories he had dug out or pieced together from ancient papers, and\n his own impressions concerning whatever was uncertain\u2014these it is\n impossible to convey to others. He asked me first whether I had\n examined the organ in the chapel. I had done so, and found its case a\n very beautiful piece of carving; the keys were kept speckless, and the\n front contained a remarkable group of figures, carved in wood and\n painted, representing our Lord and the twelve apostles. The instrument\n stood in a high tribune looking into the choir, and reached by a\n separate staircase, narrow and winding. A carved railing gave this\n tribune something of the look of a balcony, but it scarcely projected\n forward into the chapel; the carved front of the organ and the gilt\n pipes were visible from below, and a tapestry curtain hung from an iron\n rod on each side of the instrument, concealing the back entrance into\n the tribune. The peculiarity about this organ was that it was all but\n dumb, and had never given a satisfactory sound since its maker had bid\n it be silent. It emitted some doleful sounds, if struck, but for all\n musical purposes it was useless. The situation it was in, and the\n defects in its interior, besides a third reason still unforgotten by\n the popular mind, accounted for its having been left when the rest of\n the church treasures were carried off. As a relic of antiquity it was\n valuable, exhibiting as it does the state of mechanical art at the\n beginning of the sixteenth century; but it was still more interesting\n as the tangible proof of a story connected with its maker, the organist\n of the church in 1505. This my old friend of the attic had written out\n in the queer-looking manuscript I have mentioned.\n\n * * * * *\n\n Nicholas Verkloep was born a servant of the Stromwaels, and brought up\n in their household in the very house where I read the story. His\n parents kept the outer gate, and the boy passed through the usual\n stages of service common to lads of his position, now a favorite, now a\n butt, according to the humor of his master and each member of the\n family, but all the spare time at his command was devoted to music. He\n haunted the churches, and begged his way into choirs and libraries,\n learnt all the church music he could pick up by his ear, the hints of\n choristers, and the few explanations in the manuscript chant-books of\n the time, and at last begged to be allowed to blow the organ-bellows at\n the family chapel. Meanwhile, he joined in the services, and drew on\n himself the notice of the old organist, who grew so fond and proud of\n him that he taught him all he knew, taught him to play the organ, and\n asked the Count Stromwael to allow him to bring the boy up as his\n successor. Nicholas was fifteen when this request was granted, and\n henceforth he nearly lived in the chapel. Not only the music of the\n organ fascinated him; he grew absorbed in studying its mechanism, and\n would crouch for hours within the instrument, getting his eyes used to\n the darkness, and learning by heart the \u201cfeel\u201d of each piece. This\n developed all sorts of oddities in him: he grew absent-minded, and\n often unconsciously moved his fingers as if at work. Soon after he\n began to make models of various parts of an organ, indifferently the\n inside and the outside; for carving seemed as natural to him as\n mechanical dissection. He had not the same conservative feeling about\n things as is common among our present musicians, and the fact that the\n Stromwael instrument was a hundred and fifty years old, and had gone\n through many repairs as time went on and new improvements succeeded\n each other, did not prevent him from feeling certain that he could make\n a much better organ in a very short time. His plans were manifold; the\n subject grew and grew in his mind; the additional stops which he added\n in imagination disgusted him with the music he could draw from the\n instrument at present; and while every one in the town was excited\n about the wonderful young player who bade fair to be a prodigy, he\n himself was impatiently bewailing his drawbacks.\n\n He told no one but his old master of his hopes and his expectations,\n and this confidant was certainly the safest he could have; for the old\n musician was a contented and patient man, used to his old ways, firm in\n his old traditions, not caring to travel out of his old grooves, and\n rather resentful of the idea that what had been good music and perfect\n mechanism in his time should not be good enough to satisfy the\n fastidious taste of a young beginner. Yet he was fond of his pupil, who\n used to soothe him by the saying that each generation had a new door to\n open and a new room to explore in the house of knowledge, and that he\n ought not to grudge him his appointed advance, any more than Moses\n grudged Josue his succession to the leadership. In truth, the old man\n was secretly proud of his clever scholar, and, perhaps unconsciously to\n himself, expected even more of him than the youth did of himself. The\n two lived together in the house of their patron, but had little\n intercourse with the rest of the mixed household, more gay and more\n ignorant than themselves, and my snuffy old friend nursed the belief\n that he had discovered the room which was home to these two. It was a\n small attic chamber looking towards the church, and in a chest in it\n had been found remnants of wood, wire, and leather, as well as some\n strange-looking models and bits of carving, with rough sketches on\n strips of parchment, all of which I had seen in their case in the\n museum at the Town-hall. On the walls were some doggerel Latin verses\n and some rather indistinct marks, which, nevertheless, the most learned\n musician in the town had pronounced to be, most likely, a sort of\n musical short-hand, understood only by its author. All this I also saw,\n and, having no opposite theory to uphold, was glad to believe remains\n of Nicholas.\n\n Now, says the manuscript, there were found notes and jottings besides\n plans and sketches, and it seems plain from these that the young\n organist wished eagerly to make a new organ, on which no one but\n himself should work; indeed, this idea grew to be a monomania, and he\n devoted to it all the energy and interest which a man generally spends\n on wife, children, friends, home, profession, and advancement. But the\n count was an obstinate conservative, and scouted the idea of replacing\n his time-honored family organ by a new one, the work of a crazy youth,\n even though he were the best player and composer that ever breathed.\n The old organist and his pupil had many anxious talks on the subject.\n In those days it was not easy to transfer your domicile and allegiance\n to a patron better suited to you; family bondage still held good in\n practical matters; the Stromwaels had given him all the home and\n education he had, and, in fact, he belonged to them. Besides, the count\n was as proud of his human possession as he was of his ancient organ,\n and set as much store by the reputation of the marvellous young\n musician whom he owned as he did by that of his best-bred falcon, dog,\n or horse. He would not have given up any of these; they were all\n ornaments to his name, and it was fitting that he should not be beneath\n or behind any of his townsmen. He was not old enough to give room to\n hope for a change of circumstances through his death, and Nicholas\n became every day more discontented at his prospects. He was more\n reserved, morose, and morbid than ever, and as he grew odder the more\n was his music admired. Strangers from neighboring towns came to hear\n him play; the towns-people begged him to teach their sons; women looked\n up at the gallery where he sat with his back to them, with eyes that\n told of as ready an inclination to love the player as to admire the\n music; wealthy foreigners sent him presents of money or jewels, after\n the fashion of the times; but nothing seemed to elate, or even\n interest, him.\n\n One day, while he was sitting at the old organ, poring over his plans\n for a new one, and contrasting the existing instrument with the\n possible one, a man lifted the curtain which then, as now, covered the\n entrance to the tribune. He was a stranger to Nicholas, and seemed\n elderly; he was very quietly dressed in black, and wore a sword. The\n young man looked up in bewilderment, but rose and welcomed the unknown,\n who sat down with great composure by his side on the wide carved bench\n in front of the organ. He spoke Flemish, but Nicholas thought with a\n foreign accent, which, however, he could not localize.\n\n \u201cYou will forgive my curiosity,\u201d he said, \u201cin coming here. I have often\n heard you play from below, and to-day, passing by the open door, I came\n into the chapel in hopes of hearing something, but met your little\n blower lying asleep on the altar steps, woke him up, made inquiries,\n and decided to come up.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou are very welcome,\u201d said Nicholas in a low voice, politely but not\n cordially, and speaking with that resignation which well-bred but much\n tried misanthropes have but too much occasion to practise in all times\n and companies.\n\n \u201cI want to speak of something else than mere conventionalities,\u201d said\n the stranger abruptly, \u201cand I will begin by telling you that I quite\n understand and appreciate your distaste to general fellowship with your\n kind; I see no reason why I should be an exception, so you need not\n resort to courteous commonplaces. I have heard what is your aim, and\n only seek you because I think I may be of some use to you.\u201d\n\n Nicholas looked up, at first eagerly, then a shadow came over his face.\n Any allusion to future success fired him even against his will, but\n experience had always hitherto gone the opposite way. Taking the\n stranger\u2019s permission literally, he said nothing, but looked at him\n inquiringly. The other went on after a pause:\n\n \u201cI think I can promise you the certainty, within ten years, of\n accomplishing your wish and seeing your organ, if not in this place, at\n least in some other quite as advantageous. I have oddities and fixed\n ideas myself, and understand them in others. In short, it rests mainly\n with you whether you like to accept my proposal or not.\u201d\n\n \u201cThere are conditions, then?\u201d asked Nicholas, whom the belief of his\n time with regard to compacts with the devil imbued quite as strongly as\n if he had not been a genius, and who, in consequence, immediately\n jumped to the conclusion that this visit was not wholly natural.\n\n \u201cYes,\u201d said the stranger in his metallic voice, unimpassioned but\n compelling attention by some quality indefinable to Nicholas\u2019 mind, yet\n surely present to his perception, \u201cI always hedge in business with\n conditions; otherwise I should be a mere Haroun-al-Raschid, an\n experimenter in benevolence, which, though an amiable character, is a\n weak one. I hate weakness and I hate foolishness. I judged you to be\n neither fool nor weakling, and so sought you out. The conditions are\n very simple: I want you to bind yourself to my secret service for ten\n years, and in return I promise you the fulfilment of your wish at the\n end of that time. In the meanwhile your fame will increase, your powers\n as a musician will be unrivalled; you will play and compose so as to\n rouse the jealousy of all your profession; you will be in danger, but\n will never be struck down; you will have full time for work and study,\n yet you must always be ready to leave everything instantly when I call\n upon you; you will be my right hand, but no one will suspect it; but if\n you once fail in your allegiance to me during these ten years, your\n object will be frustrated at the end of that time.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut,\u201d said Nicholas, who had listened, growing more fascinated as the\n stranger spoke, and by his eagerness and play of features guiding\n unconsciously the latter\u2019s fast-increasing promises\u2014\u201cbut what power\n have you to bring such things about? Count Stromwael is a great man,\n besides being obstinate and perverse; how can you dispose of his\n property, and even his will?\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd how,\u201d quickly retorted the stranger with a cold smile, \u201ccan you be\n so imprudent as to speak thus unguardedly of your master\u2019s defects to\n one whom you saw to-day for the first time, and whose name, position,\n and motives are unknown to you? Do you know that you put yourself in my\n power by these words? But I will partly answer your question. I know\n something of Count Stromwael, and what I know gives me the right to\n offer you what I do; and as I happen to want your services\u2014they will\n never conflict with your outward allegiance to your patron\u2014I make you\n the only proposal, as an equivalent, for which you care. If you cared\n for the common things\u2014women, money, position\u2014you would not be the\n person I want; such vassals can be bought by the cart-load, in every\n station in life, from the Countess of Flanders or the first lord of her\n household down to the ragged beggars or the sleek hypocrites who crowd\n the city. I want you, my fancy has chosen you, and I ask you will you\n buy success at the price of ten years of your life?\u201d\n\n \u201cBut why,\u201d persisted the eager but uneasy Nicholas, \u201conly ten years?\n Why not ask for my whole life?\u201d\n\n The stranger laughed oddly. \u201cAnd your future life too?\u201d he said. \u201cYes,\n I see what you are thinking of: that I want your soul. I will not deny\n your imputation; you flatter me by identifying me with one whose power\n is as dread as you have been taught to believe the devil\u2019s to be, but I\n am quite truthful in saying that I do not crave more than a promise of\n ten years\u2019 faithful and blind service. You may, if you can, redeem the\n sacrifice by a long after-life\u2014I only ask ten years; at your age it is\n not much to give.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd if I should die before the ten years are over?\u201d\n\n The stranger raised his eyebrows, but without opening his eyes\n perceptibly wider.\n\n \u201cYou insist on continuing the parallel?\u201d he asked. \u201cI only said ten\n years of life; if you die you escape me, but you lose your own chance.\n What should I want with a dead man? The loss would be as much mine as\n yours.\u201d\n\n \u201cIf you can guarantee, as you said, that I should be in danger but\n should not be struck down, perhaps you can promise me that I shall not\n die till our contract is fulfilled on both sides?\u201d\n\n \u201cMy dear friend, one would need to be deathless one\u2019s self to make such\n a promise. Even a doctor could only promise life provided such and such\n circumstances were certain.\u201d\n\n \u201cIf you can dispose of Count Stromwael\u2019s will and property,\u201d said\n Nicholas doggedly, \u201cyou can ensure me ten years\u2019 life.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs your life dearer to you than your success, then?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo; but the latter depends on the former, and if _you_ must hedge in\n business by conditions, _I_ must be sure that I do not give you in\n advance all you want without being sure of my reward at the end.\u201d\n\n \u201cI should not have expected so much foresight in you; I respect you for\n it. I will see that you have this assurance, but how do I know whether\n you will believe in it? You see you are so much shrewder than ordinary\n enthusiasts that I may be taking a spy or a critic into my service.\u201d\n\n \u201cI have never thought about business or guarantees before, because I\n care for nothing but the success of my organ, and only that would have\n made me eager to bind you to your promise,\u201d said Nicholas, still\n uneasily; \u201cbut since you only ask ten years\u2019 service, I think I may\n safely say yes.\u201d\n\n The stranger smiled again, as oddly as before, and drew out a roll of\n parchment from a little bag. \u201cAccording to tradition, you should sign\n this with your blood,\u201d he said, \u201cbut I shall be quite content if you\n sign it with common ink. Here is a horn and a pen; only write your\n name. But first read the bond.\u201d\n\n Nicholas looked suspiciously at the stranger, who calmly handed him the\n paper; the latter\u2019s face showed neither interest nor triumph. The deed\n was very simply worded: \u201cI, Nicholas Verkloep, promise to owe unfailing\n and unquestioning obedience in all things to Marcus Lemoinne for the\n space of ten years from this day and hour, in return for the success of\n my organ at the end of that time, and for all the help he may give me\n in the interval.\u201d The date was already filled in, being the day on\n which the above conversation took place, and the hour was marked two\n hours after noon. Nicholas glanced at the clock behind him in the\n chapel; the hands pointed to ten minutes to that hour. The stranger\n followed his glance, quietly rose from the bench, and turning his back\n upon him, knelt down on the narrow board fixed for this purpose to the\n front of the tribune.\n\n Nicholas quickly turned things over in his mind: as to his silence\n about it when the promise was signed he had decided; as to his\n fulfilment of his obligations to the letter he was as loyally certain;\n as to the individual whom this man either was or represented he had\n very little doubt. Very few in his time would have thought otherwise;\n perhaps few would have hesitated so much after having made up their\n minds not to ask the advice of any one either before or after the\n contract was made. Nicholas was only an average Christian, and had no\n strong feelings except on the subject of his art; everything was in\n favor of his giving ten years\u2019 life for the success of his scheme. As\n the clock struck the hour the stranger rose, touched his shoulder, and\n said, \u201cWell?\u201d\n\n Nicholas, with something like a start, took the pen and signed his name\n as quickly as he could, whereupon the other also wrote in a fair and\n scholarly hand these words: \u201cI, Marcus Lemoinne, promise to ensure the\n success of Nicholas Verkloep\u2019s organ at the end of ten years, in return\n for his obedience to me during that time.\u201d\n\n No commonplaces passed at parting, and Nicholas went home soon after.\n His old master noticed that he was a little more excited than usual,\n and began to make plans and preparations with more energy, but he was\n used to these phases of mind. The young man (he was now twenty-three)\n procured beautiful and costly wood for carving, besides ivory, paints,\n and other materials, and set to work on a complete model. Now began the\n oddest experiences of his life: his mind seemed doubled, for he was\n conscious of a never-ceasing expectation, an alertness, and a\n watchfulness hitherto unknown to him. In the streets, in church, in bed\n at night, he was always looking for Lemoinne or ready to obey his\n summons, yet his attention, when he bestowed it on his work, was not\n disturbed or lessened by this parallel current of thought. His mind\n grew stronger, brighter, quicker, more ingenious; his fanatical\n devotion to his art increased daily, and with it his powers, until his\n fame grew to be just such as the stranger had foretold. This stimulated\n him further, and he made unheard-of progress, so that his old friend\n and teacher was half-crazy with joy and pride. The count sent for him\n to play in the hall before his guests on a small organ of no great\n power or value, and Nicholas drew from it such sounds as the great men\n of the profession could not draw from the most magnificent church\n instruments. That they were jealous of him he knew, but he feared no\n jealousy, as he courted no admiration. He refused repeatedly to take\n advantage of his reputation and increase his fortune by travelling to\n the various art-loving cities of the Netherlands and of Italy, or even\n by performing in public on great occasions, so that the crowds of his\n persistent admirers had to content themselves with hearing him at his\n own old organ in the Stromwael chapel. Even the popular preachers of\n the day were envious of him. Meanwhile, he worked first at the model,\n then at the separate pieces of his future organ. The count had given no\n permission, nor hinted at any, and Lemoinne had made no call on his\n time, but his belief in the efficacy of the bond never flagged for a\n moment. It did not occur to him to wonder why he never heard the man\u2019s\n name mentioned as among those who, whether merchants, artists, or\n statesmen, had public or secret power; his unspoken suspicion of his\n identity prevented all such ideas, but it did strike him as odd that\n for ten months after the signing of the contract nothing was required\n of him. He felt morbidly that he did not belong to himself, and knew\n that, do what he would, a secret influence sat within, master of his\n heart and will, master even of his dreams, and, he feared, of his art\n also. Was it himself that he put forth in his compositions? When the\n ten years were ended he would be able to tell, but it was a long time\n to look forward to. Yet during that time his fame would have been made,\n and if his power then suddenly deserted him and his suspicions came to\n be confirmed, he could easily retire on his former laurels and compose\n no more. Retire at thirty-three? Well, there was the monastery; many\n men had made a second career, more creditable even than the first, by\n devoting their worldly gifts, their wealth, and their fame to religious\n purposes when circumstances made the world distasteful to them at an\n earlier period than usual. If his suspicions should be true, an\n after-life of atonement would be fitting, and it would give him time\n for studies which he longed to undertake, but had no leisure or\n opportunity for at present. The spiritual element counted for nothing\n in his calculations; there were many doors still closed in his nature.\n As he wandered in fancy, his fingers worked and produced beautiful or\n weird things. The face of Lemoinne, so constantly present to his mind,\n often came out in wood under his touch, and always, when finished, gave\n him a start of surprise; for, surely, that was not the expression he\n remembered? And yet, in carving the likeness, he must have had the\n recollection before him? A year after the interview in the chapel his\n old teacher the organist died, and the first strange thing that he had\n ever said to his pupil he said on his death-bed.\n\n \u201cMy son,\u201d he began, as he lay with his hand in that of Nicholas, \u201cthere\n is one thing I feel I must say to you before I go; it is my duty, and\n young men sometimes forget it. With you it is more dangerous than with\n most. Be your own master; do not lose the ownership of yourself. Men\n who do generally commit crime, and, if the slavery be to a woman, they\n often do base, mean things. I have sometimes feared that you were\n losing the mastery of yourself, and yet at other times I saw you\n absorbed in what has been your only idol for twelve years or more.\u201d\n\n \u201cThere is no woman that shares that idolatry,\u201d answered Nicholas\n evasively, starting at the old man\u2019s anxious looks and awakened\n insight.\n\n \u201cWell,\u201d said the dying man, \u201cI do not grudge you a wife, but I fear any\n one, man or woman, whose influence over you is not entirely supported\n and controlled by reason. In God\u2019s name, Nicholas, and as a dying man,\n I beseech you, if you are in any toils, break through them as quickly\n as you can.\u201d\n\n \u201cMy dear master,\u201d said his pupil, \u201cwhen you are in heaven pray that I\n may be guided aright, for I shall have lost the only guide on earth\n whose help or advice was of use to me.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat is no answer, Nicholas,\u201d said the old man reproachfully and\n wearily; \u201cbut remember what I said.\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, I will remember it,\u201d said the other in an altered tone, \u201cand, if\n I can, I will heed it.\u201d\n\n After the old man\u2019s death Nicholas led a very lonely life, but his\n increasing labors at his organ cheered him and occupied his time. His\n fame kept at its high pitch, and the jealousy of his brother artists\n was well known.\n\n Fourteen months after his first interview with Lemoinne the latter came\n again, this time to his home (possibly the attic before described).\n Nicholas told him how surprised he had been at hearing nothing from him\n for so long.\n\n \u201cOne does not use one\u2019s best and rarest tools often,\u201d said the other\n with his indescribable smile, \u201cthough the highest price paid for them\n is none the more begrudged on that account; and, again, the finest\n instruments are used to do what seems the least important work. You\n know how a glass-cutter uses a diamond? Now, all I want you to do is to\n ride to a certain place and deliver this letter; you will find the\n horse ready saddled at St. Martin\u2019s Gate; you have twelve hours to do\n it in, and by daybreak you will find the same man ready to take the\n horse at the same place from which you start. The fleetest government\n messenger would take sixteen hours; but I know the horse and his\n powers; of his rider I know enough to make me trust him equally.\u201d\n\n The implied trust flattered Nicholas, who took the letter, and, seeing\n the direction, started a little, but said: \u201cIf you say it can be done,\n it can, but the distance would take a common rider nearer twenty hours\n than sixteen. Shall I go at once?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, and remember your trust goes no further than the delivery of this\n package to whoever opens the door of that house to you.\u201d\n\n It would take too long to describe the night ride, or even the state of\n mind in which Nicholas found himself while careering along at a\n headlong speed towards his goal. This was the first service he had\n performed for his strange master\u2014an easy and safe one apparently,\n though secret; the man\u2019s fascination of manner or voice\u2014which was\n it?\u2014had evidently not lessened since his last appearance. Nothing\n special occurred; he gave the letter to a commonplace looking person at\n the door of an ordinary, rather shabby house, and returned by dawn. As\n to curiosity concerning his errand, it struck him as odd that he should\n feel none; yet he had never been of a gossipy turn of mind, and these\n things were, after all, only details in the scheme. This business of\n Lemoinne\u2019s was probably connected with politics, about which he cared\n nothing. He did not see his patron again for months, and his work\n progressed wonderfully.\n\n The next figure which bore the man\u2019s likeness was that of a physician,\n pouring a liquid from one vial into another, and the expression was\n that of absorbed attention. The organ-case was to be ornamented with\n figures representing various saints, the patrons of music, of the\n Stromwaels, of the chapel, and of the city; then figures typifying the\n various city guilds; then nine figures emblematic of the traditional\n nine choirs of angels; but a space was left in the centre, just over\n the key-board, for the crowning masterpiece. A rose-tree hedge was to\n run round the instrument, and the pedals were each to be carved so as\n to represent the seven deadly sins, which, by being trodden under foot,\n contribute to make the music of the soul before God. Fantastic ideas\n and odd devices were constantly springing up in his brain and being\n realized beneath his touch, and in these he encouraged himself to\n indulge. In one corner of the case, however, was to stand a beautiful,\n dignified, venerable figure, the glorified likeness of his old master,\n with no corresponding figure opposite, and robed like a prophet,\n holding a tablet on which in letters of gold were to be carved in Latin\n these words: \u201cBe master of thyself.\u201d\n\n His life as a solitary artist and mechanic was a monotonous one to\n record; even his few tests of obedience to Lemoinne were neither\n romantic nor terrible. Once he was sent in the disguise of a page to a\n court entertainment, with orders to follow and observe a high official\n of the state (who afterwards was proved a traitor and put to death\n accordingly); another time he was instructed to detain for half an hour\n a professor of one of the great universities, by which delay the man\n lost an appointment he much coveted; and another time he was sent to a\n young man of great position and wealth, but an orphan, to recommend a\n servant to him. From this, however, sprang some other circumstances\n worth recording. The young man, Count Brederode, took a violent fancy\n to him, visited him at his home, entered into his hopes and plans, and\n begged him to be a friend and brother to him. Nicholas felt drawn to\n the count, but reminded him of the difference between their stations,\n and only agreed so far as circumstances would allow. This young man was\n his very opposite\u2014bright, garrulous, sociable. He always had a love\n affair on hand, and always confided it to Nicholas, whose words on the\n subject were never, however, very encouraging. He wasted his money in a\n way that distressed his prudent friend, and his time in a thousand\n pursuits for which he had no better excuse than that \u201cgentlemen\n generally did so and so.\u201d The best-employed part of his day was that\n which he sometimes spent watching Nicholas at work. At last one day he\n said suddenly:\n\n \u201cDo you know I am to marry Count Stromwael\u2019s favorite niece, whom he\n brought up as a sister with his own only daughter? And upon this\n occasion I am going to ask him a favor, which I am sure he cannot\n refuse: to let you put up your organ in place of his, which I will take\n for my chapel in the country.\u201d\n\n Nicholas stared at him in silence. Was this a roundabout fulfilment of\n Lemoinne\u2019s promise, or a wild, boyish freak, likely to result in\n nothing?\n\n \u201cYour organ is sufficiently far advanced to put up and play on, is it\n not?\u201d\n\n \u201cIt will be in six months.\u201d\n\n \u201cThen six months hence you shall transfer your workshop to the chapel\n tribune,\u201d said Brederode confidently.\n\n Nicholas said nothing, but the other was used to that. The famous\n musician grew more silent every day; things got complicated in his\n mind, and he was always puzzling himself. His brain was clear only for\n his work; at all other times he walked in a dream of expectation,\n conjecture, and dread. Each day the seemingly light burden weighed more\n upon him; the horror of being entangled in conspiracies of which he was\n ignorant, and concerned in wrongs which he could neither prevent nor\n reconcile to himself, haunted him; and yet in actual facts there was\n nothing to complain of, nothing even to describe. It seemed\n incomprehensible to him that Lemoinne should have made so solemn an\n appeal and promise for so little reward, and should have used his power\n so sparingly. The very blandness of the passing years made him fear\n some awful test towards the last. Meanwhile, Brederode\u2019s generous,\n boyish friendship cheered and soothed him. But a year after he first\n knew him, and two months after Count Stromwael had yielded to his\n nephew-in-law\u2019s vehement pleading for the Verkloep organ, Nicholas, at\n work in the chapel, saw him enter with an unusually serious face. The\n young man began to make dark confidences on political subjects, which\n Nicholas instinctively repelled, and, without knowing why, he said:\n\n \u201cI entreat you, Count Brederode, do not make me the repository of plans\n and intentions that may end dangerously for you. I wish to know nothing\n of anything which is likely to make the state rake up all your habits\n and intimacies, and use them as the Philistines did Delilah.\u201d\n\n \u201cI would sooner trust you than my own wife,\u201d laughed the young man,\n \u201cand no one will suspect such a maniac as you are, you know!\u201d\n\n \u201cIf you insist upon it,\u201d said Nicholas sadly, \u201clet me at least solemnly\n swear to you, by my hope of salvation, that nothing shall make me\n betray you in the slightest thing.\u201d\n\n \u201cI would trust you without an oath,\u201d cried Brederode.\n\n \u201cThen you are not of the stuff of which conspirators are made,\u201d said\n Nicholas, \u201cand I wish you would retire from a position unsuited to you.\n You have no interest even in it.\u201d\n\n \u201cNone but the fun of secrecy and excitement\u2014except this,\u201d he added more\n seriously: \u201cthat having once promised to give others the shield of my\n name and the support of my money, I am bound in honor not to run away.\u201d\n\n \u201cTrue, but break with them honorably and frankly.\u201d\n\n \u201cI cannot.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou _will_ not?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, it is not that; there are other games almost as exciting, but my\n wife\u2019s brother is involved, and I must stand by him. Let us treat it\n only as an escapade; I want to tell you about it.\u201d\n\n \u201cI repeat my oath, then, and pray Heaven to strike me deaf, dumb, and\n palsied before I have anything to do in this to your disadvantage.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou make it so serious that it loses its fun. But....\u201d And Brederode\n went on to explain a scheme which the spirit of the times and its\n prejudices alone made dangerous, but which, if frustrated and\n discovered, surely entailed capital punishment. Nicholas listened\n moodily, striving to abstract his mind, endeavoring not to take in his\n friend\u2019s talk, and all the while feeling a miserable consciousness\n that, however it might come about, he was nearing one of the tests of\n his hateful bondage. The day passed, and he still felt uneasy; each\n step on the stairs frightened him; he could hardly work. At night\n Lemoinne came to see him. Few words passed; Lemoinne bade him in the\n same cool, metallic voice, indifferent yet compelling attention,\n denounce Brederode and his fellow conspirators. He pleaded his oath.\n\n \u201cNo oath that conflicts with your promise is worth anything.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut he is my friend, and his wife the niece of my patron.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo harm shall come to you through denouncing him; your name will be\n unknown. You shall appear only as an agent\u2014my agent\u2014and not even\n Brederode himself shall have the chance of upbraiding you.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut, since you know the whole affair, why not act yourself?\u201d\n\n \u201cI do not know the whole, but you do, and I mean you to tell me and\n write it down; I will sign it alone. I am known and have power in many\n places, but it is useful to have instruments; I have bought mine, and\n only wish to use what I purchased. Sit down and write.\u201d Nicholas stood\n sullen and silent. \u201cDo you fancy, because your organ is partly built\n and placed, that no accident may happen to it? I can do more than you\n think; you weigh an act with which no one but I shall be acquainted\n against the possible destruction of your favorite, the fall of your\n ambition, the collapse of your whole life.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo one can put it to me more forcibly than I have done to myself,\u201d\n said Nicholas moodily; \u201cbut, unluckily for me, I have a conscience\n left.\u201d\n\n \u201cForget it for twenty-four hours.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou do not ask me to forget it, but to disregard it, to gag it. I know\n what I lose in breaking my bond, and I believe in your power\n sufficiently to be sure that even my friend would not have opportunity\n to rebuke me in life.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy do you talk about it?\u201d interrupted Lemoinne with the cold smile\n peculiar to him. \u201cTo discuss a thing, and weigh _pros_ and _cons_, is\n to yield; you do not reason against what you have made up your mind to\n refuse.\u201d\n\n Nicholas gazed at the man in horror. Who was he to go thus mercilessly\n to the heart of the question, to see his hidden thoughts, to interpret\n the secret of all the uneasiness he had felt ever since his friend had\n spoken those light but fatal words? Who? A master stronger than\n himself; one whom it was little use to resist now, no doubt, since he\n had not had the fortitude to resist him at first. It ended in his\n yielding, but not without the most terrible self-contempt;\n self-reproach was nothing to it. He wrote what he knew; as he wrote it\n all came back to him, much as he had honestly tried not to hear or\n understand the details. Lemoinne alone signed the paper, and bade him\n take it to a certain address before morning.\n\n \u201cIf you change your mind or try to deceive me, I shall know it,\u201d he\n said coldly as he left, \u201cand all the difference will be that you will\n lose your hopes, as well as Brederode his life.\u201d\n\n Nicholas did as he was bidden, and from that day the little peace he\n had had before fled. The day of the execution came, and he could not\n resist going to see his friend pay the penalty of _his_ treachery. His\n tongue was parched and his eyes bloodshot; he skulked behind people in\n the crowd, and wore his cap as low as he could over his forehead; but\n nothing availed him, and when the axe fell he felt as if his own soul\n had been under it instead of the head of his friend. Feverishly and\n recklessly, all but despairingly, he returned to his work, but though\n his brain and hands had not lost their cunning, the impressions of that\n day clouded everything else in his mind, and he had no heart for\n anything. Two years sped on, and Nicholas Verkloep, with his glowing\n reputation, was more of an enigma than ever; but it would be impossible\n to describe the many phases of his mental _delirium tremens_ during\n that time. The organ was near completion, and Count Stromwael was now\n as proud of it as the maker. Lemoinne visited Nicholas once more before\n the end, and this time at the place where the contract was first made.\n It was the same hour, too. He began by congratulating him on his\n success so far, then examined the carvings, and smiled as he noticed\n his own face repeated many times.\n\n \u201cAnd here is Brederode\u2019s,\u201d he said, as he pointed to the figure\n personifying the Choir of Thrones. \u201cWhat made you put him in?\u201d\n\n \u201cBecause, as you well know, his face is always with me,\u201d said Nicholas,\n emboldened by his very complicity with his terrible master. \u201cIt was a\n relief to me to make the image a sort of reality, to give tangible\n expression to my remorse.\u201d\n\n \u201cYes; I see you have made the carvings a sort of history of your mind:\n I see the venerable prophet and the device he bears; the rose-hedge\n with the prominent and unnaturally-multiplied thorns; the haunting imps\n of dreams, your own face and mine, and so on. It is only a year and a\n few months now to the time when our contract ends, and hitherto we have\n kept it well. I think it likely we shall not meet again till the day is\n over. Nothing but silence now will be your burden. If you speak of or\n hint at anything of our transactions, remember the bond is cancelled;\n but, of course, after the expiration of the ten years you are free to\n publish the whole.\u201d\n\n He smiled scornfully, and, with another expression of admiration as to\n the work, left the tribune. It was now that Nicholas put in just over\n the key-board the groups of our Saviour and the twelve apostles (Judas,\n with the bag of money, bore Lemoinne\u2019s likeness), but, instead of\n being, as they are at present, immovable, the figures went in and out\n by a spring hidden among the stops, so that at the Consecration they\n could be brought forward, and after the Communion return to the\n interior of the organ, in the same way as some of the famous figures of\n the clock in Strassburg Cathedral. The day of the public opening of the\n completed organ came, the tenth anniversary of the day of the contract,\n and the reader may imagine all the paraphernalia of a great medi\u00e6val\n _f\u00eate_, half-religious and half-secular.\n\n Lemoinne sat among the guests at Count Stromwael\u2019s banquet; it was the\n first time Nicholas had met him in public. The strange man seemed\n utterly unconscious that they had ever met before, and his eyes met the\n organist\u2019s fully as he complimented him in set phrases and handed him a\n golden gift with a small roll of parchment attached. Stromwael laughed\n as he remarked:\n\n \u201cIs that the title-deed to a mortgaged estate, or a share in one of\n your ships?\u201d Nicholas clutched it in silence and tried to smile; the\n talk around him seemed to point to his strange master being a banker,\n but he held to his first suspicions. As soon as he was alone he looked\n hastily at the hateful bond and thrust it into the fire. It seemed odd\n to him that he did not yet feel free; he had expected the release to be\n instantaneous. Weeks passed, and still the same old watchfulness and\n uneasiness went on. Brederode\u2019s face came to him more constantly; all\n his faculties were centred in horrible recollections and vague and\n still more horrible expectations. All Flanders raved about the\n wonderful organ, and requests for similar ones made under his\n directions and supervision poured in from distant parts. He vowed to\n himself never to touch such a thing again, or even give directions for\n it; it was to his fancy an accursed thing, associated with all the\n horror and despair of his life. He refused all offers; and this grew to\n be even more of a mania with him than the making of the instrument had\n been before. Now that his dream had been fulfilled, he only longed to\n die; his servitude was still unbroken, though the letter of the bond\n was now a dead letter; he felt himself miserably fettered, haunted,\n paralyzed. To the rather imperious demand of Count Stromwael\u2019s cousin,\n himself a powerful personage, for an organ with the same group of the\n twelve apostles, he returned a flat denial, and neither threats nor\n promises could shake him. At last the power of the two nobles combined\n threw him into prison; they made sure of reducing him to obedience by\n violence and temporary ill-treatment. The prison was what all medi\u00e6val\n dungeons were\u2014damp, filthy, unhealthy, dark. His food was bread and\n water, and a very scanty measure of both. For a month he was treated as\n a criminal, but nothing made any impression on the moody,\n prematurely-aged man. He had made up his mind that only death would\n make him free, only death would make him able to explain and excuse\n himself to his dead friend. He cared for no bodily tortures; for ten\n years he had suffered a mental hell. His friends and his patrons came\n alternately to coax and tempt or to threaten and abuse him; he would\n not yield.\n\n Neither wealth, marriage, nor a patent of nobility tempted him; neither\n the wheel, the rack, nor the block frightened him. He grew weaker and\n weaker. His eyes saw Lemoinne and Brederode all over the narrow cell;\n the one seemed like a fiend, and the other always like a corpse, with\n the head half-severed, yet still conscious with a kind of ghastly life.\n Physicians examined him and confidently pronounced him sane, and\n priests visited him and pronounced him certainly not possessed, but\n both agreed that something unusually terrible must be preying on his\n mind. He never told what he saw or felt, and answered all questions\n evasively. At last Stromwael, furious at his vassal\u2019s obstinacy,\n threatened to put his eyes out and prevent him from ever taking\n pleasure in work again. He only said:\n\n \u201cYou cannot take away my sight, even if you put out my eyes; would to\n God you could!\u201d\n\n Before this last measure was resorted to he received a visit from\n Lemoinne, who, in the calm tone of a cynic and a man of the world,\n begged him to reconsider his decision.\n\n \u201cNothing could tempt me!\u201d said Nicholas. \u201cNot even you could compel me;\n it is not in the bond, and I am free.\u201d\n\n \u201cOf course,\u201d said the other, smiling. \u201cI only ask you to yield for your\n own good. Why should you object?\u201d\n\n \u201cBecause the thing is accursed; it has wrecked my life, and I will have\n no more to do with it,\u201d said Nicholas violently.\n\n \u201cBut you are free now?\u201d\n\n \u201cAm I?\u201d said Nicholas, with savage meaning.\n\n \u201cYou do me too much honor,\u201d said Lemoinne sarcastically, \u201cin believing\n my power to be supernatural. Shall I tell you who I am, and what was\n both my object and the secret of my influence?\u201d\n\n \u201cYou can tell what lies you like.\u201d\n\n \u201cI dare say your superstition is greater than my falsehood,\u201d said the\n man with a smile; \u201cand if I told you, you would be convinced against\n your will and still remain of the same opinion. Well, you are free now,\n and show your freedom by throwing away the very gift you sold yourself\n to obtain.\u201d\n\n \u201cIf I could undo the past ten years,\u201d said Nicholas, \u201cI would give up\n not my organ only, but my art. But as it is, I shall never be free\n while I live, and I will do nothing that may save or lengthen my\n horrible life\u2014a mockery, indeed, of freedom!\u201d\n\n \u201cIf that is your last decision, I will say no more,\u201d said Lemoinne;\n \u201cbut remember, though our pact is over, I am still your friend, and,\n should you wish anything between this and death which your jailers\n would deny you, send me word.\u201d\n\n Nicholas looked at him in surprise and suspicion.\n\n \u201cYes, they know me here by the same name as you do, and I can generally\n find means to do what I wish. It is not the first time I have been here\n or made a like offer to a condemned man.\u201d\n\n \u201cI believe you,\u201d said Nicholas shortly, and his visitor left him. Two\n days elapsed before the threat was carried into execution, but the\n prisoner, full of his own trouble, hardly dwelt upon the coming trial.\n He prayed wildly that the red-hot iron which was to take away his\n bodily sight would blot out his phantom companions from his mental\n vision; the horrors of his disturbed brain appalled him more than any\n earthly punishment, and his half-description or hints of it to one\n person who visited him constantly was such that the latter\n compassionately got leave for one of his jailers to sleep with him in\n his dungeon. The day of the horribly unskilful torture came, and with\n common iron rods, heated red-hot, the famous artist\u2019s eyes were put\n out. He writhed and moaned, but the bodily pain was only a faint image\n of the agony of his mind. Was it madness? Was it possession? Were all\n the learned men wrong, and he alone right, in thinking that he carried\n hell within his brain? There was no peace from the gnawing remorse of\n his betrayal of friendship; no assurance that his repentance was of\n avail comforted him; no obstinate affirmations could make him feel that\n the unholy fetters of his bond were in truth broken. It was not his\n blindness that was killing him; it was his mania. He felt life ebbing,\n and was fiercely glad, yet at times furious that, with such gifts as\n his, he should go prematurely to the grave. A chaos of schemes floated\n through his brain and maddened him yet more: he saw a long array of the\n works he might have accomplished before he died\u2014Masses, antiphons,\n fugues; the improvements in the organ-stops and the internal machinery\n of the instrument; a school he might have founded\u2014if he had been\n content to rely upon his own industry and the slow path of trust in\n Providence. He had sold his birthright, and what was the farce of a ten\n years\u2019 contract, when he knew that at this present moment even the\n wreck that was left of him was not his own? \u201cIf I am still his, at\n least he shall help me once more,\u201d he thought suddenly, as Lemoinne\u2019s\n offer occurred to his mind. \u201cI will end this suspense at once.\u201d He\n asked the man who brought him his meals to tell Lemoinne that he wanted\n him; and as he began the message he watched with fear and curiosity to\n see how it would affect the bearer of it. Strange! nothing but a common\n assent; evidently the request was not a novel one. Lemoinne came that\n very evening, and Nicholas asked him for a sharp knife. He produced his\n own, which Nicholas felt all over and took, saying:\n\n \u201cWhen you hear of my playing on my organ for the last time, come to the\n tribune and claim your knife. I shall make the request, and feel sure\n they will grant it.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat do you mean to do with the knife?\u201d\n\n \u201cNothing which _you_ would disapprove; but since you _say_ I am free,\n let me prove it by not answering this question.\u201d\n\n \u201cI do not press you,\u201d said Lemoinne with his usual icy smile. Nicholas\n felt the look he could not see, and his very heart seemed to tighten\n and writhe within him. He had guessed truly; when he asked Count\n Stromwael to allow him to play once more on the organ before he\n died\u2014for he felt that he should not live long, he said\u2014the request was\n quickly granted. His persecutors fancied that he would be less on his\n guard now, and that somehow, while he played, they could surprise the\n secret which they wanted to discover. He was taken to the chapel and\n seated before his instrument. Stromwael, his cousin, and Lemoinne were\n there, besides other less important persons. All watched eagerly. After\n half an hour\u2019s playing, as divine as the player\u2019s mind was storm-driven\n and despairing, Nicholas asked:\n\n \u201cAre the apostles out or in?\u201d\n\n \u201cIn,\u201d was the answer.\n\n He pressed a spring and the group came slowly out\u2014our Lord\u2019s figure\n from the centre, and those of six apostles from each side. Then, with a\n quick and deft touch, he cut something, and a snapping sound was heard\n within; his fingers moved again, the knife gleamed, and a wailing sound\n came from the notes on which his left arm now leaned; then, turning\n round with a smile of triumph that looked ghastly on the blank face and\n mutilated eye-sockets, he said:\n\n \u201cI am free now. I am ready to die.\u201d\n\n Lemoinne quickly took up the knife that Nicholas dropped, and smiled as\n if another character-play had come to an end and he had solved another\n riddle; Stromwael burst out into wild and furious threats of\n purposeless revenge. Nicholas sat unmoved and said:\n\n \u201cThis organ will be my only monument, and, if a man\u2019s curse can follow\n another, may mine follow whoever shall attempt to remove or to repair\n my organ.\u201d\n\n To this day the instrument stands a witness to the tradition of its\n maker\u2019s fate; the group is immovable, and the few sounds the notes\n produce are worse than dumbness. Nicholas died two months after, in\n prison, his mind more and more delirious each day. It is said that,\n when Lemoinne heard of his death, he remarked to one of his associates:\n\n \u201cThat man was the most perfect tool I ever knew. If I had sworn\n to him that I was a banker, a merchant, a usurer, a spy\u2014an\n unscrupulous eccentric, whose one mania was the possession of\n secret power, and whose conscience was dead to any obstacle\u2014he\n would still have believed in his own theory. But I own I\n overshot the mark and drove him too far.\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE GERMAN ELEMENT IN THE UNITED STATES.\n\n The social, moral, and political influence of the German-born and\n German-descended population of the United States upon their\n fellow-citizens has already been perceptible; that this influence will\n vastly increase in the future is highly probable. We may state here one\n of the many reasons for this belief. The intellectual and political\n leaders of the Germans in America have hitherto mainly confined their\n public utterances, in the press or on the platform, to the German\n language. The German newspapers are very numerous; their circulation is\n large; they are written for the most part with much ability; their\n treatment of social and political questions is often marked by a\n breadth of view and a soundness of logic too frequently wanting in many\n of their English contemporaries. Their influence upon the minds of\n their readers is also greater than that wielded by the majority of our\n newspapers printed in the English language. We have heard this fact\n attributed to the superior honesty with which the German press is\n conducted; but upon this delicate ground we shall not enter. Our point\n at present is that German thought and opinion, as expressed through the\n German periodical press, influence for the most part only the German\n population. Few of us who are not Germans read a German journal; what\n the German leaders in politics, morality, and literature are saying,\n day after day, is for the most part wholly unknown to the rest of us.\n Occasionally an American editor translates a leading article from a\n German journal and gives it to his readers; still more frequently he\n avails himself of the ideas and the arguments of his German\n contemporaries and reproduces them as his own.\n\n In the next generation this state of things will be modified; more\n Americans will read German literature, and more Germans, or\n German-Americans, will write in English journals, speak in English at\n public conventions, and sit in our legislative assemblies. The barrier\n of language, which has hitherto tended to separate Germans from the\n rest of us to so great an extent, will gradually yield and disappear.\n The German language will be learned by increasing numbers of our\n non-German citizens; the common use of the German language by the\n German-Americans will be dropped, and the English tongue adopted in its\n stead, not only in business affairs, but in politics, literature,\n religion, and social intercourse. The English language has made many\n conquests, but in America it has only to hold its own. It is the\n language of the country, of the legislature, of the courts, of the\n markets and exchanges, and of society. Our German citizens must acquire\n it, or enter handicapped into all the relations of life.\n\n The ability with which the German journals here are conducted does not\n prevent nearly the whole of them which are not avowedly Catholic from\n being inspired by an antagonism to religion. The genius of the German\n mind has little sympathy with socialism or communism, and the theories\n of socialism and communism find expression among our German citizens\n only through the writings or speeches of a few insignificant and\n uninfluential men in New York and some of our other large cities. But\n the German who is not a Catholic is most often an atheist; and he\n differs from the French atheist in wishing his wife and children to be\n atheists also. The non-Catholic German press faithfully represents this\n phase of the German mind; and it sneers at religion with the same\n pertinacity and often with more skill than is shown in a like direction\n by too many of our English-written newspapers.\n\n The total immigration into the United States from the close of the War\n of Independence to the end of 1876 was 9,726,455 souls. The records of\n the government do not furnish an ethnological classification of all\n these; it is only since 1847 that this classification has been made.\n But every one knows that the bulk of our immigrants have come from\n Ireland and Germany. At the port of New York alone the total number of\n Irish immigrants from 1847 up to September 1 of the present year was\n 2,009,447; of German immigrants 2,345,486; of all others 1,265,240. An\n estimated classification of those arriving before 1847, added to the\n above figures, gives 2,463,598 Irish, 2,622,556 German, and 1,542,311\n of other nationalities. The present Secretary of the Interior is the\n only American citizen of German birth who has ever held a cabinet\n appointment; we believe that he is the only citizen of German birth who\n has ever sat in the Senate. But among the senators at the last session\n of the Forty-fourth Congress there were seven who were either of\n foreign birth or the sons of foreigners; and in the lower House of the\n same assembly there appears to have been but one German to twelve\n naturalized citizens of other nationalities. The Secretary of the\n Interior owes the prominent political position which he fills less to\n his statesmanlike and philosophical acquirements than to his command of\n the English language and to his grace and power as a public speaker. No\n doubt there are among our German citizens many who are his equals in\n learning and political wisdom, but who are almost wholly unknown\n outside the German-speaking community, for the reason that they confine\n themselves, on the platform or in the press, to the use of the German\n language. The coming generation of Americans of German descent will not\n subject themselves to this disadvantage; and thus the influence of\n German thought will be widened and deepened.\n\n Upon this portion of our subject we may as well reproduce in substance,\n although not with literal exactness, the observations made to us by a\n German ecclesiastic, a member of one of the German religious orders\n which are working here with so much zeal and success. In his opinion\n the German element now in the United States will ere long be greatly\n increased by a revival of immigration. Immigration from Germany may not\n again attain the vast proportions which it reached in 1852\u201353\u201354, nor\n during the seven memorable years 1866\u20131872, but it will still be very\n large. All other things being equal, the proportion of Catholics\n immigrating from Germany will be greater in the future than in the\n past. In looking at the future of the country we should reckon that the\n German element here will for many years to come steadily and rapidly\n increase. But it is not probable that, after the passing away of the\n present generation, our German population will so tenaciously retain\n its distinctive national or ethnological features. It will become\n absorbed in, amalgamated with, the rest of the community, but through\n this very absorption and amalgamation it will leaven the whole mass for\n good or for evil; and most probably the good will preponderate.\n\n In our present German population, especially the younger portion of it,\n there is a very perceptible disposition to be a little ashamed of their\n German origin. This feeling, which has long existed, received a check\n during and immediately after the triumph of Germany over France in 1870\n and the erection of the German Empire. But it has now revived and\n prevails with more force than before. Our German citizens feel that the\n golden apples of victory have turned to ashes in the grasp of the\n conquerors. The milliards wrung from France have sunk into the ground\n or vanished in the air, and Germany is poorer than before the war\u2014much\n poorer than France, which Prince Bismarck imagined had been crushed\n into nothingness. All the glory that Germany won by her conquest of\n France in the field has been eclipsed by the peaceful victory of\n France\u2014a victory the effects of which were made manifest at our\n International Exhibition last year. More serious still than this, in\n the opinion of the learned and acute ecclesiastic whom we are quoting,\n is the dislike and contempt with which the iniquitous, unnecessary, and\n tyrannical policy of the German government toward the church is\n regarded not only by Catholic Germans in America, but by those of their\n non-Catholic compatriots here who are not swayed by sectarian hatred of\n the church. This policy is justly regarded as at once an evidence of\n weakness and a prolific source of future trouble, and among the\n non-Catholic German-Americans the remark is common that \u201cbetween the\n Red-coats and the Black-coats\u2014the Communists and the Catholics\u2014the\n empire is in great danger of destruction.\u201d For these reasons, and other\n slighter ones, our German fellow-citizens are becoming less and less\n disposed to boast of their nationality, and more and more inclined to\n Americanize themselves and their children. The \u201cWatch on the Rhine\u201d\n gives place to \u201cYankee Doodle\u201d; the suggestive inquiry as to the\n precise locality and boundaries of the Faderland is not so popular as\n \u201cHail Columbia.\u201d Certain considerations of a utilitarian nature aid\n powerfully in leading our German citizens in the same direction. Their\n common sense enables them to see that their own advancement in life,\n and the prosperity and happiness of their children, materially depend\n upon their thorough Americanization\u2014their complete identification with\n the rest of the community in which they live. The first step towards\n this end is the acquirement and use of the English language, and in\n this the children often outstrip the wishes of their parents. In the\n German-American schools, secular as well as religious, the study of the\n English language is compulsory, and necessarily so. The children appear\n to have a natural affinity for the English tongue; they acquire its use\n rapidly and soon begin to speak it in preference to their native\n language. It is not uncommon to meet with families where the parents\n address the children in German and the children reply in English. The\n truth is that the English language as now spoken, largely Teutonic in\n its composition and structure, but enriched and softened by Celtic,\n Latin, and Greek accretions, more easily adapts itself to the\n expression of the necessities, the emotions, and the ideas of the age.\n An amusing illustration of this self-asserting power of the English\n language was afforded by the experience of a village in Indiana, on the\n Ohio River, which was settled a few years ago by an exclusively German\n colony consisting of about three hundred families. Nothing but German\n was at first spoken in the houses, but in a very brief space of time\n the language in the streets was found to be English, and ere long that\n became the prevailing dialect of the place, appearing, as one of the\n residents said, to have sprung up and taken root there just as the\n weeds in the fields.\n\n We should not omit to mention, however, a fact which to a very large\n degree tends to show that the Americanization of our German citizens is\n not so rapid as it might be. Intermarriages between Germans, or\n descendants of Germans, and Americans of other descent are not regarded\n with favor by the older Germans of the present generation, and such\n marriages are of rare occurrence. This is to be deplored, especially\n for the sake of the non-German party. In all the domestic virtues the\n Germans are richly endowed. The influence of the mother in the family\n is supreme within certain limits, and this influence is almost always\n exerted for good. The German husband does not regard his wife as a\n pretty plaything, a fragile and expensive doll to be dressed in gay\n raiment and paraded for the gratification of her own and his vanity. On\n the contrary, the German husband, if at fault at all in this respect,\n looks upon his wife too much in the light not merely of a helpmeet, but\n of a servant in whose zeal, industry, and faithfulness he can repose\n the utmost confidence. Americans too often make useless idols of their\n wives; the German husband may seem to regard his spouse from too\n utilitarian a point of view. In the German household, here as in the\n Fatherland, there is not, as there is too often in American homes, one\n bread-winner and one or more spenders. The wife, whenever it is needful\n or expedient, not only manages the domestic affairs of the family with\n economy, prudence, and good sense, but takes a full share of the burden\n of providing its income. If one journeys through those portions of the\n West where the Germans are largely engaged in agricultural pursuits, he\n will see the wife and daughters working in the fields alongside of the\n husband and the brothers; in the towns, while the husband is pursuing\n his trade or laboring in the streets, the wife is keeping a shop or a\n beer-saloon, or otherwise earning her full share of the family income,\n and aiding her husband to lay up the nest-eggs of their future fortune.\n The will of the wife is most frequently supreme in all domestic\n affairs, and even in matters of business; and this, too, without the\n husband feeling himself at all \u201chen-pecked.\u201d His wife is his equal; he\n shares with her his amusements as well as his toils. Nothing is more\n pleasant than the spectacle of German families, on _f\u00eate_ days or on\n summer evenings, taking their pleasure together in the beer-gardens.\n The presence of the women and children does not lessen the gayety of\n the men; but it prevents them from excess and compels propriety of\n conversation and deportment. With these habits, and with the gift of\n living well and wholesomely, on plain but abundant food, without\n wastefulness, the Germans prosper, and they acquire competences sooner\n and more generally than other classes. When wealth comes, their frugal\n and sensible habits of life are not laid aside for extravagant display,\n nor is the influence and sway of the mother weakened or lessened. The\n daughters, even of the wealthiest and most cultured German families,\n are taught how to become good and useful wives to poor men, and are\n thus prepared for reverses of fortune. By some of our American women\n these virtues of their German sisters may be regarded with contempt and\n dislike; but many American men, we are inclined to think, would lead\n happier lives and escape much pecuniary trouble, if they won for\n themselves wives from among the daughters of their German neighbors.\n There are but few such marriages now. The German parents dislike them;\n and there is, moreover, a little ignorant prejudice on the American\n side. The next generation or two, we trust, will be wiser.\n\n The limits of our space and the scope of our article forbid us to do\n more than merely glance at a branch of our subject which is in itself\n worthy of a separate essay\u2014the influence exerted by our German\n fellow-citizens upon the rest of us by their works in music and in the\n fine arts. Here the barrier of language does not exist; the genius of\n music and of art is universal. A certain degree of cultivation of the\n ear and eye is necessary, of course; but, this being attained, the\n music of a German composer, the painting, the sculpture, the\n architecture, or the decoration of a German artist, is appreciated,\n admired, and imitated as well by those ignorant of his language as by\n those of his own nationality. There is reason to believe that American\n taste in music and in art owes vastly more to German influence than is\n generally supposed or conceded. Perhaps the strongest evidences of this\n would result from a critical examination of the extent to which German\n ideas have modified, enlarged, beautified, and spiritualized our\n architecture, our dramatic, domestic, and ecclesiastical music, and all\n those phases of our daily life wherein the fine arts play a part.\n\n Among German-American architects may be mentioned G. F. Himpler, a\n student at Berlin and Paris, and a thoroughly-educated master of his\n art\u2014the builder of fine churches in St. Louis, Detroit, Sandusky,\n Elizabeth, Rome (New York), Atchison, and other places; among\n historical painters, Leutz\u2014now dead, but whose works at Washington and\n elsewhere have given him a national fame\u2014Lamprecht and Duvenech (the\n latter a native of this country), Biermann and Lange; among decorative\n painters, Thien, Ertle, and Muer; among sculptors and designers,\n Schroeder, Allard, and Kloster\u2014the latter a very distinguished young\n artist; among German singers, as well known here as in Germany,\n Wachtel, Hainamns, Lichtmay, and Tuska; among actors. Seebach,\n Janauschek, Taneruscheck, Lina Meyer, and Witt.\n\n But we can only hint at these things, and hasten on to remark, in\n passing, that our German citizens, even more generally and zealously\n here than in Germany, seek to provide for and to secure the education\n of their children. \u201cThe first thing that a colony of German emigrants\n settling in America seeks to establish is the school,\u201d said to us a\n high authority. \u201cIf they are Catholics, or even zealous Lutherans, the\n church is built simultaneously with the school; but in every case the\n school must be set up, and the children must attend it at whatever cost\n to the parents.\u201d\n\n Thus far we have written of our German population as a whole. We now\n turn our attention to that portion of it which belongs to\n ourselves\u2014_i.e._, the German Catholics of the United States. United\n with us by the bond of faith, their welfare is especially dear to us,\n and in their spiritual and material progress, prosperity, and happiness\n we have a deep and abiding interest.\n\n Prior to 1845 the German emigration to the United States had been\n numerically insignificant, and consisted chiefly of the peasant class.\n The revolution of 1848 had the effect not only of greatly increasing\n this emigration but of materially changing its character. An official\n report recently made by Dr. Engel, Director of the Bureau of Statistics\n at Berlin, states that the number of Germans who emigrated to the\n United States from 1845 to 1876, both years inclusive, was 2,685,430.\n Dr. Engel remarks that a very large proportion of these emigrants\n (considerably more than 1,000,000 of them) were \u201cstrong men\u201d; there\n were few old or infirm people among them; those of them who were not\n adult males in the vigor of their manhood were chiefly young and\n middle-aged women and children. A goodly proportion of these emigrants\n must now be living among us; we know by the census of 1870 that our\n German-born population even then numbered 1,690,410. The German race is\n hardy and prolific; its women are good mothers; their thrift, industry,\n and economical habits enable them to live in comfort upon modest\n resources; without being teetotalers, they are seldom intemperate. The\n German-born and German-descended population of the United States at\n present\u2014including in the latter class only those whose parents on both\n sides or on one side or the other were natives of Germany, but who were\n themselves born here\u2014is believed to be about 5,500,000 souls. The great\n bulk of this population is in the Central, Western, and Northwestern\n States; the six States of New York, Illinois, Ohio, Wisconsin,\n Pennsylvania, and Missouri contain nearly two-thirds of the whole\n number.[86]\n\n The German Empire as at present constituted contained at the latest\n census (1875) 42,723,242 people. Of these not quite one-third are\n Catholics. Had the immigration from the states which now form the\n German Empire borne this proportion, we should have in the United\n States a German Catholic population of about 1,800,000 souls. But the\n immigration was largely from the Protestant states, or from those in\n which the Protestants were in the majority. We should be satisfied, and\n more than satisfied, when we learn that the German Catholics in the\n United States, according to the latest and most accurate computation,\n numbered 1,237,563 souls. It is a very large number\u2014large enough to\n establish the fact that the Catholic Germans arriving here have not\n lost their faith, but have preserved and guarded it for themselves and\n their children. These 1,237,563 German Catholics in America are not\n mythical or hypothetical persons; in making up the numeration care was\n taken to include only those who were known as practical Catholics,\n frequenters of the sacraments, careful observers of their duties as\n Catholic parents or Catholic children. In this connection we may add\n some figures for which we are indebted to the courtesy of a German\n priest and statistician, and on the accuracy of which our readers may\n depend. First, however, let us state, upon the best authority, that the\n church in America loses very few of her German children. We were\n extremely gratified with the unanimous testimony which rewarded our\n inquiries on this matter. It very rarely occurs that a young German\n Catholic of either sex strays or is stolen from the fold. Neither the\n false philosophy of the infidel or Protestant German schools, nor the\n seductions and ridicule of their infidel or Protestant American\n neighbors, lure them from the faith. We have observed in our own visits\n to the German churches in New York, especially at the early Masses, the\n large proportion of male adult worshippers. \u201cOur old people, of course,\n never leave us,\u201d said a learned German priest, \u201cand our young people\n rarely, very rarely, stray away. They are faithful in their duties, and\n they appear to love their religion with all their hearts. When they\n marry and have children, they look after them as Catholic parents\n should do. Our parochial schools are well attended; our higher schools\n and academies are prosperous. Our teaching orders, of men and women,\n have their hands full of work, and they are almost without exception\n well supported. One of the bishops in a Western diocese, the greater\n part of whose flock are Germans, has the happiness of knowing that all\n the children of his people are in attendance either in his parochial\n schools or in other schools of which the teachers are Catholics.\u201d\n\n Our 1,237,563 German Catholics in America are ministered to in\n spiritual things by 1,373 German priests. They have 930 church\n edifices, while there are 173 other congregations of them regularly\n visited by priests, but as yet without church buildings. The whole\n number of Catholic priests in the United States, according to the\n _Catholic Directory_ for this year, is 5,297, of churches 5,292, and of\n chapels and stations 2,768. Thus it will be seen that the German\n priests number a little more than one-fourth of our American\n ecclesiastical army. There is a German priest for every 900 German\n Catholics. How faithfully they discharge their duties, and how\n zealously the people, on their part, assist their pastors, may be\n estimated by the fact that the baptisms by these German priests last\n year numbered 71,077\u2014an average of more than one each week for each\n priest; and that the number of children in the German parochial schools\n was 137,322\u2014an average of almost exactly 100 children for each priest.\n The following table will show with approximate exactness the number of\n German Catholic priests and German Catholic laymen in the various\n States or dioceses:\n\n\n _Priests_. _Laymen_.\n\n New York 149 134,100\n\n Baltimore 103 92,700\n\n Pennsylvania 75 67,500\n\n Ohio 200 180,000\n\n Indiana 132 118,800\n\n Michigan 33 29,700\n\n Kentucky 43 38,700\n\n Wisconsin 163 146,700\n\n Kansas 13 11,700\n\n Illinois 135 121,500\n\n Missouri 80 72,000\n\n Minnesota 74 69,600\n\n Louisiana 38 34,200\n\n Other 135 120,363\n localities\n\n \u2014\u2014 \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\n\n 1,373 1,237,563\n\n\n The education of the juvenile portion of this large army of\n German-American Catholics is partly in the hands of the teaching orders\n of the church, male and female; partly in the hands of the parish\n priests; and partly confided to private instructors. The \u201cGerman\n Sisters of Notre Dame,\u201d for example, 923 in number, in 79\n congregations, have charge of the parochial schools and instruct 25,557\n children. They have also 15 academies, in which 1,375 pupils are\n receiving higher education; and 11 orphan asylums with 1,400 children.\n Another branch of the same sisters have their houses in 17\n congregations, and in these 63 teaching sisters are instructing 9,000\n children; they have also 3 academies with 700 pupils. The German\n Franciscan Sisters, in 19 congregations, have 53 teaching sisters\n educating 5,700 children; and one academy. The Sisters of the Precious\n Blood, in 11 congregations, employ 17 of their number in teaching 900\n children. The German Dominican Sisters, whose houses are in New York,\n Williamsburg, and Racine, Wisconsin; and the Sisters of Christian\n Charity, at Melrose and elsewhere, are among the many religious orders\n chiefly engaged in educational work among the German Catholics. Prince\n Bismarck has done us a very good turn without wishing it. The expulsion\n of the religious orders of men and women caused by the persecution of\n the church in Germany compelled these servants of God to seek new\n homes. Many of these orders already had houses in this country; driven\n from Germany, they found not merely a refuge but a warm welcome and\n abundant work with their brothers and sisters here. Others of them, not\n previously established in this country, and being robbed by the\n paternal government of Prussia of all their property, arrived here in\n poverty; but they were joyfully received and speedily supplied with\n means for commencing their work in these new and inviting fields. The\n German branch of the Christian Brothers\u2014\u201cChristliche Schulbr\u00fcder\u201d\u2014has\n experienced a marvellous growth, and is accomplishing splendid results\n in the primary and higher education of the German Catholic youth.[87]\n\n A visit to a German Catholic church can scarcely fail to be interesting\n and profitable to an American Catholic. He will see much that is\n edifying and highly pleasing. The congregations at the early Masses on\n week-days\u2014we speak now only of what we have ourselves observed in New\n York\u2014are generally large and are composed of a fair share of men; at\n all the Masses on Sundays the attendance is still more numerous. On\n days of obligation, other than Sundays, these churches are thronged to\n their utmost capacity; at the nine o\u2019clock Mass on last Corpus Christi\n we saw the great Church of the Redemptorists, on Third Street, packed\n from the altar rails to the doors, and even the spacious vestibule\n filled with kneeling worshippers. On this occasion, as on many others,\n nearly or quite one-half of the congregation were men\u2014a fact which we\n emphasize, as it contradicts the mistaken idea that the faith is losing\n its hold upon our men and is mainly cherished only by women. There are\n thirteen German Catholic churches in this city. The good sense, thrift,\n and wise management of the Germans have borne their natural fruit in\n their churches and religious houses as well as elsewhere. For example,\n attached to each of the two Capuchin churches is a large, handsome, and\n substantial convent for the use of the fathers and for their schools.\n We were astonished at the extent, the good arrangement, and the\n solidity of these edifices, and our astonishment was not lessened when\n we learned that they had both been erected within the last ten years.\n\n It would be well, we think, if the relations between our German\n Catholics and the rest of us were made more close and intimate. The\n bond of faith, we know, unites us in all essential things; but it would\n be well for us to come nearer together in every way. Our German\n co-religionists are worthy of all esteem. They are already strong in\n numbers. They will constantly became stronger. The _Pall Mall Gazette_\n recently contained a most interesting summary of a report made by\n Vice-Consul Kruge upon the subject of German emigration. We quote the\n following portion of this summary:\n\n \u201cEmigration from Germany, particularly to the United States,\n increased steadily after the memorable year 1848, and assumed\n very large proportions immediately after the chances of a war\n between Austria and Prussia in 1852 and 1853. The largest\n number of emigrants of any year left in summer, 1854, or after\n the declaration of the Crimean war\u2014the United States alone\n receiving 215,009 German immigrants in that year. There appears\n a considerable falling off from 1858 to 1864, but already in\n 1865, when a probability of a war between Austria and Prussia\n became more and more visible, the number of emigrants began to\n increase very much. The years from 1866 to 1870, most likely in\n consequence of the suspicious relations between France and the\n North German Confederation, which ultimately brought on the war\n in 1870, give very large figures. Even the year 1870 has the\n large number of 91,779 emigrants. \u2018Strange to witness,\u2019 says\n Consul Kruge, \u2018after the close of the Franco-German war, when\n the German Empire had been created, and a prosperity seemed to\n have come over Germany beyond any expectation, when wages had\n been almost doubled, and when, in fact, everything looked in\n the brightest colors, a complete emigration fever was raging in\n all parts of Germany\u2019; and the years 1871, 1872, 1873 show an\n almost alarming tendency to quit the Fatherland. This movement\n would no doubt have continued but for the natural check it\n received through the financial and commercial crisis in the\n United States. There are however, at present again\n unquestionable signs that a very large emigrating element is\n smoldering in Germany, stimulated by political and economical\n embroilments which will break forth as soon as sufficient hope\n and inducements offer themselves in transatlantic countries in\n the eyes of the discontented and desponding Germans. The\n general political aspect and the decline of German commerce and\n industry at the present period are, observes Consul Kruge, such\n that an emigration on a large scale must be the natural\n consequence of the ruling state of affairs. Among other\n illustrations of the causes of a desire on the part of the\n Germans to leave their native land, Consul Kruge mentions the\n religious \u2018Kulturkampf,\u2019 which, he says, in its practical\n results may, at least up till now, be rightly termed an\n unsuccessful move on the political chessboard, and has been\n brought home by degrees to the Roman Catholic population in an\n irritating, harassing form. Between the priests on the one hand\n and the Government on the other the lives of the Roman Catholic\n peasantry are made one of \u2018perfect torment\u2019; and these people\n naturally desire to leave that country where, rightly or\n wrongly, they believe their religion attacked or endangered.\n The relations between France and Germany also act powerfully to\n promote emigration, and the huge expenses of maintaining the\n army, besides a navy of considerable size, contribute to swell\n the emigration tendency of the country. Consul Kruge thinks\n that if the Australian colonies care to have the largest\n portion of the coming German emigration, at no time have they\n had a better chance of creating an extensive movement to their\n shores than at present.\u201d\n\n These remarks strongly confirm the opinions expressed by ourselves when\n writing on the same subject four months ago.[88] But when the wave of\n German emigration again rises to its former height, it will turn toward\n this country, as before, and not to Australia. Here the German\n population is already so large and so well-to-do that the new-comers\n will find themselves at home upon their arrival. Especially will the\n United States be attractive to the German Catholics; for here they will\n find their exiled priests and nuns, already settled in their new homes,\n with churches and schools prepared for them. The return of moderate\n prosperity to the United States will probably give the signal for the\n commencement of the new German exodus; and we are scarcely too sanguine\n in believing that this return to prosperity will not be delayed much\n longer.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n AT THE CHURCH-DOOR.\n\n\n The city lights still glimmered in the square,\n Shivered with morning\u2019s chill the winter air,\n Scarce yet the eastern line of light broke through\n The starlit darkness of the deep skies\u2019 blue.\n\n Upon the sparkling snow clear shadows lay\n The moon flung eastward,\u2014as if so the day,\n Whose unseen coming seemed to fill the air,\n They yearning sought with outstretched arms of prayer.\n\n A sound of bells from far-off towers broke,\n The frosty silence with their pealing woke,\n And answering bells flung back across the sky\n The Christmas morning\u2019s glad, earth-echoed cry.\n\n Dark, muffled figures with quick, constant tread\n O\u2019er glittering ice and snowy pathway sped\u2014\n A gathering train, crowding from lane and street,\n To lay love\u2019s homage at the Child-Christ\u2019s feet.\n\n A soft gleam from the church\u2019s windows fell\n Across the square, as if in peace to tell\n Of light less clouded shining pure within,\n Of peace more eloquent cleansed souls should win.\n\n As, with the thronging crowd, my feet drew near\n The open doorway whence the light streamed clear,\n The accents of a language not my own\n Broke through the hurrying footsteps\u2019 monotone\u2014\n\n Quick-spoken words of soft Italian speech:\n So far the simple utterance seemed to reach,\n To Roman skies my dreaming thoughts it bore,\n While home\u2019s familiar walls new aspect wore.\n\n Seemed it almost, beneath that dark of dawn,\n As if my feet fell Roman pavement on,\n The lights that twinkled through the open door\n Burning some altar, centuries old, before,\n\n Whose glow, in truth, fell soft on northern fir\n O\u2019er whose dark shadow shone the face of her,\n The lowly Mother-Maid, Lady of Grace,\n Foligno\u2019s Queen watching the holy place.\n\n And shrined within lay martyr-saint of Rome\u2014\n Vial and bones from ancient catacomb\n Of that far city that seemed far no more,\n Whose faith and speech met at the low church-door.\n\n Seeming that speech true witness of the peace\n Won years ago, when weary earth\u2019s release\n The angels chanted in the midnight sky,\n And earth\u2019s Redeemer waked with infant cry:\n\n He who had come the narrow bonds to break\n Of race and nation, who frail flesh did take\n That Jew and Gentile might one Father claim,\n And win all sweetness through one Brother\u2019s name.\n\n Scarce foreign seemed the stranger\u2019s vivid word;\n Nay, rather was it as if so I heard\n The Christian speech of some old saintly age\n Claiming in faith an earlier heritage.\n\n Before one altar soon our knees should bend,\n In one heart\u2019s-worship soon our prayers ascend,\n Within those sacred walls\u2014our common home\u2014\n As children kneel of one true mother\u2014Rome.\n\n One faith was ours, one country all our own,\n Wherein all petty landmarks are o\u2019erthrown:\n Not worshipping as Latin, Saxon, Gaul\u2014\n The children of one God who made us all.\n\n Ours an inheritance so full and great,\n Each lowliest handmaid clothed in royal state;\n No heart so poor but that it throne may be\n For Heaven\u2019s King in his infinity.\n\n From Rome this guerdon of our faith we hold:\n What though its light o\u2019er broken seas is rolled?\n Unfaltering it shines through storm-clouds\u2019 shade,\n Unfailing beacon! by God\u2019s Spirit fed.\n\n A foreign faith! Ay, so, of that strange land\n Whereof as citizens our free souls stand,\n Whose earthly pasture is the church\u2019s shrine\u2014\n Earth\u2019s limits lost within her realm divine.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A SWEET REVENGE.\n\n CONCLUSION.\n\n IV.\n\n At this moment the door-handle was touched on the outside, and M.\n Rouvi\u00e8re sprang hastily from his chair and stationed himself with his\n back to the fire, looking very straight and stiff and aggressive. The\n door slowly opened and Mme. Dupuis entered, pushing out, at the same\n time, the unfortunate cat which was trying to slip in with her.\n\n \u201cNo, no, pussy,\u201d said the lady, \u201cyou got yourself turned out, and you\n must stay out. O the naughty men!\u201d she exclaimed, laughingly, as she\n closed the door, \u201cthey have been smoking.\u201d\n\n \u201cHave we been smoking?\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re, sniffing. \u201cBless me! I really\n believe we have; it shows how absent-minded one can be. I hadn\u2019t\n perceived it, so absorbed were George and I in our great project.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat project?\u201d asked madame as she took off her hood and cloak. \u201cAre\n you going to stay with us, M. Rouvi\u00e8re?\u201d\n\n \u201cNot exactly,\u201d replied the guest, \u201cbut for George and me the result is\n the same. Are you good at guessing riddles, madame?\u201d\n\n \u201cYou are not going to take George away with you, are you?\u201d asked the\n wife, her brown eyes resting firmly on his.\n\n \u201cWith your permission, dear lady,\u201d answered Rouvi\u00e8re, bowing with\n ironical politeness.\n\n \u201cNo, no, it cannot be!\u201d exclaimed Mme. Dupuis, with a forced,\n flickering smile, looking at him inquiringly and speaking low and\n hurriedly. \u201cYou will think me very silly to take a joke so seriously,\n but I cannot help it. You are playing with my life-spring. Tell me\u2014I\n pray you tell me, dear M. Rouvi\u00e8re, that you are _not_ going to take my\n husband away.\u201d\n\n \u201cI shall certainly leave his heart with you, my dear lady,\u201d answered\n the triumphant friend, \u201cbut it is a fact that I am going to carry off\n his body for a while. The long and the short of it is this: for some\n time past George has been meditating a return to the land of the\n living, and he is glad to seize this opportunity to start at once, thus\n obviating all minor hindrances.\u201d\n\n Mme. Dupuis listened silently, her eyes cast down; she had not taken a\n seat since her entrance into the room, and she continued standing,\n leaning against an arm-chair in front of her guest.\n\n \u201cIt is true, then,\u201d she murmured when Rouvi\u00e8re ceased speaking.\n\n \u201cDo you hear him?\u201d cried her tormentor, laughing, as a heavy thump was\n heard on the floor of the room above them. \u201cThe madcap! what a row he\n is making up there with his trunk. He\u2019s dragging it about as if it were\n a triumphal car. Come, now, madame, you really ought not to feel\n surprised that, after living thirty consecutive years in\n Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte, a man like George....\u201d\n\n \u201cDo not trouble yourself to enter into any explanations\u2014I understand,\u201d\n interrupted Mme. Dupuis dryly. \u201cWhere are you taking him?\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy, to tell the truth, my dear lady, everywhere; first....\u201d\n\n \u201cFor how long a time?\u201d again interrupted the victim.\n\n \u201cHow long? Well, a year, perhaps, or two years ... at most. Ah! my dear\n Mme. Dupuis, what pleasant hours he is preparing for you,\u201d continued M.\n Rouvi\u00e8re, who waxed each minute more and more vainglorious and\n jubilant. \u201cHow vastly will your remarkable collection of curiosities be\n enriched by his few months of travel! He will bring you back a dozen\n authentic reliquaries, and as many rosaries, blessed by the Holy Father\n himself ... _propria manu_! What say you to that?\u201d\n\n But Mme. Dupuis had ceased to listen; she had thrown herself into the\n arm-chair before her and was weeping bitterly. \u201cO my God! my God!\u201d were\n the only words she spoke between her sobs.\n\n \u201cGood!\u201d growled Rouvi\u00e8re, scowling at the unhappy woman\u2014\u201cthe elegiac\n style. Come, now,\u201d he continued, making a step towards her and forcing\n himself to speak gently\u2014\u201ccome, now, my dear lady, you are not\n reasonable. What is all this crying about? A journey. A journey don\u2019t\n kill a man; am not I a proof of that? And, good God! sailors\u2019\n wives\u2014what do they do? Really, this is too bad; you are placing _me_ in\n a most annoying position, madame,\u201d suddenly changing his gentle tone to\n one of vexation. \u201cYou are rendering my mission excessively painful.\u201d\n\n \u201cExcuse me, sir,\u201d sobbed the stricken wife, raising her wet face for a\n moment. \u201cYou see I ... I can\u2019t....\u201d She could not go on.\n\n M. Rouvi\u00e8re began to pace the room angrily; his tactics were at a loss,\n and he found his task more difficult than he had anticipated; the\n little \u201c_provinciale_\u201d did not resemble the old Indian vixen as much as\n he had imagined. Presently he stopped in front of the weeping lady.\n \u201cYou are doing, madame,\u201d said he sternly, \u201cprecisely what I was\n instructed to tell you George wishes to avoid.\u201d\n\n \u201cShall I not see him before he goes?\u201d asked Madame Dupuis with a\n frightened look, half-rising from her seat as she spoke.\n\n \u201cYou shall see him, if you can recover your equanimity,\u201d replied\n Rouvi\u00e8re; \u201cif you cannot, it will be better for you and for him not to\n meet. His resolution is not to be changed.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! I will be calm, I promise you,\u201d exclaimed the wife, great drops\n flowing fast down her pale cheeks; \u201cin a few minutes ... give me a few\n minutes more.... I cannot ... all at once.... O God! merciful God!\u201d\n Again she wept despairingly.\n\n \u201cI am compelled to make the remark, madame,\u201d observed Rouvi\u00e8re harshly,\n \u201cthat all this despair is quite out of proportion with the cause. The\n deuce take it! I\u2019m not carrying your husband off to the war.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, no; I believe that he will come back again,\u201d sobbed Mme. Dupuis,\n trying to wipe away her tears.\n\n \u201cYou are a pious woman, madame, and now\u2019s the hour to show your piety.\n Religion does not consist in only going to church. You are not to think\n of yourself solely in this world.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut you see, M. Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d replied the good little woman, making a\n great effort to control her emotion, \u201che\u2019s not accustomed, like you, to\n a life of continual fatigue; his health is more delicate than you\n suspect. You will take care of him,\u201d she added, suddenly seizing her\n enemy\u2019s right hand with both of hers\u2014\u201cyou will take care of him, will\n you not?\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy, certainly, madame, certainly,\u201d answered Rouvi\u00e8re a trifle more\n gently; \u201cyou may rely on me for that. I promise to bring him back to\n you as fresh and rosy as any lad in Cotentin. I give you my word of\n honor. You understand me, do you not? But now, I beg you, let us have\n no more tears, especially no scene at parting.\u201d\n\n \u201cI will do all you wish me to do.\u201d And Mme. Dupuis forthwith smiled\n tearfully on the hard, cold man who had so wantonly upset her\n happiness.\n\n \u201cLook,\u201d she cried presently, as she wiped away the last hot drops, \u201cit\n can\u2019t be perceived that I have been crying.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s right, madame; that\u2019s the way! I\u2019ve great esteem for strong,\n single-hearted women; for wives who are truly Christian and\n self-sacrificing. And now that you\u2019ve recovered your calmness, allow me\n to repeat to you that there really never was any reason for such great\n grief. What is a year? Gracious heavens! it is nothing. You will\n probably spend six months of it with your daughter, and the remaining\n six months you will pass here in the midst of your remembrances. George\n will not be more than half absent, for everything around you will bring\n him constantly before you; you will meet him at every step!\u201d\n\n \u201cTake care, sir, take care!\u201d said Mme. Dupuis, shaking her head at him\n with a faint smile, \u201clest, while you seek to comfort me, you increase\n the pain, ... which you cannot understand!\u201d\n\n \u201cI beg your pardon, madame; I understand it perfectly,\u201d replied\n Rouvi\u00e8re, an angry gleam lighting up his eyes for an instant, \u201cand I\n thought that I was proving to you that I do.\u201d\n\n \u201cO sir! believe me, I wish to cast no reflection either on your\n intelligence or your kindness; be quite sure of that!\u201d\n\n \u201cMadame!\u201d exclaimed the gentleman.\n\n \u201cBut there _are_ things,\u201d continued Mme. Dupuis, giving at last free\n utterance to her feelings\u2014\u201cthere _are_ things which are _not_ to be\n _guessed_. Have you thought how different your life has been to ours?\n You have been very wise; you have never allowed your heart to be bound\n by any of those ties whose number and strength are only recognized when\n they come to be broken. Yes, you may well say that everything here, the\n very hearthstone itself, forms a part of our united lives, of our\n remembrances, making our very thoughts the same. Everything around us\n loves us, everything is dear to us.... So, at least, I believed until\n now! A few minutes ago how dearly I prized the simple objects this room\n contains\u2014all so familiar to us both during so many years, all bearing\n traces of our habits; each one reminding us of the projects, the\n pleasures, the sorrows we have shared together! And now they are\n nothing to me\u2014they _can_ be nothing to me but the ruins of a false\n happiness, the wrecks of a dream!\u201d\n\n \u201cReally, madame, you exaggerate strangely,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re coldly;\n \u201cadmitting that this journey throws a shade over the present, the past,\n at least, remains intact.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou are mistaken, sir,\u201d returned Mme. Dupuis. \u201cThis journey is\n doubtless not much in itself, but it answers cruelly a question which I\n have been accustomed to ask myself in secret nearly all my life: Is\n George happy? No, he was not happy; I alone was happy. I know the truth\n at last! He was resigned\u201d\u2014she struggled a moment to contain her\n emotion\u2014\u201cbut he was not happy. And yet my heart\u2014I feel it, I am sure of\n it\u2014was worthy of his; in every other respect I was inferior to him, and\n I felt it bitterly. What companionship could a mind like his find in\n the conversation of a poor, provincial girl, ignorant of everything,\n knowing nothing but how to love him?\u201d\n\n \u201cYou undervalue yourself,\u201d remarked her attentive listener; \u201cas for me,\n I declare that the more I know you, the better I appreciate George\u2019s\n choice of a wife.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou flatter me, M. Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d replied Mme. Dupuis, smiling; \u201cyou see\n me unhappy, and you are generous. I will be so too, and forgive you all\n the pain you have occasioned me.... I have hated you for years.\u201d\n\n \u201cMe? Impossible! What had I done to deserve it? But first tell me\u201d\u2014and\n his voice was quite kind and gentle\u2014\u201cyou feel better now, do you not? I\n don\u2019t know how it is, but really you look ten years younger!\u201d\n\n \u201cPossibly,\u201d said Mme. Dupuis, with a quiet smile; \u201cI think that I am a\n little feverish\u2014so much the better!\u201d\n\n \u201cCome, come, cheer up! And tell me, now, what painful part have I\n played in your existence?\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, M. Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d she began calmly, but became more and more excited\n as she went on, \u201cI need scarcely tell you that every woman, from the\n very morrow of her wedding-day, finds herself in presence of a\n formidable rival\u2014her husband\u2019s _unmarried_ life. Nor need I explain how\n difficult is the task to make him forget all that he has given up for\n his wife; how almost impossible it is to allay his regret for the\n golden age that is gone\u2014regret which grows stronger as those past days\n recede farther and farther into the distance and youth fades away. I,\n sir, soon perceived that _your_ name, incessantly on his lips, was\n George\u2019s favorite symbol of lost pleasures\u2014the incarnation of all the\n illusions of by-gone years. In his dear thoughts _you_ represented\n liberty, adventure, and the days of fleeting sorrows and of infinite\n hopes; while _I_\u2014I was positive life, paltry domestic economy, and\n daily anxiety. _I_ was prose and _you_ were poetry. It was with you\n then that I had to struggle, and I did so with all my strength and with\n all my soul. Alas! it was in vain; you were stronger than I. Each day\n George grew more thoughtful, and it seemed to me as if every one of\n those moments of sadness was a triumph for you. How often have I wept\n secret tears over my defects, here, seated by this hearthstone, or\n under the willow-trees in our little garden! But I was young then, and\n God took pity on me and gave me my daughter, and you were overcome.\n Now\u201d\u2014her voice fell and she paused a moment\u2014\u201cnow the angel of our home\n is gone, and victory is once more yours.\u201d\n\n \u201cWho knows?\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re, his voice strangely hoarse and\n trembling. \u201cThe last word is not yet spoken. You are going to see\n George. Speak to him. You can still prevent his journey.\u201d\n\n \u201cI have promised you that I will not try to do so,\u201d she answered\n gently.\n\n \u201cBut I give you back your promise!\u201d cried her guest vehemently. \u201cI will\n not be your evil genius. I am abrupt, madame, selfish too,\n sometimes\u2014that\u2019s a bachelor\u2019s profession, you know; but I am not\n bad\u2014pray, believe it.\u201d\n\n \u201cI do believe it,\u201d she replied, looking him frankly and smilingly in\n the eyes, \u201cbut I know George. All my efforts would be useless; they\n would irritate him, and nothing more. Besides, even if, by dint of\n tears, I could keep him at home, I would not do it now. I should only\n be adding another new and bitter regret to those which have already\n poisoned his life. And my heart would seem to reproach me with my\n victory every time that I saw him silent or sad. No; he must go!\u201d\n\n \u201cAll you say is true\u2014too true,\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re after a short pause.\n \u201cThere is nothing to reply; you are right. But depend on me, madame, to\n shorten his absence.\u201d\n\n \u201cI will depend on you; thank you.\u201d She rose from her seat as she spoke\n and offered her hand to him. The repentant guest clasped it in both of\n his and kissed it, bowing low as he did so. At the same moment a loud\n noise as of something falling down the stairs, followed by a great\n confusion of tongues, was heard outside.\n\n \u201cMy God! what is the matter?\u201d exclaimed Mme. Dupuis, pale as death. \u201cIt\n is he; I hear his voice!\u201d\n\n She rushed towards the door, but before she could reach it her husband\n entered, boiling over with passion, and followed by Marianne.\n\n \u201cYou\u2019re an awkward dunce! Be silent, I command you!\u201d he shouted, as the\n maid tried to excuse herself. \u201cYou can\u2019t make me believe that you find\n this trunk, which has nothing but a few shirts in it, too heavy for you\n to carry. The stupid creature,\u201d he continued, turning to his wife,\n \u201cactually let my trunk roll from the top to the bottom of the\n staircase!\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, the fact is,\u201d cried Marianne, \u201cever since you told me that you\n were going to Rome I\u2019ve lost all strength in my arms and legs. I\u2019ve no\n strength at all. Going to Rome, indeed! What next?\u201d\n\n \u201cThe woman is crazy,\u201d said Dupuis, red with indignation. \u201cWhat business\n is it of yours, I should like to know?\u201d\n\n \u201cI don\u2019t say that it\u2019s my business,\u201d replied the maid, who was as red\n and angry as her master, \u201cbut, all the same, it\u2019s a queer idea to leave\n mistress here all alone, at her age too, while you go to Rome. You\u2019ll\n be lucky if you find her again when you come back. _I_ won\u2019t answer for\n it.\u201d\n\n \u201cMarianne, take care!\u201d cried Dupuis, who had listened, speechless with\n amazement, to his old servant\u2019s impertinence. \u201cYou must see that I am\n far from pleased.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m not surprised at that,\u201d returned she; \u201cyou\u2019re not pleased with\n others, because you\u2019re not pleased with yourself. That\u2019s always the\n way.\u201d\n\n \u201cI dismiss you from my service,\u201d cried her master, in a fury.\n\n \u201cGo down stairs directly, Marianne,\u201d said her mistress sternly.\n\n \u201cI dismiss you,\u201d repeated Dupuis; \u201cthough they should be the last words\n I have to speak in my own house, they shall be obeyed. I dismiss you\n from my service! It is your fault also, my dear Reine,\u201d he added when\n the maid had gone from the room; \u201cyou allow your servants to be too\n familiar with you. You see the consequence. I hope you understand that\n I have dismissed that woman?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, George,\u201d answered the lady gently; \u201cI will settle her wages\n to-morrow morning, if you do not change your mind.\u201d\n\n \u201cChange my mind!\u201d exclaimed her husband. \u201cAm I accustomed to change my\n mind every five minutes? Am I a weathercock, or do you deem me so\n weakened by age that I can submit to be lectured by my own servants?\u201d\n\n \u201cI beg you, dear, not to say another word on the subject. She shall go\n away to-morrow. But I want to know, George, if you have all you need.\n Let me look into your trunk, will you? Men don\u2019t know much about\n wearing-apparel, and when one is travelling the merest trifle that is\n missing suffices to put one out of sorts for the whole day. I know that\n you can buy whatever you want, but where\u2019s the use when you can avoid\n it? And then, too, I wish to make you think of me all the time, you\n gadabout!\u201d\n\n \u201cDo as you like, love,\u201d said George; \u201chere are the keys.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, Tom,\u201d he continued, when the lady had closed the door behind\n her, \u201cit seems to me that she received the news very well indeed.\u201d\n\n \u201cPerfectly; do you know, George, your wife possesses some great\n qualities?\u201d\n\n \u201cI know she does,\u201d returned Dupuis, looking inquisitively at his\n friend\u2019s serious, almost downcast countenance.\n\n \u201cShe is shy and excessively timid, and that does her wrong,\u201d went on\n Rouvi\u00e8re.\n\n \u201cI told you so, my dear friend,\u201d cried Dupuis eagerly. \u201cShe was afraid\n of you at dinner. Now, I would bet any sum that, the ice once broken,\n you hardly recognized her.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is true. Under the influence of deep emotion\u2014for I will not conceal\n that she was at first very much affected\u2014she found expressions,\n directly from her heart, which astonished me.\u201d\n\n \u201cShe has plenty of heart, that\u2019s certain!\u201d exclaimed the gratified\n husband.\n\n \u201cAnd you may add,\u201d said his friend, \u201cthat she possesses a most refined\n and elevated mind.\u201d\n\n \u201cI know it, Tom\u2014I know it well!\u201d cried Dupuis with delight. \u201cI\u2019m not a\n blockhead, hey? Do you suppose that I should have married her, if I had\n not known all that? And if it had to be done again, I should do it\n again. I am not only happy in the woman I have chosen, Tom, but I am\n proud of her! She has some slight defects\u2014I see them as well as any\n one\u2014but, bless me! of what consequence is a little awkwardness, or\n perhaps a few parish prejudices, when you find in the same woman the\n most self-sacrificing tenderness, the most exquisite good sense and\n uprightness, the most fervent and unassuming piety\u2014in short, all the\n virtues that can captivate an honest man?\u201d\n\n \u201cHa! ha!\u201d laughed Rouvi\u00e8re, slapping him caressingly on the shoulder.\n \u201cAn honest man\u2014there you are! Well, well! all right.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d asked Dupuis, astonished.\n\n \u201cI mean,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re, \u201cthat the conclusion of your little speech\n is perfectly clear: thinking better about our journey, and estimating\n more coolly the value of the treasure that remains in the house, you\n have lost the courage to leave it. In short, you are about to let me go\n away alone.... I can understand perfectly that it should be so.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut I swear ...\u201d cried Dupuis.\n\n \u201cSay no more, say no more,\u201d interrupted his friend. \u201cI understand it\n all perfectly, I tell you.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou _mis_understand, you mean,\u201d said Dupuis angrily. \u201cI have never,\n for one moment, forgotten my wife\u2019s good qualities, but, were she ten\n times the saint she is, it is not less true that I have been living the\n life of a snail. Good heavens! I shall be better able to appreciate her\n many virtues when no consciousness of intellectual degradation is\n present to spoil my enjoyment.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou are too absurd, George! You make me laugh with your \u2018intellectual\n degradation.\u2019\u201d\n\n \u201cYou did not laugh half an hour ago,\u201d retorted Dupuis, \u201cwhen you\n depicted it in colors ... well, in colors which not even your\n friendship for me could soften.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs it possible that you did not perceive that I was jesting? How\n singular it is that there\u2019s not an intelligent man in France who, if he\n is condemned to live in the provinces, far from Paris, does not fancy\n that he is becoming idiotic! I had a presentiment that you suffered\n from this monomania, and I amused myself by exciting it. I had been\n drinking, you know; let that be my excuse.\u201d\n\n \u201cHowever that may be,\u201d answered Dupuis, a cold, stubborn expression\n stealing over his face and fixing itself there, \u201cI am more than ever\n resolved to travel; if I hesitated before, I do so no longer. I confess\n that I was afraid of the effect my intention would produce on my wife,\n but her calmness removes all my scruples.\u201d\n\n \u201cListen to me, George, I beg you,\u201d replied his friend earnestly: \u201cdon\u2019t\n trust too much to appearances; your wife affects a firmness she is far\n from feeling. I know....\u201d\n\n \u201c_You know_!\u201d interrupted Dupuis. \u201cYou know that you begin to think\n that I shall be in your way, and so you want to cast me over.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, George, no\u2014nothing of the kind. You don\u2019t understand me. I\n sincerely believed, from what you said, that you had changed your mind.\n I thought that I was anticipating your wishes in giving back your\n promise to go with me. But if you really persist in your intentions,\n all right ... I am delighted.\u201d\n\n \u201cHere are the horses,\u201d bawled Marianne, opening the door suddenly and\n then shutting it with a bang.\n\n \u201cThat old woman would take my life, if she could,\u201d said Rouvi\u00e8re,\n laughing. \u201cNow, then,\u201d he continued, taking up his cloak, \u201clet\u2019s gird\n up our loins. By the bye, I think I remember that you never can sleep\n in a coach.\u201d\n\n \u201cI beg your pardon, I can sleep perfectly well.\u201d\n\n \u201cSo much the better. _Allons!_ Bravo! Are the horses put to, I wonder?\n Does this window look out upon the street?\u201d Rouvi\u00e8re opened the sash as\n he spoke, but closed it quickly. \u201cWhat a wind! It\u2019s terrible\u2014cold\n enough to split a rock! Now I think of it, one of the glasses of the\n post-chaise is broken. I\u2019m afraid you\u2019ll be frozen to death, George.\u201d\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t trouble yourself about me,\u201d replied Dupuis, putting on his\n overcoat. \u201cI can bear cold like a Laplander.\u201d\n\n \u201cAll right!\u201d\n\n The clock at this moment struck nine, and Madame Dupuis entered the\n room, carrying a soft India shawl suspended from her arm. The poor lady\n was very pale.\n\n \u201cEverything is ready,\u201d she said with a trembling voice, \u201cand here are\n your keys, dear. You will see that I have added some few little things\n that you had forgotten. And here is a comforter for you. I\u2019ve cut my\n old cashmere shawl in two, and half of it will be very nice to wrap\n round your throat; it is very warm.\u201d\n\n \u201cHow foolish of you to cut up your shawl!\u201d cried Dupuis. \u201cHowever,\n since \u2019tis done, I accept; but it really was very foolish of you.\u201d\n\n \u201cHere is the other half for you, M. Rouvi\u00e8re,\u201d said madame, presenting\n it with a kind smile.\n\n \u201cFor me!\u201d cried Rouvi\u00e8re, taking it from her with respectful eagerness.\n \u201cThank you, thank you most sincerely!\u201d\n\n \u201cYou will remember your promises, will you not?\u201d asked the lady gently,\n fixing her eyes on his.\n\n Rouvi\u00e8re bowed and turned away abruptly.\n\n \u201cYou will write to our daughter, George? You will not fail?\u201d\n\n \u201cI will write to her\u2014to both of you\u2014often, often,\u201d answered George in a\n husky voice, and pulling his travelling-cap over his eyes.\n\n \u201cThe 12th of January!\u201d suddenly exclaimed Rouvi\u00e8re, who was warming his\n feet at the fire, while he examined an almanac placed on the\n chimney-piece. \u201cIs it really the 12th of January to-day?\u201d\n\n \u201cIt really is,\u201d replied Mme. Dupuis. \u201cWhy do you ask? Is there any\n particular remembrance attached to that date?\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is a date which interests me only,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re in a tone of\n infinite sadness. \u201cFive years ago this very evening, almost at this\n same hour, I was passing through an ordeal I shall never forget. Now,\n George, _are_ you ready?\u201d he added with abrupt impatience.\n\n \u201cWhat kind of an ordeal? What had happened to you? An accident?\u201d asked\n George, with intense interest.\n\n \u201cNo, not an accident, but I was very ill, which is always a\n misfortune\u2014and ill in an inn, which is horrible.\u201d\n\n \u201cPeople are ill everywhere,\u201d remarked Dupuis sententiously.\n\n \u201cTrue; but the impressions made on you by sickness and death vary\n according to the circumstances in which they surprise you; you can\n scarcely conceive how much, unless you have had the experience.\u201d\n\n \u201cPshaw! death is death under all circumstances; it is always equally\n unpleasant!\u201d cried Dupuis.\n\n \u201cAh! you think that.... I should like to have seen you.... Well, I\u2019ll\n tell you my story. It happened at Peschiera, on the Lago di Guardia\u2014a\n lovely country; we\u2019ll pass through it, and I\u2019ll show you the house. I\n was detained there by a fever of a somewhat pernicious character. All\n went on well, however, during eight days\u2014for I was delirious the whole\n time, and knew nothing of what was passing\u2014till one fine evening, the\n evening of the 12th of January, when I suddenly came to myself, so weak\n in body, so anxious in spirit, and at the same time with such an\n extraordinary lucidity of mind that I felt convinced I was at the point\n of death. I have passed through many bitter moments in the course of my\n life\u2014cruel moments\u2014which nevertheless I can think of now with a kind of\n pleasure; but when I recall to mind my awakening in that inn-chamber, a\n cold shiver runs through me; I shudder!\u201d\n\n Rouvi\u00e8re paused as Marianne entered the room; Mme. Dupuis signed to her\n imperatively not to interrupt, and the maid remained standing near the\n door.\n\n \u201cWhat did you see that could make such a fearful impression on you?\u201d\n asked George, moving a little nearer to his friend.\n\n \u201cNothing very horrible; only some people who were waiting for me to\n die, an old woman and a young doctor who were conversing together in a\n corner, and a priest who was kneeling at the foot of my bed.\n\n \u201cThey formed to my eye a picture whose accessories were the dirty,\n faded curtains of the couch on which I was stretched and the tarnished,\n heterogeneous furniture of a lodging-house. But the ignoble\n surroundings, the preparations for death even, caused me no emotion;\n what revolted me\u2014stirred up my very soul to protest\u2014was the neglect,\n the brutal lack of charity\u2014saving the presence of the priest\u2014the\n desolate isolation, the void of all human sympathy in which I\n _realized_ that I was at that moment dying. How distinctly I can\n recollect the pitiful, suppliant look with which I gazed around me, as\n if trying to interlink the life that was escaping me with _any_, the\n slightest, earthly object; as if seeking to discover some sign of\n interest, of pity even, in the impassible faces which looked so calmly\n on me! My agonized heart longed for _any_ trifle\u2014a picture, a vase, a\n chair\u2014which had _known_ me, and to which I could say farewell. But all\n was strange.\u201d\n\n \u201cDeath never _can_ be agreeable,\u201d remarked Dupuis crabbedly. \u201cWhen the\n last hour is upon us it is dismal to be alone, I don\u2019t say the\n contrary; but I can\u2019t see that it is more cheerful to be surrounded by\n a weeping family.\u201d\n\n \u201cI think that you would have felt as _I_ felt then,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re\n with melancholy gravity; \u201cthe death which God has ordained for men\u2014the\n death which most men die, which finds consolation and resignation in\n the tears of tender regret shed by loving friends\u2014that death appeared\n to me, in my solitary agony, like a sweet, untroubled feast.... I made\n many a singular reflection that night! But come, George, are you\n ready?\u201d\n\n \u201cWhen you will; ... but, first, what were your reflections?\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, to tell you the truth, I lost somewhat of my self-sufficiency.\n And then I congratulated myself a little less on the path I had chosen\n for my life\u2019s journey. Why not say it? The book of life seemed suddenly\n to be opened before me, and I read on every page, traced by God\u2019s own\n hand, the words \u2018duty and sacrifice.\u2019 I had rejected that law. Hitherto\n I had only seen its hardships; now I recognized its benefits. I had\n avoided its bonds that I might live independently, and exile and\n isolation had been my lot. I had fancied that, by escaping the usual\n dull routine of humble duties, I should win for myself a happiness\n unknown\u2014pleasures inconceivable to the vulgar crowd. Alas! I found that\n I had experienced nothing save a loveless youth, a solitary old age,\n and an unlamented death. Then, George\u2014_then_ I understood what an\n erroneous price we pay for the indulgence of our selfishness.\u201d\n\n \u201cWere you long in this agitated state?\u201d asked Dupuis.\n\n \u201cLong enough for it to be indelibly impressed on my memory,\u201d replied\n his friend. \u201cWhen the young physician perceived that I was looking at\n him, he arose and approached me, and I felt the touch of his hand, cold\n and indifferent as his heart. I pushed it away and closed my eyes. And\n then a vision of my father\u2019s death-bed flashed before me, distinct and\n clear. I saw again, grouped around it, the faithful friends of his\n youth\u2014our ancient servants, the old doctor, the white-haired priest,\n and, dearest of all, my mother, my good mother. They leaned over him,\n they wiped his damp brow, they smiled at him through their tears; they\n had gladdened his life, and they were beside him now, to cheer and\n sustain him as he passed away! My dried-up heart melted within me as I\n gazed on this vision of a scene I had long since ceased to recall, and\n I burst into tears; they saved me!\u201d\n\n Rouvi\u00e8re stopped, overpowered by his emotion, and, covering his eyes\n with his hand, leant forward against the mantle-shelf.\n\n \u201cThese recollections are too painful,\u201d said Dupuis gently.\n\n \u201cThey _are_ painful,\u201d replied Rouvi\u00e8re, his voice hoarse and trembling,\n \u201cand everything I see around me here awakens them. Oh! how alike these\n old houses are,\u201d he continued, speaking to himself and looking around\n the room. \u201cAll this is familiar to me. There stood my mother\u2019s little\n work-table near the window, just as that is\u2014I always found her seated\n at it when I came home for a holiday\u2014and there, in the chimney-corner,\n was the great arm-chair in which my father always sat. And the family\n portraits looked down from the walls just as these do. There, as here,\n the trace of two lives closely entwined, never to be separated, was\n visible everywhere. Why did I not learn by their example? Why was I\n compelled to drag my weary, vagrant life, my unceasing remorse, all\n over the wide world, ere I could comprehend that they were happy? Did\n _they_ know that they were happy? I doubt it. How often I have heard my\n father speak with envy of the very pleasures I have found so hollow!\n How often they confided to me their mutual grievances! And yet when one\n went the other could not stay. Dear old father! dearest mother!\u201d\n\n \u201cMy dear friend!\u201d whispered George.\n\n \u201cAnd I,\u201d continued Rouvi\u00e8re, with increasing emotion\u2014\u201cI sold their home\n as soon as it was empty\u2014I had the heart to do that! I sold the room\n where I was born; I sold all our family traditions; I sold the ancient,\n faithful friendships which seemed to adhere to the house and soil. I\n alienated my patrimony.... I riveted the chain of egotism I was so\n eagerly forging. I did my work well; no kind care, no friendly\n companionship will ever be the solace of _my_ old age. I have nothing\n to offer in return\u2014not even the bribe of a legacy. I cannot even buy\n back that humble home; my last days may not be sheltered by those walls\n whose very shadows I have learned to love. I may not even die there.\n Come! let us go,\u201d he added with vehemence, dashing away the tears which\n suddenly inundated his face.\n\n \u201cYes, Tom, we will go\u201d\u2014and George seized his friend\u2019s hand\u2014\u201cwe will go,\n if you refuse to accept a brother\u2019s place by my fireside. And you,\n Reine,\u201d he said, turning to his wife, \u201cdry your tears and forget this\n hour\u2019s ingratitude. It was the first; it shall be the last!\u201d\n\n \u201cO George, my husband!\u201d sobbed the sweet little woman as she gave him\n the kiss of pardon; then, approaching Rouvi\u00e8re with gentle grace, she\n said softly and beseechingly:\n\n \u201cWill not the happiness you have restored to us tempt you to remain\n with us? We should be so glad to share it with you!\u201d\n\n \u201cMadame, dear, good friends,\u201d stammered the guest.... \u201cO George! you\n have caught me in the very snare I spread for you.\u201d\n\n He sank into a chair, overcome by his emotion, while George and Reine\n stood by him, clasping his hands in theirs. \u201cOh!\u201d sighed he at last,\n \u201cit is too sweet a dream for such a forlorn wretch as I am.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe will stay with us!\u201d exclaimed Mme. Dupuis joyfully.\n\n \u201cAnd I will go and make his bed in the best blue chamber,\u201d cried\n Marianne, wiping her eyes with her apron. The poor girl had been\n standing quietly near the door, an involuntary listener, during almost\n the whole of Rouvi\u00e8re\u2019s confession.\n\n \u201cWhat! the deuce! Marianne!\u201d growled Rouvi\u00e8re, rising hastily from his\n seat.\n\n \u201cI\u2019m going to make your bed, sir!\u201d cried Marianne, in great good-humor.\n\n \u201cVery well, then; but don\u2019t let the head be lower than the heels, my\n good creature, as you house-maids generally manage it. Slope it down\n gently from head to foot, mind you, and....\u201d He stopped a moment, then\n smilingly resumed: \u201cMake it as you will, Marianne; I\u2019m sure it will be\n first-rate. You see,\u201d he added, turning toward his hosts when Marianne\n had left the room, \u201chow this disgusting egotism crops up incessantly;\n ... you must try to cure me of it. Oh! what a rest I\u2019m going to have\n now,\u201d he exclaimed as he threw himself on the sofa.... \u201cMadame, dear\n madame, will you do me a favor? I know what the pains of exile are by\n sad experience\u2014pray, let the cat come in!\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE RECENT PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL CONVENTION AND CONGRESS.\n\n This convention, which met in Boston on the 3d of October and continued\n in session for twenty days, was the triennial \u201cConvention of the\n Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America.\u201d The\n bishops sat in a house by themselves and conducted their proceedings in\n secret, following in this the precedent of the Anglican Church as well\n as the custom of the Roman Catholic Church in its provincial and\n plenary councils. The House of Deputies consisted of one hundred and\n eighty clergymen and one hundred and eighty laymen, representing\n forty-five dioceses, and eight clergymen and eight laymen representing\n eight \u201cmissionary jurisdictions.\u201d These sat in public, and a verbatim\n report of their proceedings is before us. Among the lay delegates were\n several gentlemen of national fame\u2014the Hons. John W. Maynard, of\n Pennsylvania; Thomas A. Hendricks, of Indiana, the Democratic candidate\n for the Vice-Presidency at the recent election; John W. Stevenson, of\n Kentucky; John W. Hunter and L. Bradford Prince, of Long Island; Gen.\n C. C. Augur, U. S. Army; Daniel R. Magruder and Montgomery Blair, of\n Maryland; Robert C. Winthrop, of Massachusetts; General J. H. Simpson,\n U. S. Army; Hamilton Fish, Cambridge Livingston, and W. A. Davies, of\n New York; Morrison R. Waite, of Ohio; and Geo. W. Thompson and Richard\n Parker, of Virginia. It is not probable that any of the other sects\n could marshal laymen like these to sit in its councils. We mention\n their names because the list affords some explanation of the fact that\n the social and political influence of the Protestant Episcopalians is\n vastly out of proportion to their numerical strength. At a preliminary\n session, the bishops and deputies being together, Dr. Williams, the\n Bishop of Connecticut, preached a sermon in which he introduced a\n subject that subsequently occupied much of the attention of the\n convention\u2014\u201cthe most threatening social evil of our time, the growing\n lack of sympathy between different classes and individuals of such\n classes.\u201d \u201cTo-day,\u201d he said, \u201cwe see great chasms opening everywhere\n because of this, which threatens church and state alike with sad\n disaster.\u201d And he added:\n\n \u201cI think those chasms are more entirely unrelieved and ghastly\n in this country than in almost any other. I know that we have\n not been wont so to think or speak, and I know that to say this\n involves some chance of incurring severe displeasure; but I\n fully believe it to be true. In most lands there are things\u2014I\n speak of things outside of Christian sympathies and labors\u2014that\n somewhat bridge over these threatening severances. There are\n ancient memories; ancestral offices and ministries that in\n their long continuance have almost become binding laws;\n relations, long enduring, of patronage and clientship; and many\n other things besides. With us\u2014we may as well face the\n fact\u2014those things have, for the most part, no existence. The\n one only helping thing we have\u2014still apart from what was just\n alluded to\u2014is political equality. And how much virtue has that\n shown itself to have in pressing exigencies and emergencies?\n When, all at once, in the late summer months, that yawning\n chasm opened at our feet which appeared to threaten nearly\n everything in ordinary life, how little there seemed to be to\n turn to! There stood on either side contending forces in\n apparently irreconcilable opposition, and everywhere we heard\n the cry about rights! rights! rights! till nothing else was\n heard. If some few voices dared to speak of duties they were\n lost in the angry clamor. And yet those voices must be heard.\n Those words about duty on the one side and the other must be\n listened to, if ever we are to have more than an armed truce\n between these parties\u2014a truce which may at any time burst out\n into desolating strife.\u201d\n\n Dr. Williams\u2019 remedy was, of course, that the Protestant Episcopalians\n should teach the people their duties. To do this, however, they must\n first get the hearing of the people. But this is just what they have\n failed to get, and will always fail in getting\u2014certainly so long as\n they provide fine churches with eloquent preachers for the rich, and a\n very different order of preachers and churches for the poor. The\n Catholic Church, before whose altars all distinctions of earthly rank\n and position disappear, can and does teach the people what their duties\n are, and she does it with effect, since her priests speak with\n authority and by virtue of an incontestably divine commission\u2014two\n things quite unknown among the sects. This is what Rev. Hugh Thompson\n felt and acknowledged when, in the Episcopal Church Congress held in\n this city, he said:\n\n \u201cWhat is the worth of a church in this world except as a moral\n teacher\u2014except this: to get the Ten Commandments kept on earth?\n The church canons are usually busy with questions affecting\n garments, gestures, postures, and the orthodoxy of the\n Prayer-Book, but rarely do we find any moral legislation. There\n are plenty of instructions to the clergy and bishops, and we\n are led to think what a wicked lot of people these clergy and\n bishops must be to need all these laws, and what a good and\n pious laity we must have when they have no need of such\n legislation! The church gives no real expression of opinion on\n the complicated questions of marriage, so that one minister may\n bless a union while another would not do so under any\n circumstances. Is it right that the church should evade such\n responsibilities as these? The church must place itself plainly\n on record. The church must be to a millionaire and beggar the\n same, must demand equal justice for all\u2014for the railway\n president and the railway brakeman, for the worshipper in the\n gilded temple and in the ordinary meeting-house. Such a church,\n with the courage and fearlessness and ability to tell and\n enforce the eternal truth, without fear or favor, is what this\n country is waiting for, and would have an influence here\n unequalled since the days of Athanasius.\u201d\n\n The first two days of the convention were spent chiefly in rather\n unseemly discussions upon a proposition to print fifteen hundred copies\n of Dr. Williams\u2019 sermon, to appoint a committee \u201cto consider the\n importance of the practical principles enunciated in it,\u201d and in\n attempts to begin a debate upon three amendments to the constitution\n proposed three years ago by the last convention. Much interest was\n excited by some remarks by the Rev. Dr. Harwood, of Connecticut, who\n thought that one of the most pressing duties of the convention would be\n the invention of a method whereby clergymen who had grown tired of\n their work might be retired without incurring disgrace. It is curious\n to observe how the Catholic doctrine, \u201conce a priest always a priest,\u201d\n still lingers among the laity of this Protestant body, while its\n clergymen, or some of them, seem anxious to destroy it. Dr. Harwood\n complained that although at present the regulations of his church\n permitted any clergyman to \u201cwithdraw from the ministry for causes not\n affecting his moral character,\u201d nevertheless \u201csomewhat of a stigma\n rests upon the man, and people may even point to his children and say,\n \u2018There go the children of a disgraced clergyman.\u2019\u201d This state of things\n was found to be \u201ca grievous burden\u201d; for there were numbers of good\n fellows who feel that \u201cthey are out of place in the ministry of the\n Protestant Episcopal Church,\u201d and who still continue in that service\n because they fear to incur disgrace by leaving it. Dr. Harwood drew a\n pitiful picture of the condition of these unhappy persons: \u201cThey may\n have changed their minds about some doctrine; they may believe too much\n or too little; they may be drifting towards a blank unbelief or towards\n a wretched superstition; they may feel that they have mistaken their\n calling and cannot do their work, for neither their hearts nor their\n minds are in it.\u201d We agree with Dr. Harwood that his church would be\n better off without such parsons; and it is sad to record that his\n proposition, looking towards the adoption of a cheap and easy, although\n \u201chonorable,\u201d method of getting rid of them, was not finally successful.\n\n On the third day of the convention the Rev. Dr. De Koven, of Wisconsin,\n brought forward the question of changing the name of the Protestant\n Episcopal Church. This proposition was made in the interest of that\n section of it which follows the Anglican ritualists. This section has a\n real or affected horror of the word \u201cProtestant\u201d; its members wish to\n persuade themselves that they are Catholics\u2014and the wish is very\n natural and most praiseworthy\u2014but they are resolved never to seek the\n reality and yield to the living authority of the Catholic Church. In\n order to avoid this submission, they set up the claim that they are\n themselves the Catholic Church, or rather \u201ca branch\u201d of it. To make\n this claim a little less absurd the elimination of the word\n \u201cProtestant\u201d would be advisable; and for some time past, it appears, an\n industrious propaganda for this purpose has been carried on. Certain of\n the bishops, many of the clergymen, and a number of the journals of the\n Protestant Episcopalians have been enlisted in the proposed \u201creform,\u201d\n and its advocates mustered all their forces in the convention. Dr. De\n Koven introduced the matter by reading a paper adopted in the diocese\n of Wisconsin last June, and moving a resolution. The paper was as\n follows:\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, The American branch of the Catholic Church\n universal [_sic_] includes in its membership all baptized\n persons in this land; and\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, The various bodies of professing Christians, owing\n to her first legal title, do not realize that the church known\n in law as the \u2018Protestant Episcopal Church\u2019 is, in very deed\n and truth, the American branch of the one Catholic Church of\n God; therefore, be it\n\n \u201c_Resolved_, That the deputies to the General Convention from\n this diocese be requested to ask of the General Convention the\n appointment of a constitutional commission, to which the\n question of a change of the legal title of the church, as well\n as similar questions, may be referred.\u201d\n\n Dr. De Koven accordingly presented a motion for the appointment of this\n commission and moved its reference to the Committee on Constitutional\n Amendments. The absurd side of the assumptions made in the preamble is\n apparent; but the ridicule and scorn which they excite should not blind\n one to the arrogant claim therein set up. It is laughable to assert\n that a sect with less than 270,000 communicants, and with a history of\n less than a century, claims as its members all the baptized persons in\n the United States, including seven or eight millions of Roman\n Catholics; it is still more ludicrous to be told that the reason why we\n and all the other \u201cbaptized persons\u201d do not recognize this sect as our\n mother the church is that up to this time she has chosen to call\n herself by a false name. The name\u2014the name\u2019s the thing wherewith to\n catch the conscience of the people! Let us only call ourselves\n something else, and then \u201call the baptized persons in this\n land\u201d\u2014Papists, Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists, Mormons, and all\n the rest\u2014will hasten to exclaim, \u201cOur long-lost mother! Behold your\n children!\u201d This is the ludicrous side of the business, and it is funny\n enough. The serious side of it is the fact that a claim so arrogant\n should be seriously presented in a convention composed of respectable,\n and in some cases eminent, American gentlemen. Let us see what became\n of it.\n\n Dr. De Koven\u2019s motion immediately caused an animated debate. An attempt\n to get rid of it by laying it on the table was lost; and after a\n disorderly and heated discussion, in which the president seemed\n occasionally to lose his head, the motion for reference to the\n committee was carried. On the eighth day of the session the committee,\n through Mr. Hamilton Fish, reported that it was \u201cinexpedient to\n institute any commission to revise and amend the constitution of the\n church,\u201d for the reason, among others, that such a commission would be\n unlimited in its powers and might upset everything. On the tenth day\n another committee, to whom had been \u201creferred certain memorials and\n papers looking to a change in the legal title of the church,\u201d reported\n that such a change might impair the legal right of property in the\n several dioceses, and that it would be better to make no change. The\n two reports came up for decision on the twelfth day of the session, and\n the ball was opened by Dr. De Koven in a long and clever speech. He\n proposed the adoption of a new resolution providing for the appointment\n of a commission to consider and report upon the best method of\n \u201cremoving apparent ambiguities,\u201d and \u201cthe setting forth our true\n relations to the Anglican communion as well as to the whole Catholic\n Church.\u201d He drew a very curious and not at all a pleasant picture of\n his church as at present constituted. So far as the laity are\n concerned, anybody may be a lay member, if he \u201cmerely goes to church a\n few times a year\u201d and pays money for the support of the minister. \u201cHe\n need not be baptized; he need not be confirmed; he need not be a\n communicant. He may even be Jew, Turk, or infidel, if you please,\n _provided he has the money qualification which makes up the franchise\n of the church_.\u201d Here, indeed, is a pitiable state of things; a society\n composed of unbaptized persons can scarcely be called a Christian\n association. \u201cUnderneath it all,\u201d Dr. De Koven went on to say, \u201clies\n this money qualification. The parish elects its vestry, and its vestry\n need not be communicants. The vestry and parish elect the lay delegates\n to the diocesan convention, and they need not be communicants. The\n diocesan convention elects the lay members of the standing committees,\n and they need not be communicants.\u201d The truth is that the ruling laymen\n of the sect need not be, and probably are not, Christians at all, and\n that they \u201crun the machine\u201d for social and political purposes, just as\n they would manage a club or a political party. If the laymen are of\n this stripe, what can be said of the priests? \u201cLike people, like\n priest,\u201d said Dr. De Koven; \u201cAs you go through the land and witness the\n sorrow, the trials, the degradation of the parochial clergy, you are\n quite well aware that underneath all lies this simoniacal taint.\u201d The\n bishops are almost in as sad a state. Their councils of advice are the\n standing committees; these may be composed of unbaptized men, and the\n bishops have no voice in their nomination; and \u201cthus you have the\n marvellous spectacle of a bishop sitting at the head of his diocesan\n synod, but bound by laws which that synod (possibly composed of\n non-Christians) makes, and in the making of which he has had no voice\n whatever, either of assent or dissent.\u201d It could scarcely be supposed,\n however, that evils so great as these would be removed simply by a\n change of name, and Dr. De Koven found himself at last willing to admit\n as much. He was willing, he said, to go on for a while longer with the\n old name, although as long as it was retained such evil consequences\n would follow. But he insisted that \u201cthe day will come when this church\n shall demand, not that an accident of its condition, not that a part of\n its organization, should represent it to the world, but that its\n immortal lineage shall represent it.\u201d\n\n The church may demand what it pleases, and may call itself by whatever\n name it chooses to invent; but its history is written and cannot be\n changed. Men will always know that it is the daughter of that creature\n whose father was Henry VIII. and whose nursing mother was Queen\n Elizabeth. A delegate from Illinois pleaded for the change of name, for\n the reason that he was tired of saying on Sundays, \u201cI believe in the\n Holy Catholic Church,\u201d and all the rest of the week, \u201cI believe in the\n Protestant Episcopal Church.\u201d Mr. Hamilton Fish declared that it was\n \u201ctoo late to change the name of Protestant Episcopal,\u201d and that if the\n sect was not Protestant it was nothing. His great objection, however,\n was that if the change were made the church would be in danger of\n losing its property. Finally, on the thirteenth day of the session, the\n resolution for the appointment of the constitutional committee to\n consider this and other changes was voted down by a vote of 16 to 51;\n and a separate resolution, that no change should be made in the name of\n the church at present, was carried by an almost unanimous vote.\n\n The convention also touched upon marriage and divorce, but rather\n gingerly. The House of Bishops passed a resolution repealing the\n present canon on this subject, and adopting the following in its place:\n\n \u201cSECTION 1. If any persons be joined together otherwise than as\n God\u2019s Word doth allow, their marriage is not lawful.\n\n \u201cSEC. 2. No minister of this church shall solemnize matrimony\n in any case where there is a divorced wife or husband of either\n party still living, and where the divorce was obtained for some\n cause arising after marriage; but this canon shall not be held\n to apply to the innocent party in a divorce for the cause of\n adultery, or to parties once divorced seeking to be united\n again.\n\n \u201cSEC. 3. If any minister of this church shall have reasonable\n cause to doubt whether a person desirous of being admitted to\n holy baptism, or to confirmation, or to the holy communion, has\n been married otherwise than as the word of God and discipline\n of this church allow, such minister, before receiving such\n person to these ordinances, shall refer the case to the bishop\n for his godly judgment thereupon; _provided_, however, that no\n minister in any case refuse the sacrament to a penitent person\n _in extremis_.\n\n \u201cSEC. 4. No minister of this church shall present for\n confirmation or administer the holy sacraments to any person\n divorced, for any cause arising after marriage, or married\n again to another in violation of this canon, or during the\n lifetime of such divorced wife or husband; but this prohibition\n shall not extend to the innocent party where the divorce has\n been for the cause of adultery, nor to any truly penitent\n person.\n\n \u201cSEC. 5. Questions touching the facts of any case arising under\n this canon shall be referred to the bishop of the diocese, or,\n if there be a vacancy in the episcopate, then to some bishop\n designated by the Standing Committee, who shall thereupon make\n enquiry by a commissionary or otherwise, and deliver his godly\n judgment in the premises.\n\n \u201cSEC. 6. This canon, so far as it affixes penalties, does not\n apply to cases occurring before its taking effect, according to\n canon iv., title iv.\u201d\n\n From the Roman Catholic point of view there are at least two objections\n to this canon. There is no authority pointed out whereby it may be\n decided what it is that \u201cGod\u2019s word doth allow\u201d respecting marriage;\n and the permission for the re-marriage of one of the parties in a\n divorce is repugnant to the rule of the church, and could not for a\n moment be assented to by any one who holds the Catholic and Christian\n doctrine of marriage. In the debate upon the canon it was urged that\n the second section could not be enforced among the Indians nor among\n the negroes; and some of the clergymen objected to the section which\n provides for the reference of doubtful cases to the bishop. Especial\n ridicule was cast upon the sixth section, which, as one delegate\n expressed it, asserts that \u201cthe longer a man has continued in sin the\n less sin he has.\u201d More than one clerical delegate, on the other hand,\n lifted up his voice in favor of \u201cgreater freedom in the matter,\u201d and\n they drew pathetic pictures of the sad condition of a woman divorced\n from her husband for incompatibility of temper, for example, and, under\n this canon, unable to marry again. But at length the canon was passed.\n\n Our readers can scarcely be expected to take much interest in the other\n proceedings of the convention. There was a debate, lasting through\n several days, upon a proposed canon for the creation and development of\n orders of deaconesses, or \u201csisterhoods,\u201d in imitation of our own\n societies of holy women. The bishops wished to retain strict control\n over these possible organizations; the lower house desired them to be\n left quite free, or subject only to the supervision of the parish\n clergyman. The two houses could not agree, and the matter was dropped.\n A still more tedious debate arose from propositions for the adoption of\n a \u201cshortened service,\u201d lay preaching, and the permissible use of the\n English Lectionary. There was very little talk about dogma; and it is\n noticeable that the quarrels between the Ritualists and the\n Evangelicals were kept entirely suppressed during the convention. The\n only doctrinal breeze which animated the gathering was caused by the\n introduction of a paper by Mr. Judd, of Illinois, which, on the whole,\n is so queer that we reproduce it here:\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, A majority of the bishops of the Anglican communion\n at the Lambeth Conference, held in the year of our Lord 1867,\n while solemnly \u2018professing the faith delivered to us in Holy\n Scripture, maintained in the primitive church and by the\n fathers of the English Reformation,\u2019 did also \u2018express the deep\n sorrow with which we view the divided condition of the flock of\n Christ throughout the world, ardently longing for the\n fulfilment of the prayer of our Lord, \u201cthat all may be one,\u201d\u2019\n and did furthermore \u2018solemnly record\u2019 and set forth the means\n by which \u2018that unity will be more effectually promoted\u2019; and\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, The Lambeth declaration was not only signed by all\n the nineteen American bishops then and there present, but the\n whole House of Bishops, at the General Convention of 1868, also\n formally resolved that they \u2018cordially united in the language\n and spirit\u2019 of the same; and\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, Our fervent prayer, daily offered, \u2018that all who\n profess and call themselves Christians may hold the faith in\n unity of spirit,\u2019 cannot receive fulfilment unless there be a\n clear and steadfast clinging to \u2018the faith once for all\n delivered to the Saints\u2019; and\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, The restoration of this \u2018unity of spirit\u2019 in the\n apostolic \u2018bond of peace\u2019 among all the Christian people, for\n which we thus daily pray, ought also to be the object of our\n most earnest efforts; and\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, This unity manifestly cannot be restored by the\n submission of all other parts to any one part of the divided\n body of Christ, but must be reached by the glad reunion of all\n in that faith which was held by all before the separation of\n corrupt times began; and\n\n \u201c_Whereas_, The venerable documents in which the undisputed\n councils summed up the Catholic faith are not easily accessible\n to many of the clergy, and have never been fully set forth to\n our laity in a language \u2018understanded of the people\u2019; therefore\n\n \u201c_Resolved_, by the House of Deputies of the Protestant\n Episcopal Church in the United States of America, That a\n memorial be presented to the Lambeth Conference at its second\n session, expressing our cordial thanks for the action of its\n first session in 1867, in which it enjoined upon us all the\n promotion of unity \u2018_by maintaining the faith in its purity and\n integrity, as taught by the Holy Scriptures, held by the\n primitive church, summed up in the creeds, and affirmed by the\n undisputed general councils_\u2019; and, in furtherance of the good\n work thus recommended and enjoined, we humbly request the said\n Lambeth Conference, by a joint commission of learned divines,\n or otherwise, to provide for the setting forth of an accurate\n and authentic version, in the English language, of the creeds\n and the other acts of the said undisputed general councils\n concerning the faith thus proclaimed by them, as the standards\n of orthodox belief for the whole church.\n\n \u201c_Resolved, also_, That the House of Bishops be respectfully\n requested to take order that this memorial shall be duly laid\n before the next session of the Lambeth Conference by the hand\n of such of its members as may be present thereat.\u201d\n\n The debate on this paper was somewhat amusing. It was pointed out that\n rather serious consequences might follow the general dissemination of\n \u201can accurate and authentic version, in the English language, of the\n creeds and the other acts of the said undisputed general councils\n concerning the faith\u201d; and the awful question was asked, \u201cWho is to\n decide how many undisputed councils there have been?\u201d But at last the\n preamble and resolution were adopted, and we congratulate our\n Protestant Episcopalian brethren upon that decision. Many of\n them\u2014clergymen as well as laymen\u2014said they did not know what even the\n first six \u0153cumenical councils had decided. If they now acquire this\n knowledge, they will learn enough to convince them that they are living\n in heresy, and that their first duty is to seek for admission into the\n church.\n\n \u201cThe Church Congress,\u201d which commenced its sessions in New York on the\n 30th of October and continued to sit for four days, was in some degree\n a supplement to the \u201cconvention.\u201d At the congress, however, nothing was\n to be _done_; affairs were simply to be talked about. In four days much\n can be said: the papers read and the speeches made before the Congress\n will make a large volume when collected. A Catholic would arise from\n their perusal with a feeling of profound melancholy. He would see the\n blind leading the blind and tumbling into the ditch. In Protestantism\n the opinion of one man is as good as that of another; views the most\n discordant may be expressed on the same platform, and there is no\n arbiter to pronounce with infallible voice what is truth. In the\n congress, for instance, several of its clerical members took occasion\n to lavish praises upon the Roman Catholic Church\u2014one of them declared\n that the true spirit of the Roman Catholic Church had always been\n \u201ctender, true, and noble\u201d; another, a bishop, extolled the work of our\n missionaries among the Indians, saying that they \u201chad done the best\n work,\u201d and that their conduct was in glorious contrast with that of the\n missionaries of the sects, who acted too often like \u201ccarpet-baggers.\u201d\n These declarations did not prevent other members when speaking from\n indulging in bitter denunciations of \u201cRomanism.\u201d Bishop Potter, at the\n opening of the congress, warned the members that they must not expect\n to settle anything; the only good to be expected from their discussions\n was such as might follow the interchange of opinion. A discussion on\n church architecture was ended by a minister who said that churches\n should be built wholly with respect to acoustics, and that the ideal\n church would be a plain hall where the voice of the preacher could be\n distinctly heard. The question of the relation of the church to the\n state and to society was discussed at much length\u2014some of the speakers\n arguing for a union of church and state, and others advocating strict\n abstinence on the part of the church from all political affairs. Bishop\n Littlejohn, of Long Island, declared that\n\n \u201cThe most urgent duty of the church to the nation was first to\n vindicate its moral fitness to sway all in and around it. It\n should show that its charter was divine. It should be able to\n say to the grosser personality of the nation, \u2018Come up higher;\n this is the way, walk ye in it.\u2019 The first duty of the church\n to the national life was to put its own house in order. Again,\n the church having elevated itself to the level whence it had a\n right to teach and authority to guide, its habitual attention\n should not be diverted from its great duties to society and to\n the nation. The church\u2019s best work was at the root and upon the\n sap of the social tree of life, not with the withered and dead\n branches. It was here that the church was to exercise its\n highest functions upon society and upon the nation. Let it keep\n before it that one of its highest duties was to show, both to\n society and the individual, that they did not derive their\n personality from each other, but from God. There was a warrant\n for such teaching, for it rested upon a theological principle.\n Humanity, in the genuine whole and in the individual man, had\n its foundation in Christ, and, therefore, for each there was\n infinite sacredness, even in Christ himself. But the church had\n instructions for society, and especially for American society.\n It had some teaching for those who in dreams and in revolutions\n cried out for liberty, equality, and fraternity. By how many\n was this cry raised, even to those who would have no sloping\n sides, no top, but all bottom to the social pyramid! It seemed\n that that was a cry which the church might answer. Liberty,\n equality, fraternity! The land was full of false idols under\n those names. The perversion was of man; the movement itself was\n of God. The perversion could be brought about by forgetting the\n movement itself. God in Christ not only willed that all men\n should be free and equal, but he told them in what sense and\n how they were to become so. It was by the ministry of the word,\n not by the sword, not by the law, not by abstract speculation,\n that man was to learn what these things were for which he so\n thirsted. Modern society and the Gospel must be reconciled, and\n to do this there was no competent authority except the church.\u201d\n\n Bishop Littlejohn, when speaking of \u201cthe church,\u201d has in his mind his\n own body. That society can never accomplish the work he points out; men\n know that it has no authority to teach them, and those who speak in its\n name speak with divided and inconsistent voices. The church of God,\n however, can do this work and is doing it. She has no need \u201cto\n vindicate her moral fitness\u201d or to \u201celevate herself to the level whence\n she has a right to teach and authority to guide.\u201d She had all this done\n for her eighteen hundred years ago, when her divine charter was given\n her. And that charter never has been and never will be revoked.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE _CIVILTA CATTOLICA_ ON THE FORTIFICATIONS OF ROME.\n\n There is no European periodical which treats of the great political\n movements of the day with more complete knowledge and consummate\n ability and sagacity than the _Civilt\u00e0 Cattolica_, especially in\n respect to all that has a bearing on the Roman question. In the number\n of October 6 an article of great interest takes up the topic of the\n fortifications around Rome and Civita Vecchia which have been ordered\n by the Italian government, and casts some light on the motives which\n have induced the persons at the head of Victor Emanuel\u2019s administration\n to adopt this extraordinary measure.\n\n The pretext put forth, that it is necessary to protect Rome against\n armed invasion by the reactionary party of the _clericals_, is so\n ridiculous that it has deceived no one, but has excited the ridicule\n even of the Italian liberals. But one probable and credible reason can\n be given for an undertaking involving such a great expenditure at a\n time when the finances of the state are in such a wretched condition.\n This reason is that the measure has been undertaken by the dictation of\n Bismarck, in virtue of a secret treaty between Prussia and Italy, and\n in view of a proposed war of the two combined powers against France.\n The Italian kingdom was set up, as is well known to all, by Napoleon\n III. for the sake of using its alliance and employing its military\n power to the advantage of the French Empire. The control of this\n convenient instrument was, however, wrested from the unfortunate\n emperor by his conqueror and destroyer, Bismarck, who has continued to\n govern not only William and his empire, but Victor Emanuel and his\n kingdom, to the great and increasing disgust of the majority of\n Italians, including a large portion even of the liberals. The intention\n of Bismarck to seize upon the speediest convenient opportunity of\n making a new invasion of France has been too openly manifested to admit\n of any doubt. The execution of this purpose has been delayed at the\n instance of Russia, in order to leave that power more free and\n unembarrassed for its great enterprise of destroying the Ottoman Empire\n and taking possession of Constantinople. In the Bismarckian scheme the\n war against the Papacy and the Catholic Church, against France and\n Austria, is all one thing, with one motive and end\u2014the exaltation of\n the infidel Teutonic empire on the ruins of Latin Christianity and\n civilization; and the possession of Constantinople by the Russians as\n the capital of another great schismatical empire, dividing with Prussia\n the hegemony of the world, harmonizes with this scheme, as planned long\n ago by the two astute and powerful chancellors, Gortchakoff and\n Bismarck.\n\n The papers have been saying of late that Bismarck, whose ambitious mind\n triumphs over the shattered nerves and dropsical body which seem soon\n about to become the prey of dissolution, has been lately threatening\n Europe with a general war for the coming vernal equinox. This means, of\n course, that he is preparing an equinoctial storm of \u201cblood and iron\u201d\n to mark for ever in history the close of his own career as the\n beginning of a new European epoch. The sagacious writer in the\n _Civilt\u00e0_ considers the order for fortifying Rome and Civita Vecchia as\n a strong confirmation of the fact of a military alliance between the\n anti-Christian government of Italy and the Bismarckian empire, and of\n the probability of an approaching war by the two allied powers against\n France. He prudently abstains from carrying his prognostics any\n further, wittily observing that it would be proof of a scanty amount of\n brains if he were to attempt anything of the kind. We can easily\n understand that, for men writing and publishing in Florence, a certain\n caution and reserve are necessary in the open, explicit expression of\n the hopes and expectations which they know how to awaken in other minds\n by a significant silence. Nevertheless, as we happily enjoy more\n liberty of speech than is conceded to Italians when they happen to be\n _clericals_, we will run the risk of passing for a man of \u201cscarso\n cervello,\u201d and give utterance to a few of the conjectures which sprang\n up in our own mind upon reading the remarks of our able contemporary.\n\n Both the Bismarckian and the Cavourian political fabrics are in a\n precarious condition. It is perhaps less desperate to undertake a\n hazardous enterprise on the chance of success than to remain quiet with\n the certainty of being swept away by the current of coming events.\n Nevertheless, the ruin may be hastened, and even directly brought\n about, by the very means which are used to avert the crisis, if the\n undertaking is really desperate. Perhaps the _b\u00eate noir_ which harasses\n the sleepless nights of the Prussian, which the servile Italian\n minister threatens upon the people grumbling at their excessive\n taxation, which the political apes of French radicalism pretend to\n dread, may be the nightmare of a prophetic dream. As the unhappy\n victims of a divine fate in the Greek tragedies accomplish the direful\n woes foretold at their birth by the very means used to avert them, the\n accomplices in the anti-Christian conspiracy may bring upon themselves\n the catastrophe they seem to fear\u2014a reactionary movement in which they\n will be submerged. If Italy consents to incur the unknown risks of an\n alliance with Prussia, and play the part of a subservient tool to the\n insane ambition of Bismarck, one of the consequences may be that her\n speedily and falsely constructed unity will be shattered. Russia is at\n present too deeply engaged in her deadly struggle with Turkey to be\n either a formidable ally or enemy to any other great power for some\n time to come, even if she comes off victorious in the end. In respect\n to Russia, Austria has now her favorable, perhaps her last, opportunity\n to secure her own stability and equality by a repression of her other\n antagonist, Prussia. An invasion of France makes Austria, with her army\n of one million, the natural ally of France. There are urgent motives\n which might draw England into the same coalition. And what is there\n improbable in the conjecture that one of the great events in such a war\n would be the occupation of the Pontifical States by the allied troops,\n and the restoration of the pontifical sovereignty? If the Pope recovers\n his royal capital well fortified, the advantage of the fortifications\n will be his, and make him more secure in future against lawless\n invasion of banditti.\n\n We are not at all certain that a prospective triumph of Russia bodes so\n much good to the party of anti-Christian revolution as many suppose.\n The interest, the safety even, of that empire requires of her that she\n should exert all her power, and co-operate with every other legitimate\n power exerted in Europe, to put down Freemasonry and restore the\n Christian political order in the civilized world. It is very probable\n that when the European congress meets, after the present cycle of wars,\n to pacificate Europe and readjust the equilibrium of nations, neither\n Gortchakoff nor Bismarck will be numbered among living statesmen; and\n that the catalogue of disasters by which the enemies of the Holy See\n are punished will be so far completed for the present century, as to\n serve a salutary purpose in warning and instructing the rising and\n coming statesmen and sovereigns of Christendom.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n SONNET.\n\n\n There is a castle of most royal state,\n Wherein no warder watches from the walls,\n Nor groom nor squire abides in court or halls:\n Silent are they, grass-grown and desolate.\n A thousand steeds a thousand knights await,\n Sleeping, all harnessed, in the marble halls\n Until the Appointed One upon them calls,\n Winding the horn that hangs beside the gate.\n Then shall the doors fly open, and the steeds\n Neigh, and the knights leap, shouting, to the selle,\n And they shall follow him and do such deeds\n All men must own him master. But the spell\n Who knows not and, uncalled, essays the horn,\n Falls at the fated doors and dies forlorn.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE IRISH HEDGE-POETS.\n\n The music of the ancient Irish has been preserved because no\n interpreter was needed to translate its beauties into another tongue.\n The poetry which accompanied the music has well-nigh perished, and what\n remains attracts but little attention. For this there are two reasons:\n the students of Celtic literature have been few, and of those who have\n endeavored to translate its poetry into English there are but one or\n two who have succeeded in any fortunate degree in retaining the spirit\n and beauty of the original. The best as well as earliest collection of\n Irish poetry is Hardiman\u2019s _Minstrelsy of Ireland_, but it is\n accompanied by feeble and conventional translations. A literal\n translation of the poetry would make this a most valuable collection\n for the general reader; as it stands, it is only of worth to those who\n can read the original Irish. Several other collections, smaller and of\n less value, are in existence, but a real and full collection of Irish\n poetry has yet to be made. We are aided in the present article by two\n small volumes entitled _Munster Poetry_, collected by John O\u2019Daly, a\n well-known Dublin bookseller and antiquarian, and translated, the first\n series by the unfortunate James Clarence Mangan, and the second by Dr.\n George Sigurson. They do not attempt to deal with the general subject,\n but only profess to be a collection of popular poetry current in\n Munster from eighty to one hundred years ago, and composed by the last\n of the Irish bards who sang in their native tongue, and were called\n \u201chedge-poets.\u201d\n\n The race of bards or hedge-poets\u2014whichever title may be preferred\u2014who\n sang in their native language virtually became extinct at the beginning\n of the present century. The history of their lives, as well as most of\n their poetry, exists only in tradition, and, but for a few incomplete\n collections, would soon vanish for ever. It is not too late, however,\n to form some picture of them, and the value of their poetry is such as\n to make us deeply regret that no more has been preserved. And, even\n without intrinsic merit, the national poetry of a people is always\n worth preserving.\n\n During the eighteenth century, as is well known, the Celtic Irish were\n at a very low stage of political fortune. The entire subjugation of\n Ireland, for the time, occurred at the battle of Limerick. The flower\n of the army of Sarsfield followed its gallant leader to the plains of\n Minden, and made the reputation of their race as soldiers under the\n French banners. Those who remained in Ireland were crushed into outward\n subjection. The tyranny of the conquerors, exasperated by the doubtful\n and desperate struggle, placed no bounds to the humiliation which it\n endeavored to inflict. The penal laws were cruel and barbarous beyond\n those of any nation on record. All intellectual as well as religious\n education was denied the Irish people, and it was only by stealth that\n they could gratify their thirst for either.\n\n The spirit of the Celtic population was crushed, but not degraded. They\n were conquered, and were aware that another struggle was hopeless for\n the present. None the less they preserved all their national feelings.\n The language of the common people in their daily intercourse was Irish;\n their only pride was in Irish tradition, and their only poetry was in\n the same melodious tongue. This continued long after English was the\n language used for business. It must not be supposed that, although the\n Celtic Irish were poor and deprived of all religious and political\n rights, they were entirely ignorant or uncultivated. The average Irish\n peasant of the last century was likely to have more learning than his\n English compeer. The hedge-schoolmaster was abroad in the land, and the\n eagerness with which Irish peasant lads sought for knowledge under\n difficulties was only second to the fervency of their religious faith\n under persecution. The education was not of the most valuable or\n practical cast in all particulars, but that it was cultivated so\n earnestly is the highest proof of the undegraded character of the\n people. The hedge-schoolmasters were more learned in Latin than in\n science, and taught their pupils to scan more assiduously than to add.\n The traditionary Irish history, the exploits of Con of the Hundred\n Battles, and the prophecies of Columbkille were expounded more\n particularly than the battles of Wolfe or Marlborough or the speeches\n of Chatham. This was but natural. The Irish then felt no share in\n English victories or interest in English literature. Poetry was\n especially a branch of learning in those days as it has never been\n since. The hedge-schoolmasters were often poets as well as pedagogues,\n and the amount of verse produced of one sort or another was enormous.\n Much of it was naturally worthless, but among the crowd of poetasters\n was here and there a poet who had the heart to feel and the tongue to\n express the woes of his country and the passions of his own heart in\n the language of nature. The hearts of the people answered them, and\n their memories treasured their songs. They were no longer bards\n entertained in the halls of the great. They were the wandering\n minstrels of the poor, but some of them were genuine poets whose power\n and grace were visible under every disadvantage.\n\n In considering the fragments of this poetry three things must be kept\n in mind: first, that it has been preserved mostly by oral tradition;\n secondly, that it is translated from a language whose idiom is\n especially hard to be rendered into English; and, thirdly, that the\n lyrical form imposes additional difficulties in adequate rendering. By\n far the larger number of the productions of the hedge-poets are of an\n allegorical cast. The poet in a vision sees a queenly maiden, of\n exquisite beauty and grace, sitting lonely and weeping on some fairy\n rath by moonlight, by the side of some softly-flowing stream, or by the\n wall of some ruined castle of ancient splendor. He is at first\n confounded by her beauty. Then he takes courage at her distress, and\n asks whether she is Helen of old who caused Troy town to burn, or she\n that was the love of Fion, or Deirdre, for whom the sons of Usnach\n died. These are the three types of beauty almost invariably used. The\n lady replies, in a voice that \u201cpierces the heart of the listener like a\n spear,\u201d that she is neither of these three; she is Kathleen ni\n Ullachan, or Grauine Maol, Roisin Dubh, the Little Black Rose, or\n Sheela na Guira, these being the figurative names for the female\n personification of Ireland. She laments to the poet\u2019s ear that her\n heroes brave, her Patrick Sarsfield, her John O\u2019Dwyer of the Glens, are\n driven across the seas, and that she is the desolate slave of the Saxon\n churls. Then she rises into a strain, half-despairing, half-exulting,\n that the heroes will soon return with help from the hosts of France and\n Spain; that the fires of the Saxon houses shall light every glen, and\n the \u201csullen tribe of the dreary tongue\u201d be driven into the sea; that\n God shall soon be worshipped once more on her desolate altars, and the\n kingly hero, her noble spouse, her prince of war, shall once more clasp\n her to his arms and place three crowns upon her head. This is the\n outline of almost every one of these patriotic visions, and it will be\n seen at once how beautiful was the conception and how capable of\n exhibiting the highest pathos. The Irish minstrels had to sing of their\n country in secret, for the ear of the conquering race must not hear of\n their hopes and fears. In this disguise they would give voice to their\n patriotic passion as to an earthly mistress, and their country\u2019s woes\n and hopes could be imparted with a double intensity. This personifying\n the country in the form of a beautiful and desolate woman is not\n peculiar to Irish poets, but seems the form of expression for the\n passionate patriotism of all oppressed countries. It is common to the\n Italian, the Polish, and the Servian poets.\n\n In the description of the beauty of the forlorn maiden one poem bears a\n great resemblance to another, and those beauties which are peculiar to\n Irish girls are her distinguishing features; thus, the long, flowing\n tresses, the _coolun_, or head of fair locks, is often most beautifully\n painted.\n\n\n \u201cHer clustering, loosened tresses\n Flowed glossily, enwreathed with pearls,\n To veil her breast with kisses\n And sunny rays of golden curls\u201d\n \u2014_Sheela ni Cullenan_, by Wm. Lenane.\n\n \u201cHer curling tresses meet\n Her small and gentle feet.\n Her golden fleece\u2014the pride of Greece,\n Might shame those locks to greet.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe dew-drops flow down\n Her thick curls\u2019 golden brown.\u201d\n \u2014_The Drooping Heart_, by MacColter.\n\n \u201cSunbright is the neck that her golden locks cover.\u201d\n \u2014_The Cuilshon._\n\n \u201cHer hair o\u2019er her shoulders was flowing\n In clusters all golden and glowing,\n Luxuriant and thick as in meads are, the grass-blades\n That the scythe of the mower is mowing.\u201d\n \u2014_The Vision of Conor Sullivan._\n\n\n From these specimens it may be guessed that either blonde beauty was\n more common among Irish maidens than now, or that its rarity made it\n doubly prized. It appears to have been as much in demand as in these\n days, which have witnessed the grand rage for fair locks at the expense\n of bleaching-irons and Pactolian dye. It is only occasionally that some\n poet dares to express his preference for _cean dubh dheelish_\u2014the dear\n black head.\n\n The pure brow of wax in fairness and radiance is not forgotten:\n\n\n \u201cWhose brow is more fair than the silver bright;\n Oh! \u2019twould shed a ray of beauteous light\n In the darkest glen of mists of the south.\u201d\n\n \u2014_The Melodious Little Cuckoo._\n\n\n Narrow eyebrows finely arched were a peculiar mark of distinction. For\n the eyes there is almost a whole new nomenclature of comparison and\n compliment. The peculiar and most often repeated color is \u201cgreen,\u201d\n which is the uncompromising English translation of the delicate Irish\n epithet which means\n\n\n \u201cThe grayest of things blue,\n The greenest of things gray\u201d\n\n\n \u2014that shade of the most beautiful and brilliant eyes well known to\n Spanish as well as Irish poets, and which Longfellow and Swinburne have\n not hesitated to describe by the naked and imperfect English adjective.\n This is the way in which one of these ignorant minstrels expresses what\n he means, and renders it with a new grace:\n\n\n \u201cI gave you\u2014oh! I gave you\u2014I gave you my whole love;\n On the festival of Mary my poor heart you stole, love,\n With your soft green eyes like dew-drops on corn that is springing,\n the music of your red lips like sweet starlings singing.\u201d\n \u2014_Fair Mary Barry._\n\n\n A beautiful and apt comparison for the sweet, rosy bloom, nowhere found\n in such perfect charm as in Ireland, was the apple blossom and the\n berry.\n\n\n \u201cOn her cheek the crimson berry\n Lay in the lily\u2019s bosom wan.\u201d\n\n \u2014_Sheela ni Cullenan._\n\n\n \u201cThe bloom on thy cheek shames the apple\u2019s soft blossom.\u201d\n\n\n Among the finest and most delicate comparisons, however, is this:\n\n\n \u201cLike crimson rays of sunset streaming\n O\u2019er sunny lilies her bright cheeks shone.\u201d\n\n\n The fair one\u2019s bosom is declared to be like to the breast of the\n sailing swan, to the thorn blossoms, to the snow, to the summer cloud,\n in a variety of beautiful expressions:\n\n\n \u201cHer bosom\u2019s pearly light\n Than summer clouds more bright,\n More pure its glow than falling snow\n Or swan of plumage white.\u201d\n \u2014_Beside the Lee_, by Michael O\u2019Longen.\n\n \u201cHer breast has the whiteness\n That thorn-blossoms bore.\u201d\n\n\n Her hands are pure and white as the snow, and never without being\n accomplished in the art of embroidery. There is scarcely a poem in the\n whole collection in which the skill of the heroine in this particular\n is not mentioned. She does not play upon the harp. That was a manly\n profession. Embroidery was the fashionable accomplishment for Irish\n ladies, and the maiden who typified Ireland must be pre-eminent in it.\n\n\n \u201cHer soft, queenly fingers\n Are skilful as fair,\n While she gracefully lingers\n O\u2019er broideries rare.\n The swan and the heath-hen,\n Bird, blossom, and leaf,\n Are shaped by this sweet maid\n Who left me in grief.\u201d\n\n\n The voice was that of the thrush singing farewell to the setting sun,\n the cuckoo in the glen, or the lark high in air. Bird-voiced was the\n universal epithet. The branch of bloom, the bough of apple-blossoms,\n was the whole lovely creature.\n\n Such were the beauties and accomplishments of the heroines of the\n hedge-poets, largely, doubtless, derived from the earlier bards, but\n often exclusively their own. They were chiefly applied to the ideal\n figure who represented in her beauty and her sorrow their forlorn\n country, but sometimes to the earthly mistress of flesh and blood whose\n smiles they sought. Seldom anything so natural and so delicate is to be\n found in any national poetry. The false and artificial compliments of\n English amatory poetry, equally with the overstrained comparisons of\n Oriental verse, seem tasteless and tawdry beside these simple blossoms\n of nature. They give out health and perfume, while the English\n love-songs are like wax, and the gorgeous verse of the East is, like\n its vegetation, magnificent but often odorless.\n\n Those poems which we have described form much the larger portion of the\n remains of the hedge-poets; but there are others, devoted purely to\n love, to satire, and to lamentation. There are some which are a sort of\n dialogue and courtship in rhyme. The minstrel \u201csoothers\u201d the damsel\n with all the arts of his flattering tongue. He calls her by every sweet\n name he can think of; tells how deep is his passion and how renowned he\n will make her by his verse. The rustic coquette replies with a\n recapitulation of all his faults and failings, his poverty, his\n fondness for drink, his disgrace with all his relations, and his\n general unfitness for the yoke of matrimony, and then very often yields\n to his flattery and goes away with him; or else she listens to his\n string of endearments without a word, and then dismisses him with\n stinging contempt. Sometimes the bard sits down in sorrow, generally in\n a tap-room over an empty glass, and details the charms of the fair one\n who has wrought his woe; or sometimes, though rarely, it is one of the\n opposite sex, who has been driven from home by the curses of her\n kindred, and, sitting by the roadside, tells her tale of woe or\n despair. Such cases, however, are infrequent, and the general purity of\n both theme and verse is worthy of all praise. The number of\n lamentations is much less than would naturally be expected among a\n people whose vehemence of grief is noted, and where the _keener\u2019s_\n extemporaneous mourning reached such a height of impassioned eloquence.\n From whatever reason, but few appear to have been preserved. Those that\n are, however, are characterized by profound strength and pathos. The\n _keen_ of Felix MacCarthy for his children is one of the saddest\n lamentations ever put into verse. It is entirely too long for\n quotation, but these two verses, describing the mother\u2019s appearance and\n grief, will show something of its genuineness and power:\n\n\n \u201cWoe is me! her dreary pall,\n Who royal fondness gave to all,\n Whose heart gave milk and love to each\u2014\n Woe is me! her \u2018plaining speech\u201d\n\n \u201cWoe is me! her hands now weak\n With smiting her white palms so meek.\n Wet her eyes at noon, and broken\n Her true heart with grief unspoken.\u201d\n\n\n A lament for Kilcash, or rather for its patroness, is also very\n powerful.\n\n The romantic love-tales are few in comparison with the number among the\n Irish street-ballads of to-day. The rich young nobleman who falls in\n love with the pretty girl milking her cow, and the fair lady of great\n estate who picks out her lover from the tall young men in her own\n service, make but few appearances. The only ballad of this kind in the\n collection is not after the usual pattern. The heir to \u201cland and long\n towers white\u201d certainly falls in love with a rustic maiden, but,\n instead of flying with him on his roan steed and becoming mistress of\n his castle, she tells him with great prudence that he will find other\n maidens better suited to his degree:\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019m not used at my mother\u2019s to sit with hosts,\n I\u2019m not used at the board to have wines and toasts,\n I\u2019m not used to dance-halls with music bold,\n Nor to couches a third of them red with gold.\u201d\n\n\n And, in spite of his fervent and eloquent protestations, she refuses to\n go with him.\n\n Such are the themes and characteristics of the last age of Celtic\n poetry in Ireland. If we have failed to show that the minstrels who\n sang in such poverty and oppression had natural genius of a high order,\n we have not accomplished our purpose. We think that true poetry is\n visible in almost all that remains of their productions. Like all\n sectional and class poets, they resembled each other very much. The\n same species of imagery, the same terms of thought and peculiar\n epithets, were common to them as to the Troubadours, the Scandinavian\n minstrels, and to all other classes of poets singing to a confined\n audience and having little or no acquaintance with other forms of\n poetry. It is through them alone that the voice of the Irish people of\n their day can be heard. All other forms of the expression of the\n oppressed race have perished. In the music and poetry of Ireland is\n made manifest, so that the dullest ear cannot mistake it, the sorrow of\n a nation in bondage, tinging all mirth, all hope, and all love with an\n indefinable cadence of melancholy as plainly as in the real outbursts\n of lamentation and despairing cries of woe.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n RELIGION ON THE EAST COAST OF AFRICA.\n\n The marvellous success of the indomitable Stanley has attracted the\n attention of all to Africa, that region of mystery, marvel, and\n malaria. The Catholic would naturally learn something of the work of\n the church in that continent, and of the religious condition of its\n population. But the subject is too vast for anything less than a large\n volume, and it will be more profitable to confine our attention to the\n dominions of the Sultan of Zanzibar. This region has a double interest.\n Zanzibar is the starting-point of almost every Central African\n expedition. Thence Livingstone, Speke and Grant, Cameron, and Stanley\n on two occasions, have struck into the interior and made valuable\n discoveries. It is also the old centre of the East African slave-trade,\n which, though it has received a severe check, is not yet abolished.\n Moreover, Zanzibar is a microcosm\u2014a little world in itself. There one\n meets with the Arab, the Hindoo, the Persian, the Malagashi, the\n Banian, the Goa Portuguese, the negro, and the European.\n\n The most important portion of the Sultan of Zanzibar\u2019s territory is the\n islands of which Zanzibar is the chief. The name was once applied to\n the whole coast, and it is probable that that must have been the\n meaning of Marco Polo when he says (on hearsay evidence) that the\n island of Zanzibar is two thousand miles round. The term is supposed to\n signify the \u201cLand of the Blacks.\u201d The island is in about 6\u00b0 south\n latitude, 48 miles long by 18 broad. It is separated from the mainland\n by a strait only 20 miles in breadth. As one approaches Zanzibar from\n the north the coast appears bare, rocky, and surrounded by low cliffs.\n Here dwell some wild people, almost completely cut off from the more\n civilized portion of the inhabitants, and following debasing and\n degrading superstitions. But as we sail southwards, between the island\n and the main, the shore becomes low and flat, the beach covered with\n sand of silvery whiteness, and the whole backed by rising ground not\n more than 300 feet high, on which grow in rich abundance cocoanut and\n other feathery-leaved palms. Soft breezes, laden with sweet odors from\n the groves of spice-trees, blow from the shore. The island is rich in\n fruits; mangos, oranges, limes, pummalos or shaddock, pineapples,\n jack-fruit, guavas, bananas, and cashew abound. But about four years\n ago a hurricane visited Zanzibar for the first time; almost all the\n dhows in the harbor were wrecked, many lives were lost, and the greater\n part of the trees were destroyed. On one estate known to the writer\n only four per cent. of the trees remained standing, and the ground,\n strewn with palms, was a lamentable sight.\n\n At the entrance of Zanzibar harbor are several beautiful islands of\n emerald green. One of these, called French Island, is used as a\n burial-place for Europeans, and many wooden crosses and boards mark the\n last resting-place of seamen of the British navy, cut down by the fever\n which is so fatal on this coast. The heat is not excessive, seldom\n rising to 90\u00b0, but there is a feeling of depression in the atmosphere,\n and a short residence in this climate serves to take the energy out of\n most people.\n\n Now we arrive at the city of Zanzibar, the most important place in East\n Africa. Its name, in the native language, is Unguja. For miles before\n reaching the city we have seen large white, square buildings close to\n the shore\u2014the country residences of wealthy Arabs. The appearance is\n very pleasing, and so is that of the city from the sea, as similar\n houses stand near it. These are the English, French, American, and\n German consulates, over which wave the flags of their respective\n nations; also the sultan\u2019s palace, the custom-house, and residences of\n rich Arabs and Hindoos. They are built of coral covered with the\n whitest plaster, only relieved by regular rows of windows, the\n brightness reflected from these houses being almost blinding. But on\n entering the town you cease to wonder at the bad name it has earned.\n With scarcely an exception Zanzibar is a heap of rubbish; the narrow\n lanes, or paths which do duty for streets, are surrounded by low hovels\n formed of earth plastered over wooden frames, roofed with palm-leaves,\n and possessing no means of ventilation but the doorway, the interior\n being consequently dark, stifling, and filthy. Many buildings have been\n allowed to go to utter ruin, and the very mosques are hardly\n presentable. But the bazaars form the sight of the city. They are,\n perhaps, a little wider than the other thoroughfares, and the fronts of\n the houses are occupied by small stalls, on which are piled articles\n the most incongruous\u2014soap, fish, plantains, cotton goods, medicine,\n oil, etc. In the midst is seated, cross-legged, a fat old Banian,\n stripped to the waist, with his naked foot in a basket of grain, or a\n pretty dark-eyed girl with a ring in her nose. The market produce of\n all kinds is heaped on the ground without any attempt at order, and, as\n every one present is screaming at the top of his voice in his own\n language, the Babel of tongues is complete.\n\n The government is in the hands of the Arabs. This people have from time\n immemorial had trading-stations on the coast, but Vasco da Gama doubled\n the Cape of Good Hope in 1499, and the Portuguese soon superseded the\n Arabs and held the coast for a couple of hundred years, when the Arabs\n succeeded in dislodging them, and they are now confined to Mozambique\n and Quilimane, at the mouth of the Zambesi.\n\n Remains of Portuguese forts are scattered up and down the shores of the\n mainland, and the writer assisted once in whitewashing Vasco da Gama\u2019s\n column at Melinda, which makes an excellent harbor mark. Near the fort\n at Zanzibar numerous Portuguese cannon, cast in a European arsenal in\n the present century, lie on the ground, a proud trophy for the Arabs\n and a humiliating spectacle for Europeans. Fifty years ago Sayid Said,\n the Imaum of Muscat, visited Zanzibar and fixed his residence there. At\n his death one of his sons succeeded to his African and another to his\n Arabian possessions, the former paying an annual tax of forty thousand\n dollars to the Imaum. Sayid Barghash, the present sultan, succeeded his\n brother Sayid Majid seven years ago. He had previously been exiled to\n Bombay at the instance of the English, whose _prot\u00e9g\u00e9_ Majid was. His\n policy has been one of economy and retrenchment. Though the government\n may be called an absolute monarchy, yet it answers rather to the old\n feudal constitutions of Europe in the middle ages, the sultan being\n checked by members of his own and other powerful families.\n\n The Arab statute-book is the Koran interpreted by what may be called\n the priesthood. But witchcraft is a great power, not only with the\n heathen but also with Mahometans, in Africa, and, after consulting his\n sheiks and sherifs, the sultan often has recourse to the heathen\n Mganga. One is reminded of the Witch of Endor, Pharao\u2019s magicians, and\n many of the old superstitions which we find recorded in the ancient\n Hebrew Scriptures.\n\n The population of the city may be one hundred thousand, and that of the\n remainder of the island rather more; but one cannot decide this with\n any accuracy, as it is against Moslem principles to take a census. Who\n are they to count the favors of God? Of the mongrel population of\n Zanzibar the Arab is the dominant race, though there are few, if any,\n pure Arabs\u2014sometimes that name being applied to a man as black as a\n negro. But the better class of them are fine, handsome men, splendidly\n dressed, and very dignified and self-possessed. They are ignorant,\n however, bigoted, supercilious, and licentious. They are also very\n indolent and have few redeeming features. Lower classes of Arabs there\n are, who are soldiers, sailors, traders, and so on, and from them are\n drawn the villains who carry on the iniquitous slave-traffic.\n\n There are about seven thousand British subjects\u2014Banians and other\n Indian peoples. The commerce of the East African coast is chiefly in\n their hands, and they are the bankers and represent the moneyed\n interest. Those owning slaves are in danger of losing them, if the\n British consul discover the fact; but it is hardly possible for them\n not to trade in slaves, as they are always sold with landed properties,\n and without them labor could hardly be obtained.\n\n Most of the army, which numbers nine hundred, is composed of Belooches,\n who are a motley set of rascals, brutal, lazy, and cowardly. But\n somehow they contrive to live, and arm themselves too, on three dollars\n a month, and seem to be pretty prosperous. The artillerymen are\n Persians\u2014tall, handsome men with black moustaches, high black sheepskin\n caps, green tunics, and loose trowsers. But their battery, which is\n full of small brass and iron guns overlooking the sea, is a poor\n affair, ridiculous from a military point of view, and better adapted\n for firing salutes than for purposes of warfare.\n\n There are about two thousand men from the Comoro Islands, but no one\n seems to have anything good to say of them.\n\n The mass of the population is composed of blacks from the east coast.\n These are almost entirely slaves, and are made to work for the support\n of the lazy Arabs. A person acquainted with the country easily\n distinguishes members of the different tribes from each other; they may\n be known by the tribe marks\u2014mostly punctures in the forehead\u2014and by\n their general appearance. The slaves are capable of much endurance; the\n writer once paid thirty or forty slave women eight cents each for a\n day\u2019s work, which consisted of walking thirty miles, carrying weights\n on their heads half the way. They did not seem at all exhausted after\n this arduous task. Great cruelties are perpetrated in the capture of\n the slaves and in conveying them to Zanzibar, but, as a rule, they are\n treated fairly enough when once they are received into a family, being\n allowed one day a week to work for themselves, besides other extra\n time.\n\n There are only sixty or seventy white people\u2014American, English, Scotch,\n French, and German\u2014but without them the commerce of the place would\n collapse. The chief exports are spices, ivory, ebony, cocoanuts, and\n gum-copal. The imports are cotton fabrics, pocket-handkerchiefs of\n bright colors, crockery, etc.\n\n The climate of Zanzibar is healthier than that of the mainland, though\n it is quite bad enough; the wonder is that any one can live there. The\n city lies very low, almost surrounded by a shallow lagoon, over which\n the water flows at every tide, leaving a deposit of reeking filth. No\n attempt at drainage has been made; sanitary reform is totally unknown;\n and the smell of the beach caused Livingstone to suggest that the name\n should be changed to Stinkibar. The year before the great hurricane\n there was a cholera epidemic which is supposed to have killed ten\n thousand people. Strangely enough, the Europeans, who mostly suffer\n much from fevers, were totally exempt, and the natives got the notion\n that the devil, who gave them the cholera, was afraid to attack the\n redoubtable _Myungoo_; so they sometimes whitewashed a man who showed\n symptoms of the disease, to cheat the devil, but the devil refused to\n be cheated so easily. The physical is far superior, however, to the\n moral condition of Zanzibar; in fact, the place is a Sodom where\n morality is unknown.\n\n To arrive at an idea of the religious condition of the peoples it is\n necessary to consider each race separately, and try to understand their\n habits and modes of thought. First let us take the negro\u2014the most\n numerous class. Even so we shall be generalizing for the different\n tribes and nations of the interior, as distinct from each other and the\n races of Europe.\n\n The writer has had considerable opportunities of judging of the black\n man, having served in a British man-of-war engaged in the suppression\n of the slave-trade, and having for some time been in charge of an\n establishment of liberated slaves\u2014mostly boys. The negro character is a\n strange series of contradictions, and it takes some time to understand\n him. He is profoundly conscious of his inferiority. An English officer\n adopted a little slave boy taken from a dhow, and we taught him a few\n elements of religion, which he eagerly grasped. Amongst others he was\n much struck by the idea of a future state. One day he was being\n chaffed: \u201cAh! you nigger\u2014thick lips\u2014flat nose,\u201d when he replied: \u201cIf\n I\u2019m a good nigger, after I die I shall get up again, not black then,\n but white as you are.\u201d It was a long time, though, before he could\n believe that a negro could rise again, though it did not seem\n unreasonable to him for an Arab or white man to rise.\n\n Passing with this same boy, Mumbo, through a graveyard at Zanzibar, he\n pointed to a grave. \u201cWho\u2019s there?\u201d he said. \u201cArab man,\u201d I answered,\n recognizing it to be so from the concrete with which the grave was\n covered. \u201cHe get up again?\u201d \u201cYes,\u201d I replied, after which the boy was\n thoughtful and silent for a while. \u201cWho\u2019s buried there?\u201d he repeated,\n pointing to a grave marked by a wooden cross. \u201cA Msungu\u201d (white man), I\n answered. \u201cHe get up again?\u201d \u201cYes.\u201d Another pause. \u201cAnd who\u2019s there?\u201d\n the boy again asked, pointing to a mean grave unmarked by cross or\n stone. \u201cA nigger man,\u201d said I. \u201cHe get up again?\u201d But on replying in\n the affirmative he would not believe it, and continued obstinately\n sceptical for some time.\n\n Selfishness seems to be the most prominent feature of the negro\n character. Civilized people mask the repulsive feeling, but not so the\n black. Everything is for himself and his own present sensual\n gratification. They have not a particle of gratitude, and if you show\n them kindness or give them a present it is considered a sign of\n weakness, and their contempt for their benefactor is apparent. There is\n no word expressive of thanks in the Swahili language, though the\n \u201cSanta\u201d of the Arab, accompanied by a bow, the right hand placed on the\n heart, is most graceful and pleasing. On taking charge of the boys\u2019\n house, in the benevolence of my heart I invested in numbers of stalks\n of bananas\u2014a large one can be obtained for eight cents\u2014and distributed\n them. But no word of thanks was heard, and the boys began to consider\n fruit as a right, and to grumble if it were not forthcoming; so I grew\n rather disgusted and discontinued scattering largesse amidst such a\n graceless set. Neither do they show much affection. This, perhaps, is\n hardly to be wondered at, as the slave-traffic, which has existed from\n time immemorial, must, by constantly separating families, have weakened\n and almost destroyed all ties of kindred. A gentleman well acquainted\n with the people told me that the only known affection amongst them was\n that between a son and his mother. Several slave boys whom we had\n liberated and kept on board the ship, on our leaving the coast were\n wisely sent on shore to the mission, only the one of whom I have\n previously spoken remaining. He wept piteously and sobbed himself to\n sleep. We were touched, and fancied that, after all, we had formed too\n low an estimate of the negro, till on waking he appeared to have\n completely forgotten his friends, and never spoke of them again. It\n then appeared that his grief had been purely selfish; for, as he\n phrased it, he would have no one \u201cto skylark with.\u201d \u201cWhat will you give\n me?\u201d is the view a negro takes of his neighbor, and in this the\n Ki-Swahili, and even the Arab, very much resemble him. One\u2019s ear soon\n grows familiar with the cry of \u201cLata paca\u201d\u2014\u201cBring pice\u201d\u2014pice being\n little Indian copper coins which form the currency at Zanzibar. This\n question is asked you in the streets or country roads, not merely by\n the poor, but even by well-to-do people. I was one day walking home\n from a feast to which I had been invited by the proprietor of a sugar\n plantation\u2014a Swahili man. These people are mulattoes, partly Arab, but\n mostly negro. They are Mahometans and call themselves Arabs. We had\n been hospitably _f\u00eated_, and I was accompanied by a brother of my host,\n a nice-looking young fellow, upright as a dart\u2014as they all are\u2014and\n dressed in the graceful long white linen robe which they always wear.\n He was proceeding to his home, a well-built stone house, but before\n leaving me I was astonished at his asking in Swahili for a few pice!\n Doubting my ears, I asked a boy who understood English what he had\n said, and he told me that I had not mistaken his meaning; so I gave him\n two or three coppers, and he went away well pleased.\n\n Negroes are very improvident, like most savage races. They take no\n thought for the morrow\u2014not from faith, but from utter recklessness.\n They are also fond of desertion for the mere sake of change. Slaves\n sometimes leave their masters and hire themselves out for a year or two\n to some one else, returning afterwards as if nothing had happened, and\n receiving no punishment, the master fearing that he might revenge\n himself on him or desert again, and also arguing that it is his nature\n and that no better can be expected of him. I was once on a shooting\n party in the Kingani River, and placing one of the boats in charge of a\n quartermaster, left with him a Seedee boy, or black seaman, to clean\n the jaws of a hippopotamus that I had shot on the previous day. I went\n up the river in the other boat with the remaining seamen for a day\u2019s\n shooting, and on my return in the evening was informed that the black\n had decamped, and we never saw any more of him. In the ship he was\n receiving about four times as much pay as he could possibly earn\n elsewhere, and, in addition to this, he left clothes and money behind.\n Yet we afterwards learnt that before leaving the vessel he had told his\n friends of his intention to run.\n\n The negro is, in Africa as elsewhere, exceedingly indolent, and, nature\n having provided him with abundance of the necessaries of life, he\n indulges his laziness to the full when he possibly can\u2014that is, in his\n native country or at Zanzibar, if he can manage to possess a few slaves\n to work for him.\n\n He is also obstinate and headstrong. Going on shore on the beautiful\n island of Pemba, north of Zanzibar, to trade for provisions, they were\n uniformly refused us, whatever price we offered. Yet next day the\n natives brought the things to the ship, some miles from the shore, and\n offered them for sale. A little bit of a boy was so obstinate that he\n would not obey orders unless he chose, even if thrashed with a\n rhinoceros-hide whip; neither did he flinch nor utter a cry under\n punishment. But when he left the ship, where he had been petted by the\n sailors, being sent to the French Mission, he was so disgusted that the\n first thing he did was to roll on the beach and completely destroy his\n new clothes, and the missionaries were compelled to restore him his old\n sailor costume. Still he sulked, and when I left they had not managed\n to get him to speak.\n\n Negroes are subject to sudden fits of fury almost amounting to madness,\n and then they cry, shout, vociferate, and argue in the most ridiculous\n manner. They love to eat and are very greedy, but are still more fond\n of drinking, and in their own country begin the day by copious\n potations of beer. However, at Zanzibar drunkenness would be punished\n by imprisonment; and that is no trifle, the prisoners being placed in a\n yard enclosed by four walls, and receiving no food, unless they have a\n friend to bring them some. They are also exceedingly depraved, and,\n when brought into contact with the semi-civilization of the coast, they\n become, if anything, worse than before. A stranger is astonished at the\n cool manner in which they enter a strange house, if they see the door\n open. They place their spear in a corner, set themselves in the best\n place, and talk till they are tired (they are especially fond of\n hearing themselves talk), when they rise and leave. It is no good\n trying to exclude them; their curiosity must be satisfied, and they\n insist on seeing and learning about everything\u2014examining and handling\n your clothes and asking the value of each article.\n\n Negroes have the redeeming feature of being mostly good-tempered and\n pleased by a very little. They delight in a joke, yet their wit is of\n the most elementary character. They are exceedingly fond of music;\n neither does its unvaried monotony pall on them. I once passed an old\n man amusing himself by drumming with two sticks on a plank; returning\n after some hours, I found him continuing the performance, which he had\n evidently kept up all the time. You will see them on a moonlight night,\n or even in the daytime, dancing and flinging their limbs about in the\n most ridiculous and ungraceful manner to the tune of tomtoms and fifes;\n yet they keep perfect time. A circle is formed, and a performer waltzes\n rapidly around the inner space, looking up to the sky, till she becomes\n giddy and falls into the arms of her friends. Whatever work they are\n engaged in, these people always sing, and in the streets you constantly\n hear the chant of porters, who carry tusks of ivory or bales of goods\n slung between two of them on a pole which rests on their shoulders.\n\n The East African negro has been completely debased by centuries of\n oppression and slavery. \u201cAll the good qualities appear crushed out of\n the African race,\u201d said an experienced missionary at Zanzibar to me.\n Their religion is the same as that of the natives of the west\n coast\u2014fetichism. I believe this word is derived from the Portuguese\n _feiti\u00e7o_, a doing\u2014that is, of magic. Nature has colored the black\n man\u2019s thoughts, but not with the sublime and beautiful. He sees nothing\n in nature but the terrible, vast, threatening, and hostile. The dense\n jungle with huge trees, concealing poisonous snakes, fierce lions, and\n spotted leopards; the fever-breeding swamp; the devastating\n cyclone\u2014these have produced a feeling of dread, helplessness, and\n terror on his debased mind. He has but a very vague, unformed idea of a\n Supreme Being, and does not at all conceive of the spiritual and\n eternal side of man. To him death is destruction. Yet he believes that\n the ghost of the departed person remains, and he always imagines it to\n be harmful and hostile. In fact, he is for ever in terror of ghosts and\n witchcraft, and his religion consists in the propitiation of natural\n objects. The African\u2019s creed may be reduced to two articles: the first\n demonology, or the existence of spectres of the dead; the second\n witchcraft, or black magic. Their native superstitions the slaves carry\n with them to Zanzibar or wherever they are taken, and so deeply rooted\n are these beliefs in their minds that I have often been surprised to\n hear negroes who have been Protestant Christians for years, and daily\n attending public Christian worship, speak of witchcraft in ordinary\n conversation as much as a matter of course as they would of any\n every-day occurrence. For instance, missing some pice from my drawers,\n I asked my servant to find out who had taken them. He replied that he\n could not do so, but that a man had been there years ago who \u201cmade\n plenty witchcraft\u201d; he would have told me, but now he was gone. Some\n very good Christian boys, as I was walking with them one day, suddenly\n dropped their voices and told me that it was a \u201cplenty bad place.\u201d I\n imagined that fever or ague was intended, as it was low, marshy ground;\n but no such thing. They had once witnessed some \u201cwitchcraft\u201d or other\n there.\n\n There are _Mganga_\u2014wizards and witches\u2014who are partly impostors and\n partly dupes of their own imagination. To these people the negroes have\n recourse in any calamity or sickness. Their office is to transfer the\n evil from which they suffer to some one else. Of course payment is the\n preliminary\u2014no pay, no work. And an African must have present payment;\n he attaches no value to promises of future reward, though ever so near.\n These Mganga endeavor to entice ghosts from possessed persons and\n transfer them to some inanimate object, striving to effect it by music,\n dancing, and drinking. Thus, they nail pieces of cloth to trees to coax\n the devils into them. Epileptic fits are very common, and it is not\n astonishing that they should regard them as the effect of seizure by\n some external agent. On the mainland they attempt to discover the\n workers of magic by most cruel ordeals.\n\n There are also rain-makers. It does not require an exceptionally\n weatherwise person to infer what the weather will be in a country of\n regular monsoons and seasons; still, they sometimes make a mistake, and\n then the false prophets have to escape as best they can.\n\n The Arabs have the utmost contempt for the negroes, and, so far from\n trying to convert them, purposely leave them to perdition; if they made\n them Mahometans they would be their equals, and this they do not at all\n desire.\n\n Such is the character and religious belief of these unhappy people. We\n will see later on what the church can do for them, but in this inquiry\n one important subject must be considered\u2014that is, the slave-trade.\n Slavery on the White Nile is admirably described by Sir Samuel Baker in\n his _Nile Basin_, and it is much the same on the east coast. The petty\n native chieftains are constantly at war with each other, the object\n being plunder. They try to surprise a neighboring village at night,\n fire it, and surround it with armed men. As the luckless inhabitants\n rush out to escape from the flames, their enemies shoot down the men\n and seize the women and children for slaves, carrying off the cattle.\n Sometimes a thieving Arab slaving party joins one chief who has a\n grudge against a neighboring village, assisting him to destroy it in\n the manner just described and sharing the plunder. The Arabs then\n manage to quarrel with their allies, and so obtain their goods also.\n\n As long as this state of things exists mission work in the interior\n will be impossible. The Protestant English mission, under Bishop\n Mackenzie, some years ago established itself in the interior near the\n Zambesi, and gathered together some hundreds of natives whose\n improvement they hoped gradually to effect. But a powerful tribe\n attacking the one amongst which they dwelt, they had to perform the\n uncongenial task of driving off the invaders with their rifles. Their\n friends were saved for the time, but many of the missionaries had died\n from fever, and the small remainder was obliged to retire. Shortly\n after this the tribe with which they had been was swept away and\n destroyed. The slave-trade naturally prevents all progress and the\n increase of population. It also weakens all family ties, parents\n killing their offspring if they are in want. Great cruelties are\n practised, not only in the capture of slaves, but in their transit to\n the place of destination. The Arabs are very improvident, and\n sometimes, having failed to provide sufficient food for their caravan,\n they leave some of the slaves in the desert to starve, not even\n removing the yokes by which they are fastened together. I was told of a\n woman who was carrying a bale of cloth, and on the journey gave birth\n to a child. She could not carry both the baby and the goods; the latter\n were the more valuable, so the infant was brained against the nearest\n tree and left on the ground.\n\n About four years ago a treaty was signed between the Sultan of Zanzibar\n and the British government, by which the importation of slaves was\n prohibited, but the Arabs were permitted to retain the slaves they\n already possessed. Strong pressure had to be brought to bear on the\n Arabs to compel them to sign this treaty; but even now a considerable\n traffic is carried on by the east coast with Arabia, Pemba, and\n Madagascar. The negroes are crowded into the slave-dhows, and their\n sufferings from hunger and filth must be extreme on a voyage. Many die\n and are thrown overboard, and the remainder land in a miserably reduced\n condition. But the household slaves are treated kindly and well fed;\n this the owner finds politic, or the slave might desert. They are\n addressed as \u201cNdugu-yango\u201d\u2014\u201cMy brother\u201d\u2014and considered part of the\n family.\n\n There are two sorts of slaves in the islands\u2014the Muwallid, or domestic,\n born in slavery, and the wild imported slave. The former class are much\n better treated than the others. Even young captured slaves are not so\n tractable as they, but the older ones are very obstinate and contrary\n and given to thieving and disorder. Sometimes in revenge they attempt\n the life of their master or try to get him into serious trouble, yet\n they are seldom punished for it, any more than with us a vicious animal\n would be. They are slaves, and it is their nature, and they themselves\n give this as their excuse when convicted of the most abominable crimes.\n But slaves often rise to a very important position; and as Abraham sent\n his servant to Mesopotamia to negotiate his son\u2019s marriage, so slaves\n are entrusted by their masters with the command of trading caravans to\n the interior, they preferring to remain comfortably at home. Free\n negroes have been known to sell themselves for slaves, and, when asked\n about it, to reply: \u201cWhat can a dog do without a master?\u201d Also, slaves\n often own slaves of their own. The pilot of Zanzibar, an official of\n some importance called Buckett, was a slave, and, when seen habited in\n a naval officer\u2019s old coat and a handsome turban on his head, he\n appeared a person of much distinction.\n\n It is difficult to see how slavery can be kept up at Zanzibar, now that\n importation is forbidden; for the annual loss from death and desertion\n is thirty per cent., and the average annual importation a few years ago\n was estimated at thirteen thousand. Slavery, as it has been there, is\n an abominable institution and a complete bar to improvement.\n\n Though the negro is so ignorant, superstitious, and debased, yet it has\n been abundantly shown that he is capable of improvement. I once visited\n the well-ordered estate of Kokotoni, in the north of Zanzibar Island,\n the property of Capt. Fraser. I found it in charge of an intelligent\n Scotchman, who said that they had about five hundred laborers resident\n on the plantation\u2014half men and half women. They required them all to\n marry, gave them cottages, provision, grounds, and two dollars and a\n half each per month, and they were an orderly and well-conducted\n people. The overseer had taught them different trades\u2014as that of\n wheelwright, necessary for the work of the estate\u2014and, though they\n sometimes deserted in true negro fashion, yet the truants were sure to\n return again.\n\n At Zanzibar and Bagomoyo, twenty-five miles off on the mainland, at the\n mouth of the Kingani River, the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 du Saint-Esprit, the parent\n house of which is in Paris, have most flourishing establishments. The\n town house is in the centre of Zanzibar, its corrugated iron roof,\n towering above the neighboring buildings, being a conspicuous object.\n On entering you will be greeted in good French by very civil negro boys\n dressed in blue blouse and trowsers and wearing a black glazed hat.\n They will conduct you to a spacious sitting-room decorated with\n pictures of religious subjects, and before long the superior, P\u00e8re\n Etienne, appears. He is a tall, slight man, and has not lost the\n cavalry swagger which he acquired as captain in a Lancers regiment, and\n which forms a strange contrast to his black soutane. He is a most\n affable and agreeable priest, and conducts one round the interesting\n establishment. There is a beautiful little chapel on the first floor,\n and when I was last in it the walls were being stencilled. In the\n workshops trades are taught to the boys by the lay brethren, such as\n working in metals, carpentering, and boat-building. The pupils belong\n to the mission, they having been either handed over to it by the\n British consul from captured slave-dhows, or purchased by the mission\n in the slave-market in the old times before slavery was abolished. At\n Bagomoyo there is a still larger establishment under the care of P\u00e8re\n Horner, where about ten clergy and the same number of sisters have\n charge of an agricultural colony on which are several hundred Christian\n negroes. At first the mission did not mean to Christianize the natives,\n thinking that they were so degraded that it would take several\n generations to raise them to that point; but they found them capable of\n more than was originally expected. The mission establishment is half a\n mile from the town of Bagomoyo, which contains about five thousand\n people, but it has the appearance of a small town itself. The grounds\n are laid out in a most orderly manner; it is a pleasure to walk along\n the straight, well-kept paths between fields of maize, millet, and\n sweet potatoes.\n\n The captain of the ship in which I served was one day up the Kingani\n River in his boat, accompanied by a young Alsatian lay brother from the\n mission. Shooting a hippopotamus cow, the calf, only a week or two old,\n would not leave the mother\u2019s carcase, and the captain, who had to\n return to his ship, giving money to the brother, advised him to obtain\n assistance and catch the little animal, which he presented to the\n mission. A few months after, as we were visiting the good fathers, the\n lay brother took us to a large tank surrounded with a fence, which they\n had formed for the accommodation of the hippopotamus. Standing at the\n gate, the brother called the animal by name, and it came snorting out\n of the water, ran up to its master, looking up into his face, and\n followed us about the garden and into the house like a dog. Here he was\n fed from a bottle with flour and milk. He was taken to the Zo\u00f6logical\n Gardens at Berlin shortly afterwards, and must have sold for at least\n six thousand dollars. Hippopotami are inimical to the crops of rice\n which grow near the rivers, as they come on shore in the night and\n devour enormous quantities of the young tender shoots, so that the\n fields have to be carefully watched. But more dangerous animals are\n found on the coast, and P\u00e8re Horner told us a story of a huge lion\n which had carried off several of their cattle. They constructed a trap\n of a deserted hut, into which they enticed the animal, which, finding\n himself imprisoned, aroused all the establishment from their midnight\n slumbers by his roarings. He was shot by one of the brethren.\n\n The fathers give their guests a good dinner of many courses in true\n French style, but one should not conclude, as does Stanley in his _How\n I Found Livingstone_, that champagne is their ordinary beverage. On the\n contrary, when I was there they could offer us nothing but a little\n white rum which had been sent them from our ship, and the champagne\n with which they welcomed Mr. Stanley was some of a small present which\n they had received.\n\n Their mode of work is undoubtedly the true one: to get a certain number\n of negroes, isolate them as much as possible from the licentious\n society of their heathen brethren, and hope of them to form the nucleus\n of a future Christian population.\n\n The Church of England has a mission at Zanzibar, and has also some\n settlements on the mainland; and as I had several friends there, I know\n something about it from personal observation, and regret that its\n members are not Catholics, for a more devoted set of workers it would\n be hard to find. They have a house on a _shamba_, or estate, two miles\n from the town, in which there are a number of liberated slave boys, who\n are instructed in reading, writing, and arithmetic, and are taught such\n trades as carpentering and field labor. Dr. Steere, the third bishop of\n this mission, which was set on foot by the English universities of\n Oxford and Cambridge at the instance of Livingstone, is a linguist,\n being the authority on Swahili, the language commonly spoken at\n Zanzibar and on the coast. He has written a Swahili grammar, and\n translated into the language great parts of the Bible, prayers, hymns,\n and school-books, and these are excellently printed in the mission\n press by some of the pupils, a few of whom he took to England to\n perfect themselves in the trade at a large London printing\n establishment. All the printing done in Zanzibar is their work. They\n have a beautiful chapel, where there are daily morning and evening\n services, and these are attended by all the establishment; and I am\n told that many of the boys show great devotion, kneeling for a quarter\n of an hour together in the chapel. I am inclined to fear, though, that\n the African Anglican\u2019s notion of religion is something which will\n propitiate an angry, hostile power\u2014in fact, a relic of demonology. \u201cOur\n Father\u201d has no meaning to one who had perhaps been sold to an Arab by\n his parent for a bowl of rice. Two miles beyond the English mission\u2019s\n boys\u2019 house is a similar establishment for girls under the charge of\n women. The girls look fatter and healthier than the boys, a large\n proportion of whom are affected by the terrible skin diseases so\n prevalent amongst the blacks.\n\n The mission had a devoted young clergyman there some years ago, who,\n being possessed of large means and wealthy friends, purchased the old\n slave market in Zanzibar, on which a handsome stone church with groined\n roof, and different school buildings, were erected. But he sacrificed\n his life, as most of the workers of this mission have done, by his\n zeal, and fell a victim to fever; his funeral was attended by parties\n from the English men-of-war in the harbor, and by some of the Catholic\n missionaries, and many of the European residents who wished to pay a\n last tribute of respect to the memory of a brave and devoted, if\n mistaken, man. He once told me that some of his pupils asked him a very\n pertinent question: Why, if the Christian religion was one, the French\n and English missions were not united? He evaded it by replying that\n they taught in English, but the others in French! When his death was\n announced in England a young clergyman, who had formerly worked in the\n same mission, was preaching for it in an English church and exhorting\n his hearers to give money and, if possible, their personal services to\n the cause. He was astonished afterwards at a young woman presenting\n herself and offering herself for the work. Neither pictures of fever,\n discomfort, nor death could deter her from going to Zanzibar, as I\n believe she afterwards did.\n\n Bishop Steere used to give a weekly address in the native language in\n the city of Zanzibar to any who chose to attend, and I have heard that\n the rich Arabs used to flock to it in crowds, coming to the bishop\u2019s\n house afterwards to discuss the different Christian doctrines of which\n they had heard. But if any Arab became a Christian he would probably be\n assassinated by his comrades, so great is their bigotry. Singularly,\n the part of the Bible which has most interest for an Arab is the\n genealogies; for, as is well known, they are most careful in preserving\n such records, even of their very horses.\n\n The Mahometan residents at Zanzibar and on the coast, both Arab and\n Ki-Swahili, go to school at seven years of age, and in two or three\n years learn to write, and read the Koran. They are also taught a few\n prayers and hymns and some Arab proverbs, and this completes their\n education. In two points a good Moslem puts ordinary Christians to\n shame\u2014in prayer and temperance. In the East one often sees even the\n poorest people prostrating themselves towards Mecca on their\n praying-mat, and repeating the accustomed prayers at the stated hours,\n which occur five times a day. I have seen a naked black laborer praying\n in a coal-lighter during an interval of work. One is reminded of the\n quaint old Belgian cities, where it is common to see female figures, in\n their long black cloaks, kneeling before a crucifix in some open space.\n Temperance the Arab rigidly observes; and how can one expect them to\n become Christians when they daily witness the drunkenness of white\n seamen? In fact, this objection has been urged upon me by natives, and\n the answer which one makes, that our religion does not permit\n drunkenness, is not satisfactory to them. \u201cIf we got drunk,\u201d they say,\n \u201cour sultan would put us in prison.\u201d\n\n Strict Mahometans are very Pharisaical. We once had great trouble with\n a Mahometan priest or schoolmaster who visited our ship. He refused the\n coffee which we offered him because it was made by a Christian, and\n would only condescend to drink some lime-juice out of a glass which we\n assured him had never been used, and even this beverage had to be\n prepared by his own servant. Some Arab gentlemen who accompanied him\n and dined with us, being prevented from eating anything that we had\n cooked, could get nothing but oranges.\n\n The Hindis are a sect of Mahometans who are not recognized by the\n Arabs, but the exact nature of their differences I have not been able\n to learn. Neither could I arrive at the religion of the Banians. Their\n mortality at Zanzibar is very great, and you may daily see processions\n of Banian men going to the beach beyond the town, where they raise a\n funeral pyre of wood, on which their deceased friend is consumed, the\n remains being washed away by the rising tide.\n\n On the coast the people are much the same as those who inhabit the\n island of Zanzibar. There are the lazy, cowardly Belooch soldiers and\n their families, and these swashbucklers are thoroughly despised and\n hated. The towns are ruled by headmen, who are subject to the Sultan of\n Zanzibar, but who enrich themselves by extortion. The Washenzi are\n day-laborers, and are barbarians from the interior. Banians are always\n found prospering in trade. The Ki-Swahili\u2014which means people of the\n coast, degenerate Arabs\u2014are ignorant and vicious. They have a great\n fear and hatred of the white man, particularly of the English, whom\n they called _Beni Nar_\u2014Sons of Fire. They think that, if once the white\n man\u2019s foot has been placed on the land, he is sure to obtain possession\n of it in the end; and in this they are not far mistaken. The Wamrina\n are a coast clan even more debased and vicious than the latter people,\n and they appear to have little reason. They are cowardly and cautious,\n but very cunning, and, as most of the inhabitants in those parts, lie\n habitually, even when there is no object to be gained thereby.\n\n There are a number of small towns on the coast from Magadoxo, a little\n north of the equator, to Kilwa, the great slave-mart in the south. The\n chief ones are Brava, Lamu, Marka, Melinda, and Mombas. At both of the\n latter are Portuguese remains, and at Mombas is a Protestant mission\n which at the time of my visit had been established thirty years, and\n had cost a large amount of money, but had apparently done very little\n good. The celebrated Dr. Krapf, who had been four years in Abyssinia,\n was the first to go there, starting from Zanzibar. This was in 1844. He\n was the first to draw up a Ki-Swahili grammar, in which he was assisted\n by Dr. Rebmann, who arrived two years afterwards. Their journeys from\n Mombas, which is situated in 4\u00b0 south latitude, are well known. They\n discovered Kilima Njaro, a snow-clad mountain 22,814 feet high, only 3\u00b0\n south of the equator, and what they heard from the natives of vast\n lakes in the interior, where nothing but sandy deserts had hitherto\n been supposed to exist, led to the famous travels which have exposed a\n new world to the wondering eyes of men and opened up new fields for the\n glorious labors of the missionary.\n\n Dr. Rebmann was living near Mombas at the time of my visit, though old\n and blind, and, I hear, has since died. I did not see him, though I\n started to do so with one of the missionaries. I was so disgusted by\n this man\u2019s narrow sectarianism in the midst of heathendom\u2014he commencing\n to abuse the mission of his own church at Zanzibar\u2014that I preferred to\n spend the night on the river in a boat with our seamen rather than,\n with my friends, accompany him to the Rabai Mission. We came across a\n pamphlet written by them for their English supporters, containing a lot\n of pious texts: \u201cCome over and help us\u201d; \u201cThe fields are white to the\n harvest\u201d; \u201cA wide door and effectual is open,\u201d and so on; but it struck\n us as being great nonsense. However, I am told that they have since\n that started a large establishment of liberated slaves. The Wesleyans\n have a mission in the neighborhood, but of them I know nothing, as we\n did not visit them.\n\n The Sultan of Zanzibar visited England two years ago, offered to place\n his dominions under British protection, and has exerted himself to put\n a stop to the slave-trade, though he fought hard against its abolition\n at first, as from it he derived the principal part of his revenue. If a\n stop could be put to this evil and peace established in the interior, a\n splendid field for mission-work would be the result, the black having\n such respect for the superior knowledge and intellect of the white man\n that many tribes would receive the missionary with a hearty welcome.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n NEW PUBLICATIONS.\n\n\n THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY, WITH A VIEW OF THE STATE OF THE ROMAN\n WORLD AT THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. By George P. Fisher, D.D., Professor\n of Ecclesiastical History in Yale College. New York: Scribner,\n Armstrong & Co. 1877.\n\n Dr. Fisher has taken up a line of argument of great interest and\n importance, which has employed the minds and pens of a number of able\n writers before him, but which cannot be too frequently or copiously\n treated. The author informs us in his preface that he has prepared the\n work as now published from a course of lectures before the Lowell\n Institute of Boston. The principal portion of his argument presents\n precisely what is needed by a large number of educated persons in New\n England, especially in Boston, where a reckless, extravagant\n rationalism and neologism, borrowed from Germany, are rapidly\n undermining all belief in the genuineness, historical truth, and\n doctrinal authenticity of our earliest Christian documents, together\n with those of Judaism. This modern infidelity saps the historical basis\n of Christianity, that it may be free to criticise it as a theory, a\n mere natural phenomenon, a phase of human evolution. Any one who turns\n their own historical and critical methods against these sceptics does\n good service to truth. We are pleased to recognize the many merits,\n both in respect to matter and diction, in the essay of the learned\n professor. The five chapters on the Roman policy, and Greco-Roman\n religion, literature, philosophy, and morals, are admirable. The\n geographical accuracy and distinctness with which, as on a map, the\n Roman Empire is graphically delineated, makes a characteristic and\n noteworthy feature of this part of the work, which is enriched with a\n great number of happy classical quotations. The succinct review of\n historical Judaism during the important but much-neglected period of\n five centuries immediately preceding the birth of Christ is interesting\n and valuable. A very able critical defence of the genuineness of the\n New Testament history, of the truth of the miracles and resurrection of\n our Lord, his superhuman character and divine mission, completes a\n solid and unanswerable argument for the historical basis of\n Christianity as a divine and supernatural religion.\n\n The author has shown the convergence of all the lines of movement drawn\n in the past history of the world towards the moment of Christ\u2019s\n appearance. This is one of the strongest proofs of his divine mission,\n inasmuch as it shows that the Author and Ruler of the world is also the\n Author of the Christian religion. The complement to the argument should\n point out the divergence of the lines from the same point through the\n post-Christian times, and the work of human regeneration historically\n fulfilled\u2014the second and even greater proof of the divine legation of\n Christ. The author shows very conclusively that those destructive\n critics and sceptics who deny the true historical idea of Christ as\n presented in the New Testament take away all sufficient cause for the\n effect produced in Christianity.\n\n The foundation for a complete argument from cause to effect and effect\n to cause, in the relation between the historical idea of Christ and the\n historical idea of his regenerating work, is laid by establishing his\n supernatural character, mission, and works. Thus far Dr. Fisher gives\n us complete satisfaction. When he proceeds to develop his own\n conception of the true Christian idea\u2014the plan, namely, of human\n regeneration, and the means for executing the plan\u2014we do not find it\n complete and adequate. As compared with the view heretofore prevalent\n among evangelical Protestants, it is, nevertheless, a marked\n approximation to the Catholic idea. We consider that Dr. Fisher\u2019s\n argument requires a complement, in order to make the historical circle\n embracing all ages and centred in Christ perfect in its circumference.\n To explain our statement and adduce reasons for it would require many\n pages, and we must for the present refrain from anything beyond a mere\n expression of our judgment.\n\n There is only one passage which we have thus far noticed in a perusal\n of nearly the whole of Dr. Fisher\u2019s volume which has jarred upon our\n feelings as out of tune with his prevalent mode of philosophical candor\n and historical justice. On page 238 it is written: \u201cPharisaism, like\n Jesuitism, is a word of evil sound, not because these parties had no\n good men among them, but because prevailing tendencies stamped upon\n each ineffaceable traits of ignominy.\u201d\n\n We are persuaded that in the great number and variety of studies which\n have absorbed his time and attention the writer of the foregoing\n passage has never found leisure to read the books which would give him\n the true notion of the institute and history of the Jesuits. We give\n him credit for great sincerity and love of truth, and yet we cannot\n help thinking that there is still a remnant of prejudice left in his\n mind, which in this case causes, to use his own words, \u201cgroundless,\n gratuitous suspicion, such as, in the ordinary concerns of life, is\n habitually repelled by a healthy moral nature.\u201d\n\n As a production of learning, philosophical thought, and literary taste,\n the _Beginnings of Christianity_ deserves, in our opinion, a place\n among the best works of New England scholars. We will close this notice\n by an extract which shows the philosophical and religious tone and\n quality of the great argument presented in the volume:\n\n \u201cWhen we look back upon the ancient philosophy in its entire course, we\n find in it nothing nearer to Christianity than the saying of Plato that\n man is to resemble God. But, on the path of speculation, how defective\n and discordant are the conceptions of God! And if God were adequately\n known, how shall the fetters of evil be broken and the soul attain to\n its ideal? It is just these questions that Christianity meets through\n the revelation of God in Jesus Christ. God, the head of that universal\n society on which Cicero delighted to dwell, is brought near, in all his\n purity and love, to the apprehension, not of a coterie of philosophers\n merely, but of the humble and ignorant. There is a real deliverance\n from the burden of evil, achieved through Christ, actually for himself\n and potentially for mankind. How altered in their whole character are\n the ethical maxims which, in form, may not be without a parallel in\n heathen sages! Forgiveness, forbearance, pity for the poor, universal\n compassion, are no longer abstractions derived from speculation on the\n attributes of Deity. They are a part of the example of God. He has so\n dealt with us in the mission and death of his Son. The cross of Christ\n was the practical power that annihilated artificial distinctions among\n mankind and made human brotherhood a reality. In this new setting,\n ethical precepts gain a depth of earnestness and a force of impression\n which heathen philosophy could never impart. We might as well claim for\n starlight the brightness and warmth of a noon-day sun\u201d (p. 189). This\n fine passage is supplemented by two condensed statements in another\n place, that the end in view of the plan of Jesus was \u201cthe introduction\n of a new life in humanity,\u201d and the plan itself \u201cthe establishment of a\n society of which he is the living head\u201d (p. 467). This really\n comprehends the whole Christian Idea in germ. Its true and perfect\n evolution, and an accurate commentary upon it, would present a complete\n philosophy of Christianity.\n\n\n DE DEO CREANTE: Pr\u00e6lectiones Scholastico-Dogmatic\u00e6 quas in Collegio\n S.S. Cordis Jesu ad Woodstock, Maxima Studiorum Domo Soc. Jesu in\n F\u0153d. Americ\u00e6 Sept. Statibus, habebat A.D. MDCCCLXXVI.-VII., Camillus\n Mazzella, S.J., in eod. Coll. Stud. Pr\u00e6fectus et Theol. Dogm.\n Professor. Woodstock, Marylandi\u00e6: Ex Officina Typographica Collegii.\n 1877. 8vo, pp. xxxv.-935.\n\n This treatise is a complete exposition and defence of the Catholic\n doctrine on creation and its kindred topics as handed down in the\n church by tradition from the earliest ages to the present day. As the\n title of the book indicates, the subject is considered not merely from\n a dogmatic point of view; all the errors of the ancients as well as of\n their modern imitators being taken up in turn and refuted. A glance at\n the general divisions of the work will show the wide range of topics\n treated: I. \u201cDe Creatione Generatim\u201d; II. \u201cDe Angelica Substantia\u201d;\n III. \u201cDe Hominis Origine et Natura\u201d; IV. \u201cDe Hominis Elevatione ad\n Statum Supernaturalem\u201d; V. \u201cDe Human\u00e6 Natur\u00e6 Lapsu\u201d; VI. \u201cDe Hominis\n Novissimis.\u201d\n\n Each of these subjects is developed with the greatest detail. Take, for\n example, the seventeenth proposition in the third disputation, on the\n origin of the human race. In the introductory remarks to this\n proposition the author first explains our descent from Adam, the first\n man, according to revelation, and then devotes some ten pages to a\n concise but thorough exposition of Darwinism and its companion errors.\n After this he lays down the following thesis: \u201cPrimi parentes, prout ex\n divina revelatione constat, non modo quoad animam, sed etiam quoad\n corpus, immediate a Deo conditi sunt. Quam certissimam veritatem\n frustra evertere aut infirmare nituntur qui nunc audiunt Transformist\u00e6:\n principium enim quod assumunt arbitrarium est, atque experienti\u00e6\n repugnans; media, qu\u00e6 assignant, ad transformationem efficiendam sunt\n insufficientia; probationes, demum, quas adducunt, nihil omnino\n evincunt.\u201d This he proves directly by a large array of arguments from\n the Holy Scriptures, the fathers and the doctors of the church. He then\n proceeds to show the untenableness of the opposite theories,\n demonstrating that animals can only be propagated by others of the same\n species; that the ablest practical scientists of the day have\n acknowledged the arbitrariness of the transformation theory, and that\n many have proved it contrary to known facts; that the means suggested\n by the evolutionists are insufficient to explain the origin of man,\n etc., etc. He introduces a large and well-marshalled army of quotations\n from American, British, and Continental scientists to back up his\n position.\n\n The divisions of the work and the order in which they are treated lay\n no claims to originality, which the author has very sensibly considered\n as worse than out of place in a theological text-book, since it tends\n only to perplex the student and to introduce confusion into the schools\n of divinity. The fate of writers who have, even in our own day, adopted\n a different course proves clearly the correctness of this view.\n Nevertheless, the method pursued in the treatment of particular\n questions is at once novel and useful, and, as far as we know, peculiar\n to Father Mazzella. As a general rule, theological writers, after\n having briefly explained the meaning of the proposition and touched on\n the errors of their adversaries, enter at once on the demonstration.\n This done, they devote a great deal of space to the solution of\n difficulties and the refutation of objections; and it is on this last\n point especially that they rely for making the sense of their thesis\n clear. Father Mazzella has adopted a different mode of proceeding. The\n development of each of his propositions contains two distinct parts: in\n the first he presents a complete exposition of the subject-matter in\n all its bearings; in the second he proves the point at issue. He starts\n out by giving a summary of the decisions of the church regarding the\n question under discussion. Then, if there be any diversity of opinion\n amongst Catholic doctors, he explains each system and notes the degree\n of probability contained in it. Finally, he proceeds to the exposition\n of contrary errors or heresies, and of the various senses, false and\n true, in which the doctrine may be interpreted. All this opens the way\n to the second part, in which the thesis is proved from Scripture, the\n fathers, and reason, and the few difficulties that perhaps remain are\n answered.\n\n This manner of developing a subject seems to us to confer a twofold\n benefit on the student: it gives him a clear and comprehensive\n conception of the positive doctrine, and at the same time supplies him\n with general principles by means of which he may readily solve any new\n objections that may chance to arise in discussion. It is not sufficient\n for the young theologian to have learned by heart a number of proofs,\n and the answers to the long string of difficulties given in his\n text-book. He must be imbued with the whole spirit of Catholic\n doctrine, and thus he will form within himself a new theological\n _sense_, if we may use the expression, by which he can easily discern\n what is consonant with, and what is repugnant to, the truths contained\n in the deposit of faith. Such is the result aimed at in Father\n Mazzella\u2019s method. Hence he devotes but little space to the answering\n of objections; for he has already disposed of them in the exposition of\n his thesis. Most difficulties, in fact, arise from a misunderstanding\n of Catholic doctrine; hence it is plain that they must readily\n disappear, if the dogmas of the church be clearly explained.\n\n As is proper for a theologian, the author makes abundant use of\n Scripture and tradition. Whilst avoiding all needless excursions into\n the fields of philology and hermeneutics, he does not refuse to handle\n the difficulties brought from these sciences. An instance of this is\n his vindication of the true sense of the famous [Greek: eph \u00f4]\u2014_in\n quo_\u2014in the fifth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. Whenever the\n question under discussion has been defined by the church, the decrees\n are carefully given and explained. We frequently find a series of\n definitions on the same subject, taken from councils held at various\n periods, proving the wonderful unity of the church\u2019s teaching in\n various ages. Father Mazzella makes frequent use of the fathers and\n great scholastic writers. He generally quotes them word for word, thus\n ensuring conviction as to their real opinion, and familiarizing the\n reader with their peculiar modes of thought and expression, taking\n care, however, to explain all obscurities in the text.\n\n Every student of theology is aware of the importance of mental\n philosophy in our days, when the repugnance of the supernatural to\n reason is so loudly and boldly asserted. Hence the author constantly\n appeals to it, but is careful to admit only such opinions as are\n approved by the authority of the schools, taking as his guides only St.\n Thomas and the ablest commentators of the Angelic Doctor, especially\n Suarez.\n\n In the third disputation the author has made the natural sciences come\n to the aid of theology, especially when treating of the Mosaic\n cosmogony, of the origin and antiquity of the human race, etc. Certain\n devotees of modern experimental science, whose principles are built on\n mere hypotheses, and who insist on our taking mere possibilities as\n established facts, have declared a deadly war against revelation. It is\n difficult to convince such men of their errors by appealing to pure\n reason; for they are in a remarkable degree wanting in the logical\n faculty. You can overcome them only by opposing facts to facts, and by\n proving that their own pet studies contradict their theories. This\n Father Mazzella has aimed at doing; and he supports his position by\n bringing forward a mass of facts and disclaimers from the latest\n writings of the ablest scientists. The style is clear, simple, and\n straightforward\u2014a most necessary quality in a book of the kind.\n Difficult terms are always explained, and neither order nor precision\n is ever sacrificed to a show of learning or rhetorical skill.\n\n\n MODERN PHILOSOPHY, FROM DESCARTES TO SCHOPENHAUER AND HARTMANN. By\n Francis Bowen, A.M., Alford Professor of Natural Religion and Moral\n Philosophy in Harvard College. New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co.\n 1877.\n\n The preface of Prof. Bowen prepossesses us at once in his favor. \u201cNo\n one,\u201d says he, \u201ccan be an earnest student of philosophy without\n arriving at definite convictions respecting the fundamental truths of\n theology. In my own case, nearly forty years of diligent inquiry and\n reflection concerning these truths have served only to enlarge and\n confirm the convictions with which I began, and which are inculcated in\n this book. Earnestly desiring to avoid prejudice on either side, and to\n welcome evidence and argument from whatever source they might come,\n without professional bias, and free from any external inducement to\n teach one set of opinions rather than another, I have faithfully\n studied most of what the philosophy of these modern times and the\n science of our own day assume to teach. And the result is that I am now\n more firmly convinced than ever that what has been justly called[89]\n \u2018the dirt-philosophy\u2019 of materialism and fatalism is baseless and\n false. I accept with unhesitating conviction and belief the doctrine of\n the being of one personal God, the creator and governor of the world,\n and of one Lord Jesus Christ in whom \u2018dwelleth all the fulness of the\n Godhead bodily\u2019; and I have found nothing whatever in the literature of\n modern infidelity which, to my mind, casts even the slightest doubt\n upon that belief.... Let me be permitted also to repeat the opinion,\n which I ventured to express as far back as 1849, that the time seems to\n have arrived for a more practical and immediate verification than the\n world has ever yet witnessed of the great truth that the civilization\n which is not based upon Christianity is big with the elements of its\n own destruction\u201d (pp. vi., vii.).\n\n These are sound and wise words, which we welcome with peculiar pleasure\n as emanating from a chair in Harvard University. The scope of _Modern\n Philosophy_ is more restricted, as the author distinctly premises, than\n the general title indicates. The authors whose systems are discussed\n _ex professo_ are Descartes, Spinoza, Malebranche, Pascal, Leibnitz,\n Berkeley, Kant, Schelling, Hegel, Schopenhauer, and Hartmann. There is\n also a general discussion of those great topics of metaphysics, the\n origin of ideas and the nature of the universals, of the freedom of the\n will and of the system of positivism, with an exposition of the\n relation of physical to metaphysical science. It is quite proper for\n the learned professor to select a particular range in modern philosophy\n for his lectures, but we respectfully submit that a less general title\n would have been more accurately definitive of his real object, and that\n he identifies too much the course of European thought with the\n direction of certain classes of thinkers. The revival of the philosophy\n of Aristotle and St. Thomas in modern times is certainly worthy of\n notice, and is exercising a strong and decisive influence on modern\n European thought. The questions of ideology and the universals can\n hardly be adequately presented without consideration of their treatment\n by the able modern expositors of scholastic philosophy. We do not agree\n with Mr. Bowen in his estimate of Descartes, or in his general views of\n the superiority of modern to ancient and medi\u00e6val philosophy. Neither\n are we in accordance with his special views of ideology. Nevertheless,\n we recognize a current of very sound and discriminating thought\n throughout his whole course of argumentation, which tends always toward\n the most rational and Christian direction, taking up the good and\n positive elements which it meets with on the way, and rejecting their\n contraries. The author seems to have a subtle intellectual and moral\n affinity for the highest, most spiritual and ennobling ideas of the\n great men of genius, both heathen and Christian. Plato, Malebranche,\n and Leibnitz seem to be those with whom he is most in sympathy. His\n most marked antipathy is shown for the degrading pessimism of\n Schopenhauer. We feel sure, from the tone of his reasoning and the\n quality of his sentiments, that he would find the greatest pleasure in\n the perusal of the writings of such Catholic philosophers as Kleutgen,\n San Severino, Liberatore, St\u00f6ckl, and perhaps more than all of Laforet,\n on account of his Platonizing tendencies.\n\n Mr. Bowen\u2019s style is remarkably and elegantly classic. He throws a\n literary charm and glow over his discussions and expositions of\n abstruse ethical and metaphysical topics which we do not often find,\n except in the works of Italian authors, although some who write in\n English are beginning to cultivate this style, in which logical\n severity is combined with rhetorical grace. No one could write with\n more modesty and suavity of manner, or in a more calm and amiable\n temper. We hope this truly excellent volume, in such contrast with the\n common run of jejune and debasing trash which passes for science and\n philosophy, will be very much read, especially in the neighborhood of\n Boston, where it is sadly needed.\n\n\n HISTORY OF THE SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY OF JESUS IN THE PORTUGUESE\n DOMINIONS. By the Rev. Alfred Weld, S.J. London: Burns & Oates.\n 1877. (For sale by The Catholic Publication Society Co.)\n\n This able work of Father Weld throws a flood of light on a very sad and\n gloomy page of history. Never was the Society of Jesus so fearfully\n tried and persecuted, and never did its virtues shine more\n conspicuously, than in the period referred to by the author\u2014that is,\n during the twenty years preceding the entire suppression of the order\n by Clement XIV. in 1773.\n\n We behold its holy and self-sacrificing members spreading themselves\n over the New as well as the Old World, making countless conquests for\n Christ, bearing every hardship and danger in order to teach the truths\n of faith to the most barbarous tribes and peoples, planting the\n standard of the cross in the most distant regions, and watering the\n seed of the Gospel by their blood. Wherever they went they gave\n evidence, in their own persons, of the highest apostolic virtues.\n\n God could not but bless the efforts of such disinterested and\n self-sacrificing followers of his divine Son, and their labors were\n crowned with astonishing success. Take, for example, the history of\n their missions in Paraguay. No brighter or more cheering picture was\n ever displayed to the world than the fatherly government of the Jesuits\n over these poor children of the forest. Here civilization and religion\n went hand in hand, and peace and prosperity reigned. But the very\n success of the missionaries raised up against them powerful and bitter\n enemies. The more saintly they were, the more envy they excited; the\n more learned and influential, the more jealousy arose, until at last\n their enemies vowed their destruction.\n\n Chief among those enemies, and most powerful in his opposition, was\n Carvalho, Marquis of Pombal, the chief minister of state under Joseph\n I., King of Portugal. Having, by sycophancy, flattery, and deception,\n made himself master of this weak sovereign, and always finding means to\n prevent his evil designs from becoming known, he labored to destroy the\n authority of the Holy See throughout the kingdom of Portugal, and to\n establish, as nearly as possible, a national church. He saw that the\n faithful Society of Jesus would be an insuperable obstacle in his way.\n He accordingly determined on its destruction, or, if he could not\n effect this, at least its expulsion from the Portuguese dominions.\n Knowing the high esteem in which the learned body was held throughout\n Europe by kings, princes, nobles, and people, and, above all, by each\n succeeding Sovereign Pontiff, he made use of every means, and means\n always the most malicious, in order to destroy the character and\n influence of the Jesuits. There was no insinuation too low, no\n instrument too vile, no slander too base, of which he did not make use\n to effect their injury and ruin. He spread throughout Europe,\n especially in the principal courts, the grossest libels (many of them\n written by himself) against the society, and all under the hypocritical\n plea of serving religion, law, and order. Every species of tyranny that\n human malice, aided by a deeper malice, could invent or call into being\n to injure the glorious institute founded by that great soldier of\n Christ, St. Ignatius, Pombal exercised.\n\n During his ministry nine thousand innocent persons, many of whom were\n of the noblest families in the kingdom or ecclesiastics of the highest\n character, were condemned either to prison or to death, without any\n trial, and often without even knowing the cause for which they were\n deprived of their life or liberty.\n\n The sufferings of the poor Jesuits, many of whom had spent the chief\n portion of their lives as apostles in South America and had been\n brought back in chains to the dungeons of Portugal, were of the most\n harrowing description. Not a few died in their wretched prisons, and\n the few that survived at the end of eighteen years, when they were\n released by order of the Queen, were but miserable wrecks of their\n former selves.\n\n On the day of the queen\u2019s coronation, May 13, 1777, Francis da Silva,\n Judge of the Supreme Court, pronounced his memorable address, in which\n he thus denounces, in the name of the whole nation, the tyranny from\n which they were just freed: \u201cThe blood is still flowing from the wounds\n with which the heart of Portugal has been pierced by the unlimited and\n blind despotism from which we have just ceased to suffer. He (Pombal)\n was the systematic enemy of humanity, of religion, of liberty, of\n merit, and of virtue. He filled the prisons and the fortresses with the\n flower of the kingdom. He harassed the public with vexations and\n reduced it to misery. He destroyed all respect for the pontifical and\n episcopal authority; he debased the nobility, corrupted morals,\n perverted legislation, and governed the state with a sceptre of iron,\n in the vilest and most brutal manner that has ever been seen in the\n world.\u201d\n\n All the machinations of this politician are laid bare, and his\n miserable agents in this fearful persecution exposed to view, in this\n work of Father Weld. He does not ask us to take for granted his simple\n declarations, but fortifies every position which he takes by the\n clearest and most undeniable proofs. He has had access to authentic\n documents, which he has put to the best use. His style is clear and\n forcible, and in the arguments which he uses and the proofs with which\n he sustains them he gives us a noble, just, and triumphant vindication\n of the great society of which he is a member.\n\n In reading this work we could not but call to mind the prophecy of St.\n Ignatius that \u201cthe heritage of the Passion should never fail the\n society\u201d\u2014\u201cA prophecy,\u201d says the Protestant writer Stewart Rose,\n \u201cfulfilled up to this time; for they (the Jesuits) are still, as for\n three hundred years past, indefatigable in the saving of souls,\n perversely misrepresented and stupidly misunderstood.\u201d\n\n\n ANTAR AND ZARA, AND OTHER POEMS, MEDITATIVE AND LYRICAL. By Aubrey De\n Vere.\n\n THE FALL OF RORA, AND OTHER POEMS, MEDITATIVE AND LYRICAL. By the same.\n London: Henry S. King & Co. 1877. (For sale by The Catholic\n Publication Society Co.)\n\n These two volumes \u201ccomprise the author\u2019s secular poetry previous to the\n \u2018Legends of St. Patrick\u2019 (1872), together with many poems composed\n before that date, though not published.\u201d \u201cHis religious poems will be\n collected later in a separate volume.\u201d\n\n _Antar and Zara_, with many shorter pieces, first appeared in the pages\n of THE CATHOLIC WORLD. It was in those pages that the writer made Mr.\n De Vere\u2019s acquaintance; and not a few of our readers, probably, are\n indebted to the same source for their introduction to the great\n Catholic poet of the day. To such it will be a welcome surprise, as it\n is to us, to find his cultured muse so prolific. The variety of themes,\n too, within these volumes affords a frequent ramble \u201cto fresh fields\n and pastures new.\u201d The poet himself has travelled. With Byron, he has\n \u201cstood on the Alps,\u201d and pondered in the \u201cCity of the Soul,\u201d and basked\n in the \u201ceternal summer\u201d that \u201cyet gilds the Isles of Greece.\u201d At home,\n again, he has sung Erin\u2019s glories and woes as though he had taken down\n the old Bardic harp from \u201cTara\u2019s walls.\u201d\n\n As a poet, however, he shows the influence of two other great masters\n than Byron and Moore\u2014though some of his Irish ballads remind us of the\n latter. He is chiefly a disciple of Wordsworth, while he has studied to\n good purpose the scholarly verse of Tennyson. With most imitators of\n Tennyson the classic perfections of the Laureate are turned to mere\n affectations. Not so with Mr. De Vere, who is equally a scholar\n himself. This scholarly taste, indeed, would have prevented him, we are\n sure, from adopting Wordsworth\u2019s theory of poetic diction, even had\n Tennyson never arisen to recall English poetry from the loose,\n inaccurate style into which his great predecessors, with the exception\n of Coleridge, had thrown so much splendid thought.\n\n This conviction of ours regarding the combined influence of Tennyson\n and Wordsworth on our author\u2019s poetry is confirmed by the discovery\n that _Antar and Zara_ is dedicated to the former by \u201chis friend\u201d; and,\n again, of the sonnet \u201cComposed at Rydal, September, 1860,\u201d with the two\n following sonnets \u201cTo Wordsworth, on Visiting the Duddon.\u201d _Antar and\n Zara_, particularly in the shorter metre of _Zara\u2019s_ \u201csong,\u201d is\n eminently Tennysonian. For example:\n\n\n \u201cHe culled me grapes\u2014the vintager;\n In turn, for song the old man prayed:\n I glanced around; but none was near:\n With veil drawn tighter, I obeyed.\n\n \u201c\u2018Were I a vine, and he were heaven,\n That vine would spread a vernal leaf\n To meet the beams of morn and even,\n And think the April day too brief.\n\n \u201c\u2018Were he I love a cloud, not heaven,\n That leaf would spread and drink the rain;\n Warm summer shower and dews of even\n Alike would take, and think them gain.\n\n \u201c\u2018It would not shrink from wintry rime\n Or echoes of the thunder-shock,\n But watch the advancing vintage-time,\n And meet it, reddening on the rock.\u2019\u201d\n\n\n And again:\n\n\n \u201cDear tasks are mine that make the weeks\n Too swift in passing, not too slow:\n I nurse the rose on faded cheeks,\n Bring solace to the homes of woe.\n\n \u201cI hear our vesper anthems swell;\n I track the steps of Fast and Feast;\n I read old legends treasured well\n Of Machabean chief or priest.\n\n \u201cI hear on heights of song and psalm\n The storm of God careering by;\n Beside His Deep, for ever calm,\n I kneel in caves of Prophecy.\n\n \u201cO Eastern Book! It cannot change!\n Of books beside, the type, the mould\u2014\n It stands like yon Carmelian range\n By _our_ Elias trod of old!\u201d\n\n\n Here are the sonnets:\n\n\n \u201cCOMPOSED AT RYDAL,\n\n \u201cSEPT, 1860.\n\n\n \u201cThe last great man by manlier times bequeathed\n To these our noisy and self-boasting days\n In this green valley rested, trod these ways,\n With deep calm breast this air inspiring breathed.\n True bard, because true man, his brow he wreathed\n With wild-flowers only, singing Nature\u2019s praise;\n But Nature turn\u2019d, and crown\u2019d him with her bays,\n And said, \u2018Be thou _my_ Laureate.\u2019 Wisdom sheathed\n In song love-humble; contemplations high,\n That built like larks their nests upon the ground;\n Insight and vision; sympathies profound,\n That spann\u2019d the total of humanity:\n These were the gifts which God pour\u2019d forth at large\n On men through him; and he was faithful to his charge.\u201d\n\n\n \u201cTO WORDSWORTH, ON VISITING THE DUDDON.\n\n I.\n\n\n \u201cSo long as Duddon, \u2019twixt his cloud-girt walls\n Thridding the woody chambers of the hills,\n Warbles from vaulted grot and pebbled halls\n Welcome or farewell to the meadow rills;\n So long as linnets pipe glad madrigals\n Near that brown nook the laborer whistling tills,\n Or the late-reddening apple forms and falls\n \u2018Mid dewy brakes the autumnal red-breast thrills;\n So long, last poet of the great old race,\n Shall thy broad song through England\u2019s bosom roll.\n A river singing anthems in its place,\n And be to later England as a soul.\n Glory to Him who made thee, and increase,\n To them that hear thy word, of love and peace!\u201d\n\n\n II.\n\n\n \u201cWhen first that precinct sacrosanct I trod\n Autumn was there, but Autumn just begun;\n Fronting the portals of a sinking sun,\n The queen of quietude in vapor stood,\n Her sceptre o\u2019er the dimly-crimsoned wood\n Resting in light. The year\u2019s great work was done;\n Summer had vanish\u2019d, and repinings none\n Troubled the pulse of thoughtful gratitude.\n Wordsworth! the autumn of our English song\n Art thou: \u2019twas thine our vesper psalms to sing:\n Chaucer sang matins; sweet his note and strong;\n His singing-robe the green, white garb of Spring:\n Thou like the dying year art rightly stoled\u2014\n Pontific purple and dark vest of gold.\u201d\n\n\n Wordsworth was a giant at the sonnet. His sonnets are, in our judgment,\n by far his best productions, and those in which his theory of diction\n jars one least. We congratulate Mr. De Vere on following in the\n master\u2019s footsteps by cultivating the sonnet, and without the defects\n of the leader. We are also proud to see him disregard the Petrarchian\n sonnet as the only correct type\u2014a form in which the English language\n would be sadly monotonous, were it never allowed to vary the order of\n rhymes, particularly in the minor system. Surely our language has every\n right to a sonnet of its own\u2014and that flexible.\n\n We will only add that the objections commonly made to Mr. De Vere\u2019s\n poetry\u2014to wit, that it is elaborate and requires much thought\u2014are of no\n weight against his mission as a poet. He aims, we presume, at\n interesting the cultured few rather than the uncultured many. A poet\u2019s\n highest function is, we say, to teach. And a true Catholic poet, like\n our author, can reach intelligences, both within and without the\n church, through doors at which \u201cdivine philosophy\u201d in dull, prosaic\n garb must knock in vain.\n\n\n SADLIER\u2019S ELEMENTARY HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. By a Teacher of\n History. New York: William H. Sadlier. 1877.\n\n This is a very pleasing and useful little manual for children. It\n presents the chief events of the history of this country in the form of\n question and answer, giving a prominence much needed to the great part\n which Catholics have played in the struggles of the Republic, and its\n material and social development. The plan was well conceived, and has\n been well executed. It is the last work of the enterprising and\n much-lamented young Catholic publisher who was so suddenly carried off\n at the opening of what promised to be a most useful and honorable\n career.\n\n\n ANCIENT HISTORY. From the French of Rev. Father Gazeau, S.J. Revised\n and corrected, with questions at the end of each chapter. By a pupil\n of the Sisters of Notre Dame. First American edition. New York: The\n Catholic Publication Society Co. 1877.\n\n This is another and useful addition to the Catholic Publication\n Society\u2019s educational series. It is a very interesting, clear, and\n comprehensive history, embracing the chief powers and peoples of\n ancient times, and ending with the death of Alexander the Great and the\n division of his empire. The questions at the end of each chapter form\n an improved feature on the original, and the translation runs as\n smoothly as could be desired.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n THE\n\n CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n VOL. XXVI., No. 154.\u2014JANUARY, 1878.\n\n BETWEEN THE YEARS.\n\n 1877\u20131878.\n\n _Rogate, qu\u00e6 ad pacem sunt, Jerusalem: et abundantia diligentibus\n te._\u2014Ps. cxxi.\n\n I.\n\n\n Old with its sorrow, weary with the load\n Of angry strife and murderous thought of wrong\n It hath with such sad patience borne so long,\n The year draws near the judgment-seat of God.\n Signed at its birth with Heaven\u2019s holiest name,\n Blessed with the chrism of self-sacrifice,\n It brought men gifts of more than royal price;\n Asked in return a pure and generous fame;\n Life\u2019s book it opened at a clean white page\u2014\n Whereon fell not the shadow of a stain\u2014\n Set in man\u2019s hand a consecrated pen\n Whose script should be the future\u2019s heritage.\n Lo! we have written; shall we dare to see\n The closed book opened in eternity?\n\n\n II.\n\n\n _Jesu, Redemptor!_ at thy feet we kneel,\n Who burn the tapers round the dying year;\n Rest we beseech for him that lieth here,\n And on the blotted page thy mercy\u2019s seal.\n Through this dark night we wait with hope the day,\n Ready the handmaid of thy grace to greet\n Who hear the rhythm of her strong, young feet\u2014\n The fair New Year, advancing swift this way.\n Jesus, most patient, does thy morning break?\n Shall she we wait for, with thy Spirit\u2019s breath\n Stir to new life a world that slumbereth?\n Shall last year\u2019s thorns to fleecy blossom wake?\n Cometh thy kingdom? Shall thy will be done,\n And Calvary\u2019s shade be lost in Thabor\u2019s sun?\n\n\n III.\n\n\n To thee we look, O Jesus, our true light!\n With eyes, tear-dimmed, that, straining, gaze along\n The future\u2019s ways the past o\u2019ershades with wrong;\n That dread the glitter of this earthly night,\n Where every star is rivet of a cross.\n Still in the light of Child-blessed Bethlehem\n We feel the portent of Jerusalem,\n We hear the echoes of sad Rama\u2019s loss.\n In thee we trust, and in her, crucified,\n Our holy mother Rome, thy spouse divine,\n In whose dear face eternal light doth shine,\n In whose maimed hands thy perfect gifts abide.\n In thee we rest, who know the future thine;\n Shape thou our deeds unto thy will divine.\n\n\n Copyright: Rev. I. T. HECKER. 1878.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n CHRISTIANITY AS AN HISTORICAL RELIGION.[90]\n\n The doctrine of natural development or evolution may be apprehended and\n presented in theoretical form under two diverse phases or aspects. One\n of these resembles the old scholastic theory of the eduction of forms\n from the potentiality of matter. The indeterminate something which is\n almost nothing takes on all kinds of specific determinations, which\n chase away and supplant one another, each one vanishing into\n nothingness like a melody when the harp-strings cease to vibrate. The\n animal soul, the highest of these determining principles, is only one\n of the evanescent forms, depending for existence on the body it\n animates, becoming extinct, like a sound or the trace of a bird in the\n air, as soon as death takes place. So, in the theory of pure natural\n evolution, history, polity, ethics, theology, science, educe themselves\n from the potential, determinable substratum of humanity, without\n efficient or final causes, in evanescent forms; and their animating\n spirit is no more than an _anima belluina_.\n\n The other theory may be likewise illustrated from the same philosophy,\n comparing it with the doctrine of the rational soul, immediately\n created, self-subsisting, entering into composition with body but not\n immersed in it; like a swimmer in water, with head and shoulders above\n the surface; animating matter, but dominating over it and subordinating\n it to serve by its development and life the higher end of the spirit,\n which reaches beyond the temporal and sensible toward infinity and\n eternity. Thus all human development\u2014though it is nature which is\n developed, though natural processes subserve its evolution, and its\n history is the history of human events, acts, thoughts, polities,\n religions\u2014is informed and dominated by a superhuman, a divine spirit,\n power, action, for a supra-mundane end.\n\n The true philosophy of history is constructed on this theory\u2014meaning by\n theory what Aristotle and the Greeks meant, not a visionary conjecture,\n but an intellectual speculation by which the mind has true vision of\n intelligible realities, as it has of sensible objects by ocular vision.\n This true philosophy of history is partly identified with theology, or\n the science of God and all that which is divine; not only in so far as\n theology is the highest part of rational philosophy, but also inasmuch\n as it transcends reason. The knowledge of God and that which is divine\n transcending natural intelligence and reason, is the revelation of God\n in and through the Word, who \u201cenlighteneth every man coming into this\n world,\u201d and consequently casts light on everything pertaining to\n humanity. The creation, destination, fall, redemption and glorification\n of humanity in and through the Word, \u201cwho was made flesh and dwelt\n among us,\u201d is the object of Christian theology, to which the immediate\n object of history is subordinate. The Incarnate Son of God is the\n central figure in human history, its circumference is drawn around this\n centre, and all its diameters pass through it.\n\n A number of great historians have perceived this truth, and made\n universal history render up its testimony, which is sometimes latent\n and sometimes patent, to Christ and to his divine work of human\n regeneration. Leo, for instance, having first convinced himself of the\n truth of divine revelation by the study of history, made his entire\n work on the universal history of mankind a splendid and irrefutable\n demonstration of Christianity. The course of time and events before\n Christ is a preparation for his coming. The one great event in human\n history is the divine Epiphany, the visible manifestation of God in the\n Person of the Word through his assumed human nature, in which he was\n conceived and born of the Virgin, lived among men, died, and rose again\n to an immortal and glorious life, for the fulfilment of the divine\n purpose in creation and the consummation of the destiny of mankind. The\n course of time and events after Christ is the successive fulfilment of\n this divine purpose, to be completed in the final consummation at the\n end of the present order of the world.\n\n In the six centuries immediately preceding Christ the preparation and\n convergence of events become more distinct and manifest; the features\n of human evolution are more marked; the progress and tendency of the\n universal movement are apparently accelerated in the direction of the\n common point of convergence; all human affairs, the objects of history,\n seem to rise out of its dim horizon, looming up in increasing\n magnitude, like the great ships of a squadron hastening from all points\n of the compass over a broad sea to their rendezvous. Before this period\n the expanse of time is to our eye almost like the waste solitudes of\n ocean. Confucius collected some remnants of Chinese historical\n documents going back to the ninth century b.c. Some imperfect records\n of Hindoo antiquity have been brought to light in modern researches.\n Hieroglyphic and cuneiform inscriptions, like traces of a caravan on\n the sand, present to the curious modern eye vestiges of a remote past.\n Berosus wrote in the reign of Seleucus Nicator, Manetho in that of\n Ptolemy Philadelphus, Herodotus four centuries and a half before\n Christ. Varro, the most learned of the Romans, dates the beginning of\n authentic Roman history from the first Olympiad, B.C. 776. Authentic\n written history does not go back as far as Solomon, except as we find\n it in the sacred writings of the Old Testament. These priceless\n documents are the family records of the house of Nazareth, the\n genealogy of Jesus Christ, the history of his predecessors and\n precursors; of inchoate Christianity, of the prophecy and providence,\n the promises and laws, the typical rites and preliminary covenants, the\n elementary revelations and the other preludes, by which, in divers\n places, times, and manners, the Word of God prepared the way for his\n coming upon earth to fulfil all prophecy and accomplish the expectation\n of all nations.\n\n About five centuries and a half before Christ the prophet Daniel made\n his celebrated prediction of the great period of seventy weeks\u2014_i.e._,\n four hundred and ninety years\u2014from the rebuilding of the temple and\n city of Jerusalem to the Messias. This period is marked as the one of\n immediate expectation and preparation. As the time of the great Prophet\n drew near the succession of the minor prophets in Judea ceased. The\n Jewish people became less exclusively isolated, and came into relations\n with other nations which were quite new and marked with a transitional\n tendency. The Greek Scriptures of the second canon, like the writings\n of St. Paul in the New Testament, are more like the classic works of\n other nations than those of the first canon, which are marked with the\n peculiar Hebrew characteristics. A diffusion of the Jews, of their\n books and ideas; a general dissemination of the Greek language and\n literature, a world-wide unification of civilized, and in part of\n barbarous peoples under the Roman polity; a remarkable advancement of\n the human mind in the great works of philosophy, poetry, literature,\n art, and every species of civilization; are the principal second and\n concurrent causes directed by divine Providence to fulfil a purpose,\n analogous to the mission of St. John the Baptist, among the nations\n predestined to a Christian vocation.\n\n There is nothing in this view which favors rationalism. Grace supposes\n nature, and God is the author of both. Natural and supernatural\n providence are distinct but not separate. Rational science and revealed\n doctrine are portions of the universal truth which has its measure in\n the divine intelligence and its primal origin in the divine essence. It\n is, moreover, characteristic of the divine operation to act on the rule\n of parsimony in the use of means. Where second causes are sufficient\n the first cause does not immediately intervene and supersede their\n action; where natural forces are sufficient they are not supplanted by\n those which are supernatural. What a long period elapsed before the\n earliest of the inspired books was written! How few have been the\n prophets, how comparatively few and rare miracles of the first order!\n In the beginning, religion, the church, the whole spiritual order, was\n identified with the common social and civil order. The special\n intervention of God in the calling of Abraham, the legation of Moses,\n the entire Jewish system, was a renovation of the more ancient and\n universal dispensation, confined within the limits of one nation,\n protected by special legislation, sanctioned by miracles, manifested in\n revelations through inspired men and prophets. As the time draws near\n when the church and religion were to become once more and finally\n Catholic, the supernatural providence of God over the Jewish people\n becomes less extraordinary, and his natural providence over the other\n nations more conspicuous. The great Prophet himself, the Messias, the\n Son of God in human form, performs miracles and appeals to them, as it\n were, with reserve and reluctance, hides his wisdom and power from men,\n refuses to exert his dominion over men and nature in defence of his own\n life, discloses himself after his resurrection to a few only, and\n departs, so to speak, _incognito_ from the earth to return to his\n heavenly abode with the Father. The gift of inspiration, by virtue of\n which the written documents of revelation are completed, is imparted to\n a small number only; their writings fill but a small compass; within\n fifty years from the opening of the New Testament canon by the first\n Gospel it is closed by the last book of the last of the apostles, St.\n John. No new David, or Isaias, or Daniel, or Paul, or John is\n henceforth to appear in the church. All this shows the purpose of God\n not to oppress the human by the divine in the deification of humanity,\n not to supersede the natural by the supernatural, or to supplant the\n activity of the human intelligence and will by an overbearing divine\n power. The Spirit of God brooded over the face of chaos in the\n beginning, gradually bringing it into form and order, and the same\n Spirit has been waving his wings[91] over the waters of human history\n during the entire period of the explication of God\u2019s creative act in\n time and space through human actions and events. Where creative power\n is required\u2014_i.e._, where it is the will of God to give being to a term\n educed from non-existence and from no pre-existing subject\u2014God acts\n alone and immediately as first cause with no concurrent cause. He has\n created and continues to create all simple substances. Where\n supernatural power is required to bring from created substances certain\n results which presuppose a new form of being in them above their\n intrinsic substantial actuality, or some other augmentation of their\n natural force by an immediate divine act, God intervenes directly as\n the efficient cause of the effect produced. He is the author of second\n causes and principles, of the first germs of evolution, of generative\n powers, of all origin, and of all that is called in the German language\n _Urwesen_. He preserves everything, concurs with everything, directs\n everything toward proximate, remote, and final ends, bringing the\n creation which proceeded from him as first cause back to himself as\n final cause. And therefore, whenever there is a sufficient reason, he\n intervenes directly to overrule the order of second causes and the\n natural laws he has himself established. The especial reason for this\n is to prevent the thwarting of the legitimate action of beings endowed\n with con-creative power, through the illegitimate interference of other\n beings endowed with the same power. All spiritual beings have this\n con-creative power by virtue of intelligence and free-will. They may\n fail to exercise it when they should; they may be hindered from\n exercising it by equal or superior force. The order of moral probation\n requires that great freedom of movement should be allowed to these\n forces in voluntary efforts and in conflicts. But the final cause of\n this probation also exacts that the predetermined plans of God shall be\n infallibly executed, and that he shall overrule the wills both of men\n and angels for the fulfilment of his own sovereign will.\n\n The natural and the supernatural are, therefore, not separate, much\n less disconnected, least of all hostile, in the order of divine\n providence, although they are distinct and placed in logical opposition\n to one another. Sacred and secular history, religion and civilization,\n theology and science, the eternal and temporal interests of mankind,\n cannot be separated from each other and relegated to mutually distant\n or hostile kingdoms, like the kingdoms of light and darkness in the\n system of the Manicheans. Any view which considers mankind as separated\n into two divisions of the elect and the reprobate by an antecedent\n decree, is false. The doctrine that the nature of man has become\n totally depraved, and that his entire rational and physical activity\n develops only sin which tends fatally to perdition, is utterly\n unchristian as well as unphilosophical. It is only from this doctrine\n that we could deduce a theory by which the society of the elect would\n be considered as a separated, isolated tribe, a small invisible church,\n without any real relation through a spiritual bond with the mass of\n mankind. The Catholic doctrine is expressed by the author of the Book\n of Wisdom in these beautiful words: \u201cGod created all things that they\n might be: and he made the nations of the earth for health: and there is\n no poison of destruction in them, nor kingdom of hell upon the earth.\n For justice is perpetual and immortal.\u201d[92]\n\n The true philosophy of Christianity must, therefore, take into view the\n providence of God over the Gentiles, their history, philosophy, polity,\n and civilization, in order to appreciate the period of preparation for\n the Messias who was the expected of the nations. The philosophy of\n history, also, must take into view the whole cycle of special acts of\n divine providence recorded in the books of the Old Testament, and\n fulfilled between the epochs of the calling of Abraham and the\n appearance of the Messias in the history of the peculiar people of God.\n Mr. Formby, with his peculiar originality and vigor of thought, has\n brought out into more striking relief than any other author we know of\n the idea common to several excellent modern writers respecting the\n position of the two cities, Jerusalem and Rome, in the historical order\n of divine Providence. They are, as it were, the two great citadels of\n God, the two great capitals of the universal kingdom of Christ. During\n the thousand years immediately before the Incarnation the city of\n David, the seat of the royal ancestors of Jesus Christ our Lord, was\n the citadel of all the highest interests of humanity. All the hopes,\n the whole future destiny, of mankind were in David\u2019s royal line, the\n sweet psalmist, the prophet, the king of Israel. For seven centuries\n God was preparing Rome, first the ally, then the arbiter, and finally\n the conqueror of Judea, to take the place of Jerusalem, and by its\n world-wide polity to serve as a medium for the promulgation and\n extension of the divine religion throughout the whole earth.\n\n The true philosophy of history sets aside all theories which are\n exclusive on the one side or on the other\u2014those which exclude the\n ordinary providence of God over all mankind under the natural law, and\n those which exclude his extraordinary providence over the church under\n the supernatural law\u2014and includes both under one synthesis. The one\n exclusive view proceeds from an _\u00e0 priori_ theological principle\n resulting in a conclusion with which a logical induction from facts\n cannot be reconciled, and therefore denies or misrepresents the facts.\n The other proceeds from an _\u00e0 priori_ metaphysical principle with a\n similar result. The one is a pseudo-supernaturalism, the other a\n pseudo-naturalism. The first pretends to be the genuine spiritual\n religion, or pure Christianity; the second professes to be the genuine\n rational philosophy, or pure science. Both are counterfeits of the\n truth. The best corrective of these theoretical tendencies is to be\n found in the correct knowledge and exposition of history. Lacordaire\n has well said: \u201c_On ne br\u00fble pas les faits_.\u201d Facts are incombustible;\n they cannot be made to evaporate in the gaseous elements of\n transcendental metaphysics, or vanish in clouds of smoke from the pipes\n of German neologists. Each of these make their gas or blow their clouds\n from products of their own imagination adroitly substituted for facts.\n Facts resist with an invincible inertia every combination with false\n theories of supernatural religion. In all branches of science pure\n reasoning and the investigation of facts must go together in harmony\n and mutually complete each other. Even in divine revelation God is\n careful to present facts with their evidence in connection with\n doctrine, and a large portion of the Bible is made up of historical\n records. The divine legation of Moses and the divine mission of Jesus\n Christ are great historical facts, and they are in synthetical\n connection with all the great events and epochs of human universal\n history. In this concurrence and harmony we find the most evident and\n tangible proof and corroboration in the order of natural reason of the\n truth revealed by God in Jesus Christ, which is the object of divine\n faith, and the soul of the complete substance of Christianity.\n\n Jesus Christ came on the earth at the very juncture of the ages, at the\n moment for crystallization, at the epoch of crisis in human affairs,\n when Judaism, Grecian culture, and Roman jurisprudence combined with\n Roman valor, were ready to blend in a new combination; when the three\n strands spun by no blind fate, but by all-seeing Providence, were ready\n to be intertwined: the pure tradition of the patriarchs, the philosophy\n of the heathen sages, the organic polity of the imperial legislators\u2014an\n electric cable to bind the earth and transmit the new movement of\n divine impulse. The Jews preserved and handed down the pure doctrine of\n monotheism, the promise of redemption, and the moral law\u2014the germ of\n revealed doctrine and ethics, which, in the state of development, is\n the faith and law of Christianity. The Greeks furnished the\n intellectual human culture in philosophy, poetry, and art, of which the\n Christian religion availed itself, as of a precious vase in which to\n detain its subtle and sublime essence\u2014an ideal atmosphere for the\n communication of its influence to the minds and imaginations of men in\n all ages and countries. Rome opened the way for diffusion and\n unification. Immobility in tradition, mobility in intelligence, motive\n power in organization, are the characters of Jewish, Greek, and Roman\n civilization, which were united in Christianity under a higher and\n controlling vital force.\n\n They were each and all temporary and insufficient, subject to a law of\n internal decay, evanescent in their nature, and about vanishing when\n Jesus Christ came on the earth. That he came just in time to supersede\n them and to begin the universal regeneration of mankind; that he really\n did so without any purely human and natural means which were sufficient\n causes of the effects produced; is a proof that the God whose\n providence rules the world sent him to fulfil this mission, and that\n his work was a divine operation. God\u2019s hand alone could spin and twine\n the threads of human destiny and make Time\u2019s noiseless, incessant\n shuttle weave the woof and web into the successive figures of\n historical embroidery.\n\n The miracles and resurrection of Jesus Christ, historically proved as\n certain, indubitable facts, authenticate his divine mission; they stamp\n a divine seal on his credentials as the Messias promised from the\n beginning of the world. This divine legation gives divine authority to\n his word and precepts. Whatever he teaches in the name of God is a\n divine revelation, and whatever he commands is a divine law. The\n authentic record of these miracles, the record of what Jesus said and\n did; the authentic account of his teaching respecting his own person,\n plan, doctrine, and law\u2014that is, of the principles and the foundation\n of the Christian religion\u2014is historical; it is an authentic testimony\n respecting facts. The authentic record of the actual founding of\n Christianity on the principles and plan of the Master, by the disciples\n to whom he entrusted the work of carrying his design into effect, is\n historical. This divine design necessarily embracing all that is\n contained in the idea of a continuity and development of divine\n providence over human affairs and destinies from the beginning to the\n end of the world, its actual carrying out through successive ages\n becomes matter of history for the time present in respect to times\n past. Its principles of continuity and development, in connection with\n the order of providence anterior to Christ, and with the progress of\n its movement from the apostolic age through the ages following, are to\n be sought for in its history, not to the exclusion of reasoning from\n abstract principles, but in connection with it. The historical\n documents of the New Testament, considered merely as credible testimony\n and apart from their inspiration, are of paramount importance in\n respect to the inquiry into the nature of the genuine, authentic\n Christianity promulgated and established as a world-religion by its\n Founder and his apostles. After these come all other documents\n containing historical record or indirect evidence respecting the\n earliest age of the Christian religion. In this aspect the study of\n dogmas of faith, of laws and rites, of the spirit and the organization\n of Christianity, is directed toward an historical term. The object of\n the inquiry is to ascertain what is Christianity, what was its\n legitimate development, where is to be found through all ages the real\n continuation, uninterrupted succession, perpetual life, and progressive\n expansion which connote the identity of its essence and its specific\n unity in all its distinct moments, as it proceeds from its beginning\n towards its end. Although its intrinsic truth and authority are\n established simultaneously with the exposition of its historical\n character, the argument is nevertheless distinct, in respect to its\n conclusive force in this direction, from the pure manifestation of the\n real essence and nature of the religion. The question as to its\n essential constituents and their logical connection is logically\n distinct from the question as to its material truth, although they are\n metaphysically one by an inseparable composition. Christ, manifesting\n himself in history, is a revelation of the infinite wisdom, power, and\n goodness of God in his divine works, which transcend the reach of all\n created and dependent forces. It is the Eternal Word speaking\n efficiently, as when he said: \u201cLet there be light: and there was\n light.\u201d If we can only see all objects by this light, through a pure\n medium, we cannot fail to be enlightened by the knowledge of the truth.\n\n The able work of Dr. Fisher, the title of which is prefixed to this\n article, and which was briefly noticed in our last number, is based on\n the idea we have set forth in these preliminary remarks, although we do\n not profess to have given an exposition of the learned author\u2019s precise\n thesis, or ascribe to him a view identical in all particulars with the\n one we have presented. We will employ his own language for this\n purpose, of showing his own individual conception of the historical\n environment of Christianity, and the conclusions to which investigation\n and reflection on the great facts and events connected with its\n beginnings have led him.\n\n \u201cChristianity is an historical religion. It is made up of\n events, or, to say the least, springs out of events which,\n however peculiar in their origin, form a part of the history of\n mankind.... The Apostle Paul refers to the birth of Christ as\n having occurred \u2018when the fulness of time was come\u2019 (Gal. iv.\n 4).\n\n \u201cHis thought evidently is not only that a certain measure of\n time must run out, but that a train of historical events and\n changes must occur which have the coming of Christ for their\n proper sequence. Of the nature of these antecedents in the\n previous course of history he speaks when he has occasion to\n discuss the relation of the Mosaic dispensation to the\n Christian, and to point out the aims of Providence in regard to\n the Gentile nations. It was formerly a mistake of both orthodox\n and rationalist to look upon Christianity too exclusively as a\n system of doctrine addressed to the understanding. Revelation\n has been thought of as a communication written on high and let\n down from the skies\u2014delivered to men as the Sibylline books\n were said to have been conveyed to Tarquin. Or it has been\n considered, like the philosophical system of Plato, a creation\n of the human intellect, busying itself with the problems of\n human life and destiny; the tacit assumption in either case\n being that Christianity is merely a body of doctrine. The truth\n is that revelation is at the core historical. It is embraced in\n a series of transactions in which men act and participate, but\n which are referable manifestly to an extraordinary agency of\n God, who thus discloses or reveals himself. The supernatural\n element does not exclude the natural; miracle is not magic.\n Over and above teaching there are laws, institutions,\n providential guidance, deliverance, and judgment. Here is the\n groundwork of revelation. For the interpretation of this\n extraordinary and exceptional line of historical phenomena\n prophets and apostles are raised up\u2014men inspired to lift the\n veil and explain the dealings of Heaven with men. Here is the\n doctrinal or theoretical side of revelation. These individuals\n behold with an open eye the significance of the events of which\n they are witnesses or participants. The facts of secular\n history require to be illuminated by philosophy. Analogous to\n this office is the authoritative exposition and comment which\n we find in the Scripture along with the historical record. The\n doctrinal element is not a thing independent, purely theoretic,\n disconnected from the realities of life and history. These lie\n at the foundation; on them everything of a didactic nature is\n based. This fact will be impressively obvious to one who will\n compare the Bible, as to plan and structure, with the Koran.\n\n \u201cThe character of revelation is less likely to be misconceived\n when the design of revelation is kept in view. The end is not\n to satisfy the curiosity of those who \u2018seek after wisdom,\u2019 by\n the solution of metaphysical problems. The good offered is not\n science, but salvation. The final cause of revelation is the\n recovery of men to communion with God\u2014that is, to true\n religion. Whatever knowledge is communicated is tributary to\n this end.\n\n \u201cHence the grand aim, under the Old Dispensation and the New,\n was not the production of a book, but the training of a people.\n To raise up and train up a nation that should become a fit\n instrument for the moral regeneration of mankind was the aim of\n the old system.... Under the new or Christian system the object\n was not less the training of a people; not, however, with any\n limitations of race. The fount of the system was to be a\n community of men who should be \u2018the light of the world,\u2019 and\n \u2018the salt of the earth....\u2019\n\n \u201cThe grand idea of the kingdom of God is the connecting thread\n that runs through the entire course of divine revelation. We\n behold a kingdom planted in the remote past, and carried\n forward to its ripe development, by a series of transactions in\n which the agency of God mingles in an altogether peculiar way\n in the current of human affairs. There is a manifestation of\n God in act and deed. Verbal teaching is the commentary attached\n to the historic fact, ensuring to the latter its true meaning.\u201d\n\n This is sound and Christian philosophy, admirably expressed and\n containing many fruitful germs of thought. What we have quoted may\n suffice to show that the historical nature of Christianity is the\n fundamental idea of Dr. Fisher\u2019s argument in the work under review.\n\n He recognizes also a law of historical and continuous development\n through all time in Christianity as resulting from its vital force,\n which differs from the previous historical stage in this: that \u201cin the\n giving of revelation, at each successive stage, and especially at the\n consummation, there was an increment of its contents,\u201d whereas \u201cthis is\n not true of Christianity since the apostolic age.\u201d The touchstone and\n test of normal development, in the sense to which the signification of\n the term is restricted when it is used of the post-apostolic age, is\n that \u201cit springs out of the primitive seed\u201d\u2014namely, the deposit of\n revealed truth contained in the teaching of Christ and the apostles in\n its state of ultimate completeness.\n\n The historical method of determining the real origin and nature of\n Christianity is contrasted with the method which is purely _\u00e0 priori_\n and exclusively metaphysical in the following passage:\n\n \u201cThe historical basis of Christianity marks the distinction\n between Christian theology and metaphysical philosophy. The\n starting-point of the philosopher is the intuitions of the\n mind; on them as a foundation, with the aid of logic, he builds\n up his system. His only postulates are the data of\n consciousness. In Christian theology, on the contrary, we begin\n with facts recorded in history, and explore, with the aid of\n inspired authors, their _rationale_. To reverse this course,\n and seek to evolve the Christian religion out of consciousness,\n to transmute its contents into a speculative system, after the\n manner of the pantheistic thinkers in Germany, is not less\n futile than would be the pretence to construct American history\n with no reference to the Puritan emigration, the Revolutionary\n war, or the Southern Rebellion. The distinctive essence of\n Christianity evaporates in an effort, like that undertaken by\n Schelling in his earlier system, and by Hegel, to identify it\n with a process of thought.\u201d[93]\n\n Farther on in his argument Dr. Fisher shows how this perverse\n employment of the _\u00e0 priori_ method has produced the sceptical theories\n of the T\u00fcbingen school of criticism:\n\n \u201cAs regards the credibility of the Gospel history, it ought to\n be clearly understood that the modern attack by Baur, Strauss,\n Zeller, and others is founded upon an _\u00e0 priori_ assumption. It\n is taken for granted beforehand that whatever is supernatural\n is unhistorical. The testimony into which a miracle enters is\n stamped at once as incredible. Christianity, it was assumed,\n was an evolution of thought upon the natural plane. At a later\n day Strauss fell into a materialistic way of thinking, which\n rendered him, if possible, more deaf to all the evidence which,\n if admitted, implies the supernatural. From the point of view\n taken in the sceptical school, therefore, the New Testament\n histories, so far as they relate to the wonderful works of\n Christ, and his resurrection and manifestation to his disciples\n after his death, must be discredited. But their principle, or\n prejudice, carries the negative critics farther. It must affect\n their judgment as to the authorship of the narratives which\n record the miracles. It is rendered difficult to believe, if\n not quite improbable, that these histories emanate from\n apostles, eye-witnesses of the life of Jesus. The myths, or the\n consciously-invented stories, the product of a theological\n \u2018tendency\u2019 in the primitive church, cannot well be ascribed to\n the immediate followers of Christ. The fact that the New\n Testament histories contain accounts of miracles also tends to\n weaken and vitiate their general authority, in the estimation\n of the sceptical school. That is to say, the credulity of the\n Gospel writers, or their willingness to deceive, as evinced in\n the supernatural elements embraced in their books, makes them\n less entitled to trust in their record of ordinary events into\n which the miracle does not enter....\n\n \u201cConnected with the unscientific assumption first noticed,\n other assumptions were adopted by the T\u00fcbingen school which are\n equally unsound. It was assumed that Christianity is an\n evolution of thought according to the scheme of the Hegelian\n logic, where it is held as a law that a doctrine in an\n undeveloped form must divaricate into two opposites, to be\n recombined afterwards in a higher unity. Thus, it was assumed\n that Paulinism, and the sharply-defined Judaizing system\n attributed to Peter, were the antagonistic types of opinion\n which sprang out of the seed of doctrine planted by Christ, and\n which were reunited in the old Catholic theology, the\n evangelical legalism of the fathers of the second century.\u201d[94]\n\n This statement is supplemented by another succinct and pregnant passage\n containing the elements of an argument of great comprehension and\n irrefragable conclusiveness. After affirming that \u201cthe mythical theory\n is wrecked upon a variety of difficulties which it cannot evade or\n surmount\u201d\u2014a statement which has much more force, taken in connection\n with the entire context of thorough critical reasoning, than it can\n show as a mere isolated quotation\u2014the learned professor proceeds:\n\n \u201cWhat is the rationalistic theory of the origin of the\n Christian religion? It is that Jesus, a carpenter of Nazareth,\n with no prestige derived from birth or social standing, taught\n in Galilee for about a year\u2014for to this period the class of\n whom we speak would limit his public work. From these brief\n labors, made up wholly of verbal instruction, came that\n profound impression of his superhuman dignity which was made\n indelibly upon his disciples, and which his crucifixion as a\n criminal did not weaken, and that transforming power which went\n forth upon them, and, in ever-increasing measure, upon all\n subsequent generations. The Apostolic Church, the conversion of\n Paul, and his Epistles, the narratives of the four Gospels,\n with all that they contain, and Christianity, as it appears in\n the history of mankind, all spring from that one year of mere\n teaching! The effect is utterly disproportionate to the cause\n assigned.\u201d[95]\n\n We must take notice that the author, with a competent knowledge of the\n theories and arguments of the German Biblical critics, has carefully\n refuted them, and presented solid proofs of the genuineness and\n authenticity of the historical books of the New Testament, before\n arriving at this part of his argument. He is summing up his plea after\n an examination and discussion of evidence. His reasoning is not,\n therefore, based on mere hypothesis, but is the conclusion of a\n well-sustained thesis, with all the weight derived from his precedent\n proofs. And he is therefore logically entitled to make the demand that\n Christianity shall be estimated by the historical measure, according to\n the full value of its miraculous facts and supernatural qualities, to\n the exclusion of any hypothesis which pretends to be rational but is\n really only fantastic, and therefore unphilosophical as well as\n unchristian.\n\n \u201cIt is much more consistent with a sound philosophy, instead of\n taking refuge in an unreasonable denial of facts historically\n established, to seek to comprehend them. At the outset the\n notion should be banished that miracles are repugnant to\n nature; that the supernatural is anti-natural. There is one\n system; and supernatural agency, however it may modify the\n course of nature, does no violence to the universal order. For\n there is no such unbending rigidity in the course of nature\n that it cannot be modified by the interposition of voluntary\n agency. A steamship, cutting its way through the billows in the\n teeth of wind and tide, moves by the force of machinery which\n is contrived and directed by the human will.[96] The volitions\n of man produce an effect which nature, independently of this\n spiritual force, could never occasion. Now, of the limits of\n the possible control of matter by the power of spirit, any more\n than of the essence and origin of matter itself, we cannot\n speak. It is a presumptuous affirmation that there is no being\n in the universe who can infinitely outdo the power of man, vast\n as it is, in this direction.\u201d[97]\n\n In this brief and sententious manner, with a few heavy and\n well-directed strokes of sound reason, the author effectually\n demolishes all the brittle ware of transcendental nonsense which calls\n itself rationalism. We are reminded of a sentence we once heard uttered\n by that singular genius, Henry Giles, in a railway carriage, respecting\n a matter quite different: \u201cSuch theories are shattered like rotten\n glass by a single thump of common sense.\u201d\n\n We find no reason for quoting anything from Dr. Fisher\u2019s exposition of\n the historical preparation for Christianity in the prop\u00e6deutic system\n of Judaism. For the present we will only refer to the notice which he\n takes of the dispersion of the Hebrews over the world at the epoch of\n the birth of Christ, adopting the language of Mommsen, which designates\n Judaism as \u201can effective leaven of cosmopolitanism\u201d working in the same\n direction with the imperial Roman polity toward a blending of\n nationalities in the more general solidarity \u201cthe nationality of which\n was really nothing but humanity.\u201d Of the providential office of Greece\n and Rome in connection with that of Judea he thus speaks:\n\n \u201cThese were three nations of antiquity, each of which was\n entrusted with a grand providential office in reference to\n Christianity. The Greeks, whatever they may have learned from\n Babylon, Egypt, and Tyre, excelled all other races in a\n self-expanding power of intellect\u2014in \u2018the power of lighting\n their own fire.\u2019 They are the masters in science, literature,\n and art. Plato, speaking of his own countrymen, made \u2018the love\n of knowledge\u2019 the special characteristic of \u2018our part of the\n world,\u2019 as the love of money was attributed with equal truth to\n the Ph\u0153nicians and Egyptians. The robust character of the\n Romans, and their sense of right, qualified them to rule, and\n to originate and transmit their great system of law and their\n method of political organization. Virgil lets Anchises define\n the function of the Roman people in his address to \u00c6neas, a\n visitor to the abodes of the dead:\n\n\n \u201c\u2018Others, I know, more tenderly may beat the breathing brass,\n And better from the marble block bring living looks to pass;\n Others may better plead the cause, may compass heaven\u2019s face,\n And mark it out, and tell the stars their rising and their place;\n But thou, O Roman! look to it the folks of earth to sway;\n For this shall be thine handicraft: peace on the world to lay,\n To spare the weak, to mar the proud by constant weight of war.\u2019\n\n\n \u201cGreece and Rome had each its own place to fill; but true\n religion\u2014the spirit in which man should live\u2014comes from the\n Hebrews.\u201d[98]\n\n Dr. Fisher places the relation of sympathy or affinity between the\n mythological religion and Christianity in three things: first, in the\n stimulus and scope given to subjective religious sentiments; second, in\n the impulse towards \u201ca goal hidden from sight,\u201d the object of \u201can\n unfulfilled demand in the religious nature\u201d of men seeking after God,\n whom they, in the language of St. Paul on Mars\u2019 Hill, at Athens,\n \u201cignorantly worshipped\u201d; third, in a growing \u201cmonotheistic\n tendency.\u201d[99]\n\n The topic of the relation of Greek philosophy to Christianity is\n handled by the learned author in a very judicious and discriminating\n manner, although we are disposed to take a considerably different view\n of the philosophy of Aristotle as compared with Platonism. We are\n pleased to observe his high estimate of the writings of Cicero. The\n chapter on this topic is thus introduced:\n\n \u201cThe Greek philosophy was a preparation for Christianity in\n three ways: it dissipated, or tended to dissipate, the\n superstitions of polytheism; it awakened a sense of need which\n philosophy of itself failed to meet; and it so educated the\n intellect and conscience as to render the Gospel apprehensible\n and, in many cases, congenial to the mind. It did more than\n remove obstacles out of the way; its work was positive as well\n as negative: it originated ideas and habits of thought which\n had more or less direct affinity with the religion of the\n Gospel, and which found in this religion their proper\n counterpart. The prophetic element of the Greek philosophy lay\n in the glimpses of truth which it could not fully discern, and\n in the obscure and unconscious pursuit of a good which it could\n not definitely grasp.\u201d[100]\n\n In treating of \u201cthe close relation of the Roman Empire to Christianity\u201d\n Prof. Fisher notices the extension of Roman citizenship, the\n cosmopolitan polity of C\u00e6sar, the unifying influence of Roman\n jurisprudence, the assimilation of mankind in language and culture by\n the spread of the Romano-Hellenic civilization and the Greek and Latin\n languages, travel and intercourse, commerce and a general mingling of\n mankind from various causes, the mingling of religions, and the\n resuscitation of the idea of a common humanity. Without overlooking the\n external agency of Rome in paving the way for Christianity, the author\n more distinctly accentuates another kind of influence:\n\n \u201cThe effect of the consolidation of so large a part of mankind\n in one political body, in breaking up local and tribal\n narrowness, and in awakening what may be termed a cosmopolitan\n feeling, is in the highest degree interesting. The Roman\n dominion was the means of a mental and moral preparation for\n the Gospel; and this incidental effect is worthy of special\n note. The kingdom of Christ proposed the unification of mankind\n through a spiritual bond. Whatever tended to melt down the\n prejudices of nation, and clan, and creed, and instil in the\n room of them more liberal sentiments, opened a path for the\n Gospel. Now, we find that under the political system\n established by Rome a variety of agencies co-operated to effect\n such a result. Powerful forces were at work whose effect was\n not limited to the creation of outward advantages for the\n dissemination of the religion of Christ, but tended to produce\n a more or less genial soil for its reception. We have, then, to\n embrace in one view the influence of the Roman Empire in both\n of these relations, in shaping outward circumstances, and in\n favoring a mental habit, which were propitious to the\n introduction of the new faith.\u201d[101]\n\n What the author proposes in the last clause of this quotation he\n fulfils in a very satisfactory manner in one of the most splendid\n chapters of his work.\n\n The outline of the historical basis of Christianity having been drawn,\n and the principles of the sound historical construction of a true and\n logical theory or philosophy of the Christian religion established, the\n outline of the actual foundations, and the first course of the great\n structure itself, determining its plan of architecture, next demands\n our consideration. In plainer language, the actual \u201cbeginnings of\n Christianity\u201d in the apostolic age, the earliest history of the\n religion of Christ, in respect to all its constitutive principles,\n presents itself for examination. What is Christianity in its essence,\n nature, integrity of organic constitution, its proper attributes; with\n a due distinction of its substance from its accidents, of its genuine\n and normal germs of future development from everything of a parasitic\n nature or in any way abnormal? This is the great question to be studied\n in the authentic records of the antiquities of Christianity, with all\n the light and aid which can be obtained from every source accessible to\n research.\n\n The long-continued, widely-extended preparations of divine Providence\n for the great event of the coming of the Messias of the Jews and\n Gentiles, the immensity of the ground prepared to be the theatre of the\n future Christian history, the vast and mighty instrumentalities made\n ready to serve the fulfilment of the plan of Jesus and of the apostolic\n mission, all point toward something proportionate in grandeur to the\n grandeur of the inchoate order which preceded. The anticipation of\n Christ in history demands a corresponding realization of his actual\n presence and operation in the \u201cfulness of time,\u201d the age of the\n completion and consummation of human destinies on the earth. Moreover,\n the stupendous miracles, especially the crowning one of the\n Resurrection, which are among the first facts and events of historical\n Christianity, logically and rationally require that an ideal of\n Christianity shall be presented which justifies such an outlay of\n supernatural power, and the position of causes containing such infinite\n potential force. The end of all previous human history being found in\n the beginning of Christianity, the new beginning of all human history\n must be likewise found there. If the normal, legitimate development in\n later ages is tested by its origination from the primitive seed planted\n in the apostolic age, the nature and qualities of that seed must be\n correctly ascertained. If we would recognize the true genius of\n Christianity in its real manifestations from the days of the apostles\n to our own, and discriminate it from simulated apparitions, we must\n know what this genius really is, or the original error will falsify all\n subsequent processes of judgment and reasoning, like an ambiguous\n middle in a syllogism.\n\n But we have proceeded as far as our limits will permit in the present\n article, and must postpone the consideration of what was actual\n Christianity in the apostolic age, and of the learned author\u2019s theory\n on the subject, to a future opportunity.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n TO THE WITCH-HAZEL.\n\n\n \u201cLast of their floral sisterhood,\n The hazel\u2019s yellow blossoms shine,\n The tawny gold of Afric\u2019s mind!\u201d\n J. G. WHITTIER.\n\n\n I.\n\n\n No mocking dream art thou of summer sun,\n No fading shadow of the autumn\u2019s gold;\n Thy sunset stars their yellow light unfold\n As some pale planet, when the day is done,\n Giveth unfailing promise of the night\n With its blessed hours of rest, its sparkling fields\u2014\n The glittering harvest that the darkness yields\n Of unknown worlds far reaching out of sight.\n In the year\u2019s twilight thy pale blossoms shine\n With faithful promise of the winter\u2019s night\u2014\n The broad, white fields with nameless stars a-light,\n The crystal glitter far outshining thine.\n In the late daylight that about thee lies,\n How soft thy radiance to sun-weary eyes!\n\n\n II.\n\n\n The brave arbutus fair foretold the spring\n With gleam auroral of the coming slow\n Of perfect summer\u2019s full life\u2019s noon-day glow,\n With undimmed sunshine, earth illumining.\n Thy stars, wan hazel, break amid the blaze\n Of gold and scarlet wherewith burn the hills\u2014\n As when the pomp of royal burial fills\n The clouded skies that mourn the dying days.\n The gold grows spent, ashen the scarlet fires,\n The night too near for any song of bird;\n \u2018Mid voice of streams and rustling leaves, foot-stirred,\n The grieving summer\u2019s last earth-prayer expires.\n Brighter thy glow as golden pomp grows sere,\n O pale-hued Hesper of the westering year!\n\n\n III.\n\n\n No dreary harbinger art thou of woe,\n Of barren days, and warm life lost in death:\n On heav\u2019n-kissed peaks is born the icy breath\n Whose touch unfolds the flowers of the snow.\n Spring\u2019s buds, close-folded, lie along the bare\n And shivering boughs where calls the wild-voiced wind,\n And fine the leafless tracery is lined\n On blue undimmed as summer heavens wear.\n Hearts glow the warmer for the bitter wind,\n Stars are but brighter for the frosty night,\n Of earth despoiled love climbeth holy height,\n New, blossoming paths her feet, untiring, find.\n Thought of thy promise shining in dim skies\n Fills darkest hour with lights of Paradise.\n\n\n IV.\n\n\n Among thy boughs almost the sound I hear\n Of Christmas bells breaking on wintry gloom;\n Foretelling so, the glimmer of thy bloom\n The kindliest feast of all the saint-crowned year.\n O happy year! that for its twilight crown\n Wears the dim radiance of thy peaceful stars,\n Hears song of angels, where no harsh note jars,\n Filling the woods whence latest bird hath flown.\n O wailing bloom! bud forth thy prophecies,\n Thine earnest of a life fore\u2019er renewed,\n Thy light in darkness, with fair hope imbued,\n Thy golden gift of love\u2019s amenities.\n O conjurer\u2019s wand! thy jewelled staff bend low,\n Show the bright waters living \u2018neath the snow.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE WOLF-TOWER.\n\n A BRETON CHRISTMAS LEGEND.\n\n I.\n\n\n Long ago in Brittany, under the government of St. Gildas the Wise,\n seventh abbot of Ruiz, there lived a young tenant of the abbey who was\n blind in the right eye and lame in the left leg. His name was Sylvestre\n Ker, and his mother, Josserande Ker, was the widow of Martin Ker, in\n his lifetime the keeper of the great door of the Convent of Ruiz.\n\n The mother and son lived in a tower, the ruins of which are still seen\n at the foot of Mont Saint-Michel de la Trinit\u00e9, in the grove of\n chestnut-trees that belongs to Jean Mar\u00e9chal, the mayor\u2019s nephew. These\n ruins are now called the Wolf-Tower, and the Breton peasants shudder as\n they pass through the chestnut-grove; for at midnight around the\n Wolf-Tower, and close to the first circle of great stones erected by\n the Druids at Carnac, are seen the phantoms of a young man and a young\n girl\u2014Pol Bihan and Matheline du Coat-Dor.\n\n The young girl is of graceful figure, with long, floating hair, but\n without a face; and the young man is tall and robust, but the sleeves\n of his coat hang limp and empty, for he is without arms. Round and\n round the circle they pass in opposite directions, and, strange to\n tell, as the legend adds, they never meet, nor do they ever speak to\n each other.\n\n Once a year, on Christmas night, instead of walking they run; and all\n the Christians who cross the heath to go to the midnight Mass hear from\n afar the young girl cry: \u201cWolf Sylvestre Ker, give me back my beauty!\u201d\n and the deep voice of the young man adds: \u201cWolf Sylvestre Ker, give me\n back my strength!\u201d\n\n\n II.\n\n\n And this has lasted for thirteen hundred years; therefore you may well\n think there is a story connected with it.\n\n When Martin Ker, the husband of Dame Josserande, died, their son\n Sylvestre was only seven years old. The widow was obliged to give up\n the guardianship of the great door to a man-at-arms, and retire to the\n tower, which was her inheritance; but little Sylvestre Ker had\n permission to follow the studies in the convent school. The boy showed\n natural ability, but he studied little, except in the class of\n chemistry, taught by an old monk named Tha\u00ebl, who was said to have\n discovered the secret of making gold out of lead by adding to it a\n certain substance which no one but himself knew; for certainly, if the\n fact had been communicated, all the lead in the country would have been\n quickly turned into gold. As for Tha\u00ebl himself, he had been careful not\n to profit by his secret, for Gildas the Wise had once said to him:\n \u201cTha\u00ebl, Tha\u00ebl, God does not wish you to change the work of his hands.\n Lead is lead, and gold is gold. There is enough gold, and not too much\n lead. Leave God\u2019s works alone; if not, Satan will be your master.\u201d\n\n Most assuredly such precepts would not be well received by modern\n industry; but St. Gildas knew what he said, and Tha\u00ebl died of extreme\n old age before he had changed the least particle of lead into gold.\n This, however, was not from want of will, which was proved after his\n death, as the rumor spread about that Tha\u00ebl did not altogether desert\n his laboratory, but at times returned to his beloved labors. Many a\n time in the lonely hours of the night the fishermen, in their barks,\n watched the glimmer of the light in his former cell; and Gildas the\n Wise, having been warned of the fact, arose one night before Lauds, and\n with quiet steps crossed the corridors, thinking to surprise his late\n brother, and perhaps ask of him some details of the other side of the\n dreaded door which separates life from death.\n\n When he reached the cell he listened and heard Tha\u00ebl\u2019s great bellows\n puffing and blowing, although no one had yet been appointed to succeed\n him. Gildas suddenly opened the door with his master-key, and saw\n before him little Sylvestre Ker actively employed in relighting Tha\u00ebl\u2019s\n furnaces.\n\n St. Gildas was not a man to give way to sudden wrath; he took the child\n by the ear, drew him outside, and said to him gently:\n\n \u201cKer, my little Ker, I know what you are attempting and what tempts you\n to make the effort; but God does not wish it, nor I either, my little\n Ker.\u201d\n\n \u201cI do it,\u201d replied the boy, \u201cbecause my dear mother is so poor.\u201d\n\n \u201cYour mother is what she is; she has what God gives her. Lead is lead,\n and gold is gold. If you go against the will of God, Satan will be your\n master.\u201d\n\n Little Ker returned to the tower crestfallen, and never again slipped\n into the cell of the dead Tha\u00ebl; but when he was eighteen years old a\n modest inheritance was left him, and he bought materials for dissolving\n metals and distilling the juice of plants. He gave out that his aim was\n to learn the art of healing; for that great purpose he read great books\n which treated of medical science and many other things besides.\n\n He was then a youth of fine appearance, with a noble, frank face,\n neither one-eyed nor lame, and led a retired life with his mother, who\n ardently loved her only son. No one visited them in the tower, except\n the laughing Matheline, the heiress of the tenant of Coat-Dor and\n god-daughter of Josserande; and Pol Bihan, son of the successor of\n Martin Ker as armed keeper of the great door.\n\n Both Pol and Matheline often conversed together, and upon what subject,\n do you think? Always of Sylvestre Ker. Was it because they loved him?\n No. What Matheline loved most was her own fair self, and Pol Bihan\u2019s\n best friend was named Pol Bihan. Matheline passed long hours before her\n little mirror of polished steel, which faithfully reflected her\n laughing mouth, full of pearls; and Pol was proud of his great\n strength, for he was the best wrestler in the Carnac country. When they\n spoke of Sylvestre Ker it was to say: \u201cWhat if some fine morning he\n should find the secret of the fairy-stone that is the mother of gold!\u201d\n\n And each one mentally added:\n\n \u201cI must continue to be friendly with him, for if he becomes wealthy he\n will enrich me.\u201d\n\n Josserande also knew that her beloved son sought after the fairy-stone,\n and even had mentioned it to Gildas the Wise, who shook his venerable\n head and said:\n\n \u201cWhat God wills will be. Be careful that your son wears a mask over his\n face when he seeks the cursed thing; for what escapes from the crucible\n is Satan\u2019s breath, and the breath of Satan causes blindness.\u201d\n\n Josserande, meditating upon these words, went to kneel before the cross\n of St. Cado, which is in front of the seventh stone of C\u00e6sar\u2019s camp\u2014the\n one that a little child can move by touching it with his finger, but\n that twelve horses, harnessed to twelve oxen, cannot stir from its\n solid foundation. Thus prostrate, she prayed: \u201cO Lord Jesus! thou who\n hast mercy for mothers on account of the Holy Virgin Mary, thy mother,\n watch well over my little Sylvestre, and take from his head this\n thought of making gold. Nevertheless, if it is thy will that he should\n be rich, thou art the master of all things, my sweet Saviour!\u201d\n\n And as she rose she murmured: \u201cWhat a beautiful boy he would be with a\n cloak of fine cloth and a hood bordered with fur, if he only had means\n to buy them!\u201d\n\n\n III.\n\n\n It came to pass that as all these young people, Pol Bihan, Matheline,\n and Sylvestre Ker, gained a year each time that twelve months rolled\n by, they reached the age to think of marriage; and Josserande one\n morning proceeded to the dwelling of the farmer of Coat-Dor to ask the\n hand of Matheline for her son, Sylvestre Ker; at which proposal\n Matheline opened her rosy mouth so wide, to laugh the louder, that far\n back she showed two pearls which had never before been seen.\n\n When her father asked her if the offer suited her she replied: \u201cYes,\n father and godmother, provided that Sylvestre Ker gives me a gown of\n cloth of silver embroidered with rubies, like that of the Lady of\n Lannelar, and that Pol Bihan may be our groomsman.\u201d\n\n Pol, who was there, also laughed and said: \u201cI will assuredly be\n groomsman to my friend Sylvestre Ker, if he consents to give me a\n velvet mantle striped with gold, like that of the castellan of G\u00e2vre,\n the Lord of Carnac.\u201d\n\n Whereupon Josserande returned to the tower and said to her son: \u201cKer,\n my darling, I advise you to choose another friend and another bride;\n for those two are not worthy of your love.\u201d\n\n But the young man began to sigh and groan, and answered: \u201cNo friendship\n or love will I ever know, except for Pol, my dear comrade, and\n Matheline, your god-daughter, my beautiful play-fellow.\u201d\n\n And Josserande having told him of the two new pearls that Matheline had\n shown in the back of her mouth, nothing would do but he must hurry to\n Coat-Dor to try and see them also.\n\n On the road from the tower to the farm of Coat-Dor is the Point of\n Hinnic, where the grass is salt, which makes the cows and rams very\n fierce while they are grazing. As Sylvestre Ker walked down the path at\n the end of which is the Cross of St. Cado, he saw on the summit of the\n promontory Pol and Matheline strolling along, talking and laughing; so\n he thought:\n\n \u201cI need not go far to see Matheline\u2019s two pearls.\u201d\n\n And, in fact, the girl\u2019s merry laughter could be heard below, for it\n always burst forth if Pol did but open his lips; when, lo and behold! a\n huge old ram which had been browsing on the salt grass tossed back his\n two horns, and, fuming at the nostrils, bleated as loud as the stags\n cry when chased, and rushed in the direction of Matheline\u2019s voice; for,\n as every one knows, the rams become furious if laughter is heard in\n their meadow.\n\n He ran quickly, but Sylvestre Ker ran still faster, and arrived the\n first by the girl, so that he received the shock of the ram\u2019s butting\n while protecting her with his body. The injury was not very great, only\n his right eye was touched by the curved end of one of the horns when\n the ram raised his head, and thus Sylvestre Ker became one-eyed.\n\n The ram, prevented from slaughtering Matheline, dashed after Pol Bihan,\n who fled; reached him just at the end of the cliff, and pushed him into\n the sea, that beat against the rocks fifty feet below.\n\n Well content with his work, the ram walked off, and the story says he\n laughed behind his woolly beard. But Matheline wept bitterly and cried:\n\n \u201cKer, my handsome Ker, save Bihan, your sweet friend, from death, and I\n pledge my faith I will be your wife without any condition.\u201d\n\n At the same time, amid the roaring of the waves, was heard the\n imploring voice of Pol Bihan crying:\n\n \u201cSylvestre, O Sylvestre Ker! my only friend, I cannot swim. Come\n quickly and save me from dying without confession, and all you may ask\n of me you shall have, were it the dearest treasure of my heart.\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker asked:\n\n \u201cWill you be my groomsman?\u201d\n\n And Bihan replied:\n\n \u201cYes, yes, and I will give you a hundred crowns. And all that your\n mother may ask of me she shall have. But hasten, hasten, dear friend,\n or the waves will carry me off.\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker\u2019s blood was pouring from the wound in his eye, and his\n sight was dimmed; but he was generous of heart, and boldly leaped from\n the top of the promontory. As he fell his left leg was jammed against a\n jutting rock and broke, so there he was, lame as well as one-eyed;\n nevertheless, he dragged Bihan to the shore and asked:\n\n \u201cWhen shall the wedding be?\u201d\n\n As Matheline hesitated in her answer\u2014for Sylvestre\u2019s brave deeds were\n too recent to be forgotten\u2014Pol Bihan came to her assistance and gaily\n cried:\n\n \u201cYou must wait, Sylvestre, my saviour, until your leg and eye are\n healed.\u201d\n\n \u201cStill longer,\u201d added Matheline (and now Sylvestre Ker saw the two new\n pearls, for in her laughter she opened her mouth from ear to\n ear)\u2014\u201cstill longer, as limping, one-eyed men are not to my taste\u2014no,\n no!\u201d\n\n \u201cBut,\u201d cried Sylvestre Ker, \u201cit is for your sakes that I am one-eyed\n and lame.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat is true,\u201d said Bihan.\n\n \u201cThat is true,\u201d also repeated Matheline; for she always spoke as he\n did.\n\n \u201cKer, my friend Ker,\u201d resumed Bihan, \u201cwait until to-morrow, and we will\n make you happy.\u201d\n\n And off they went, Matheline and he, arm-in-arm, leaving Sylvestre to\n go hobbling along to the tower, alone with his sad thoughts.\n\n Would you believe it? Trudging wearily home, he consoled himself by\n thinking that he had seen two new pearls behind the smile. You may,\n perhaps, think you have never met such a fool. Undeceive yourself: it\n is the same with all the men, who only look for laughing girls with\n teeth like pearls.\n\n But the sorrowful one was Josserande, the widow, when she saw her son\n with only one eye and one sound leg.\n\n \u201cWhere did all this happen?\u201d she asked with tears.\n\n And as Sylvestre Ker gently answered, \u201cI have seen them, mother; they\n are very beautiful,\u201d Josserande divined that he spoke of her\n god-daughter\u2019s two pearls, and cried:\n\n \u201cBy all that is holy, he has also lost his mind!\u201d\n\n Then, seizing her staff, she went to the Abbey of Ruiz, to consult St.\n Gildas as to what could be done in this unfortunate case; and the wise\n man replied:\n\n \u201cYou should not have spoken of the two pearls; your son would have\n remained at home. But now that the evil is done, nothing will happen to\n him contrary to God\u2019s holy will. At high tide the sea comes foaming\n over the sands, yet see how quietly it retires. What is Sylvestre Ker\n doing now?\u201d\n\n \u201cHe is lighting his furnaces,\u201d replied Josserande.\n\n The wise man paused to reflect, and after a little while said:\n\n \u201cIn the first place, you must pray devoutly to the Lord our God, and\n afterward look well before you to know where to put your feet. The weak\n buy the strong, the unhappy the happy; did you know that, my good\n woman? Your son will persevere in search of the fairy-stone that\n changes lead into gold, to pay for Pol\u2019s wicked friendship and for the\n pearls behind the dangerous smiles of that Matheline. Since God permits\n it, all is right. Yet see that your son is well protected against the\n smoke of his crucible, for it is the very breath of Satan; and make him\n promise to go to the midnight Mass.\u201d\n\n For it was near the glorious Feast of Christmas.\n\n\n IV.\n\n\n Josserande had no difficulty in making Sylvestre Ker promise to go to\n the midnight Mass, for he was a good Christian; and she bought for him\n an iron armor to put on when he worked around his crucibles, so as to\n preserve him from Satan\u2019s breath.\n\n And it happened that, late and early, Pol Bihan now came to the tower,\n bringing with him the laughing Matheline; for it was rumored around\n that at last Sylvestre Ker would soon find the fairy-stone and become a\n wealthy man. It was not only two new pearls that Matheline showed at\n the corners of her rosy mouth, but a brilliant row, that shone, and\n chattered, and laughed, from her lips down to her throat; for Pol Bihan\n had said to her:\n\n \u201cLaugh as much as you can; for smiles attract fools, as the\n turning-mirror catches larks.\u201d\n\n We have spoken of Matheline\u2019s lips, of her throat, and of her smile,\n but not of her heart; of that we can only say the place where it should\n have been was nearly empty; so she replied to Bihan:\n\n \u201cAs much as you will. I can afford to laugh to be rich; and when the\n fool shall have given me all the gold of the earth, all the pleasures\n of the world, I will be happy, happy.... I will have them all for\n myself, for myself alone, and I will enjoy them.\u201d\n\n Pol Bihan clasped his hands in admiration, so lovely and wise was she\n for her age; but he thought: \u201cI am wiser still than you, my beauty: we\n will share between us what the fool will give\u2014one half for me, and the\n other also; the rest for you. Let the water run under the bridge.\u201d\n\n The day before Christmas they came together to the tower\u2014Matheline\n carrying a basket of chestnuts, Pol a large jug, full of sweet cider\u2014to\n make merry with the godmother. They roasted the chestnuts in the ashes,\n and heated the cider before the fire, adding to it fermented honey,\n wine, sprigs of rosemary, and marjoram leaves; and so delicious was the\n perfume of the beverage that even Dame Josserande longed for a taste.\n\n On the way Pol had advised Matheline adroitly to question Sylvestre\n Ker, to know when he would at last find the fairy-stone. Sylvestre Ker\n neither ate chestnuts nor drank wine, so absorbed was he in the\n contemplation of Matheline\u2019s bewitching smiles; and she said to him:\n\n \u201cTell me, my handsome, lame, and one-eyed bridegroom, will I soon be\n the wife of a wealthy man?\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker, whose eye shot forth a lurid flame, replied:\n\n \u201cYou would have been as rich as you are beautiful to-morrow, without\n fail, if I had not promised my dear mother to accompany her to the\n midnight Mass to-night. The favorable hour falls just at the first\n stroke of Matins.\u201d\n\n \u201cTo-day?\u201d\n\n \u201cBetween to-day and to-morrow.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd can it not be put off?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, it can be put off for seven years.\u201d\n\n Dame Josserande heard nothing, as Pol was relating an interesting\n story, so as to distract her attention; but while talking he listened\n with all his ears.\n\n Matheline laughed no longer, and thought:\n\n \u201cSeven years! Can I wait seven years?\u201d Then she continued:\n\n \u201cBeautiful bridegroom, how do you know that the propitious moment falls\n precisely at the hour of Matins? Who told you so?\u201d\n\n \u201cThe stars,\u201d replied Sylvestre Ker. \u201cAt midnight Mars and Saturn will\n arrive in diametrical opposition; Venus will seek Vesta; Mercury will\n disappear in the sun; and the planet without a name, that the deceased\n Tha\u00ebl divined by calculation, I saw last night, steering its unknown\n route through space to come in conjunction with Jupiter. Ah! if I only\n dared disobey my dear mother.\u201d\n\n He was interrupted by a distant vibration of the bells of Plouharnel,\n which rang out the first signal of the midnight Mass. Josserande\n instantly left her wheel.\n\n \u201cIt would be a sin to spin one thread more,\u201d said she. \u201cCome, my son\n Sylvestre, put on your Sunday clothes, and let us be off for the parish\n church, if you please.\u201d\n\n Sylvestre wished to rise, for never yet had he disobeyed his mother;\n but Matheline, seated at his side, detained him and murmured in silvery\n tones:\n\n \u201cMy handsome friend, you have plenty of time.\u201d\n\n Pol, on his side, said to Dame Josserande:\n\n \u201cGet your staff, neighbor, and start at once, so as to take your time.\n Your god-daughter Matheline will accompany you; and I will follow with\n my friend Sylvestre, for fear some accident might happen to him with\n his lame leg and sightless eye.\u201d\n\n As he proposed, so was it done; for Josserande suspected nothing,\n knowing that her son had promised, and that he would not break his\n word. As they were leaving, Pol whispered to Matheline:\n\n \u201cAmuse the good woman well, for the fool must remain here.\u201d\n\n And the girl replied:\n\n \u201cTry and see the caldron in which our fortune is cooking. You will tell\n me how it is done.\u201d\n\n Off the two women started; a large, kind mother\u2019s heart, full of tender\n love, and a sparrow\u2019s little gizzard, narrow and dry, without enough\n room in it for one pure tear.\n\n For a moment Sylvestre Ker stood on the threshold of the open door to\n watch them depart. On the gleaming white snow their two shadows fell;\n the one bent and already tottering, the other erect, flexible, and each\n step seemed a bound. The young lover sighed. Behind him Pol Bihan in a\n low voice said:\n\n \u201cKer, my comrade, I know what you are thinking about, and you are right\n to think so; this must come to an end. She is as impatient as you are,\n for her love equals yours; for both of you it is too long to wait.\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker turned pale with joy.\n\n \u201cDo you speak truth?\u201d he stammered. \u201cAm I fortunate enough to be loved\n by her?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, on my faith!\u201d replied Pol Bihan, \u201cshe loves you too well for her\n own peace. When a girl laughs too much, it is to keep from\n weeping\u2014that\u2019s the real truth.\u201d\n\n\n V.\n\n\n Well might they call him \u201cthe fool,\u201d poor Sylvestre Ker! Not that he\n had less brains than another man\u2014on the contrary, he was now very\n learned\u2014but love crazes him who places his affections on an unworthy\n object. Sylvestre Ker\u2019s little finger was worth two dozen Pol Bihans\n and fifty Mathelines; in spite of which Matheline and Pol Bihan were\n perfectly just in their contempt, for he who ascends the highest falls\n the lowest.\n\n When Sylvestre had re-entered the tower Pol commenced to sigh heavily\n and said:\n\n \u201cWhat a pity! What a great, great pity!\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat is a pity?\u201d asked Sylvestre Ker.\n\n \u201cIt is a pity to miss such a rare opportunity.\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker exclaimed:\n\n \u201cWhat opportunity? So you were listening to my conversation with\n Matheline?\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy, yes,\u201d replied Pol. \u201cI always have an ear open to hear what\n concerns you, my true friend. Seven years! Shall I tell you what I\n think? You would only have twelve months to wait to go with your mother\n to another Christmas Mass.\u201d\n\n \u201cI have promised,\u201d said Sylvestre.\n\n \u201cThat is nothing; if your mother loves you truly, she will forgive\n you.\u201d\n\n \u201cIf she loves me!\u201d cried Sylvestre Ker. \u201cOh! yes, she loves me with her\n whole heart.\u201d\n\n Some chestnuts still remained, and Bihan shelled one while he said:\n\n \u201cCertainly, certainly, mothers always love their children; but\n Matheline is not your mother. You are one-eyed, you are lame, and you\n have sold your little patrimony to buy your furnaces. Nothing remains\n of it. Where is the girl who can wait seven years? Nearly the half of\n her age!... If I were in your place I would not throw away my luck as\n you are about to do, but at the hour of Matins I would work for my\n happiness.\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker was standing before the fireplace. He listened, his eyes\n bent down, with a frown upon his brow.\n\n \u201cYou have spoken well,\u201d at last he said; \u201cmy dear mother will forgive\n me. I shall remain, and will work at the hour of Matins.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou have decided for the best!\u201d cried Bihan. \u201cRest easy; I will be\n with you in case of danger. Open the door of your laboratory. We will\n work together; I will cling to you like your shadow!\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker did not move, but looked fixedly upon the floor, and\n then, as if thinking aloud, murmured:\n\n \u201cIt will be the first time that I have ever caused my dear mother\n sorrow!\u201d\n\n He opened a door, but not that of the laboratory, pushed Pol Bihan\n outside, and said:\n\n \u201cThe danger is for myself alone; the gold will be for all. Go to the\n Christmas Mass in my place; say to Matheline that she will be rich, and\n to my dear mother that she shall have a happy old age, since she will\n live and die with her fortunate son.\u201d\n\n\n VI.\n\n\n When Sylvestre Ker was alone he listened to the noise of the waves\n dashing upon the beach, and the sighing of the wind among the great\n oaks\u2014two mournful sounds. And he looked at the empty seats of\n Matheline, the madness of his heart; and of his dear mother,\n Josserande, the holy tenderness of all his life. Little by little had\n he seen the black hair of the widow become gray, then white, around her\n sunken temples. That night memory carried him back even to his cradle,\n over which had bent the sweet, noble face of her who had always spoken\n to him of God.\n\n But whence came those golden ringlets that mingled with Josserande\u2019s\n black hair, and which shone in the sunlight above his mother\u2019s snowy\n locks? and that laugh, ah! that silvery laugh of youth; which prevented\n Sylvestre Ker from hearing in his pious recollections the calm, grave\n voice of his mother. Whence did it come?\n\n Seven years! Pol had said, \u201cWhere is the girl who can wait seven\n years?\u201d and these words floated in the air. Never had the son of Martin\n Ker heard such strange voices amid the roaring of the ocean, nor in the\n rushing winds of the forest of the Druids.\n\n Suddenly the tower also commenced to speak, not only through the cracks\n of the old windows when the mournful wind sighed, but with a confusion\n of sounds that resembled the busy whispering of a crowd, that\n penetrated through the closed doors of the laboratory, under which a\n bright light streamed.\n\n Sylvestre Ker opened the door, fearing to see all in a blaze, but there\n was no fire; the light that had streamed under the door came from the\n round, red eye of his furnace, and happened to strike the stone of the\n threshold. No one was in the laboratory; still the noises, similar to\n the chattering of an audience awaiting a promised spectacle, did not\n cease. The air was full of speaking things; the spirits could be felt\n swarming around, as closely packed as the wheat in the barn or the sand\n on the sea-shore.\n\n And, although not seen, they spoke all kinds of phantom-words, which\n were heard right and left, before and behind, above and below, and\n which penetrated through the pores of the skin like quicksilver passing\n through a cloth. They said:\n\n \u201cThe Magi have started, my friend.\u201d\n\n \u201cMy friend, the Star shines in the East.\u201d\n\n \u201cMy friend, my friend, the little King Jesus is born in the manger,\n upon the straw.\u201d\n\n \u201cSylvestre Ker will surely go with the shepherds.\u201d\n\n \u201cNot at all; Sylvestre Ker will not go.\u201d\n\n \u201cGood Christian he was.\u201d\n\n \u201cGood Christian he is no longer.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe has forgotten the name of Joseph, the chaste spouse.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd the name of Mary, the ever Virgin Mother.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, no, no!\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, yes, yes!\u201d\n\n \u201cHe will go!\u201d\n\n \u201cHe will not go!\u201d\n\n \u201cHe will go, since he promised Dame Josserande.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe will not go, since Matheline told him to stay.\u201d\n\n \u201cMy friend, my friend, to-night Sylvestre Ker will find the golden\n secret.\u201d\n\n \u201cTo-night, my friend, my friend, he will win the heart of the one he\n loves.\u201d\n\n And the invisible spirits, thus disputing, sported through the air,\n mounting, descending, whirling around like atoms of dust in a sunbeam,\n from the flag-stones of the floor to the rafters of the roof.\n\n Inside the furnace, in the crucible, some other thing responded, but it\n could not be well heard, as the crucible had been hermetically sealed.\n\n \u201cGo out from here, you wicked crowd,\u201d said Sylvestre Ker, sweeping\n around with a broom of holly-branches. \u201cWhat are you doing here? Go\n outside, cursed spirits, damned souls\u2014go, go!\u201d\n\n From all the corners of the room came laughter; Matheline seemed\n everywhere.\n\n Suddenly there was profound silence, and the wind from the sea brought\n the sound of the bells of Plouharnel, ringing the second peal for the\n midnight Mass.\n\n \u201cMy friend, what are they saying?\u201d\n\n \u201cThey say Christmas, my friend\u2014Christmas, Christmas, Christmas!\u201d\n\n \u201cNot at all! They say, Gold, gold, gold!\u201d\n\n \u201cYou lie, my friend!\u201d\n\n \u201cMy friend, you lie!\u201d\n\n And the other voices, those that were grumbling in the interior of the\n furnace, swelled and puffed. The fire, that no person was blowing, kept\n up by itself, hot as the soul of a forge should be. The crucible became\n red, and the stones of the furnace were dyed a deep scarlet.\n\n In vain did Sylvestre Ker sweep with his holly broom; between the\n branches, covered with sharp leaves, the spirits passed\u2014nothing could\n catch them; and the heat was so great the boy was bathed in\n perspiration.\n\n After the bells had finished their second peal he said: \u201cI am stifling.\n I will open the window to let out the heat as well as this herd of evil\n spirits.\u201d\n\n But as soon as he opened the window the whole country commenced to\n laugh under its white mantle of snow\u2014barren heath, ploughed land, Druid\n stones, even to the enormous oaks of the forest, with their glistening\n summits, that shook their frosty branches, saying: \u201cSylvestre Ker will\n go! Sylvestre Ker will not go!\u201d\n\n Not a spirit from within flew out, while all the outside spirits\n entered, muttering, chattering, laughing: \u201cYes, yes, yes, yes! No, no,\n no, no!\u201d And I believe they fought.\n\n At the same time the sound of a cavalcade advancing was heard on the\n flinty road that passed before the tower; and Sylvestre Ker recognized\n the long procession of the monks of Ruiz, led by the grand abbot,\n Gildas the Wise, arrayed in cope and mitre, with his crosier in his\n hand, going to the Mass of Plouharnel, as the convent-chapel was being\n rebuilt.\n\n When the head of the cavalcade approached the tower the grand abbot\n cried out:\n\n \u201cMy armed guards, sound your horns to awaken Dame Josserande\u2019s son!\u201d\n\n And instantly there was a blast from the horns, which rang out until\n Gildas the Wise exclaimed:\n\n \u201cBe silent, for there is my tenant wide awake at his window.\u201d\n\n When all was still the grand abbot raised his crosier and said:\n\n \u201cMy tenant, the first hour of Christmas approaches, the glorious Feast\n of the Nativity. Extinguish your furnaces and hasten to Mass, for you\n have barely time.\u201d\n\n And on he passed, while those in the procession, as they saluted Ker,\n repeated:\n\n \u201cSylvestre Ker, you have barely time; make haste!\u201d\n\n The voices of the air kept gibbering: \u201cHe will go! He will not go!\u201d and\n the wind whistled in bitter sarcasm.\n\n Sylvestre Ker closed his window. He sat down, his head clasped by his\n trembling hands. His heart was rent by two forces that dragged him, one\n to the right, the other to the left: his mother\u2019s prayer and\n Matheline\u2019s laughter.\n\n He was no miser; he did not covet gold for the sake of gold, but that\n he might buy the row of pearls and smiles that hung from the lips of\n Matheline....\n\n \u201cChristmas!\u201d cried a voice in the air.\n\n \u201cChristmas, Christmas, Christmas!\u201d repeated all the other voices.\n\n Sylvestre Ker suddenly opened his eyes, and saw that the furnace was\n fiery red from top to bottom, and that the crucible was surrounded with\n rays so dazzling he could not even look at it. Something was boiling\n inside that sounded like the roaring of a tempest.\n\n \u201cMother! O my dear mother!\u201d cried the terrified man, \u201cI am coming. I\u2019ll\n run....\u201d\n\n But thousands of little voices stung his ears with the words:\n\n \u201cToo late, too late, too late! It is too late!\u201d\n\n Alas! alas! the wind from the sea brought the third peal of the bells\n of Plouharnel, and they also said to him: \u201cToo late!\u201d\n\n\n VII.\n\n\n As the sound of the bells died away the last drop of water fell from\n the clepsydra and marked the hour of midnight. Then the furnace opened\n and showed the glowing crucible, which burst with a terrible noise, and\n threw out a gigantic flame that reached the sky through the torn roof.\n Sylvestre Ker, enveloped by the fire, fell prostrate on the ground,\n suffocated in the burning smoke.\n\n The silence of death followed. Suddenly an awful voice said to him:\n \u201cArise.\u201d And he arose.\n\n On the spot where had stood the furnace, of which not a vestige\n remained, was standing a man, or rather a colossus; and Sylvestre Ker\n needed but a glance to recognize in him the demon. His body appeared to\n be of iron, red-hot and transparent; for in his veins could be seen the\n liquid gold, flowing into, and then in turn retreating from, his heart,\n black as an extinguished coal.\n\n The creature, who was both fearful and beautiful to behold, extended\n his hand toward the side of the tower nearest the sea, and in the thick\n wall a large breach was made.\n\n \u201cLook,\u201d said Satan.\n\n Sylvestre Ker obeyed. He saw, as though distance were annihilated, the\n interior of the humble church of Plouharnel where the faithful were\n assembled. The officiating priest had just ascended the altar,\n brilliant with the Christmas candles, and there was great pomp and\n splendor; for the many monks of Gildas the Wise were assisting the poor\n clergy of the parish.\n\n In a corner, under the shadow of a column, knelt Dame Josserande in\n fervent prayer, but often did the dear woman turn toward the door to\n watch for the coming of her son.\n\n Not far from her was Matheline du Coat-Dor, bravely attired and very\n beautiful, but lavishing the pearls of her smiles upon all who sought\n them, forgetting no one but God; and close to Matheline Pol Bihan\n squared his broad shoulders.\n\n Then, even as Satan had given to Sylvestre Ker\u2019s sight the power of\n piercing the walls, so did he permit him to look into the depth of\n hearts.\n\n In his mother\u2019s heart he saw himself as in a mirror. It was full of\n him. Good Josserande prayed for him; she united Jesus, Mary, and\n Joseph, the holy family, whose feast is Christmas, in the pious prayer\n which fell from her lips; and ever and ever said her heart to God: \u201cMy\n son, my son, my son!\u201d\n\n In the heart of Pol Sylvestre Ker saw pride of strength and gross\n cupidity; in the spot where should have been the heart of Matheline he\n saw Matheline, and nothing but Matheline, in adoration before\n Matheline.\n\n \u201cI have seen enough,\u201d said Sylvestre Ker.\n\n \u201cThen,\u201d replied Satan, \u201clisten!\u201d\n\n And immediately the sacred music resounded in the ears of the young\n tenant of the tower, as plainly as though he were in the church of\n Plouharnel. They were singing the _Sanctus_: \u201cHoly, holy, holy, Lord\n God of Hosts! The heavens and the earth are full of thy glory. Hosanna\n in the highest! Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.\n Hosanna in the highest!\u201d\n\n Dame Josserande repeated the words with the others, but the refrain of\n her heart continued: \u201cO Jesus, Infinite Goodness! may he be happy.\n Deliver him from all evil and from all sin. I have only him to love....\n Holy, holy, holy, give me all the suffering, and keep for him all the\n happiness!\u201d\n\n Can you believe it? Even while piously inhaling the perfume of this\n celestial hymn the young tenant wished to know what Matheline was\n saying to God. Everything speaks to God\u2014the wild beasts in the forest,\n the birds in the air, even the plants, whose roots are in the ground.\n\n But miserable girls who sell the pearls of their smiles are lower than\n the animals and vegetables. Nothing is beneath them, Pol Bihan\n excepted. Instead of speaking to God, Pol Bihan and Matheline whispered\n together, and Sylvestre Ker heard them as distinctly as if he had been\n between them.\n\n \u201cHow much will the fool give me?\u201d asked Matheline.\n\n \u201cThe idiot will give you all,\u201d replied Pol.\n\n \u201cAnd must I really squint with that one-eyed creature, and limp with\n the lame wretch?\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker felt his heart die away within him.\n\n Meanwhile, Josserande prayed: \u201cO ever Virgin Mother! pray for my dear\n child. As Jesus is your adorable heart, Sylvestre Ker is my poor\n heart....\u201d\n\n \u201cNever mind,\u201d continued Bihan, \u201cit is worth while limping and squinting\n for a time to win all the money in the world.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat is true; but for how long?\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker held his breath to hear the better.\n\n \u201cAs long as you please,\u201d answered Pol Bihan.\n\n There was a pause, after which the gay Matheline resumed in a lower\n tone:\n\n \u201cBut ... they say after a murder one can never laugh, and I wish to\n laugh always....\u201d\n\n \u201cWill I not be there?\u201d replied Bihan. \u201cSome time or other the idiot\n will certainly seek a quarrel with me, and I will crack his bones by\n only squeezing him in my arms; you can count upon my strength.\u201d\n\n \u201cI have heard enough,\u201d said Sylvestre Ker to Satan.\n\n \u201cAnd do you still love this Bihan?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, I despise him.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd Matheline\u2014do you love her yet?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, oh! yes, ... but ... I hate her!\u201d\n\n \u201cI see,\u201d said Satan, \u201cthat you are a coward and wicked like all men.\n Since you have heard and seen enough at a distance, listen, and look at\n your feet....\u201d\n\n The wall closed with a loud crash of the stones as they came together,\n and Sylvestre Ker saw that he was surrounded by an enormous heap of\n gold-pieces, as high as his waist, which gently floated, singing the\n symphony of riches. All around him was gold, and through the gap in the\n roof the shower of gold fell and fell and fell.\n\n \u201cAm I the master of all this?\u201d asked Sylvestre Ker.\n\n \u201cYes,\u201d replied Satan; \u201cyou have compelled me, who am gold, to come\n forth from my caverns; you are therefore the master of gold, provided\n you purchase it at the price of your soul. You cannot have both God and\n gold. You must choose one or the other.\u201d\n\n \u201cI have chosen,\u201d said Sylvestre Ker. \u201cI keep my soul.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou have firmly decided?\u201d\n\n \u201cIrrevocably.\u201d\n\n \u201cOnce, twice, ... reflect! You have just acknowledged that you still\n love the laughing Matheline.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd that I hate her; ... yes, ... it is so, ... but in eternity I wish\n to be with my dear mother Josserande.\u201d\n\n \u201cWere there no mothers,\u201d growled Satan, \u201cI could play my game much\n better in the world!\u201d\n\n And he added:\n\n \u201cFor the third time, ... adjudged!\u201d\n\n The heap of gold became as turbulent as the water of a cascade, and\n leaped and sang; the millions of little sonorous coins clashed against\n each other, then all was silent and they vanished. The room appeared as\n black as a place where there had been a great fire; nothing could be\n seen but the lurid gleam of Satan\u2019s iron body.\n\n Then said Sylvestre Ker:\n\n \u201cSince all is ended, retire!\u201d\n\n\n VIII.\n\n\n But the demon did not stir.\n\n \u201cDo you think, then,\u201d he asked, \u201cthat you have brought me hither for\n nothing? There is the law. You are not altogether my slave, since you\n have kept your soul; but as you have freely called me, and I have come,\n you are my vassal. I have a half-claim over you. The little children\n know that; I am astonished at your ignorance.... From midnight to three\n o\u2019clock in the morning you belong to me, in the form of an animal,\n restless, roving, complaining, without help from God. This is what you\n owe to your strong friend and beautiful bride. Let us settle the affair\n before I depart. What animal do you wish to be\u2014roaring lion, bellowing\n ox, bleating sheep, crowing cock? If you become a dog you can crouch at\n Matheline\u2019s feet, and Bihan can lead you by a leash to hunt in the\n woods....\u201d\n\n \u201cI wish,\u201d cried Sylvester Ker, whose anger burst forth at these\n words\u2014\u201cI wish to be a wolf, to devour them both!\u201d\n\n \u201cSo be it,\u201d said Satan; \u201cwolf you shall be three hours of the night\n during your mortal life.... Leap, wolf!\u201d\n\n And the wolf Sylvestre Ker leaped, and with one dash shattered the\n casement of the window as he cleared it with a bound. Through the\n aperture in the roof Satan escaped, and, spreading a pair of immense\n wings, rapidly disappeared in an opposite direction from the steeple of\n Plouharnel, whose chimes were ringing at the Elevation.\n\n\n IX.\n\n\n I do not know if you have ever seen a Breton village come forth after\n the midnight Mass. It is a joyous sight, but a brief one, as all are in\n a hurry to return home, where the midnight meal awaits them\u2014a frugal\n feast, but eaten with such cheerful hearts. The people, for a moment\n massed in the cemetery, exchange hospitable invitations, kind wishes,\n and friendly jokes; then divide into little caravans, which hurry along\n the roads, laughing, talking, singing. If it is a clear, cold night,\n the clicking of their wooden shoes may be heard for some time; but if\n it is damp weather the sound is stifled, and after a few moments the\n faint echo of an \u201cadieu\u201d or Christmas greeting is all that can be heard\n around the church as the beadle closes it.\n\n In the midst of all this cheerfulness Josserande alone returned with a\n sad heart; for through the whole Mass she had in vain watched for her\n beloved son. She walked fifty paces behind the cavalcade of the monks\n of Ruiz, and dared not approach the Grand-Abbot Gildas, for fear of\n being questioned about her boy. On her right was Matheline du Coat-Dor,\n on her left Bihan\u2014both eager to console her; for they thought that by\n that time Sylvestre Ker must have learned the wonderful secret which\n would secure him untold wealth, and to possess the son they should\n cling to the mother; therefore there were promises and caresses, and\n \u201cwill you have this, or will you have that?\u201d\n\n \u201cDear godmother, I shall always be with you,\u201d said Matheline, \u201cto\n comfort and rejoice your old age; for your son is my heart.\u201d\n\n Pol Bihan continued:\n\n \u201cI will never marry, but always remain with my friend, Sylvestre Ker,\n whom I love more than myself. And nothing must worry you; if he is weak\n I am strong, and I will work for two.\u201d\n\n To pretend that Dame Josserande paid much attention to all these words\n would be false; for her son possessed her whole soul, and she thought:\n\n \u201cThis the first time he has ever disobeyed and deceived me. The demon\n of avarice has entered into him. Why does he want so much money? Can\n all the riches of the world pay for one of the tears that the\n ingratitude of a beloved son draws from his mother\u2019s eyes?\u201d\n\n Suddenly her thoughts were arrested, for the sound of a trumpet was\n heard in the still night.\n\n \u201cIt is the convent-horn,\u201d said Matheline.\n\n \u201cAnd it sounds the wolf-alarm!\u201d added Pol.\n\n \u201cWhat harm can the wolf do,\u201d asked Josserande, \u201cto a well-mounted troop\n like the cavalry of Gildas the Wise? And, besides, cannot the holy\n abbot with a single word put to flight a hundred wolves?\u201d\n\n They had arrived at the heath of Carnac, where are the two thousand\n seven hundred and twenty-nine Druid stones, and the monks had already\n passed the round point where nothing grows, neither grass nor heath,\n and which resembles an enormous caldron\u2014a caldron wherein to make oaten\n porridge\u2014or rather a race-course, to exercise horses.\n\n On one side might be seen the town, dark and gloomy; on the other, as\n far as the eye could reach, rows of rugged obelisks, half-black,\n half-white, owing to the snow, which threw into bold relief each jagged\n outline. Josserande, Matheline, and Pol Bihan had just turned from the\n sunken road which branches toward Plouharnel; and the moon played\n hide-and-go-seek behind a flock of little clouds that flitted over the\n sky like lambs.\n\n Then a strange thing happened. The cavalcade of monks was seen to\n retreat from the entrance of the avenues to the middle of the circle,\n while the horn sounded the signal of distress, and loud cries were\n heard of \u201cWolf! wolf! wolf!\u201d\n\n At the same time could be distinguished the clashing of arms, the\n stamping of horses, and all the noise of a ferocious struggle, above\n which rose the majestic tones of Gildas the Wise, as he said with\n calmness:\n\n \u201cWolf, wicked wolf, I forbid you to touch God\u2019s servants!\u201d\n\n But it seemed that the wicked wolf was in no hurry to obey, for the\n cavalcade plunged hither and thither, as though shaken by convulsion;\n and the moon having come forth from the clouds, there was seen an\n enormous beast struggling with the staffs of the monks, the halberds of\n the armed guard, the pitch-forks and spears of the peasants, who had\n hastened from all directions at the trumpet-call from Ruiz.\n\n The animal received many wounds, but it was fated not to die. Again and\n again it charged upon the crowd, rushed up and down, round and round,\n biting, tearing with its great teeth so fearfully that a large circle\n was made around the grand abbot, who was finally left alone in face of\n the wolf.\n\n For a wolf it was.\n\n And the grand abbot having touched it with his crosier, the wolf\n crouched at his feet, panting, trembling, and bloody. Gildas the Wise\n bent over it, looked at it attentively, then said:\n\n \u201cNothing happens contrary to God\u2019s holy will. Where is Dame\n Josserande?\u201d\n\n \u201cI am here,\u201d replied a mournful voice full of tears, \u201cand I dread a\n great misfortune.\u201d\n\n She also was alone; for Matheline and Pol Bihan, seized with terror,\n had rushed across the fields at the first alarm and abandoned their\n precious charge. The grand abbot called Josserande and said:\n\n \u201cWoman, do not despair. Above you is the Infinite Goodness, who holds\n in his hands the heavens and the whole earth. Meanwhile, protect your\n wolf; we must return to the monastery to gain from sleep strength to\n serve the Lord our God!\u201d\n\n And he resumed his course, followed by his escort.\n\n The wolf did not move; his tongue lay on the snow, which was reddened\n by his blood. Josserande knelt beside him and prayed fervently. For\n whom? For her beloved son. Did she already know that the wolf was\n Sylvestre Ker? Certainly; such a thing could scarcely be divined, but\n under what form cannot a mother discover her darling child?\n\n She defended the wolf against the peasants, who had returned to strike\n him with their pitch-forks and pikes, as they believed him dead. The\n two last who came were Pol Bihan and Matheline. Pol Bihan kicked him on\n the head and said, \u201cTake that, you fool!\u201d and Matheline threw stones at\n him and cried: \u201cIdiot, take that, and that, and that!\u201d\n\n They had hoped for all the gold in the world, and this dead beast could\n give them nothing more.\n\n After a while two ragged beggars passed by and assisted Josserande in\n carrying the wolf into the tower. Where is charity most often found?\n Among the poor, who are the figures of Jesus Christ.\n\n\n X.\n\n\n Day dawned. A man slept in the bed of Sylvestre Ker, where widow\n Josserande had laid a wolf. The room still bore the marks of a fire,\n and snow fell through the hole in the roof. The young tenant\u2019s face was\n disfigured with blows, and his hair, stiffened with blood, hung in\n heavy locks. In his feverish sleep he talked, and the name that escaped\n his lips was Matheline\u2019s. At his bedside the mother watched and prayed.\n\n When Sylvestre Ker awoke he wept, for the thought of his condemnation\n returned, but the remembrance of Pol and Matheline dried the tears in\n his burning eyes.\n\n \u201cIt was for those two,\u201d said he, \u201cthat I forgot God and my mother. I\n still feel my friend\u2019s heel upon my forehead, and even to the bottom of\n my heart the shock of the stones thrown at me by my betrothed!\u201d\n\n \u201cDearest,\u201d murmured Josserande, \u201cdearer to me than ever, I know\n nothing; tell me all.\u201d\n\n Sylvestre Ker obeyed; and when he had finished Josserande kissed him,\n took up her staff, and proceeded toward the convent of Ruiz to ask,\n according to her custom, aid and counsel from Gildas the Wise. On her\n way men, women, and children looked curiously at her, for throughout\n the country it was already known that she was the mother of a wolf.\n Even behind the hedge which enclosed the abbey orchard Matheline and\n Pol were hidden to see her pass; and she heard Pol say: \u201cWill you come\n to-night to see the wolf run round?\u201d\n\n \u201cWithout fail,\u201d replied Matheline; and the sting of her laughter\n pierced Josserande like a poisonous thorn.\n\n The grand abbot received her, surrounded by great books and dusty\n manuscripts. When she wished to explain her son\u2019s case he stopped her\n and said:\n\n \u201cWidow of Martin Ker, poor, good woman, since the beginning of the\n world Satan, the demon of gold and pride, has worked many such\n wickednesses. Do you remember the deceased brother, Tha\u00ebl, who is a\n saint for having resisted the desire of making gold\u2014he who had the\n power to do it?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes,\u201d answered Josserande; \u201cand would to heaven my Sylvestre had\n imitated him!\u201d\n\n \u201cVery well,\u201d replied Gildas the Wise, \u201cinstead of sleeping I passed the\n rest of the night with St. Tha\u00ebl, seeking a means to save your son,\n Sylvestre Ker.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd have you found it, father?\u201d\n\n The grand abbot neither answered yes nor no, but he began to turn over\n a very thick manuscript filled with pictures; and while turning the\n leaves he said: \u201cLife springs from death, according to the divine word;\n death seizes the living according to the pagan law of Rome; and it is\n nearly the same thing in the order of miserable temporal ambition,\n whose inheritance is a strength, a life, shot forth from a coffin. This\n is a book of the defunct Tha\u00ebl\u2019s, which treats of the question of\n maladies caused by the breath of gold\u2014a deadly poison.... Woman, would\n you have the courage to strike your wolf a blow on his head powerful\n enough to break the skull?\u201d\n\n At these words Josserande fell her full length upon the tiles, as if\n she had been stabbed to the heart; but in the very depth of her\n agony\u2014for she thought herself dying\u2014she replied:\n\n \u201cIf you should order me to do it, I would.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou have this great confidence in me, poor woman?\u201d cried Gildas, much\n moved.\n\n \u201cYou are a man of God,\u201d answered Josserande, \u201cand I have faith in God.\u201d\n\n Gildas the Wise prostrated himself on the ground and struck his breast,\n knowing that he had felt a movement of pride. Then, standing up, he\n raised Josserande, and kissed the hem of her robe, saying:\n\n \u201cWoman, I adore in you the most holy faith. Prepare your axe, and\n sharpen it!\u201d\n\n\n XI.\n\n\n In Brittany, when this legend is repeated, the relater here adds a\n current proverb of the province: \u201cChristians, there is nothing greater\n than Faith, that is the mother of Hope, and thus the grandmother of\n Holy Love, that carries one above to the Paradise of God.\u201d\n\n In the days of Gildas the Wise intense silence always reigned at night\n through the dense oak forests of the Armorican country. One of the most\n lonely places was C\u00e6sar\u2019s camp, the name given to the huge masses of\n stone that encumbered the barren heath; and it was the common opinion\n that the pagan giants supposed to be buried under them rose from their\n graves at midnight, and roamed up and down the long avenues, watching\n for the late passers-by to twist their necks.\n\n This night, however\u2014the night after Christmas\u2014many persons could be\n seen about eleven o\u2019clock on the heath before the stones of Carnac, all\n around the Great Basin or circle, whose irregular outline was clearly\n visible by moonlight.\n\n The enclosure was entirely empty. Outside no one was seen, it is true;\n but many could be heard gabbling in the shadow of the high rocks, under\n the shelter of the stumps of oaks, even in the tufts of thorny\n brambles; and all this assemblage watched for something, and that\n something was the wolf, Sylvestre Ker.\n\n They had come from Plouharnel, and also from Lannelar, from Carnac,\n from Kercado, even from the old town of Crach, beyond La Trinit\u00e9.\n\n Who had brought together all these people, young and old, men and\n women? The legend does not say, but very probably Matheline had strewn\n around the cruel pearls of her laughter, and Pol Bihan had not been\n slow to relate what he had seen after the midnight Mass.\n\n By some means or other the entire country around for five or six\n leagues knew that the son of Martin Ker, the tenant of the abbey, had\n become a man-wolf, and that he was doomed to expiate his crime in the\n spot haunted by the phantoms\u2014the Great Basin of the Pagans, between the\n tower and the Druid stones.\n\n Many of the watchers had never seen a man-wolf, and there reigned in\n the crowd, scattered in invisible groups, a fever of curiosity, terror,\n and impatience; the minutes lengthened as they passed, and it seemed as\n though midnight, stopped on the way, would never come.\n\n There were at that time no clocks in the neighborhood to mark the hour,\n but the matin-bell of the convent of Ruiz gave notice that the\n wished-for moment had arrived.\n\n While waiting there was busy conversation: they spoke of the man-wolf,\n of phantoms, and also of betrothals, for the rumor was spread that the\n bans of Matheline du Coat-Dor, the promised bride of Sylvestre Ker,\n with the strong Pol Bihan, who had never found a rival in the\n wrestling-field, would be published on the following Sunday; and I\n leave you to imagine how Matheline\u2019s laughter ran in pearly cascades\n when congratulated on her approaching marriage.\n\n By the road which led up to the tower a shadow slowly descended; it was\n not the wolf, but a poor woman in mourning, whose head was bent upon\n her breast, and who held in her hand an object that shone like a\n mirror, and the brilliant surface of which reflected the moonbeams.\n\n \u201cIt is Josserande Ker!\u201d was whispered around the circle, behind the\n rocks, in the brambles, and under the stumps of the oaks.\n\n \u201c\u2019Tis the widow of the armed keeper of the great door!\u201d\n\n \u201c\u2019Tis the mother of the wolf, Sylvestre Ker!\u201d\n\n \u201cShe also has come to see....\u201d\n\n \u201cBut what has she in her hand?\u201d\n\n Twenty voices asked this question. Matheline, who had good eyes, and\n such beautiful ones, replied:\n\n \u201cIt looks like an axe.... Happy am I to be rid of those two, the mother\n and son! With them I could never laugh.\u201d\n\n But there were two or three good souls who said in low tones:\n\n \u201cPoor widow! her heart must be full of sorrow.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut what does she want with that axe?\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is to defend her wolf,\u201d again replied Matheline, who carried a\n pitch-fork.\n\n Pol Bihan held an enormous holly stick which resembled a club. Every\n one was armed either with threshing flails or rakes or hoes; some even\n bore scythes, carried upright; for they had not only come to look on,\n but to make an end of the man-wolf.\n\n Again was heard the chime of the Matin-bells of the convent of Ruiz,\n and immediately a smothered cry ran from group to group:\n\n \u201cWolf! wolf! wolf!\u201d\n\n Josserande heard it, for she paused in her descent and cast an anxious\n look around; but, seeing no one, she raised her eyes to heaven and\n clasped her hands over the handle of her axe.\n\n The wolf, in the meantime, with fuming nostrils and eyes which looked\n like burning coals, leaped over the stones of the enclosure and began\n to run around the circle.\n\n \u201cSee, see!\u201d said Pol Bihan, \u201che no longer limps.\u201d\n\n And Matheline, dazzled by the red light from his eyes, added: \u201cIt seems\n he is no longer one-eyed!\u201d\n\n Pol brandished his club and continued:\n\n \u201cWhat are we waiting for? Why not attack him?\u201d\n\n \u201cGo you first,\u201d said the men.\n\n \u201cI caught cold the other day, and my leg is stiff, which keeps me from\n running,\u201d answered Pol.\n\n \u201cThen I will go first!\u201d cried Matheline, raising her pitch-fork. \u201cI\n will soon show how I hate the wretch!\u201d\n\n Dame Josserande heard her and sighed:\n\n \u201cGirl, whom I blessed in baptism, may God keep me from cursing you\n now!\u201d\n\n This Matheline, whose pearls were worth nothing, was no coward; for she\n carried out her words, and marched straight up to the wolf, while Bihan\n stayed behind and cried:\n\n \u201cGo, go, my friends; don\u2019t be afraid! Ah! but for my stiff leg I would\n soon finish the wolf, for I am the strongest and bravest.\u201d\n\n Round and round the circle galloped the wolf as quickly as a hunted\n stag; his eyes darted fire, his tongue was hanging from his mouth.\n Josserande, seeing the danger that threatened him, wept and cried out:\n\n \u201cO Bretons! is there among you all not one kind soul to defend the\n widow\u2019s son in the hour when he bitterly expiates his sin?\u201d\n\n \u201cLet us alone, godmother,\u201d boldly replied Matheline.\n\n And from afar Pol Bihan added:\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t listen to the old woman; go!\u201d\n\n But another voice was heard in answer to Dame Josserande\u2019s appeal, and\n it said:\n\n \u201cAs last night, we are here!\u201d\n\n Standing in front of Matheline, and barring the passage, were two\n ragged beggars with their wallets, leaning upon their staffs.\n Josserande recognized the two poor men who had so charitably aided her\n the night before; and one of them, who had snow-white hair and beard,\n said:\n\n \u201cChristians, my brethren, why do you interfere in this? God rewards and\n punishes. This poor man-wolf is not a damned soul, but one expiating a\n great crime. Leave justice to God, if you do not wish some great\n misfortune to happen to you.\u201d\n\n And Josserande, who was kneeling down, said imploringly:\n\n \u201cListen, listen to the saint!\u201d\n\n But from behind Pol Bihan cried out:\n\n \u201cSince when have beggars been allowed to preach sermons? Ah! if it were\n not for my stiff leg.... Kill him, kill him! ... wolf! wolf! wolf!\u201d\n\n \u201cWolf! wolf!\u201d repeated Matheline, who tried to drive off the old beggar\n with her pitch-fork.\n\n But the fork broke like glass in her hands, as it touched the poor\n man\u2019s tatters, and at the same time twenty voices cried:\n\n \u201cThe wolf! the wolf! Where has the wolf gone?\u201d\n\n Soon was seen where the wolf had gone. A black mass dashed through the\n crowd, and Pol Bihan uttered a horrible cry:\n\n \u201cHelp! help! Matheline!\u201d\n\n You have often heard the noise made by a dog when crunching a bone.\n This was the noise they heard, but louder, as though there were many\n dogs crunching many bones. And a strange voice, like the growling of a\n wolf, said:\n\n \u201cThe strength of a man is a dainty morsel for a wolf to eat. Bihan,\n traitor, I eat your strength!\u201d\n\n The black mass again bounded through the terrified crowd, his bloody\n tongue hanging from his mouth, his eyes darting fire.\n\n This time it was from Matheline that a scream still more horrible than\n that of Pol\u2019s was heard; and again there was the noise of another\n terrible feast, and the voice of the wild beast, which had already\n spoken, growled:\n\n \u201cThe pearls of a smile make a dainty morsel for a wolf to eat.\n Matheline, serpent that stung my heart, seek for your beauty. I have\n eaten it!\u201d\n\n\n XIII.\n\n\n The white-haired beggar had endeavored to protect Matheline against the\n wolf, but he was very old, and his limbs would not move as quickly as\n his heart. He only succeeded in throwing down the wolf. It fell at\n Josserande\u2019s feet and licked her knees, uttering doleful moans. But the\n people, who had come thither for entertainment, were not well pleased\n with what had happened. There was now abundance of light, as men with\n torches had arrived from the abbey in search of their holy saint,\n Gildas the Wise, whose cell had been found empty at the hour of\n Compline.\n\n The glare from the torches shone upon two hideous wounds made by the\n wolf, who had devoured Matheline\u2019s beauty and Pol\u2019s strength\u2014that is to\n say, the face of the one and the arms of the other: flesh and bones. It\n was frightful to behold. The women wept while looking at the repulsive,\n bleeding mass which had been Matheline\u2019s smiling face; the men sought\n in the double bloody gaps some traces of Pol\u2019s arms, for the powerful\n muscles, the glory of the athletic games; and every heart was filled\n with wrath.\n\n The legend says that the tenant of Coat-Dor, Matheline\u2019s poor father,\n knelt beside his daughter and felt around in the blood for the\n scattered pearls, which were now as red as holly-berries.\n\n \u201cAlas!\u201d said he, \u201cof these dead stained things, which when living were\n so beautiful, which were admired and envied and loved, I was so proud\n and happy.\u201d\n\n Alas! indeed, alas! Perhaps it was not the girl\u2019s fault that her heart\n was no larger than a little bird\u2019s; and yet for this defect was not\n Matheline most cruelly punished?\n\n \u201cDeath to the wolf! death to the wolf! death to the wolf!\u201d\n\n From all sides was this cry heard, and brandishing pitch-forks,\n cudgels, ploughshares, and mallets, came rushing the people toward the\n wolf, who still lay panting, with open jaws and pendent tongue, at the\n feet of Dame Josserande. Around them the torch-bearers formed a circle:\n not to throw light upon the wolf and Dame Josserande, but to render\n homage to the white-haired beggar, in whom, as though the scales had\n suddenly fallen from their eyes, every one recognized the Grand-Abbot\n of Ruiz, Gildas the Wise.\n\n The grand abbot raised his hand, and the armed crowd\u2019s eager advance\n was checked, as if their feet had been nailed to the ground. Calmly he\n surveyed them, blessed them, and said:\n\n \u201cChristians, the wolf did wrong to punish, for chastisement belongs to\n God alone; therefore the wolf\u2019s fault should not be punished by you. In\n whom resides the power of God? In the holy authority of fathers and\n mothers. So here is my penitent Josserande, who will rightfully judge\n the wolf and punish him, since she is his mother.\u201d\n\n When Gildas the Wise ceased speaking you could have heard a mouse run\n across the heath. Each one thought to himself: \u201cSo the wolf is really\n Sylvestre Ker.\u201d But not a word was uttered, and all looked at Dame\n Josserande\u2019s axe, which glistened in the moonlight.\n\n Josserande made the sign of the cross\u2014ah! poor mother, very slowly, for\n her heart sank within her\u2014and she murmured:\n\n \u201cMy beloved one, my beloved one, whom I have borne in my arms and\n nourished with my milk\u2014ah! me, can the Lord God inflict this cruel\n martyrdom upon me?\u201d\n\n No one replied, not even Gildas the Wise, who silently adjured the\n All-Powerful, and recalled to him the sacrifice of Abraham.\n\n Josserande raised her axe, but she had the misfortune to look at the\n wolf, who fixed his eyes, full of tears, upon her, and the axe fell\n from her hands.\n\n _It was the wolf who picked it up_, and when he gave it back to her he\n said: \u201cI weep for you, my mother.\u201d\n\n \u201cStrike!\u201d cried the crowd, for what remained of Pol and Matheline\n uttered terrible groans. \u201cStrike! strike!\u201d\n\n While Josserande again seized her axe the grand abbot had time to say:\n\n \u201cDo not complain, you two unhappy ones, for your suffering here below\n changes your hell into purgatory.\u201d\n\n Three times Josserande raised the axe, three times she let it fall\n without striking; but at last she said in a hoarse tone that sounded\n like a death-rattle: \u201cI have great faith in the good God!\u201d and then,\n says the legend, she struck boldly, for the wolf\u2019s head split in two\n halves.\n\n\n XIV.\n\n\n A sudden wind extinguished the torches, and some one prevented Dame\n Josserande from falling, as she sank fainting to the ground, by\n supporting her in his arms. By the light of the halo which shone around\n the blessed head of Gildas the Wise, the good people saw that this\n somebody was the young tenant, Sylvestre Ker, no longer lame nor\n one-eyed, but with two straight legs and two perfect eyes.\n\n At the same time there were heard voices in the clouds chanting the _Te\n Deum_. Why? Because heaven and earth quivered with emotion at\n witnessing this supreme act of faith soaring from the depth of anguish\n in a mother\u2019s heart.\n\n\n XV.\n\n\n This is the legend that for many centuries has been related at\n Christmas time on the shores of the Petite-Mer, which in the Breton\n tongue is called _Armor bihan_, the Celtic name of Brittany.\n\n If you ask what moral these good people draw from this strange story, I\n will answer that it contains a basketful. Pol and Matheline, condemned\n to walk around the Basin of the Pagans until the end of time, one\n without arms, the other without a face, offer a severe lesson to those\n fellows who are too proud of their broad shoulders and brute force, and\n gossiping flirts of girls with smiling faces and wicked hearts; the\n case of Sylvestre Ker teaches young men not to listen to the demon of\n money; the blow of Josserande\u2019s axe shows the miraculous power of\n faith; the part of Gildas the Wise proves that it is well to consult\n the saints.\n\n Still further, that you may bind together these diverse morals in one,\n here is a proverb which is current in the province: \u201cNever stoop to\n pick up the pearls of a smile.\u201d After this ask me no more.\n\n As to the authenticity of the story, I have already said that the\n chestnut-grove belongs to the mayor\u2019s nephew, which is one guaranty;\n and I will add that the spot is called Sylvestreker, and that the\n ruins, hung with moss, have no other name than \u201cThe Wolf-Tower!\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n MR. FROUDE ON THE DECLINE OF PROTESTANTISM.[102]\n\n We have seen what Mr. Froude thinks of the \u201cRevival of Romanism.\u201d Let\n us now see what he has to say on a subject nearer his heart\u2014the decline\n of Protestantism.\n\n He has much to say; and, to use an ordinary phrase, he makes no bones\n about saying it. At the outset we would dispose of what seems a fair\n objection. If, it may be urged, you make Mr. Froude so very\n untrustworthy a witness against Catholics and the Catholic Church, why\n should he not be equally untrustworthy when assailing Protestantism?\n\n The objection is more plausible than real. Mr. Froude is a professed\n Protestant. In the cause of Protestantism he is earnest even to\n aggressiveness. He believes in and loves it with all his heart and\n soul, as really as he disbelieves in and detests Catholicity. He can\n say nothing that is too good of the early Protestant Reformers and of\n their \u201cReform.\u201d He doubts about nothing, apologizes for nothing,\n attempts to palliate nothing either in the Reformers or their Reform.\n He sees nothing in either to apologize for or to palliate. He can only\n regret that, so far as Protestant belief and work and workers go, the\n nineteenth century is not as the sixteenth. He is altogether on his own\n ground here; and we submit that the testimony of such a man in such a\n matter is of value, the more so when it is confirmed to-day by\n concurrent Protestant testimony on all sides. The only difference\n between Mr. Froude and the great mass of non-Catholic writers on this\n subject is that he is more frank than they, and lays his finger\n unshrinkingly on very tender Protestant spots.\n\n Of the actual state of Protestantism he has little that is good or\n hopeful to say, with one notable exception\u2014North Germany\u2014which will be\n considered later on. Protestantism to-day Mr. Froude finds weak-kneed\n as well as weak-headed. It has not that aggressive strength of the\n early teachers and preachers of Reform. The modern teachers have lost\n that pronounced faith in themselves and in their doctrines, that\n burning zeal, that fierce hatred of Catholicity, of falsehood, and of\n sham, that Mr. Froude is pleased to discover in the early Reformers.\n\n \u201cReligion speaks with command,\u201d he says very rightly. It \u201clays down a\n set of doctrines, and says, \u2018Believe these at your soul\u2019s peril.\u2019 A\n certain peremptoriness being thus of the essence of the thing, those\n religious teachers will always command most confidence who dare most to\n speak in positive tones.\u201d All of which is, of course, most true.\n\n Speaking \u201cin positive tones,\u201d however, does not necessarily imply a\n divine mission, or even an erroneous sense of a divine mission. It may\n be bluster; it may be calculated lying; it may be the mistaken\n enthusiasm of a weak intellect and fervid imagination. To be real it\n must stand the severest tests. Of a man who asserts his mission from\n heaven as a teacher of religion something more than his own word is\n demanded, however positive that word may be. In the preaching and the\n teaching of the truth there is in all ages a unity of voice, a\n community of feeling and of purpose, a singleness of eye, of aim, of\n method, a union of heart and of soul, that is unmistakable and carries\n conviction with it. There is no change in it; no fleck or flaw. What is\n new agrees with what is old; is generally a consequence flowing out of\n the old. It preaches only one God and one law from the beginning. It\n never contradicts itself; it never narrows or broadens its moral lines\n to suit the convenience or the whim of persons or of nationalities. It\n never compromises with humanity. It enlightens the intellect while\n appealing to the heart of man. It makes no divisions between men or\n nations; no special code for this or for that. It is awful in its\n inflexibility; majestic in its calm; eternal in its vigilance; \u201cthe\n same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever.\u201d This is living Truth; this is\n God\u2019s; and he who speaks the word of God is known by these signs.\n\n Mr. Froude is at a loss to find this spirit now abroad in the world.\n The nearest approach to it he finds, oddly enough for him, in the\n Catholic Church. But, of course, that is owing to some devilish\n ingenuity of which the Catholic Church alone has the secret. As for\n Protestants, \u201cit is no secret,\u201d he says, \u201cthat of late years Protestant\n divines have spoken with less boldness, with less clearness and\n confidence, than their predecessors of the last generation.\u201d \u201cThey are\n not to be blamed for it,\u201d he adds, and we quite agree with him. \u201cTheir\n intellectual position has grown in many ways perplexed. Science and\n historical criticism have shaken positions which used to be thought\n unassailable\u201d (p. 99). We pointed out one of those \u201cpositions\u201d\u2014the\n Protestant Reformation in England\u2014but that is not in the contemplation\n of Mr. Froude. To him, even if to him alone, that position still\n stands, \u201cunassailable.\u201d\n\n \u201cDoctrines once thought to carry their own evidence with them\n in their inherent fitness for man\u2019s needs have become, for some\n reason or other, less conclusively obvious. The state of mind\n to which they were addressed has been altered\u2014altered in some\n way either for the worse or for the better. And where the\n evangelical theology retains its hold, it is rather as\n something which it is unbecoming to doubt than as a body of\n living truth which penetrates and vitalizes the heart\u201d (p. 99).\n\n It is to be regretted that Mr. Froude does not specify these\n \u201cdoctrines.\u201d He fails to do so in any place, and in such matters, as\n indeed in all, there is nothing like accuracy in order to arrive at a\n clear understanding of what is wrong. Some of them, however, may be\n easily guessed at. In these days it would be hard to discover what\n precise \u201cdoctrines\u201d \u201cevangelical\u201d or any but Catholic theologians do\n hold, if hard pushed and driven to make an explicit statement of what\n they do and what they do not believe. The expression \u201cevangelical\n theology\u201d may help to enlighten us as to Mr. Froude\u2019s meaning. That we\n take to mean a theology based on the Bible as the first, final, and\n only guide to man\u2019s knowledge of God and all implied in that knowledge.\n This view of his meaning is confirmed by another passage (p. 100),\n wherein, contrasting the doctrinal position of the Catholic and\n Protestant, he says:\n\n \u201cIt\u201d (the Catholic Church) \u201cstands precisely on the same\n foundation on which the Protestant religion stands\u2014on the truth\n of the Gospel history. Before we can believe the Gospel history\n we must appeal to the consciousness of God\u2019s existence, which\n is written on the hearts of us all.\u201d\n\n There is a mistake here which will be obvious to any instructed reader.\n There is no more reason \u201cto appeal to the consciousness of God\u2019s\n existence\u201d for the truth of \u201cthe Gospel history\u201d than for the truth of\n any other history. As a history, history it is and no more, to be\n judged as to its accuracy on the known laws of historical criticism. It\n contains a written record of events, and stands or falls on the truth\n of what it records, just as does Mr. Froude\u2019s own history. If it can be\n shown that it is false, there is an end of it; false it is, and no man\n is bound to believe it. The foundation of Protestantism, as Mr. Froude\n very rightly says, stands \u201con the truth of the Gospel history\u201d\u2014that is,\n on the Bible, and the Bible alone. Christ, however, did not build his\n church on the Bible, but on Peter, the chief of the apostles: \u201cI say to\n thee, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and\n the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.\u201d Those are very plain,\n strong, and unmistakable words; and in their comprehension lies a\n fundamental difference between Catholics and Protestants.\n\n Out of this difference comes a singular effect, more noticeable in\n these than in former days. Catholics reverence the Bible more really\n because more truly than do Protestants. Over-reverence is irreverence.\n They never made the mistake of accepting the Bible as the foundation of\n Christ\u2019s church, any more than in human affairs we should take a\n history of a commonwealth, with the digest of its laws, the sayings of\n some of its wise men, their documents to their contemporaries and to\n posterity, as the commonwealth itself. Protestants withdrew from the\n body of the church, which may have had, and had, sore spots and\n diseased members; they took up the written record and said: Here are\n the laws; here are the words of Christ; here are the sayings of the\n fathers; here is truth; here let us build our church anew\u2014each one\n judging for himself as to what the church was and ought to be.\n Difficulties that were essential to such a position and that are\n obvious at sight arose at once and continued all the way down, until at\n last, in these days of all others, there sprang up in the very bosom of\n Protestantism a school of assailants of the Bible itself. This is the\n school of modern scientists, which rejects revelation, rejects God,\n rejects the truth of the Bible history, rejects Christ\u2014rejects, in a\n word, everything, save what approves itself to it by so-called positive\n testimony. Hence arises the perplexity of the \u201cintellectual position\u201d\n of Protestant divines, which Mr. Froude notices. The very foundation of\n their creed is questioned, and questioned at every inch. So, until\n everything is satisfactorily cleared up and the \u201cscientists\u201d absolutely\n refuted, Protestantism is in a state of dissolution. It has no\n foundation on which to stand, while Catholics have their living church,\n to which they adhered steadfastly from the very beginning, which\n existed, and was called into being, entirely independent of the Bible,\n and which would have been what it is had the Bible never been written\n at all. So that, _per impossibile_, even were the Bible shown to be\n false, it would not affect the fundamental Catholic position. Of course\n we do not intimate for a moment that the Bible is false, and that the\n scientists can prove anything against it. We only bring forward this\n instance of an essential difference between Catholics and Protestants,\n and the effect of it on their minds, as showing the reason why\n Catholics take the criticism of the new school of inquirers very\n calmly, while the result of this criticism on Protestants is\n disastrous.\n\n Catholics are just as steadfast in their belief as they ever were;\n Protestants are daily becoming less and less so. Inquiry, or\n \u201ccriticism,\u201d as it is called, while it strengthens, if possible,\n Catholicity, destroys Protestantism. Truth can stand all things.\n \u201cScience and historical criticism _have_ shaken positions which used to\n be thought unassailable\u201d by Protestants, who find themselves in the\n false position of being compelled to question or reject as false what\n their fathers pinned their faith to\u2014Germany always excepted, according\n to Mr. Froude. It is a hard thing indeed to preach and teach as divine\n truth a doctrine, or by our very profession to subscribe to a doctrine,\n which in our heart we doubt about or disbelieve. This is a moral\n phenomenon which Protestantism presents to us every day, and in no one\n of its infinite branches more conspicuously than in the Anglican.\n\n If men are preaching what they disbelieve or are in grave doubt about,\n it is simply natural that \u201cwhere truth\u201d (or what was taken for truth)\n \u201cwas once flashed out like lightning, and attended with oratorical\n thunders, it is now uttered with comparative feebleness.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe most honest, perhaps, are the most uncomfortable and most\n hesitating, while those who speak most boldly are often\n affecting a confidence which in their hearts they do not feel\u201d\n (p. 99). \u201cFrom some cause, it seems they\u201d (Protestant\n preachers) \u201cdare not speak, they dare not think, like their\n fathers. Too many of them condescend to borrow the weapons of\n their adversaries. _They are not looking for what is true; they\n are looking for arguments to defend positions which they know\n to be indefensible._ Their sermons are sometimes sophistical,\n sometimes cold and mechanical, sometimes honestly diffident.\n Any way, they are without warmth and cannot give what they do\n not possess\u201d (p. 100).\n\n This is a very heavy indictment; we leave to others to judge of its\n truth. It is a mistake, however, to draw the line at \u201ctheir fathers.\u201d\n These men are what their fathers have made them. The characteristics\n that mark the present teachers of Protestantism run down the whole line\n of the Protestant tradition. Incoherency and inconsistency, not to use\n harsher terms, necessarily stamped Protestantism from the first.[103]\n These characteristics are only more apparent to-day because the\n constant fire of criticism has exposed and brought them more\n prominently into view.\n\n The practical results of teaching what is necessarily and inherently\n contradictory scarcely need to be pointed out. \u201cThe Protestant,\u201d says\n Mr. Froude, \u201cfinding three centuries ago that the institution called\n the Church was teaching falsehood, refused to pin his faith upon the\n Church\u2019s sleeve thenceforward. He has relied on his own judgment, and\n times come when he is perplexed.\u201d The whole story is told here. It was\n too late in the day to find that \u201cthe Church was teaching falsehood.\u201d\n The Christian Church can err or it cannot err. There is room for no\n _via media_ here. If it can err, it could have erred just as easily in\n the first century as in the fifteenth or sixteenth. If it could err at\n all there is no necessary reason to suppose that it ever was right;\n there is no belief to be placed in the promise of Christ; there is no\n belief to be placed in Christ himself more than in any other man. And\n again, if it could err, who was right, and who was going to set it\n right? The church being abandoned as a teacher of falsehood, there is\n no hope of escape from constant perplexity to the Christian mind; for\n the Bible itself, being left to private judgment, is of course open to\n any interpretation that private judgment may be pleased to extract from\n it. And this in itself is destruction, quite apart from the assaults of\n hostile criticism. To make the church at all, or at any time, or by any\n possibility a teacher of falsehood is to strike the divinity from it\n and convert it into a human institution of the most monstrous\n assumptions and absurd pretensions.\n\n This is Protestantism, which never had any spiritual life in itself. It\n was from the beginning, as it still is, a convenient and very powerful\n political agent, as was Mahometanism. Mr. Froude says very truly, what\n all men are coming to say, that \u201cthere is no real alternative between\n the Catholic Church and atheism\u201d (p. 100), which leaves Mr. Froude and\n his fellow-Protestants in a pleasant position.\n\n In the general perplexity of the Protestant mind \u201cthe Romanist,\u201d as Mr.\n Froude graciously puts it, \u201chas availed himself of the opportunity.\u201d\n\n \u201cHis church stands as a visible thing, which appears [appeals?]\n to the imagination as well as the reason. The vexed soul, weary\n of its doubts, and too impatient to wait till it pleases God to\n clear away the clouds, demands a certainty on which it can\n repose\u2014never to ask a question more. By an effort of will\n which, while claiming the name of faith, is in reality a want\n of faith, it seizes the Catholic system as a whole. Foregoing\n the use of the natural reason for evermore, it accepts the word\n of a spiritual director as an answer to every difficulty, and\n finds, as it supposes, the peace for which it longed, as the\n body which is drugged with opium ceases to feel pain\u201d (p. 101).\n\n Such is Mr. Froude\u2019s picture of conversion to the Catholic faith. A man\n is drugged into Catholicity, and remains drugged to the end of the\n chapter. Whenever a gleam of his lost reason returns he hurries to the\n confessional box; his \u201cspiritual director\u201d administers another dose,\n and the drowsy patient slumbers away again content. We do not pretend\n to Mr. Froude\u2019s singular gift of prescience which enables him to read\n so readily the hearts of thousands of men and women who to all the\n world save Mr. Froude are intellectually and morally strong. He has\n traced their secret emotions and followed them up even into the\n confessional box. He has seen the opiate administered and satisfied\n himself of the process. To ordinary persons the conversion of a man to\n the Catholic faith is the result of a long and most painful struggle\n which only the strongest conviction of right can bring about. Leaving\n him there, deprived of \u201cthe use of the natural reason for evermore,\u201d\n let us see what becomes of those who retain the use of their natural\n reason and all the noble gifts and faculties that accompany it.\n Protestants alone see clearly the roads to heaven and hell, according\n to Mr. Froude; which road do they take?\n\n We have seen the position of their preachers. Were we not deprived of\n \u201cour natural reason for evermore,\u201d we should describe that position as\n most pitiable, where it is not dishonest and intellectually immoral.\n The God of Protestantism, if we believe its expounders, is truly a\n strange being. He teaches everything, or he teaches nothing, with equal\n facility and pleasing variety. He teaches that there are three persons\n in one God; he teaches no such doctrine. He teaches that Christ is\n truly God and truly man; he is rather doubtful about the matter. He\n teaches the eternity of punishment; he teaches no such monstrous\n doctrine. He commands that all men be baptized in the name of the\n Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, if they would enter the\n kingdom of heaven; he does not know of the Father, the Son, and the\n Holy Ghost. His views of baptism and its necessity are rather mixed.\n There is no baptism unless a man is wholly immersed. It is just as good\n a baptism if a man\u2019s feet be immersed. It is equally good if water be\n poured on a man\u2019s head. A man is just as fit for the kingdom of heaven,\n and just as good a Christian, if he be not baptized at all. God teaches\n that the Blessed Sacrament is really and truly the body and blood of\n Christ, and to be adored. He teaches that it is only a figure of\n Christ, and that to adore it is to commit the sin of idolatry. He\n teaches that man has free-will; he teaches that man has not free-will,\n and that all he can do is worthless, heaven or hell being portioned out\n for him from all eternity quite apart from his own endeavor. He teaches\n that good works as well as faith in him are necessary for salvation; he\n teaches that faith alone is necessary, and that provided a man believe\n right he may do wrong. And so on _ad infinitum_ down to the grossest\n and most abhorrent tenets.\n\n But this is Protestantism, or reliance on one\u2019s \u201cown judgment.\u201d One\u2019s\n own judgment is very apt to favor one\u2019s own self. One\u2019s own judgment\n makes a god of self, and right and wrong matters of whim, appetite, and\n inclination. Let us see its outcome as pictured by Mr. Froude.\n\n In section iv. of his study he considers the \u201cCauses of Weakness in\n Modern Protestant Churches.\u201d The words \u201cmodern\u201d and \u201cchurches\u201d are\n themselves contradictory of unity and of a church built on Christ. He\n sets out by drawing a glowing picture of what the early \u201cReformers\u201d did\n and what they were, which we may let pass as not immediately bearing on\n our present purpose. \u201cAfter the middle of the seventeenth century,\u201d he\n says (p. 111), \u201cProtestantism ceased to be aggressive.\u201d\n\n ... \u201cAs it became established it adapted itself to the world,\n laid aside its harshness, confined itself more and more to the\n enforcement of particular doctrines, and abandoned, at first\n tacitly and afterward deliberately, the pretence to interfere\n with private life or practical business.\u201d\n\n Is this true? Did Protestantism cease to be aggressive after the middle\n of the seventeenth century? We have already said that Mr. Froude was\n generally the best refutation of Mr. Froude. He shall be his own judge.\n\n Did Protestantism cease to be aggressive in Ireland, for instance,\n after the middle of the seventeenth century? We might bring many\n unimpeachable witnesses on the stand to prove our point. Mr. Froude\n will suffice for us, and we quote him at some length because his words\n here set forth in the strongest contrast what Protestantism can do to\n degrade a people, and what Catholicity can do to lift a people out of\n the slough of degradation. Herein we see the spirits of both in deadly\n conflict, and the lesson of the struggle is a lesson for to-day, when\n the same spirits are locked again in strife.\n\n Writing not of the middle of the seventeenth, but of the beginning of\n the eighteenth, century (1709), Mr. Froude thus describes the second\n Act against Popery in Ireland:\n\n \u201cThe code of law which was designed to transfer the entire soil\n of Ireland to members of the Established Church, and reduce the\n Catholics to landless dependents, was finally completed.... By\n the new act every settlement, every lease on lives, every\n conveyance made by a Catholic owner since 1704, by which any\n Protestant or Protestants had been injured,[104] was declared\n void, and the loop-holes were closed by which the act of that\n year had been evaded. To defeat Protestant heirs, Catholics had\n concealed the true value of their property. Children were now\n enabled to compel their fathers to produce their title-deeds\n and make a clear confession. Catholic gentlemen had pretended\n conversion to qualify themselves for being magistrates and\n sheriffs, for being admitted to the bar, or for holding a seat\n in Parliament, while their children were being bred up secretly\n in the old faith. The education of their families was made a\n test of sincerity, and those whose sons were not brought up as\n churchmen remained under the disabilities.\n\n \u201cNor, if words could hinder it, were the acts directed against\n the priests to be any more trifled with. Fifty pounds reward\n was now offered for the conviction of any Catholic archbishop,\n bishop, or vicar-general; twenty pounds reward for the\n conviction of friar, Jesuit, or unregistered parish priest....\n It was now made penal for a priest to officiate anywhere except\n in the parish church for which he was registered, and the last\n rivet was driven into the chain by the compulsory imposition of\n the Abjuration Oath, which every priest was made to swear at\n his registration. As if this was not enough, any two\n magistrates received power to summon any or every Irish subject\n above the age of sixteen, to offer him the oath, and to commit\n him to prison if he refused it. They might also, if he was a\n Catholic, ask him where he last heard Mass, and by whom it was\n celebrated. If the priest officiating was found to have been\n unregistered he was liable to be transported.\n\n \u201cA fatal clause was added that any Protestant whatever who\n discovered and was able to prove before a Protestant jury the\n existence of any purchase or lease of which a Catholic was to\n have secretly the advantage, should himself be put in\n possession of the property which was the subject of the fraud\u201d\n (pp. 332\u2013334).[105]\n\n Even Mr. Froude cannot help remarking on this last clause that \u201cthe\n evasion of a law so contrived that every unscrupulous scoundrel in\n Ireland was its self-constituted guardian became impossible\u201d; and he\n adds with gratifying frankness: \u201cThat it was unjust in itself never\n occurred as a passing emotion to any Protestant in the two kingdoms,\n not even to Swift, who speaks approvingly of what he deems must be the\n inevitable result.\u201d\n\n Writing still of the Penal Laws, he says that \u201cthe practice of the\n courts\u201d in regard to them \u201cwas a very school of lying and a discipline\n of evasion. No laws could have been invented, perhaps, more ingeniously\n demoralizing\u201d (p. 374).\n\n Writing of a period still later in the eighteenth century, after the\n Protestant emigration and the ruin of Irish trade and industry had been\n brought about by English legislation, he thus describes the condition\n of the Irish peasant class, who composed the bulk of the population:\n\n \u201cThe tenants were forbidden in their leases to break or plough\n the soil. The people, no longer employed, were driven away into\n holes and corners, and eked out a wretched subsistence by\n potato gardens, or by keeping starving cattle of their own on\n the neglected bogs. Their numbers increased, for they married\n early, and they were no longer liable, as in the old times, to\n be killed off like dogs in forays. They grew up in compulsory\n idleness, encouraged once more in their inherited dislike of\n labor, and enured to wretchedness and hunger; and, on every\n failure of the potato crop, hundreds of thousands were\n starving.\u201d\n\n Horrible as such a picture is, it is but a faint sketch of the reality.\n All readers of Irish history know it, and no student of English\n legislation should forget or pass over that dark chapter in England\u2019s\n history. Our own readers have seen the whole system vividly sketched in\n these pages recently in the series of papers on \u201cEnglish Rule in\n Ireland.\u201d What, in human nature and human possibilities, was to become\n of a people thus submitted to so long and unbending and systematic a\n course of degradation? They had nothing left but their faith, and the\n eternal truth of the promise that this is the victory which overcometh\n the world; and that our faith shall make us free was never more\n gloriously and wondrously made manifest than in the case of the Irish\n people.\n\n Ignorance was made compulsory by this Protestant government. The\n statute law of Ireland forbade Catholics to open schools or to teach in\n them. The Irish people, of all peoples, have ever had a craving for\n knowledge. What was left to them to do?\n\n \u201cThe Catholics,\u201d says Mr. Froude, \u201cwith the same steady courage\n and unremitting zeal with which they had maintained and\n multiplied the number of their priests, had established open\n schools in places like Killarney, where the law was a\n dead-letter. In the more accessible counties, where open\n defiance was dangerous, they extemporized class teachers under\n ruined walls or in the dry ditches by the roadside, where\n ragged urchins, in the midst of their poverty, learnt English\n and the elements of arithmetic, and even to read and construe\n Ovid and Virgil. With institutions which showed a vitality so\n singular and so spontaneous repressive acts of Parliament\n contended in vain.\u201d\n\n Ignorance is esteemed to be the prolific mother of vice. The social\n condition of the Irish people was made as bad as legislation could make\n it. Where was the room for morality in such a case? In vainly trying to\n explain away that most brutal project of law for the mutilation of the\n Irish priests, Mr. Froude says (vol. i. p. 557): \u201cThey (the Lord\n Lieutenant and Privy Council) did propose, not that all the Catholic\n clergy in Ireland, as Plowden says, but that unregistered priests and\n friars coming in from abroad, should be liable to castration\u201d; and he\n adds in a note:\n\n \u201cNot, certainly, as implying a charge of immorality. Amidst the\n multitude of accusations which I have seen brought against the\n Irish priests of the last century, I have never, save in a\n single instance, encountered a charge of unchastity. Rather the\n exceptional and signal purity of Irish Catholic women of the\n lower class, unparalleled probably in the civilized world, and\n not characteristic of the race, which in the sixteenth century\n was no less distinguished for licentiousness, must be\n attributed wholly and entirely to the influence of the Catholic\n clergy.\u201d\n\n Mr. Froude cannot be wholly generous and honest in a matter of this\n kind, but what is true in this is sufficient for our purpose without\n inquiring into what is false. It is plain from his own words that the\n one thing that saved the Irish people from perdition, body and soul,\n was their Catholic faith. Yet this is the man who, having thus\n testified to the rival effects of Catholicity and Protestantism on a\n people, has the effrontery to tell us in the \u201cRevival of Romanism\u201d that\n\n \u201cIf by this [conversions] or any other cause the Catholic\n Church anywhere recovers her ascendency, she will again exhibit\n the detestable features which have invariably attended her\n supremacy. Her rule will once more be found incompatible either\n with justice or intellectual growth, and our children will be\n forced to recover by some fresh struggle the ground which our\n forefathers conquered for us, and which we by our pusillanimity\n surrendered\u201d (p. 103).\n\n With his own testimony before us we may well ask in amazement, Of which\n church is he writing? It would seem as though Heaven, which through all\n ages has looked down upon and permitted martyrdom for the faith, had in\n this instance called upon, not a tender virgin or a strong youth, not\n an old man tottering into the grave or an innocent child, to step into\n the arena and offer up their life and blood for the cause of Christ,\n but a whole people. And the martyrdom of this people was not for a day\n or an hour; it was the slow torture of centuries. A legacy of martyrdom\n was \u201cbequeathed from bleeding sire to son.\u201d Life was hopeless to the\n Irish people under the Penal Laws; the world a wide prison; the earth a\n grave. They could only lift their eyes and hearts to heaven and wait\n patiently for merciful death to come. This was the supreme test of\n faith to a noble and passionate race, as it was faith\u2019s supremest\n testimony. No work of the saints, no writings of the fathers, no\n Heaven-illumined mind ever brought to the aid of faith stronger reason\n for conviction than this. As words pale before deeds, as the blood of a\n martyr speaks more loudly to men, and cries more clamorously to heaven,\n than all that divine philosophy can utter or inspired poet sing, so the\n attitude of the Irish people, so opposed to all the instincts of their\n quick and passionate nature, bore the very noblest testimony to the\n reality of the Christian religion. A world looked down into that dark\n arena and waited for some sign of faltering in the victim, for some\n sign of pity in the persecutor. Neither came. The victim refused to die\n or sacrifice to the gods; the persecutor to relent. The struggle ended\n at length through the sheer weariness of the latter, and brighter times\n came because darker could not be devised.\n\n Faith conquered. The Irish people arose from its grave, and at once\n spread abroad over the world to preach the Gospel and to plant the\n church which for two centuries it had watered with its blood. The Act\n of Catholic Emancipation was the first real sign of resurrection, and\n that was only passed in 1829.\n\n So much for Protestantism having \u201cceased to be aggressive after the\n middle of the seventeenth century.\u201d How aggressive are certain\n Protestant powers to-day all men know.\n\n Another thing happened to Protestantism after the middle of the\n seventeenth century:\n\n \u201cIt no longer produced men conspicuously nobler and better than\n Romanism,\u201d says Mr. Froude, \u201cand therefore it no longer made\n converts. As it became established, it adapted itself to the\n world, laid aside its harshness, confined itself more and more\n to the enforcement of particular doctrines\u201d (of no doctrines in\n particular, we should be inclined to say), \u201cand abandoned, at\n first tacitly and afterward deliberately, the pretence to\n interfere with private life or practical business.\u201d\n\n In plainer words, Protestantism, having secured its place in this\n world, left the next world to take care of itself, and left men free to\n go to the devil or not just as they pleased. Mr. Froude faithfully\n pictures the result:\n\n \u201cThus Protestant countries are no longer able to boast of any\n special or remarkable moral standard; and the effect of the\n creed on the imagination is analogously impaired. Protestant\n nations show more energy than Catholic nations because the mind\n is left more free, and the intellect is undisturbed by the\n authoritative instilment of false principles\u201d (p. 111).\n\n This strikes us as a very easy manner of begging a very important\n question. However, we are less concerned now with Mr. Froude\u2019s\n Catholics than with his Protestants.\n\n \u201cBut,\u201d he goes on, \u201cProtestant nations have been guilty, as\n nations, of enormous crimes. Protestant individuals, who\n profess the soundest of creeds, seem, in their conduct, to have\n no creed at all, beyond a conviction that pleasure is pleasant,\n and that money will purchase it. Political corruption grows up;\n sharp practice in trade grows up\u2014dishonest speculations, short\n weights and measures, and adulteration of food. The commercial\n and political Protestant world, on both sides of the Atlantic,\n has accepted a code of action from which morality has been\n banished; and the clergy have for the most part sat silent, and\n occupy themselves in carving and polishing into completeness\n their schemes of doctrinal salvation. They shrink from\n offending the wealthy members of their congregation.\u201d (We\n believe we heard concordant testimony to this from\n distinguished members of the late Protestant Episcopalian\n Convention and Congress.) \u201cThey withdraw into the affairs of\n the other world, and leave the present world to the men of\n business and the devil.\u201d\n\n Mr. Froude having thus placidly handed Protestantism over to the devil,\n we might as well leave it there, as the devil is proverbially reported\n to know and take care of his own. And certainly, if Protestantism be\n only half what Mr. Froude depicts it, it is the devil\u2019s, and a more\n active and fruitful agent of evil he could not well desire. One thing\n is beyond dispute: if Protestantism be what so ardent an advocate as\n Mr. Froude says it is, it is high time for a change. It is time for\n some one or something to step in and dispute the devil\u2019s absolute\n sovereignty. If this is the result of the Protestant mind being \u201cleft\n more free\u201d than the Catholic, the sooner such freedom is curtailed the\n better. It is the freedom of lethargy and license which has yielded up\n even the little that it had of real freedom and truth to its own child,\n Materialism, the modern name for paganism.\n\n \u201cThey\u201d (the Protestant clergy), says Mr. Froude, \u201chave allowed\n the Gospel to be superseded by the new formulas of political\n economy. This so-called science is the most barefaced attempt\n that has ever yet been openly made on this earth to regulate\n human society without God or recognition of the moral law. The\n clergy have allowed it to grow up, to take possession of the\n air, to penetrate schools and colleges, to control the actions\n of legislatures, without even so much as opening their lips in\n remonstrance.\u201d\n\n Yes, because they had nothing better to offer in its place. And this\n Mr. Froude advances with much truth as one of the causes of the\n \u201cRevival of Romanism\u201d:\n\n \u201cI once ventured,\u201d he tells us, \u201cto say to a leading\n Evangelical preacher in London that I thought the clergy were\n much to blame in these matters. If the diseases of society were\n unapproachable by human law, the clergy might at least keep\n their congregations from forgetting that there was a law of\n another kind which in some shape or other would enforce itself.\n He told me very plainly that he did not look on it as part of\n his duty. He could not save the world, nor would he try. The\n world lay in wickedness, and would lie in wickedness to the\n end. His business was to save out of it individual souls by\n working on their spiritual emotions, and bringing them to what\n he called the truth. As to what men should do or not do, how\n they should occupy themselves, how and how far they might enjoy\n themselves, on what principles they should carry on their daily\n work\u2014on these and similar subjects he had nothing to say.\n\n \u201cI needed no more to explain to me why Evangelical preachers\n were losing their hold on the more robust intellects, or why\n Catholics, who at least offered something which at intervals\n might remind men that they had souls, should have power to win\n away into their fold many a tender conscience which needed\n detailed support and guidance\u201d (pp. 112\u2013113).\n\n One ray of light in the universal darkness now enshrouding\n Protestantism shines before the eyes of Mr. Froude. It falls on the\n present German Empire. Here at least the weary watchman crying out the\n hours of heaven may call \u201cAll is well\u201d to the sleepers. Here\n Protestantism had its true birth; here it finds its true home. In this\n blessed land lies hope and salvation for a lost world. But the picture\n is so graphic that we give it in Mr. Froude\u2019s own words:\n\n \u201cAs the present state of France,\u201d he says, \u201cis the measure of\n the value of the Catholic revival, so Northern Germany,\n spiritually, socially, and politically, is the measure of the\n power of consistent Protestantism. Germany was the cradle of\n the Reformation. In Germany it moves forward to its manhood;\n and there, and not elsewhere, will be found the intellectual\n solution of the speculative perplexities which are now dividing\n and bewildering us\u201d (pp. 130\u2013131).\n\n \u201cLuther was the root in which the intellect of the modern\n Germans took its rise. In the spirit of Luther this mental\n development has gone forward ever since. The seed changes its\n form when it develops leaves and flowers. But the leaves and\n flowers are in the seed, and the thoughts of the Germany of\n to-day lay in germs in the great reformer. Thus Luther has\n remained through later history the idol of the nation whom he\n saved. The disputes between religion and science, so baneful in\n their effects elsewhere, have risen into differences there, but\n never into quarrels\u201d (p. 132).\n\n \u201cProtestant Germany stands almost alone, with hands and head\n alike clear. Her theology is undergoing change. Her piety\n remains unshaken. Protestant she is, Protestant she means to\n be.... By the mere weight of superior worth the Protestant\n states have established their ascendency over Catholic Austria\n and Bavaria, and compel them, whether they will or not, to turn\n their faces from darkness to light.[106] ... German religion\n may be summed up in the word which is at once the foundation\n and the superstructure of all religion\u2014Duty! No people anywhere\n or at any time have understood better the meaning of duty; and\n to say that is to say all\u201d (pp. 134\u2013135).\n\n These glowing periods are very tempting to the critic; but it is a mark\n of cruelty and savagery to gloat over an easy prey. We forbear all\n verbal criticism, then, and simply deny _in toto_ the truth of Mr.\n Froude\u2019s statement. It is so very wrong that we can only think he wrote\n from his imagination\u2014a weakness from which he suffers oftenest when he\n wishes most to be effective. Had he searched the world he could not\n have found a worse instance to prove his point than North Germany.\n\n Prussia is the leading North German and Protestant state, and in\n various passages Mr. Froude shows that he takes it as his beau-ideal of\n a Protestant power. How stands Protestantism in Prussia to-day?\n\n The indications for more than a quarter of a century past have been\n that Protestantism in Prussia was little more than the shadow of a once\n mighty name. These indications have become more marked of late years,\n especially since the consolidation of the new German Empire. Earnest\n German Protestants are continually deploring the fact; the press\n proclaims it; the Protestant ministers avow it, and all the world knew\n of it, save, apparently, Mr. Froude. \u201cProtestantism in Prussia\u201d formed\n the subject of a letter from the Berlin correspondent of the London\n _Times_ as recently as Sept. 7, 1877. His testimony on such a subject\n could scarcely be called in question, but even if it could be the facts\n narrated speak for themselves.\n\n \u201cForty years ago,\u201d he says, \u201cthe clergy of the Established\n Church of this country, including the leading divines and the\n members of the ecclesiastical government, almost to a man were\n under the influence of free-thinking theories.\n\n \u201cIt was the time when German criticism first undertook to\n dissect the Bible. History seemed to have surpassed theology,\n and divines had recourse to \u2018interpreting\u2019 what they thought\n they could no longer maintain according to the letter. The\n movement extended from the clergy to the educated classes,\n gradually reaching the lower orders, and ultimately pervaded\n the entire nation. At this juncture atheism sprang forward to\n reap the harvest sown by latitudinarians. Then reaction set in.\n The clergy reverted to orthodoxy, and their conversion to the\n old faith happening to coincide with the return of the\n government to political conservatism, subsequent to the\n troublous period of 1848, the stricter principles embraced by\n the cloth were systematically enforced by consistory and\n school....\n\n \u201cThe clergy turned orthodox twenty-five years ago; _the laity\n did not_. The servants of the altar, having realized the\n melancholy effect of opposite tenets, resolutely fell back upon\n the ancient dogmas of Christianity; _the congregations declined\n to follow suit_. Hence the few \u2018liberal\u2019 clergymen remaining\n after the advent of the orthodox period had the consolation of\n knowing themselves to be in accord, if not with their clerical\n brethren, at least with the majority of the educated, and,\n perhaps, even the uneducated, classes.\u201d\n\n He proceeds to mention various cases of prominent Lutheran clergymen\n who denied the divinity of Christ, or other doctrines equally necessary\n to be maintained by men professing to be Christians, and of the\n unsuccessful attempts made to silence them. As the correspondent says\n \u201cirreverent liberal opinion on the case is well reflected in an article\n in the Berlin _Volks-Zeitung_,\u201d which is so instructive that we quote\n it for the especial benefit of Mr. Froude:\n\n \u201cAs long as Protestant clergymen are appointed by provincial\n consistories officiating in behalf of the crown our\n congregations will have to put up with any candidates that may\n be forced upon them. They may, perhaps, be allowed to nominate\n their pastors, but they will be impotent to exact the\n confirmation of their choice from the ecclesiastical\n authorities. Nor do we experience any particular curiosity as\n to the result of the inquiry instituted against Herr Hossbach.\n In matters of this delicate nature judicious evasions have been\n too often resorted to by clever accused, and visibly favored by\n ordained judges of the faith, for us to care much for the\n result of the suit opened. A sort of fanciful and imaginative\n prevarication has always flourished in theological debate, and\n the old artifice, it is to be foreseen, will be employed with\n fresh versatility in the present instance. Should the election\n of Herr Hossbach be confirmed, the consistorial decree will be\n garnished with so many \u2018ifs\u2019 and \u2018althoughs\u2019 that the brilliant\n ray of truth will be dimmed by screening assumptions, like a\n candle placed behind a colored glass. Similarly, should the\n consistory decline to ratify the choice of the vestry, the\n refusal is sure to be rendered palatable by the employment of\n particularly mild and euphonious language. In either case the\n triumph of the victorious party will be but half a triumph....\n It is not a little remarkable that the Protestant Church in\n this country should be kept under the control of superimposed\n authorities, while Roman Catholics and Jews are free to preach\n what they like. The power of the Catholic hierarchy has been\n broken by the new laws. _Catholic clergymen deviating from the\n approved doctrine of the Church are protected by the Government\n from the persecution of their bishops. Catholic congregations\n are positively urged and instigated to profit by the privileges\n accorded them, and assert their independence against bishop and\n priest._ Jewish rabbis, too, are free to disseminate any\n doctrine without being responsible for their teaching to\n spiritual or secular judges. Only Protestant congregations\n enjoy the doubtful advantage of having the election of their\n clergy controlled, and the candor of their clergy made the\n theme of penal inquiry.... And yet Protestant congregations\n have a ready means of escape at their disposal. Let them leave\n the church, and they are free to elect whomsoever they may\n choose as their minister. As it is, the indecision of the\n congregations maintains the _status quo_ by forcing liberal\n clergymen into the dogmatic straight-waistcoat of the\n consistories.\u201d\n\n \u201cIn the above argument one important fact is overlooked,\u201d says the\n _Times_\u2019 correspondent.\n\n \u201cAmong the liberals opposed to the consistories there are many\n atheists, but few sufficiently religious to care for reform.\n Hence the course taken by the consistories may be resented, but\n the preaching of the liberal clergy is not popular enough to\n create a new denomination or to compel innovation within the\n pale of the church. The fashionable metaphysical systems of\n Germany are pessimist.\u201d\n\n A week previous to the date of this letter the Lutheran pastors held\n their annual meeting at Berlin. The Rev. Dr. Grau, who is referred to\n as \u201ca distinguished professor of theology,\u201d speaking of the task of the\n clergy in modern times\u2014certainly a most important subject for\n consideration\u2014said:\n\n \u201cThese are serious times for the church. The protection of the\n temporal power is no longer awarded to us to anything like the\n extent it formerly was. _The great mass of the people is either\n indifferent or openly hostile to doctrinal teaching._ Not a few\n listen to those striving to combine Christ with Belial, and to\n reconcile redeeming truth with modern science and culture.\n _There are those who dream of a future church erected on the\n ruins of the Lutheran establishment, which by these\n enterprising neophytes is already regarded as dead and gone.\u201d_\n\n \u201cThe meeting,\u201d observes the correspondent, \u201cby passing the resolutions\n proposed by Dr. Grau, endorsed the opinions of the principal speaker.\u201d\n And he adds:\n\n \u201cWhile giving this unmitigated verdict upon the state of\n religion among the people, the meeting displayed open\n antagonism to the leading authorities of the church. To the\n orthodox pastors the sober and sedative policy pursued by the\n Ober Kirchen Rath is a dereliction even more offensive than the\n downright apostasy of the liberals. To render their opposition\n intelligible the change that has recently supervened in high\n quarters should be adverted to in a few words. Soon after his\n accession to the throne the reigning sovereign, in his capacity\n as _summus episcopus_, recommended a lenient treatment of\n liberal views. Though himself strictly orthodox, as he has\n repeatedly taken occasion to announce, the emperor is tolerant\n in religion, and too much of a statesman to overlook the\n undesirable consequences that must ensue from permanent warfare\n between church and people. He therefore appointed a few\n moderate liberals members of the supreme council, accorded an\n extensive degree of self-government to the synods, at the\n expense of his own episcopal prerogative, and finally\n sanctioned civil marriage and \u2018civil baptism,\u2019 as registration\n is sarcastically called in this country, to the intense\n astonishment and dismay of the orthodox. The last two measures,\n it is true, were aimed at the priests of the Roman Catholic\n Church, who were to be deprived of the power of punishing those\n of their flock siding with the state in the ecclesiastical war;\n but, as the operation of the law could not be restricted to one\n denomination, Protestants were made amenable to a measure\n which, to the orthodox among them, was quite as objectionable\n as to the believing adherents of the Pope. The supreme council\n of the Protestant Church, having to approve these several\n innovations adopted by the crown, gradually accustomed itself\n to regard compromise and bland pacification as one of the\n principal duties imposed upon it.\u201d\n\n The correspondent ends his letter thus:\n\n \u201cWhen all was over orthodoxy was at feud with the people as\n well as with the authoritative guardians of the church. Yet\n neither people nor guardians remonstrated. For opposite reasons\n both were equally convinced they could afford to ignore the\n charges made.\u201d\n\n So important was the letter that the London _Times_ made it the subject\n of an editorial article, wherein it speaks of \u201cthe singular revival of\n theological and ecclesiastical controversy, which is observable in all\n directions,\u201d having \u201cat last reached the slumbering Protestantism of\n Prussia.\u201d It confesses that\n\n \u201cThe state of things as described by our correspondent is\n certainly a very anomalous one. The Prussian Protestant Church\n has, of late years at least, had but little hold on the respect\n and affections of the great majority of the people; they are at\n best but indifferent to it when they are not actively hostile.\n We are not concerned to investigate the causes of this lack of\n popularity; we are content to take it as a fact manifest to all\n who know the country and acknowledged by all observers alike.\u201d\n\n \u201cGerman Protestantism _was_ a power and an influence,\u201d it says,\n\n \u201cTo which the modern world is deeply indebted, and with which,\n now that ultramontanism is triumphant in the Church of Rome and\n priestcraft is again striving in all quarters to exert its\n sway, the friends of freedom and toleration can ill afford to\n dispense. There is no more ominous sign in the history of an\n established church than a divorce between intelligence and\n orthodoxy. This is what, to all appearances, has happened in\n Prussia.\u201d\n\n We could corroborate this by abundance of testimony from all quarters;\n but surely the evidence here given is sufficient to convince any man of\n the deplorable state of Protestantism in Prussia. Why Mr. Froude should\n have chosen that country of all others for his Protestant paradise we\n cannot conceive, unless on the ground that he is Mr. Froude. \u201cThe world\n on one side, and Popery on the other,\u201d he says, \u201care dividing the\n practical control over life and conduct. North Germany, manful in word\n and deed, sustains the fight against both enemies and carries the old\n flag to victory. A few years ago another Thirty Years\u2019 War was feared\n for Germany. A single campaign sufficed to bring Austria on her knees.\n _Protestantism, as expressed in the leadership of Prussia_, assumed the\n direction of the German Confederation\u201d (pp. 135\u2013136).\n\n And whither does this leadership tend? To the devil, if the London\n _Times_, if Dr. Grau, if every observant man who has written or spoken\n on this subject, is to be believed. The only religion in Prussia to-day\n is the Catholic; Protestantism has yielded to atheism or nothingism.\n The persecution has only proved and tempered the Catholic Church; not\n even a strong and favoring government can infuse a faint breath of life\n into the dead carcase of Prussian Protestantism. It is much the same\n story all the world over. Mr. Froude sees clearly enough what is\n coming. Protestantism as a religious power is dead. It has lost all\n semblance of reality. It had no religious reality from the beginning.\n It will still continue to be used as an agent by political schemers and\n conspirators; but in the fight between religion and irreligion it is of\n little worth. The fight is not here, but where Mr. Froude rightly\n places it\u2014between the irreligious world and Catholicity, which \u201care\n dividing the practical control over life and conduct.\u201d\n\n And thus heresies die out; they expire of their own corruption. Their\n very offspring rise up against them. Their children cry for bread and\n they give them a stone. The fragments of truth on which they first\n build are sooner or later crushed out by the great mass of falsehood.\n The few good seeds are choked up by the harvest of the bad, and only\n the ill weeds thrive, until all the space around them is desolate of\n fruit or light or sweetness, or anything fair under heaven. Then comes\n the husbandman in his own good time, and curses the barren fig-tree and\n clears the desolate waste. It will be with Protestantism as it has been\n with all the heresies; Christians will wonder, and the time would seem\n not to be very far distant when they will wonder that Protestantism\n ever should have been. It will go to its grave, the same wide grave\n that has swallowed up heresy after heresy. Gnosticism, Arianism,\n Pelagianism, Nestorianism, Monophysitism, Protestantism, all the isms,\n are children of the same family, live the same life, die the same\n death. The everlasting church buries them all, and no man mourns their\n loss.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A RAMBLE AFTER THE WAITS.\n\n\n \u201cCHRISTMAS comes but once a year,\n So let us all be merry,\u201d\n\n\n saith the old song. And now, as the festal season draws nigh, everybody\n seems bent on fulfilling the behest to the uttermost. The streets are\n gay with lights and laughter; the shops are all a-glitter with precious\n things; the markets are bursting with good cheer. The air vibrates with\n a babble of merry voices, until the very stars seem to catch the\n infection and twinkle a thought more brightly. The faces of those you\n meet beam with joyous expectation; huge baskets on their arms, loaded\n with good things for the morrow, jostle and thump you at every turn,\n but no one dreams of being ill-natured on Christmas Eve; mysterious\n bundles in each hand contain unimagined treasures for the little ones\n at home. And hark! do you not catch a jingle of distant sleigh-bells, a\n faint, far-off patter and scrunching of tiny hoofs upon the snow? It is\n the good St. Nicholas setting out upon his merry round; it is Dasher\n and Slasher and Prancer and Vixen scurrying like the wind over the\n house-tops. And high over all\u2014\u201cthe poor man\u2019s music\u201d\u2014the merry, merry\n bells of Yule, the solemn, the sacred bells, peal forth the tidings of\n great joy. Is it not hard to conceive that the time should have been\n when Christmas was not? impossible to conceive that any in a Christian\n land should have wished to do away with it\u2014should have been willing,\n having had it, ever to forego a festival so fraught with all holy and\n happy memories?\n\n Yet once such men were found, and but little more than two centuries\n ago. It was on the 24th day of December, 1652\u2014day for ever to be marked\n with the blackest of black stones, nay, with a bowlder of Plutonian\n nigritude\u2014that the British House of Commons, being moved thereto \u201cby a\n terrible remonstrance against Christmas day grounded upon divine\n Scripture, wherein Christmas is called Antichrists masse, and those\n masse-mongers and Papists who observe it,\u201d and after much time \u201cspent\n in consultation about the abolition of Christmas day, passed order to\n that effect, and resolved to sit upon the following day, which was\n commonly called Christmas day.\u201d Whether this latter resolution was\n carried into effect we do not know. If so, let us hope that their\n Christmas dinners disagreed with them horribly, and that the foul fiend\n Nightmare kept hideous vigil by every Parliamentary pillow.\n\n But think of such an atrocious sentiment being heard at all in\n Westminster! How must the very echoes of the hall have shrunk from\n repeating that monstrous proposition\u2014how shuddered and fled away into\n remotest corners and crevices as that\n\n\n \u201cHideous hum\n Ran through the arch\u2019d roof in words deceiving\u201d!\n\n\n How must they have disbelieved their ears, and tossed the impious\n utterance back and forth from one to another in agonized questioning,\n growing feebler and fainter at each repulse, until their voices,\n faltering through doubt into dismay, grew dumb with horror! How must\n \u201cRufus\u2019 Roaring Hall\u201d[107] have roared again outright with rage and\n grief over that strange, that unhallowed profanation! What wan phantoms\n of old-time mummeries and maskings, what dusty and crumbling memories\n of royal feast and junketing, must have hovered about the heads of\n those audacious innovators, shrieking at them what unsyllabled\n reproaches from voiceless lips, shaking at them what shadowy fingers of\n entreaty or menace! And if the proverb about ill words and burning ears\n be true, how those crop-ears must have tingled!\n\n Within those very walls England\u2019s kings for generations had kept their\n Christmas-tide most royally with revelry and dance and wassail. There\n Henry III. on New Year\u2019s day, 1236, to celebrate the coronation of\n Eleanor, his queen, entertained 6,000 of his poorer subjects of all\n degrees; and there twelve years later, though he himself ate his\n plum-pudding at Winchester, he was graciously pleased to bid his\n treasurer \u201cfill the king\u2019s Great Hall from Christmas day to the Day of\n Circumcision with poor people and feast them.\u201d There, too, at a later\n date Edward III. had for sauce to his Christmas turkey\u2014not to mention\n all sorts of cates and confections, tarts and pasties of most cunning\n device, rare liquors and spiced wines\u2014no less than two captive kings,\n to wit, David of Scotland and John of France. Poor captive kings!\n _Their_ turkey\u2014though no doubt their princely entertainer was careful\n to help them to the daintiest tidbits, and to see that they had plenty\n of stuffing and cranberry sauce\u2014must have been but a tasteless morsel,\n and their sweetbreads bitter indeed. Another Scottish king, the first\n James, of tuneful and unhappy memory, had even worse (pot) luck soon\n after. Fate, and that hospitable _penchant_ of our English cousins in\n the remoter centuries for quietly confiscating all stray Scotch princes\n who fell in their way, as though they had been contraband of war, gave\n him the enviable opportunity of eating no less than a score of\n Christmas dinners on English soil. But he seems to have been left to\n eat them alone or with his jailer in \u201cbowery Windsor\u2019s calm retreat\u201d or\n the less cheerful solitude of the Tower. It does not appear that either\n the fourth or the fifth Henry, his enforced hosts, ever asked him to\n put his royal Scotch legs under their royal English mahogany. Had\n Richard II. been in the place of \u201cthe ingrate and cankered\n Bolingbroke,\u201d we may be sure that his northern guest would not have\n been treated so shabbily. In his time Westminster and his two thousand\n French cooks (shades of Lucullus! what an appetite he must have had,\n and what a broiling and a baking and a basting must they have kept up\n among them; the proverb of \u201cbusier than an English oven at Christmas\u201d\n had reason then, at least) were not long left idle; for it was their\n sovereign\u2019s jovial custom to keep open house in the holidays for as\n many as ten thousand a day\u2014a comfortable tableful. It was his motto\n plainly to\n\n\n \u201cBe merry, for our time of stay is short.\u201d\n\n\n Such a device, however, the third Richard might have made his own with\n still greater reason. That ill-used prince, who was no doubt a much\n better fellow at bottom than it has pleased Master Shakspeare to\n represent him\u2014if Richmond had not been Queen Bess\u2019 grandpapa, we should\n like enough have had a different story and altogether less about humps\n and barking dogs\u2014made the most of a limited opportunity to show what he\n could do in the way of holiday dinner-giving. The only two Christmases\n he had to spend as king at Westminster\u2014for him but a royal stage on his\n way to a more permanent residence at Bosworth Field\u2014he celebrated with\n extraordinary magnificence, as became a prince \u201creigning,\u201d says Philip\n de Comines, \u201cin greater splendor than any king of England for the last\n hundred years.\u201d On the second and last Christmas of his reign and life\n the revelry was kept up till the Epiphany, when \u201cthe king himself,\n wearing his crown, held a splendid feast in the Great Hall similar to\n his coronation.\u201d Wearing his crown, poor wretch! He seems to have felt\n that his time was short for wearing it, and that he must put it to use\n while he had it. Already, indeed, as he feasted, rapacious Fortune,\n swooping implacable, was clawing it with skinny, insatiable claws,\n estimating its value and the probable cost of altering it to fit\n another wearer, and thinking how much better it would look on the long\n head of her good friend Richmond, who had privately bespoken it. No\n doubt some cold shadow of that awful, unseen presence fell across the\n banquet-table and poisoned the royal porridge.\n\n What need to tell over the long roll of Christmas jollities, whose\n memory from those historic walls might have pleaded with or rebuked the\n sour iconoclasts planning gloomily to put an end to all such for ever;\n how even close-fisted Henry VII.\u2014no fear of his losing a crown, if\n gripping tight could keep it\u2014feasted there the lord-mayor and aldermen\n of London on the ninth Christmas of his reign, sitting down himself,\n with his queen and court and the rest of the nobility and gentry, to\n one hundred and twenty dishes served by as many knights, while the\n mayor, who sat at a side-table, no doubt, had to his own share no fewer\n than twenty-four dishes, followed, it is to be feared, if he ate them\n all, by as many nightmares; how that meek and exemplary Christian\n monarch, Henry VIII., \u201cwelcomed the coming, sped the parting\u201d wife at\n successive Christmas banquets of as much splendor as the spoils of\n something over a thousand monasteries could furnish forth;[108] how\n good Queen Bess, who had her own private reading of the doctrine \u201cit is\n more blessed to give than to receive,\u201d sat in state there at this\n festival season to accept the offerings of her loyal lieges, high and\n low, gentle and simple, from prime minister to kitchen scullion, until\n she was able to add to the terrors of death by having to leave behind\n her something like three thousand dresses and some trunkfuls of jewels\n in Christmas gifts; or what gorgeous revels and masques\u2014Inigo Jones\n (Inigo Marquis Would-be), Ben Jonson, and Master Henry Lawes (he of\n \u201cthe tuneful and well-measured song\u201d) thereto conspiring\u2014made the\n holidays joyous under James and Charles. Some ghostly savor of those\n bygone banquets might, one would think, have made even Praise-God\n Barebone\u2019s mouth water, and melted his surly virtue into tolerance of\n other folks\u2019 cakes and ale\u2014what virtue, however ascetic, could resist\n the onslaught of two thousand French cooks? Some faint, far echo of all\n these vanished jollities should have won the ear, if not the heart, of\n the grimmest \u201csaint\u201d among them. Or if they were proof against the\n blandishments of the world\u2019s people, if they fled from the abominations\n of Baal, could not their own George Wither move them to spare the\n cheery, harmless frivolities, the merry pranks of Yule? Jovially as any\n Cavalier, shamelessly as any Malignant of them all, he sings their\n praises in his\n\n\n \u201cCHRISTMAS CAROL.\n\n\n \u201cSo now is come our joyful\u2019st feast,\n Let every man be jolly;\n Each room with ivy leaves is drest,\n And every post with holly.\n Though some churls at our mirth repine,\n Round your foreheads garlands twine,\n Drown sorrow in a cup of wine,\n And let us all be merry.\n\n \u201cNow all our neighbors\u2019 chimneys smoke,\n And Christmas blocks are burning;\n Their ovens they with bak\u2019d meats choke,\n And all their spits are turning.\n Without the door let sorrow lie;\n And if for cold it hap to die,\n We\u2019ll bury\u2019t in a Christmas pye.\n And evermore be merry.\n\n \u201cNow every lad is wondrous trim,\n And no man minds his labor;\n Our lasses have provided them\n A bagpipe and a tabor.\n Young men and maids, and girls and boys,\n Give life to one another\u2019s joys;\n And you anon shall by their noise\n Perceive that they are merry....\n\n \u201cNow poor men to the justices\n With capons make their errants;\n And if they hap to fail of these,\n They plague them with their warrants:\n But now they feed them with good cheer,\n And what they want they take in beer;\n For Christmas comes but once a year,\n And then they shall be merry....\n\n \u201cThe client now his suit forbears,\n The prisoner\u2019s heart is eased,\n The debtor drinks away his cares,\n And for the time is pleased.\n Though others\u2019 purses be more fat,\n Why should we pine or grieve at that?\n Hang sorrow! care will kill a cat,\n And therefore let\u2019s be merry....\n\n \u201cHark! now the wags abroad do call\n Each other forth to rambling;\n Anon you\u2019ll see them in the hall,\n For nuts and apples scrambling.\n Hark! how the roofs with laughter sound;\n Anon they\u2019ll think the house goes round,\n For they the cellar\u2019s depths have found.\n And there they will be merry.\n\n \u201cThe wenches with the wassail-bowls\n About the streets are singing;\n The boys are come to catch the owls,\n The wild mare[109] in is bringing.\n Our kitchen-boy hath broke his box,\n And to the kneeling of the ox\n Our honest neighbors come by flocks,\n And here they will be merry.\n\n \u201cNow kings and queens poor sheep-cotes have,\n And mate with everybody;\n The honest now may play the knave,\n And wise men play at noddy.\n Some youths will now a-mumming go,\n Some others play at Rowland-boe,\n And twenty other gambols moe,\n Because they will be merry.\n\n \u201cThen wherefore, in these merry days,\n Should we, I pray, be duller?\n No, let us sing some roundelays,\n To make our mirth the fuller;\n And, while we thus inspired sing,\n Let all the streets with echoes ring\u2014\n Woods and hills and everything\n Bear witness we are merry.\u201d\n\n\n Or Master Milton, again, Latin secretary to the council, author of the\n famous _Iconoclastes_, shield (or, as some would have put it, official\n scold) of the Commonwealth, the scourge of prelacy and conqueror of\n Salmasius\u2014he was orthodox surely; yet what of _Arcades_ and _Cornus_?\n Master Milton, too, had written holiday masques, and, what is more,\n they had been acted; nay, he had even been known more than once, on no\n less authority than his worshipful nephew, Master Philips, \u201cto make so\n bold with his body as to take a gaudy-day\u201d with the gay sparks of\n Gray\u2019s Inn. Alas! such carnal-minded effusions belonged to the\n unregenerate days of both these worthy brethren, when they still dwelt\n in the tents of the ungodly, before they had girded on the sword of\n Gideon and gone forth to smite the Amalekite hip and thigh. Vainly\n might the menaced festival look for aid in that direction. So far from\n saying a word in its favor, they would now have been fiercest in\n condemnation, if only to cover their early backsliding; if only to\n avert any suspicion that they still hankered after the fleshpots. Poor\n Christmas was doomed.\n\n So, by act of Parliament, \u201cour joyful\u2019st feast\u201d was solemnly stricken\n out of the calendar, cashiered from its high pre-eminence among the\n holidays of the year, and degraded to the ranks of common days. All its\n quaint bravery of holly-berries and ivy-leaves was stripped from it,\n its jolly retinue of boars\u2019 heads and wassail-bowls, of Yule-clogs and\n mistletoe-boughs, of maskers and mummers, of waits and carols, Lords of\n Misrule and Princes of Christmas, sent packing. Then began \u201cthe fiery\n persecution of poor mince-pie throughout the land; plum-porridge was\n denounced as mere popery, and roast-beef as anti-Christian.\u201d \u2019Twas a\n fatal, a perfidious, a short-lived triumph. The nation, shocked in its\n most cherished traditions, repudiated the hideous doctrine; the British\n stomach, deprived of its holiday beef and pudding, so to speak,\n revolted. The reign of the righteous was speedily at an end. History,\n with her usual shallowness, ascribes to General Monk the chief part in\n the Restoration; it was really brought about by that short-sighted\n edict of the 24th of December, 1652. Charles or Cromwell, king or\n protector\u2014what cared honest Hodge who ruled and robbed him? But to\n forego his Christmas porridge\u2014that was a different matter; and Britons\n never should be slaves. So, just eight years after it had been\n banished, Christmas was brought back again with manifold rejoicing and\n bigger wassail-bowls and Yule-clogs than ever; and, as if to make\n honorable amends for its brief exile, the Lord of Misrule himself was\n crowned and seated on the throne, where, as we all know, to do justice\n to his office, if he never said a foolish thing he never did a wise\n one.\n\n And from that time to this Christmas has remained a thoroughly British\n institution, as firmly entrenched in the national affections, as\n generally respected, and perhaps as widely appreciated as Magna Charta\n itself. Sit on Christmas day! A British Parliament now would as soon\n think of sitting on the Derby day. To how many of their constituents\n have the two festivals any widely differing significance perhaps it\n would be wise not to inquire too closely. Each is a holiday\u2014that is, a\n day off work, a synonym for \u201ca good time,\u201d a little better dinner than\n usual, and considerably more beer. Like the children, \u201cthey reflect\n nothing at all about the matter, nor understand anything in it beyond\n the cake and orange.\u201d \u201cLa justice elle-m\u00eame,\u201d says Balzac, \u201cse traduit\n aux yeux de la halle par le commissaire\u2014personage avec lequel elle se\n familiarise.\u201d His epigram the author of _Ginx\u2019s Baby_ may translate for\n us\u2014English epigrams, like English plays, being for the most part matter\n of importation free of duty; _e.g._, that famous one in _Lothair_ about\n the critic being a man who has failed in literature or art, another\n consignment from Balzac\u2014when he makes Ginx\u2019s theory of government\n epitomize itself as a policeman. So Ginx\u2019s notion of Christmas, we\n suspect, is apt to be beef and beer and Boxing-night\u2014with perhaps a\n little more beer.\n\n Certainly the attachment of the British public to these features of the\n day\u2014we are considering it for the moment in the light in which a\n majority of non-Catholics look upon it, apparently, as a merely social\n festival, and not at all in its religious aspect (though to a Catholic,\n of course, the two are as indistinguishably blended as the rose and the\n perfume of the rose)\u2014has never been shaken. If one may judge from a\n large amount of the English fiction which at this season finds its way\n to the American market\u2014and the novels of to-day, among a novel-reading\n people, are as straight and sure a guide to its heart as were ever its\n ballads in the time of old Fletcher of Saltoun\u2014if one may judge from\n much of English Christmas literature, these incidents of the day are,\n if not the most important, certainly the most prominent and popular.\n What we may call the Beef and Beer aspect of the season these stories\n are never tired of glorifying and exalting. Dickens is the archpriest\n of this idolatry, which, indeed, he in a measure invented, or at least\n brought into vogue; and his _Christmas Stories_, as most of his\n stories, fairly reek with the odors of the kitchen and the tap-room.\n Material comfort, and that, too, usually of a rather coarse kind, is\n the universal theme, and even the charity they are supposed to\n inculcate can scarcely be called a moral impulse, so much as the\n instinct of a physical good-nature, well-fed and content with itself\n and the world\u2014of a good-humored selfishness willing to make others\n comfortable, because thereby it puts away from itself the discomfort of\n seeing them otherwise. It is a kind of charity which, in another sense\n than that of Scripture, has to cover a multitude of sins.\n\n One may say this of Dickens, without at all detracting from his many\n great qualities as a writer, that he has done more, perhaps, than any\n other writer to demoralize and coarsen the popular notion of what\n Christmas is and means; to make of his readers at best but good-humored\n pagans with lusty appetites for all manner of victuals and an\n open-handed readiness to share their good things with the first comer.\n These are no doubt admirable traits; but one gets a little tired of\n having them for ever set forth as the crown and completion of Christian\n excellence, the sum and substance of all that is noble and exalted in\n the sentiment of the season. Let us enjoy our Christmas dinner by all\n means; let the plum-pudding be properly boiled and the turkey done to a\n turn, and may we all have enough to spare a slice or two for a poorer\n neighbor! But must we therefore sit down and gobble turkey and pudding\n from morning till night? Should we hang up a sirloin and fall down and\n worship it? Is that all that Christmas means? Turn from the best of\n these books to this exquisite little picture of Christmas Eve in a\n Catholic land:\n\n \u201cChristmas is come\u2014the beautiful festival, the one I love most,\n and which gives me the same joy as it gave the shepherds of\n Bethlehem. In real truth, one\u2019s whole soul sings with joy at\n this beautiful coming of God upon earth\u2014a coming which here is\n announced on all sides of us by music and by our charming\n _nadalet_[110] Nothing at Paris can give you a notion of what\n Christmas is with us. You have not even the midnight Mass. We\n all of us went to it, papa at our head, on the most perfect\n night possible. Never was there a finer sky than ours was that\n midnight\u2014so fine that papa kept perpetually throwing back the\n hood of his cloak, that he might look up at the sky. The ground\n was white with hoar-frost, but we were not cold; besides, the\n air, as we met it, was warmed by the bundles of blazing\n torchwood which our servants carried in front of us to light us\n on our way. It was delightful, I do assure you; and I should\n like you to have seen us there on our road to church, in those\n lanes with the bushes along their banks as white as if they\n were in flower. The hoar-frost makes the most lovely flowers.\n We saw a long spray so beautiful that we wanted to take it with\n us as a garland for the communion-table, but it melted in our\n hands; all flowers fade so soon! I was very sorry about my\n garland; it was mournful to see it drop away and get smaller\n and smaller every minute.\u201d\n\n It is Eug\u00e9nie de Gu\u00e9rin who writes thus\u2014that pure and delicate spirit\n so well fitted to feel and value all that is beautiful and touching in\n this most beautiful and touching service of the church. To come from\n the one reading to the other is like being lifted suddenly out of a\n narrow valley to the free air and boundless views of a mountain-top;\n like coming from the gaslight into the starlight; it is like hearing\n the song of the skylark after the twitter of the robin\u2014a sound pleasant\n and cheery enough in itself, but not elevating, not inspiring, not in\n any way satisfying to that hunger after ideal excellence which is the\n true life of the spirit, and which strikes the true key-note of this\n festal time.\n\n But Eug\u00e9nie de Gu\u00e9rin is perhaps too habitual a dweller on those serene\n heights to furnish a fair comparison; let us take a homelier picture\n from a lower level. It is still in France; this time in Burgundy, as\n the other was in Languedoc:\n\n \u201cEvery year, at the approach of Advent, people refresh their\n memories, clear their throats, and begin preluding, in the long\n evenings by the fireside, those carols whose invariable and\n eternal theme is the coming of the Messias. They take from old\n pamphlets little collections begrimed with dust and smoke, ...\n and as soon as the first Sunday of Advent sounds they gossip,\n they gad about, they sit together by the fireside, sometimes at\n one house, sometimes at another, taking turns in paying for the\n chestnuts and white wine, but singing with one common voice the\n praises of the _Little Jesus_. There are very few villages,\n even, which during all the evenings of Advent do not hear some\n of these curious canticles shouted in their streets to the\n nasal drone of bagpipes.\n\n \u201cMore or less, until Christmas Eve, all goes on in this way\n among our devout singers, with the difference of some gallons\n of wine or some hundreds of chestnuts. But this famous eve once\n come, the scale is pitched upon a higher key; the closing\n evening must be a memorable one.... The supper finished, a\n circle gathers around the hearth, which is arranged and set in\n order this evening after a particular fashion, and which at a\n later hour of the night is to become the object of special\n interest to the children. On the burning brands an enormous log\n has been placed; ... it is called the _Suche_ (the Yule-log).\n \u2018Look you,\u2019 say they to the children, \u2018if you are good this\n evening Noel will rain down sugar-plums in the night.\u2019 And the\n children sit demurely, keeping as quiet as their turbulent\n little natures will permit. The groups of older persons, not\n always as orderly as the children, seize this good opportunity\n to surrender themselves with merry hearts and boisterous voices\n to the chanted worship of the miraculous Noel. For this final\n solemnity they have kept the most powerful, the most\n enthusiastic, the most electrifying carols.\n\n \u201cThis last evening the merry-making is prolonged. Instead of\n retiring at ten or eleven o\u2019clock, as is generally done on all\n the preceding evenings, they wait for the stroke of midnight;\n this word sufficiently proclaims to what ceremony they are\n going to repair. For ten minutes or a quarter of an hour the\n bells have been calling the faithful with a triple-bob-major;\n and each one, furnished with a little taper streaked with\n various colors (the Christmas candle), goes through the crowded\n streets, where the lanterns are dancing like will-o\u2019-the-wisps\n at the impatient summons of the multitudinous chimes. It is the\n midnight Mass.\u201d\n\n There you have fun, feasting, and frolic, as, indeed, there may fitly\n be to all innocent degrees of merriment, on the day which brought\n redemption to mankind. But there is also, behind and pervading all this\n rejoicing and harmless household gayety, the religious sentiment which\n elevates and inspires it, which chastens it from commonplace and\n grossness, which gives it a meaning and a soul. The English are fond of\n calling the French an irreligious people, because French literature,\n especially French fiction, from which they judge, takes its tone from\n Paris, which is to a great extent irreligious. But outside of the large\n cities, if a balance were struck on this point between the two\n countries, it would scarcely be in favor of England.\n\n This, however, by way of episode and as a protest against this\n grovelling, material treatment of the most glorious festival of the\n Christian year. As we were about to say when interrupted, though\n Christmas regained its foothold as a national holiday at the\n Restoration, it came back sadly denuded of its following and shorn of\n most of its old-time attractions. So it fared in old England. In New\n England it can scarcely be said ever to have won a foothold at all, or\n at best no more than a foothold and a sullen toleration. Almost the\n first act of those excellent Pilgrim Fathers who did _not_ land at\n Plymouth Rock was to anticipate by thirty years or so the action of\n their Parliamentary brethren at home in abolishing the sacred\n anniversary, which must, indeed, have been a tacit rebuke to the spirit\n of their creed. They landed on the 16th of December, and \u201con ye 25th\n day,\u201d writes William Bradford, \u201cbegan to erect ye first house for\n comone use to receive them and their goods.\u201d And lest this might seem\n an exception made under stress, we find it recorded next year that \u201con\n ye day caled Christmas day ye Gov\u2019r caled them out to worke.\u201d So it is\n clear New England began with a calendar from which Christmas was\n expunged. In New England affections Thanksgiving day replaces it\u2014an\n \u201cinstitution\u201d peculiarly acceptable, we must suppose, to the thrift\n which can thus wipe out its debt of gratitude to Heaven by giving one\n day for three hundred and sixty-four\u2014liquidating its liabilities, so to\n speak, at the rate of about three mills in the dollar. In the Middle\n States and in the South the day has more of its time-old observance,\n but neither here nor elsewhere may we hope to encounter many of the\n quaint and cheery customs with which our fathers loved to honor it, and\n which made it for them the pivot of the year. Wither has told us\n something of these; let a later minstrel give us a fuller picture of\n what Merry Christmas was in days of yore:\n\n\n \u201cAnd well our Christian sires of old\n Loved, when the year its course had rolled,\n And brought blithe Christmas back again,\n With all its hospitable train.\n Domestic and religious rite\n Gave honor to the holy night:\n On Christmas Eve the bells were rung;\n On Christmas Eve the Mass was sung;\n That only night of all the year\n Saw the stoled priest the chalice rear.\n The damsel donned her kirtle sheen;\n The hall was dressed with holly green;\n Forth to the wood did merry men go\n To gather in the mistletoe.\n Then opened wide the baron\u2019s hall\n To vassals, tenants, serf, and all.\n The heir, with roses in his shoes,\n That night might village partner choose;\n The lord, underogating, share\n The vulgar game of \u2018post and pair.\u2019\n All hailed with uncontrolled delight,\n And general voice, the happy night\n That to the cottage, as the crown,\n Brought tidings of salvation down.\n\n The fire, with well-dried logs supplied,\n Went roaring up the chimney wide;\n The huge hall-table\u2019s oaken face,\n Scrubbed till it shone, the day to grace,\n Bore then upon its massive board\n No mark to part the squire and lord.\n Then was brought in the lusty brawn\n By old blue-coated serving-man;\n Then the grim boar\u2019s head frowned on high,\n Crested with bays and rosemary....\n The wassail round in good brown bowls,\n Garnished with ribbons, blithely trowls.\n There the huge sirloin reeked; hard by\n Plum-porridge stood and Christmas pye.\n Then came the merry masquers in\n And carols roared with blithesome din;\n If unmelodious was the song,\n It was a hearty note and strong.\n Who lists may in their mumming see\n Traces of ancient mystery....\n England was merry England then\u2014\n Old Christmas brought his sports again;\n \u2019Twas Christmas broached the mightiest ale;\n \u2019Twas Christmas told the merriest tale;\n A Christmas gambol oft would cheer\n A poor man\u2019s heart through half the year.\u201d\n\n\n Let Herrick supplement the picture with his\n\n\n \u201cCEREMONIES FOR CHRISTMASSE.\n\n\n \u201cCome, bring with a noise,\n My merrie, merrie boyes,\n The Christmas log to the firing;\n While my good dame, she\n Bids ye all be free\n And drink to your hearts\u2019 desiring.\n\n \u201cWith the last yeeres brand\n Light the new block, and\n For good successe in his spending\n On your psaltries play,\n That sweet luck may\n Come while the log is a-teending.\n\n \u201cDrink now the strong beere,\n Cut the white loafe here,\n The while the meate is a-shredding\n For the rare mince-pie,\n And the plums stand by\n To fill the paste that\u2019s a-kneading.\u201d\n\n\n Does the picture please you? Would you fain be a guest at the baron\u2019s\n table, or lend a hand with jovial Herrick to fetch in the mighty\n Yule-log? Are you longing for a cut of that boar\u2019s head or a draught of\n the wassail, or curious to explore the contents of that mysterious\n \u201cChristmas pye,\u201d which seems to differ so much from all other pies that\n it has to be spelled with a _y_? Well, well, we must not repine. Fate,\n which has denied us these joys, has given us compensations. No doubt\n the baron, for all his Yule-logs, would sometimes have given his\n baronial head (when he happened to have a cold in it) for such a\n fire\u2014let it be of sea-coal in a low grate and the curtains drawn\u2014as the\n reader and his humble servant are this very minute toasting their toes\n at. Those huge open fireplaces are admirably effective in poetry, but\n not altogether satisfactory of a cold winter\u2019s night, when half the\n heat goes up the chimney and all the winds of heaven are shrieking in\n through the chinks in your baronial hall and playing the very mischief\n with your baronial rheumatism. Or do we believe that boar\u2019s head was\n such a mighty fascinating dish after all, or much, if anything,\n superior to the soused pig\u2019s head with which good old Squire\n Bracebridge replaced it? No, every age to its own customs; we may be\n sure that each finds out what is best for it and for its people.\n\n Yet one custom we do begrudge a little to the past, or rather to the\n other lands where it still lingers here and there in the present. That\n is the graceful and kindly custom of the waits. These were Christmas\n carols, as the reader no doubt knows, chanted by singers from house to\n house in the rural districts during the season of Advent. In France\n they were called noels, and in Longfellow\u2019s translation of one of these\n we may see what they were like:\n\n\n \u201cI hear along our street\n Pass the minstrel throngs;\n Hark! they play so sweet.\n On their hautboys, Christmas songs!\n Let us by the fire\n Ever higher\n Sing them till the night expire!...\n\n \u201cShepherds at the grange\n Where the Babe was born\n Sang with many a change\n Christmas carols until morn.\n Let us, etc.\n\n \u201cThese good people sang\n Songs devout and sweet;\n While the rafters rang,\n There they stood with freezing feet.\n Let us, etc.\n\n \u201cWho by the fireside stands\n Stamps his feet and sings;\n But he who blows his hands\n Not so gay a carol brings.\n Let us, etc.\u201d\n\n\n In some parts of rural England, too, the custom is still to some extent\n kept up, and the reader may find a pleasant, and we dare say faithful,\n description of it in a charming English story called _Under the\n Greenwood Tree_, by Mr. Thomas Hardy, a writer whose closeness of\n observation and precision and delicacy of touch give him a leading\n place among the younger writers of fiction.\n\n Very pleasant, we fancy, it must be of a Christmas Eve when one is, as\n aforesaid, toasting one\u2019s toes at the fire over a favorite book, or\n hanging up the children\u2019s stockings, let us say, or peering through the\n curtains out over the moonlit snow, and wondering how cold it is\n out-doors with that little perfunctory shiver which is comfort\u2019s homage\n to itself\u2014there should always be snow upon the ground at Christmas, for\n then Nature\n\n\n \u201cWith speeches fair\n Woos the gentle air\n To hide her guilty front with innocent snow\u201d;\n\n\n but let us have no wind, since\n\n\n \u201cPeaceful was the night\n Wherein the Prince of Light\n His reign of peace upon the world began.\n The winds, with wonder whist,\n Smoothly the waters kist,\n Whispering new joys to the wild ocean,\n Who now hath quite forgot to rave,\n While birds of calm sit brooding on the charm\u00e9d wave\u201d\u2014\n\n\n at such a time, we say, it would be pleasant to hear the shrill voices\n of the Waits cleaving the cold, starlit air in some such quaint old\n ditty as the \u201cCherry-tree Carol\u201d or \u201cThe Three Ships.\u201d No doubt, too,\n would we but confess it, there would come to us a little wicked\n enhancement of pleasure in the reflection that the artists without were\n a trifle less comfortable than the hearer within. That rogue Tibullus\n had a shrewd notion of what constitutes true comfort when he wrote,\n _Quam juvat immites ventos audire cubantem_\u2014which, freely translated,\n means, How jolly it is to sit by the fireside and listen to other\n fellows singing for your benefit in the cold without! But that idea we\n should dismiss as unworthy, and even try to feel a little uncomfortable\n by way of penance; and then, when their song was ended, and we heard\n their departing footsteps scrunching fainter and fainter in the snow,\n and their voices dying away until they became the merest suggestion of\n an echo, we should perhaps find\u2014for these are to be ideal Waits\u2014that\n their song had left behind it in the listener\u2019s soul a starlit silence\n like that of the night without, but the stars should be heavenly\n thoughts.\n\n These are ideal Waits; the real ones might be less agreeable or\n salutary. But have we far to look for such? Are there not on the\n shelves yonder a score of immortal minstrels only waiting our bidding\n to sing the sacred glories of the time? Shall we ask grave John Milton\n to tune his harp for us, or gentle Father Southworth, or impassioned\n Crashaw, or tender Faber? These are Waits we need not scruple to listen\n to, nor fail to hear with profit.\n\n Milton\u2019s _Ode on the Nativity_ is, no doubt, the finest in the\n language. Considering the difficulties of a subject to which, short of\n inspiration, it is next to impossible to do any justice at all, it is\n very fine indeed. It is not all equal, however; there are in it stanzas\n which remind one that he was but twenty-one when he wrote it. Yet other\n stanzas are scarcely surpassed by anything he has written.\n\n\n \u201cYea, Truth and Justice then\n Will down return to men,\n Orb\u2019d in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing\n Mercy will sit between,\n Thron\u2019d in celestial sheen,\n With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering,\n And heaven, as at some festival,\n Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall.\n\n \u201cBut wisest Fate says, No,\n It must not yet be so;\n The Babe yet lies in smiling infancy\n That on the bitter cross\n Must redeem our loss,\n So both himself and us to glorify;\n Yet first to those ychained in sleep\n The wakeful trump of doom must thunder thro\u2019 the deep,\n\n \u201cWith such a horrid clang\n As on Mount Sinai rang,\n While the red fire and smould\u2019ring clouds out-brake.\n The aged earth, aghast\n With terror of that blast,\n Shall from the surface to the centre shake;\n When at the world\u2019s last session\n The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread his throne.\n\n \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\n\n \u201cThe oracles are dumb;\n No voice or hideous hum\n Runs through the arched roof in words deceiving.\n Apollo from his shrine\n Can no more divine,\n With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving.\n No nightly trance or breath\u00e8d spell\n Inspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell.\n\n \u201cThe lonely mountains o\u2019er,\n And the resounding shore,\n A voice of weeping heard and loud lament.\n From haunted spring, and dale\n Edg\u2019d with poplar pale,\n The parting genius is with sighing sent.\n With flower-inwoven tresses torn,\n The Nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thicket mourn.\u201d\n\n\n Seldom has Milton sung in loftier strains than this. What a magnificent\n line is that:\n\n\n \u201cThe wakeful trump of doom shall thunder through the deep.\u201d\n\n\n The poet evidently had his eye on that wonderful verse of the _Dies\n Ir\u00e6_:\n\n\n \u201cTuba mirum spargens sonum\n Per sepulchra regionum,\n Cogit omnes ante thronum,\u201d\n\n\n but the imitation falls little short of the original. Dr. Johnson\n characteristically passes this ode over in silence\u2014perhaps because of\n his opinion that sacred poetry was a contradiction in terms. His great\n namesake, and in some respects curious antitype, was more generous to\n another poem we shall quote\u2014Father Southwell\u2019s \u201cBurning Babe.\u201d \u201cSo he\n had written it,\u201d he told Drummond, \u201che would have been content to\n destroy many of his.\u201d\n\n\n \u201cAs I, in hoary winter\u2019s night, stood shivering in the snow,\n Surprised I was with sudden heat which made my heart to glow;\n And lifting up a fearful eye to view what fire was near,\n A pretty Babe all burning bright did in the air appear,\n Who, scorch\u00e9d with exceeding heat, such floods of tears did shed\n As though his floods should quench his flames with what his tears\n were fed;\n \u2018Alas!\u2019 quoth he, \u2018but newly born, in fiery heats I fry,\n Yet none approach to warm their hearts or feel my fire but I.\n My faultless breast the furnace is, the fuel wounding thorns;\n Love is the fire, and sighs the smoke, the ashes shames and scorns;\n The fuel Justice layeth on, and Mercy blows the coals;\n The metal in this furnace wrought are men\u2019s defil\u00e9d souls;\n For which, as now in fire I am to work them to their good,\n So will I melt into a bath to wash them in my blood.\u2019\n With this he vanished out of sight, and swiftly shrank away,\n And straight I call\u00e9d unto mind that it was Christmas day.\u201d\n\n\n The fire is getting low in the grate, the stars are twinkling pale, and\n though the minstrels are many we should have been glad to introduce to\n the reader\u2014grand old St. Thomas of Aquin; silver-tongued Giacopone,\n whose lately-discovered _Stabat Mater Speciosa_ is one of the loveliest\n of the medi\u00e6val hymns; rapturous St. Bernard\u2014they must wait a fitter\n time. We can hear but another of our Christmas waits\u2014one of the most\n effective English poems on the Nativity, considered as mere poetry, it\n has been our fortune to meet. The author is the hero of Browning\u2019s\n verses, \u201cWhat\u2019s become of Waring?\u201d\u2014Alfred H. Dommett; a poet who,\n perhaps, would be better known had he been a worse poet. And with this\n we must wish our readers \u201cMerry Christmas to all, and to all a\n good-night.\u201d\n\n\n \u201cIt was the calm and silent night!\n Seven hundred years and fifty-three\n Had Rome been growing up to might,\n And now was queen of land and sea.\n No sound was heard of clashing wars;\n Peace brooded o\u2019er the hushed domain;\n Apollo, Pallas, Jove, and Mars\n Held undisturbed their ancient reign\n In the solemn midnight\n Centuries ago.\n\n \u201c\u2019Twas in the calm and silent night!\n The senator of haughty Rome\n Impatient urged his chariot\u2019s flight,\n From lonely revel rolling home.\n Triumphal arches, gleaming, swell\n His breast with thoughts of boundless sway;\n What recked the Roman what befell\n A paltry province far away\n In the solemn midnight\n Centuries ago?\n\n \u201cWithin that province far away\n Went plodding home a weary boor;\n A streak of light before him lay,\n Fallen through a half-shut stable-door,\n Across his path. He passed; for naught\n Told what was going on within.\n How keen the stars! his only thought;\n The air how calm and cold, and thin!\n In the solemn midnight\n Centuries ago.\n\n \u201cO strange indifference! Low and high\n Drowsed over common joys and cares;\n The earth was still, but knew not why;\n The world was listening unawares.\n How calm a moment may precede\n One that shall thrill the world for ever!\n To that still moment none would heed;\n Man\u2019s doom was linked, no more to sever,\n In the solemn midnight\n Centuries ago.\n\n \u201cIt is the calm and solemn night!\n A thousand bells ring out and throw\n Their joyous peals abroad, and smite\n The darkness, charmed and holy now!\n The night, that erst no name had worn,\n To it a happy name is given;\n For in that stable lay, new-born,\n The peaceful Prince of earth and heaven,\n In the solemn midnight\n Centuries ago.\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE DESCENT OF MAN.\n\n Mr. Charles Darwin, in his _Descent of Man_, proposes to himself to\n show that man is nothing more than a modified beast, and that his\n remote ancestors are to be found among some tribes of brutes. A paradox\n of this kind, in a work of fiction such as Ovid\u2019s _Metamorphoses_,\n would not offend an intelligent reader; but in a work which professes\n to be serious and scientific it is extremely offensive, for it amounts\n to a deliberate insult to all humanity in general and to every human\n being in particular. Mr. Darwin\u2019s work violates the dignity of human\n nature, blots out of our souls the image and likeness of our Creator,\n and totally perverts the notions most cherished by civil and Christian\n society. This effort does certainly not entitle him to credit for\n wisdom. A man of ordinary prudence, before he undertakes to maintain in\n the face of the public a theory which conflicts with a doctrine\n thoroughly established and universally received, would examine both\n sides of the case, and ascertain that he is in possession of sufficient\n evidence to make good his assertions and to defend them against the\n arguments of the opposite side. Mr. Darwin, on the contrary, seems to\n have satisfied himself that a man of his eminence in natural history\n had a right to be believed, whatever he might venture to say, even\n though he was to give no satisfactory evidence in support of his views,\n and no answer to the objections which he ought to refute.\n\n We do not say that Mr. Darwin did not do his best to prove his new\n doctrine on man; we only say that he has signally failed in his\n attempt, and that his failure is as inexcusable as it is ignominious. A\n man of his ability should have seen that the origin of man was not a\n problem to be solved by physiology; and he ought also to have\n considered that a man of science could only stultify himself by\n submitting to the test of science a historical fact of which science,\n as such, is entirely incompetent to speak. Indeed, we scarcely know\n which to admire most in Mr. Darwin, the serenity with which he ignores\n the difficulty of his philosophic position, or the audacity with which\n he affirms things which he cannot prove. What a pity that a man so\n richly endowed by nature has been so entirely absorbed by the study of\n material organisms as to find no time for the more important study of\n philosophy, especially of psychology, without which it is impossible to\n form a rational theory respecting the origin and the destiny of man!\n Shall we add that a sound scientific theory cannot be the outcome of\n illogical reasoning? And yet it is a plain fact, though our advanced\n thinkers will deny it, that Mr. Darwin\u2019s logic, to judge from his\n _Descent of Man_, is as mischievous as most of his assumptions are\n reckless.\n\n It would be impossible within the limits of our space to enter into a\n detailed examination of the logical and metaphysical blunders to which\n the Darwinian theory owes its existence. We shall, therefore, at\n present confine ourselves to a short criticism of the first chapter of\n the work in question; for, if we are not mistaken, every impartial\n reader will be able, after a sufficient analysis of this first chapter,\n to judge of the kind of logic that characterizes the whole treatise.\n\n Mr. Darwin begins thus:\n\n \u201cHe who wishes to decide whether man is the modified descendant\n of some pre-existing form would probably first inquire whether\n man varies, however slightly, in bodily structure and in mental\n faculties; and, if so, whether the variations are transmitted\n to his offspring in accordance with the laws which prevail with\n the lower animals. Again, are the variations the result, as far\n as our ignorance permits us to judge, of the same general\n causes, and are they governed by the same general laws, as in\n the case of other organisms\u2014for instance, by correlation, the\n inherited effects of use and disuse, etc.? Is man subject to\n similar malconformations, the result of arrested development,\n of reduplication of parts, etc., and does he display in any of\n his anomalies reversion to some former and ancient type of\n structure? It might also naturally be inquired whether man,\n like so many other animals, has given rise to varieties and\n sub-races, differing but slightly from each other, or to races\n differing so much that they must be classed as doubtful\n species? How are such races distributed over the world; and\n how, when crossed, do they react on each other in the first and\n succeeding generations? And so with many other points.\u201d\n\n This preamble, which superficial readers may have considered perfectly\n harmless, contains the seed of all the mischievous reasonings scattered\n through the rest of the work. It comes to this: \u201cIf we find that man\n varies, however slightly, according to the same laws which prevail with\n the lower animals, we shall be justified in concluding that man is a\n modified descendant of some pre-existing form.\u201d Now, this assertion is\n evidently nothing but clap-trap for the ignorant. In the first place,\n Mr. Darwin takes for granted that mankind wishes to decide whether man\n is the modified descendant of some pre-existing form. This gratuitous\n supposition implies that mankind is still ignorant or doubtful of its\n true origin; which is by no means the case. We have an authentic record\n of the origin of man; and we know that the first man and the first\n woman were not the descendants of any lower pre-existing form. The\n Bible tells us very clearly that God created them to his own image and\n likeness; and so long as Mr. Darwin does not demolish the Biblical\n history of creation he has no right to assume that there may be the\n least reasonable doubt regarding the origin of man. Mr. Darwin, it is\n true, makes light of the Biblical history; but contempt is no argument.\n On the other hand, philosophy and common sense, and science, if not\n perverted, unanimously agree with the Mosaic record in proclaiming that\n the origin of man must be traced to a special creation. Thus there has\n never been, nor is there at present, among thinking men, any real doubt\n as to the origin of our race; whence we infer that the question raised\n by the _Descent of Man_ is a mere fiction which would deserve no answer\n but a smile of pity.\n\n In the second place, granting for the sake of argument that there may\n be an honest doubt about the origin of man, and that physiology and\n other kindred sciences are competent to answer it, would the inquiry\n suggested by Mr. Darwin convince an honest doubter that man is the\n descendant of a lower animal? Suppose that \u201cman varies, however\n slightly, in bodily structure and in mental faculties\u201d; suppose that\n \u201csuch variations are transmitted to his offspring in accordance with\n the laws which prevail with the lower animals\u201d; and suppose that all\n the other conditions enumerated by Mr. Darwin are verified\u2014would we\n then be justified in concluding that \u201cman is a modified descendant of\n some pre-existing form\u201d? Evidently not. The utmost that logic would\n allow us to grant is that the present form of human beings, owing to\n the slight variations transmitted to us by our human ancestors, may\n exhibit some accidental features slightly different from those which\n were possessed by the primitive men, yet without any change of the\n specific form, which must always remain essentially the same. But Mr.\n Darwin is not content with this. His peculiar logic allows him to\n confound the accidental and unimportant variations that occur within\n the limits of any single species with a gradual transition from one\n species to another\u2014a transition which science no less than philosophy\n utterly rejects. Nowhere in nature do we find an instance of such a\n pretended transition. Varieties are indeed very numerous, but none of\n them show the least departure from the species to which they belong.\n The oak emits every year thousands of leaves, of which each one differs\n from every other in some accidental feature; but who has ever seen the\n oak-leaves change into fir-leaves, or fig-leaves, or maple-leaves, or\n any other leaves? If nature admitted such a specific change, a thousand\n indications would awaken our attention to the fact. The transition,\n being gradual, would leave everywhere innumerable traces of its\n reality. There would be all around us a host of transitional forms from\n the fish to the lizard, from the lizard to the bird, from the bird to\n the ape, and from the ape to man. But where do we find such\n transitional forms? Science itself proclaims that they have no\n existence. Hence to affirm the transition from one species to another\n is a gross scientific blunder, whatever Mr. Darwin and his eminent\n associates may say to the contrary.\n\n In the third place, even admitting that a gradual transition from one\n species to another were not rejected by science, Mr. Darwin\u2019s view\n would still remain a ludicrous absurdity. In fact, the pretended\n transition from a form of a lower to a form of a higher species would\n be an open violation of the principle of causality; and therefore, if\n any transition were to be admitted at all, it could only be a\n transition from a higher to a lower species. Thus, the transition from\n a human to a brutish form by continual deterioration and degradation,\n though repugnant to other principles, would not conflict with the\n principle of causality, inasmuch as deterioration and degradation are\n negative results, which may be brought about by mere lack of\n intellectual, moral, and social development. But the transition from a\n brutish to a human form would be a positive effect without a positive\n proportionate cause. The lower cannot generate the higher, because to\n constitute the higher something is necessary which the lower cannot\n impart. Just as a force = 10 cannot produce an effect = 20, so cannot\n the irrational brute produce the rational man. To assume the contrary\n is to assume that the less contains the greater, that emptiness begets\n fulness\u2014in a word, that nature is a standing contradiction.\n\n A full development of this last consideration would lead us too far\n from our line of argument, as it would require a psychological\n treatment of the subject. We will merely remark that _rational_ and\n _irrational_ differ not only in degree but in kind; that the human soul\n is not produced by the forces of nature, but proceeds directly and\n immediately from God\u2019s creative action; and that Darwinism, which\n ignores the soul\u2019s spirituality and immortality, is, on this account\n also, a monument of philosophical ignorance.\n\n But let us proceed. The author considers it an important point to\n ascertain \u201cwhether man tends to increase at so rapid a rate as to lead\n to occasional severe struggles for existence, and consequently to\n beneficial variations, whether in body or in mind, being preserved, and\n injurious ones eliminated.\u201d This is another of Mr. Darwin\u2019s delusions.\n It is not in the nature of man that the stronger should murder the\n weaker. Man, as a rule, is benevolent towards his kind, and even\n savages respect the life of the weak; whereas it is always the stronger\n that go to battle and fall in the struggle. Thus a struggle for\n existence, occasioned by a too rapid increase, would deprive the race\n of its best men and mar its further development. On the other hand, if\n at any time or in any place there has been a struggle for existence, it\n is in our large cities that we can best study the nature of its\n results. Is it in London, Paris, Berlin, or Vienna that we meet the\n best specimens of the race? Surely, if there is a tremendous struggle\n for existence anywhere, it is in such capitals as these; and yet no one\n is ignorant that such proud cities would, in a few generations, sink\n into insignificance, were they not continually refurnished with new\n blood from the country, where the best propagators of the race are\n brought up in great numbers and without any apparent struggle for\n existence. But we need not dwell any further on this point. A struggle\n for existence presupposes existence; and if man existed before\n struggling, the origin of man does not depend on his struggle. Hence\n the so-called \u201cimportant point\u201d has really no importance whatever.\n\n Then he asks: \u201cDo the races or species of men, whichever term may be\n applied, encroach on and replace one another, so that some finally\n become extinct?\u201d and he answers the question in the affirmative. To\n this we have no objection. We only remark that \u201craces\u201d and \u201cspecies\u201d\n are not synonymous; hence it is surprising how a naturalist of Mr.\n Darwin\u2019s celebrity could show the least hesitation which of the two\n terms he ought to apply to mankind.\n\n He proceeds to examine \u201chow far the bodily structure of man shows\n traces, more or less plain, of his descent from some lower form,\u201d and\n he contends that the existence of such \u201ctraces\u201d can be proved, first,\n from the similarity of bodily structure in men and beasts; secondly,\n from the similarity of their embryonic development; thirdly, from the\n existence of rudimentary organs, which show that man and all other\n vertebrate animals have been constructed on the same general model.\n\n Bearing in mind that Mr. Darwin\u2019s object is to prove that there are\n \u201ctraces,\u201d more or less plain, of man\u2019s descent from some lower form, we\n cannot help expressing our astonishment when we find that he has failed\n to see the necessity of grounding his proofs on a secure foundation.\n That the bodily structure of man has some resemblance to the structure\n of other mammals; that all the bones of his skeleton can be compared\n with corresponding bones in a monkey, bat, or seal; that this\n comparison may be extended to his muscles, nerves, blood-vessels, and\n internal viscera; that the brain, the most important of all organs,\n follows the same law, etc., etc., are indeed well-known facts, from\n which we rightly infer that man is constructed on the same _general_\n type as other mammals. But can these same facts be considered as\n \u201ctraces,\u201d more or less plain, of man\u2019s descent from any lower form? Mr.\n Darwin says _Yes_; but instead of giving any conclusive reason for his\n assertion, he loses his time in accumulating superfluous anatomical and\n physiological details which, however instructive, have no bearing upon\n the thesis he has engaged to prove.\n\n To prove his assumption he ought to have made a syllogism somewhat like\n the following:\n\n Wherever there is similarity of bodily structure or development there\n are \u201ctraces\u201d of a common origin or descent;\n\n But man and other mammals have similar bodily structures and a similar\n development;\n\n Therefore man and other mammals show \u201ctraces\u201d of a common origin or\n descent.\n\n This argument would have left no escape to the most decided adversary\n of the Darwinian view, if its first proposition had been susceptible of\n demonstration. But Mr. Darwin, seeing the utter impossibility of\n demonstrating it, and yet being unable to dispense with it, resorted to\n the ordinary trick of his school, which consists in assuming latently\n what they dare not openly maintain; and thus he turned the whole\n attention of his reader to the second proposition, which had no need of\n demonstration, as it was not questioned by instructed men. Thus the\n twenty pages of physiologic lore with which Mr. Darwin in this chapter\n distracts and amuses his readers may be styled, in a logical point of\n view, a prolonged _ignoratio elenchi_\u2014an effort to prove that which is\n conceded instead of that which is denied\u2014a blunder into which men of\n science of the modern type are sure to fall when they presume to meddle\n with matters above their reach.\n\n There is one sense only in which it may be affirmed that the similarity\n of bodily structure in men and lower animals proves their common\n origin, and it is this: that men and animals have been made by the same\n Creator on a similar ideal type of homogeneous organic arrangements; in\n other terms, that their organic similarity proves them to be the work\n of the same Maker. Man was destined to live on this earth among other\n inferior animals and surrounded by like conditions. His animal life was\n therefore to be dependent on similar means of support, exposed to\n similar influences, and subject to similar needs. It is not surprising,\n then, that he should have received from a wise Creator an organic\n constitution similar to that of the inferior creatures that were placed\n around him. This fully accounts for the similarity of the human\n organism with that of other mammals. But to say that because the bodily\n structure of man is similar to that of the ape, therefore man is the\n descendant of the ape, is as nonsensical as to say that because the\n bodily structure of the ape is similar to that of man, therefore the\n ape is the descendant of man. How was it possible for Mr. Darwin to lay\n down such an absurd principle, and not foresee how easily it might be\n turned against his own conclusion?\n\n Thus the argument drawn from the similarity of bodily structure is a\n mere delusion. It avails nothing to say that man is liable to receive\n from the lower animals, and to communicate to them, certain diseases,\n as hydrophobia, variola, the glanders, syphilis, cholera, herpes, etc.\n This fact, says Mr. Darwin, \u201cproves the similarity of their tissues and\n blood, both in minute structure and composition, far more plainly than\n does their comparison under the best microscope or by the aid of the\n best chemical analysis.\u201d But this is a mistake; for the evidence\n afforded by the microscope as to existing diversities cannot be\n negatived by any guesses of ours respecting the communication of\n diseases and its conditions; it being evident that what is obscure and\n mysterious is not calculated to weaken the certitude of a fact which we\n see with our own eyes. Nor does it matter that \u201cmedicines produce the\n same effect on them [monkeys] as on us,\u201d or that many monkeys \u201chave a\n strong taste for tea, coffee, and spirituous liquors,\u201d or even that a\n certain monkey \u201csmoked tobacco with pleasure\u201d in Mr. Darwin\u2019s presence.\n These and other details of the same nature may be interesting, but they\n are no indication of a common origin, except in the sense which we have\n pointed out\u2014viz., that they are the work of the same Maker.\n\n But, says Mr. Darwin, \u201cthe homological construction of the whole frame\n in the members of the same class is intelligible, if we admit their\n descent from a common progenitor, together with their subsequent\n adaptation to diversified conditions. On any other view the similarity\n of pattern between the hand of a man or monkey, the foot of a horse,\n the flipper of a seal, the wing of a bat, etc., is utterly\n inexplicable. It is no scientific explanation to assert that they have\n all been formed on the same ideal plan.\u201d These words, which occur at\n the end of the chapter we are examining, show how little Mr. Darwin\n understands the duty of his position as author of a new theory. To say\n that an explanation is not _scientific_ is a very poor excuse for\n setting it aside. Science, if not perverted, is an excellent thing, but\n it does not profess to give an explanation of every subject we may\n think of. Its range is co-extensive with the material world, but only\n with respect to matter and its modifications as known by observation\n and experiment. This means that there are numberless things about which\n science is altogether incompetent to speak, because such things do not\n fall under observation and experiment. To pretend, therefore, that an\n explanation which is not scientific has no claim to be heeded by a man\n of science, is like pretending that a man of science, as such, must\n remain in blissful ignorance of everything which transcends experiment\n and observation. Will Mr. Darwin reject historical explanations of\n historical events, philosophical explanations of philosophical\n conclusions, mathematical explanations of mathematical questions? The\n origin of things is not a scientific but a philosophic problem. Science\n cannot speak of creation, of which it can have no experimental\n knowledge; it gives it up to the philosopher and the theologian, who\n alone know the grounds on which it must be demonstrated. The question,\n then, whether mammals have all been formed on the same _ideal_ plan, is\n not scientific, and therefore it needs no scientific explanation. The\n plea that the explanation is not scientific might be held valid, if Mr.\n Darwin had humbly acknowledged his inability to rise above matter, and\n his incompetency to give a judgment in philosophic matters; but his\n disregard of the explanation shows that, when he calls it _not\n scientific_, he desires his reader to believe that it is\n _anti-scientific_ or irreconcilable with science; and this is as absurd\n as if he pretended that reason and science destroy one another.\n\n On the other hand, what shall we say of the pretended \u201cscientific\u201d\n explanation offered by Mr. Darwin? \u201cThe homological construction of the\n whole frame in the members of the same class is intelligible, if we\n admit their descent from a common progenitor.\u201d Is this appeal to a\n common progenitor a scientific explanation of the fact in question? If\n a common progenitor accounts scientifically for the fact, why should\n not a common Creator account scientifically for it? Science\u2014that is,\n Mr. Darwin\u2019s science\u2014does not know a common Creator; it knows even less\n of a common progenitor; and yet it sets up the latter to exclude the\n former, and boasts that its gratuitous and degrading hypothesis is a\n \u201cscientific\u201d explanation! Yet all true scientists aver that no instance\n has ever been found of a transition from one species to another;\n philosophers go even further, and show that such a transition is\n against nature. Hence Mr. Darwin\u2019s hypothesis, far from being\n scientific, contradicts science and philosophy, observation and\n experiment, reason and fact. The descent from a common progenitor, even\n if it made \u201cintelligible\u201d the similarity of different mammals, would\n still be unscientific. The ancients accounted for the movement of the\n heavenly bodies by putting them under the control of intellectual\n agents. This hypothesis made the astronomical phenomena intelligible.\n The fall of heavy bodies was accounted for by assuming that all such\n bodies had a natural intrinsic tendency to a central point. This\n hypothesis, too, made the fall of bodies intelligible. Even in modern\n physics a number of hypotheses have been proposed regarding light,\n magnetism, electricity, chemical changes, etc., to make phenomena\n intelligible. But hypotheses, however satisfactory at first, are soon\n discarded when a deeper study of the facts reveals new features and new\n relations for which such hypotheses cannot account. This is why the\n hypothesis of the descent of all mammals from a common progenitor, even\n if it seems to make their homological construction intelligible in a\n manner, must be rejected. For in every species of mammals we find\n features for which the hypothesis cannot account, and relations of\n genetic opposition by which the hypothesis is reduced to nothing.\n\n Mr. Darwin says that, \u201con any other view, the similarity of pattern\n between the hand of a man or monkey, the foot of a horse, the flipper\n of a seal, the wing of a bat, etc., is utterly inexplicable.\u201d We do not\n see any great similarity between the hand of a man and the foot of a\n horse or the flipper of a seal, etc. We would rather say, with Mr.\n Darwin\u2019s permission, that we see in all such organs a great\n dissimilarity. Each of them has a special adaptation to a special end,\n and each of them is constructed on a different specific pattern. Their\n similarity is therefore generic, not specific; and, accordingly, each\n species must have its own distinct progenitors. We might make other\n remarks, but we are afraid that we have already taxed the patience of\n the reader to a greater extent than the case requires; and therefore we\n will now pass to the second argument of the author.\n\n This second argument is drawn from the consideration of the embryonic\n development. \u201cMan,\u201d says Mr. Darwin, \u201cis developed from an ovule about\n the 125th of an inch in diameter, which differs in no respect from the\n ovules of other animals.\u201d This is a very reckless assertion. For how\n does Mr. Darwin happen to know that the human ovule \u201cdiffers in no\n respect\u201d from the ovules of other animals? When a man of science lays\n down an assertion as the groundwork of his doctrine, he must be able to\n show that the assertion is true. Hence we are entitled to ask on what\n foundation our great scientist can maintain his proposition. Will he\n appeal to the microscope? Probably he will, but to no purpose; for he\n has just declared, as we have seen, that the best microscope does not\n reveal everything with sufficient distinction. On the other hand, if he\n resorts to the mode of reasoning which he has just employed while\n speaking of diseases\u2014that is, if he argues from the effects to the\n causes\u2014he cannot but defeat himself; for, as similarity of diseases\n was, in his judgment, a proof of similar organic structure, so now the\n dissimilarity of the final development of two ovules will be a proof\n that the two ovules are really dissimilar. One ovule constantly\n develops into a monkey, another constantly develops into a dog, and a\n third constantly develops into a man. Is it conceivable that the three\n ovules are identically the same, so as to \u201cdiffer in no respect\u201d? We do\n not know what Mr. Darwin will reply. At any rate he cannot reply on\n scientific grounds; for science neither knows the intimate constitution\n of the ovules, nor is it likely ever to know it, as the primordial\n organic molecules baffle the best microscopic investigations.\n\n \u201cThe embryo itself,\u201d he adds, \u201cat a very early period can\n hardly be distinguished from that of other members of the\n vertebrate kingdom.... At a somewhat later period, when the\n extremities are developed, \u2018the feet of lizards and mammals,\u2019\n as the illustrious Von Baer remarks, \u2018the wings and feet of\n birds, no less than the hands and feet of man, all arise from\n the same fundamental form.\u2019 It is, says Prof. Huxley, \u2018quite in\n the later stages of development that the young human being\n presents marked differences from the young ape.\u2019\u201d\n\n If these assertions and quotations are intended as a proof that the\n human ovule \u201cdiffers in no respect\u201d from the ovules of lower animals,\n we must confess that our advanced scientific thinkers are endowed with\n a wonderful power of blinding themselves. We have two ovules: the one\n develops into hands and feet; the other develops into wings and\n feathers; and yet we are told that they are both \u201c_the same_\n fundamental form\u201d! What is the fundamental form? Who has seen it? We\n are sure that neither Prof. Huxley nor the illustrious Von Baer has had\n the privilege of inspecting and determining the proper form of the\n mysterious organism known under the name of ovule. Much less have they,\n or has Mr. Darwin, discerned what is fundamental and what is not in its\n constitution. They are, therefore, not more competent to judge of the\n fundamental sameness of two ovules than is the blind to judge of\n colors; and their view, as founded on nothing but presumption and\n ignorance, must be considered altogether unscientific.\n\n The same view is also, as we have already shown, eminently\n unphilosophic. If two ovules are essentially the same and \u201cdiffer in no\n respect\u201d from one another, what is it that causes them invariably to\n develop into different specific organisms? Does a constant difference\n in the effects countenance the idea that they proceed from identical\n causes? It is evident that a theory which resorts to such absurdities\n for its support has no claim to be accepted, or even tolerated, by\n lovers of reason and truth. The very boldness of its affirmations, its\n air of dogmatism, its allegation of partisan authorities, and its\n contempt of fundamental principles prove it to be nothing but a\n flippant attempt at imposition.\n\n Although Mr. Darwin has insisted so strongly on the similarity between\n our bodily structure and that of the lower animals, and although he has\n endeavored to convince us that the human ovule differs in no respect\n from the ovules of other animals, yet he is compelled by abundant\n evidence to admit that there is something in man which does not exist\n in the lower animals, and something in the lower animals which does not\n exist in man. How does he account for these organic differences? Men of\n science, only twenty years ago, would have explained the fact by the\n old philosophical and scientific axiom, _Omne animal generat simile\n sibi_, which means that each species of animals has progenitors of the\n same species; whence they would have inferred by legitimate deduction\n that animals of different species owe their specific differences to\n their having issued from progenitors of different species. This\n explanation was universally received, as it was supported by an\n induction based on centuries of observation, without a single example\n to the contrary. It was, therefore, a truly scientific explanation. But\n twenty years are passed, and with them (if we believe Mr. Darwin) the\n axioms, the logic, and the experimental knowledge of all centuries have\n disappeared from the world of science, to make room for higher and\n deeper conceptions. It was not an easy task, that of giving the lie to\n a uniform and perpetual experience; but to Mr. Darwin nothing is\n difficult. He needs only a word. With one word, \u201cRudiments,\u201d he is\n confident that he will transform the objections of the old science into\n arguments in his favor, just as King Midas by the touch of his hand\n transmuted everything into shining gold.\n\n The world has hitherto believed that man has only two hands, whereas\n the monkey has four. But we must not say this in Mr. Darwin\u2019s face. If\n we did, he would inform us that we are strangely mistaken. Man, he\n pretends, belongs to the order of quadrumana; hence he has four hands\n no less than the monkey, though two of them are used as feet, which may\n be considered as rudimentary or undeveloped hands. If we were to remark\n in his presence that monkeys have a tail, whilst man can boast of no\n such elegant appendage, he would immediately confound our ignorance by\n informing us that we all possess a rudimentary tail, which might be\n made to develop and grow by mere local irritation.\n\n In this way he explains all the organic differences which separate one\n species from another. Every difference is made to depend either on the\n development in man of an organ which is undeveloped and rudimentary in\n lower animals, or on the development in lower animals of some organ\n which is rudimentary and undeveloped in man. To explain this theory he\n reasons as follows:\n\n \u201cThe chief agents in causing organs to become rudimentary seem\n to have been disuse at that period of life when the organ is\n chiefly used (and this is generally during maturity), and also\n inheritance at a corresponding period of life. The term\n \u2018disuse\u2019 does not relate merely to the lessened action of\n muscles, but includes a diminished flow of blood to a part or\n organ from being subjected to fewer alterations of pressure, or\n from becoming in any way less habitually active. Rudiments,\n however, may occur in one sex of those parts which are normally\n present in the other sex; and such rudiments, as we shall\n hereafter see, have often originated in a way distinct from\n those here referred to. In some cases organs have been reduced\n by means of natural selection, from having become injurious to\n the species under changed habits of life. The process of\n reduction is probably often aided through the two principles of\n compensation and economy of growth; but the later stages of\n reduction, after disuse has done all that can fairly be\n attributed to it, and when the saving to be effected by the\n economy of growth would be very small, are difficult to\n understand. The final and complete suppression of a part\n already useless and much reduced in size, in which case neither\n compensation nor economy can come into play, is perhaps\n intelligible by the aid of the hypothesis of pangenesis.\u201d\n\n On this passage, which forms the main foundation of the Darwinian\n theory of rudiments, much might be said; but we must limit ourselves to\n the following obvious remark. Science and philosophy reason on\n ascertained facts, but do not invent them; whereas Mr. Darwin in this\n very passage, as in many others, not only invents with poetic liberty\n all the facts which he needs to build up his theory, but also violates\n the laws of reasoning by drawing from his imaginary facts such\n conclusions as even real facts would not warrant. Philosophy would\n certainly not allow him to assume without proof that \u201corgans _become_\n rudimentary\u201d; for this is not an ascertained fact. Nor would philosophy\n permit the gratuitous introduction of rudiments derived \u201cfrom the\n corresponding organs of other more developed animals\u201d; for there is no\n evidence that such has ever been the case. Nor would philosophy\n sanction \u201cthe final and complete suppression of a part already\n useless\u201d; for on the one hand we have no means of knowing whether a\n part be really useless, and on the other no total suppression of\n organic parts has ever been known to occur (except in monsters) within\n the range of any given species. Nor would philosophy permit an appeal\n to the hypothesis of pangenesis or to the principle of compensation to\n evade the difficulties of which the new theory cannot give a solution;\n for the hypothesis of pangenesis is itself in need of proof, and the\n principle of compensation involves, in our case, a begging of the\n question, inasmuch as it assumes the mutability of species\u2014the very\n thing which the theory is intended to demonstrate.\n\n But, says Mr. Darwin, perhaps the hypothesis of pangenesis would make\n \u201cintelligible\u201d the suppression of a useless part. Let it be so, though\n we hold the contrary to be true; what then? Is all hypothesis to be\n accepted which would make a thing \u201cintelligible\u201d? The succession of\n days and nights was intelligible in the Ptolemaic hypothesis; the loss\n of a battle becomes intelligible by the hypothesis of treason; the\n death of an old woman is intelligible by the hypothesis of starvation;\n but no man of sense would mistake the hypothesis for a fact. The truth\n is that Mr. Darwin, before attempting the explanation of what he calls\n \u201cthe final and complete suppression of a part,\u201d was bound to prove that\n the absence of such a part was a _real suppression_ of the pre-existing\n part. This he has not done; in fact, he had no means of doing it. Hence\n all his reasonings on this subject are paralogistic, and his theory of\n rudiments is a rope of sand.\n\n The preceding remarks are fully applicable to the other examples of\n rudiments given by the author in the fourteen remaining pages of the\n chapter. Thus, \u201crudiments of various muscles have been observed in many\n parts of the human body.\u201d We flatly deny the assertion. \u201cNot a few\n muscles which are regularly present in some of the lower animals can\n occasionally be detected in man in a greatly-reduced condition.\u201d We\n answer that such muscles are not at all in a _reduced_ condition, but\n in the condition originally required by the nature of the individual.\n \u201cRemnants of the _panniculus carnosus_ in an efficient state are found\n in various parts of our bodies; for instance, the muscle on the\n forehead by which the eyebrows are raised.\u201d On what ground can this\n muscle be called a _remnant_? \u201cThe muscles which serve to move the\n external ear are in a rudimentary condition in man.... The whole\n external shell (of the ear) may be considered a rudiment, together with\n the various folds and prominences which in the lower animals strengthen\n and support the ear when erect.\u201d Where is the proof of such rudimentary\n condition? \u201cThe nictitating membrane is especially well developed in\n birds, ... but in man it exists as a mere rudiment, called the\n semilunar fold.\u201d How is it proved that the semilunar fold is a mere\n rudiment, and not a special organism, purposely contrived by the hand\n of the Creator at the first production of man?\n\n Mr. Darwin goes on making any number of assertions of the same kind,\n not one of which is or can be substantiated, and yet at the end of the\n chapter closes his argumentation in the following triumphant words:\n\n \u201cConsequently, we ought frankly to admit their community of\n descent [of man and other vertebrate animals]. To take any\n other view is to admit that our own structure, and that of all\n the animals around us, is a mere snare laid to entrap our\n judgment. This conclusion is greatly strengthened, if we look\n to the members of the whole animal series, and consider the\n evidence derived from their affinities or classification, their\n geographical distribution and geological succession. It is only\n our natural prejudice, and that arrogance which made our\n forefathers declare that they were descended from demi-gods,\n which leads us to demur to this conclusion. But the time will\n before long come when it will be thought wonderful that\n naturalists who were well acquainted with the comparative\n structure and development of man and other mammals should have\n believed that each was the work of a separate act of creation.\u201d\n\n This conclusion, though well known, and already famous throughout the\n scientific world, is here given in the proper words of the great\n naturalist, that the reader may see what unbounded confidence a man of\n science can place in himself and in his speculations. All the\n scientific world, excepting a few sectarian unbelievers, is against\n him; he knows it, and he is not dismayed. If you listen to him, his\n opponents are \u201carrogant\u201d; they demur to his conclusion only because\n they pretend to be \u201cthe descendants of demi-gods.\u201d He alone is right,\n he alone understands science. Buffon, Cuvier, Quatrefages, Agassiz,\n Elam, Fr\u00e9dault, and a host of other naturalists are evidently wrong. In\n fact, all philosophers are wrong; Mr. Darwin alone knows how to\n interpret scientific results; and he is so sure of this that he\n ventures to prophesy his approaching triumph over those benighted\n naturalists who, though \u201cwell acquainted with the comparative structure\n and development of man and other mammals,\u201d are nevertheless so foolish\n as to believe that each species is the work of a separate act of\n creation. Such is his modesty!\n\n Perhaps we, too, may be allowed to venture a little prophecy. Mr.\n Darwin is not young, and before many years, we are sorry to say, death\n will snatch him from us; his scientific friends in England and in\n Germany will shed a cold tear on his dead \u201cmammalian structure,\u201d while\n his spiritual and immortal soul will be summoned before the God he has\n insulted in the noblest of his creatures, to account for the abuse of\n his talents, and to receive the sentence due to those who know and\n disregard truth. Then the _Descent of Man_ will soon be a thing of the\n past; and those who now sing its praises in all tunes, and feign such\n an enthusiastic conviction of its coming triumph, will become the\n laughing stock of cultivated society, unless they put a timely end to\n their \u201cscientific\u201d jugglery. This is the fate which the common sense of\n mankind keeps in store for the Darwinian theory.\n\n Mr. Darwin, in formulating his conclusion, sums up the whole discussion\n in a single sentence: \u201cTo take any other view is to admit that our own\n structure, and that of all the animals around us, is a mere snare laid\n to entrap our judgment.\u201d No doubt a \u201csnare\u201d is laid; not, however, by\n the Author of nature, but by the author of the _Descent of Man_. The\n homologousness of animal structures does not prove a common genetic\n descent: it only proves, as we have shown, that all such structures are\n the work of the same Maker; hence the arbitrary substitution of a\n common progenitor for a common Creator is \u201ca mere snare\u201d laid by Mr.\n Darwin to entrap the judgment of the ignorant. We say _of the\n ignorant_; for he who knows anything about philosophy will simply\n wonder at the audacity of a writer who derives reason from unreason,\n and intellect from organism; and he who knows anything about divine\n revelation will rebuke him for his disregard of the Mosaic history,\n than which no document has greater antiquity or higher authority;\n whereas he who knows anything of zo\u00f6logy will be scandalized at the\n impudence of a man who dares to contradict in the name of science what\n he knows to be an unquestionable fact and a fundamental principle of\n science\u2014viz., the unchangeableness of species.\n\n To \u201cstrengthen\u201d his worthless conclusion Mr. Darwin bids us look to\n \u201cthe members of the whole animal series\u201d and consider \u201cthe evidence\n derived from their affinities or classification, their geographical\n distribution and geological succession.\u201d But it must be evident to\n every intelligent reader that the considerations here suggested by Mr.\n Darwin are not calculated to \u201cstrengthen\u201d his position. Between the\n members of the animal series there are not only affinities, but also\n specific differences and incompatibilities, which a man of science\n ought not to ignore, were they ever so embarrassing to his inventive\n genius. And as to the \u201cgeological succession\u201d of animal forms, need we\n remind Mr. Darwin that the geological remains and their succession\n afford the most peremptory refutation of his theory? He himself\n acknowledges that no transitional forms from one species to another\n have been dug up from the bowels of the earth; whereas his theory\n requires a succession of animal remains of all transitional forms and\n in all stages of development. It would have been wiser for him to have\n kept back all mention of geology; but, alas! those who lay snares for\n others sometimes succeed also in entrapping themselves.\n\n This may suffice to give an idea of the first chapter of the _Descent\n of Man_, and even of the whole work. Everywhere we find the same want\n of rigorous logic, the same absence of method, the same disregard of\n principles, and the same abundance of fanciful assumptions. Such is not\n the proceeding of science. \u201cI believe,\u201d says Prof. Agassiz, \u201cthat the\n Darwinian system is pernicious and fatal to the progress of the\n sciences.\u201d \u201cThis system,\u201d says Dr. Constantin James, \u201cstarts from the\n unknown, appeals to evidences which are nowhere to be found, and falls\n into consequences which are simply absurd and impossible. One would say\n that Darwin merely undertook to blot out creation and bring back\n chaos.\u201d[111] We cannot, without trespassing on the limits prescribed to\n this article, give the scientific arguments by which these and other\n eminent writers set at naught the assumptions, the reasonings, and the\n conclusions of our eccentric \u201cmammalian,\u201d but we venture to say that if\n the reader procures a copy of Dr. James\u2019 work, and examines the\n Darwinian theory in the light of the facts that the learned author has\n culled from physiology, pal\u00e6ontology, and other branches of science\n connected with the history of the animal world, he will be fully\n satisfied that the _Descent of Man_ is nothing but a congeries of\n blunders.\n\n But we may be asked: How is it possible to admit that a theory so\n manifestly absurd should have been received with enthusiasm and lauded\n to the skies by men of recognized ability and scientific eminence? The\n answer is obvious. Scientific eminence, as now understood, means only\n acquaintance with the materials of science, and is no warrant against\n false reasoning. \u201cThere can be fools in science as well as in any other\n walk in life,\u201d says a well-known English writer: \u201cin fact, in\n proportion to the small aggregate number of scientific men, I should be\n disposed to think that there is a greater percentage in that class than\n in any other.\u201d But the same writer gives us another remarkable\n explanation of the fact.\n\n \u201cI have read,\u201d says he, \u201cthe writings of Mr. Darwin and Prof.\n Huxley and others, and had the advantage of personal talk with\n an eminent friend of theirs who shares their views, and I have\n read without prejudice, but failed to find that they advanced\n one solid argument in support of their views. I am quite\n certain that, if this controversy could be turned into a law\n suit, any judge on the bench would dismiss the case against the\n evolutionists with costs, without calling for a reply. The\n eminent friend I allude to, himself one of the first of living\n mathematicians, and an intimate associate of Tyndall, Huxley,\n Spencer, etc., and sharing their views, was candid enough to\n admit that the theory was beset with difficulties, that quite\n as many facts were against it as for it, that it hardly seemed\n susceptible of proof. And when I asked why he held the theory\n under such a condition of the evidence; why, on the assumption\n of this law, Dr. Tyndall chaffed and derided prayer, and Prof.\n Huxley gnashed his teeth at dogma and chuckled over the base\n descent of man, his reply was: \u2018We are bound to hold it,\n because it is the only theory yet propounded which can account\n for life, all we see of life, without the intervention of a\n God. Nature must be held to be capable of producing everything\n by herself and within herself, with no interference _ab extra_,\n and this theory explains how she may have done it. Hence we\n feel bound to hold it, and to teach it.\u2019 Shade of Bacon! here\n is science!\u201d[112]\n\n These words need no comment of ours. We knew already from other\n evidences that a conspiracy had been formed with the aim of turning\n science against religion, and we now see its work. We have here a\n candid avowal that the enthusiasm of certain scientists for the new\n theory has its root in malice, not in reason, and is kept up, though\n with ever-increased difficulty, in the interest not of science but of a\n brutal atheism. In fact, science has nothing to do with the origin of\n man; and the very attempt at transforming a historical event into a\n scientific speculation clearly reveals the wicked determination of\n obscuring, corrupting, and discrediting truth. To carry out their\n object the leaders of the conspiracy organized a body of infidel\n scientists, doctors, professors, lecturers, and journalists; they took\n hold of the scientific press, which was to illustrate the names and\n magnify the merits of such men as Moleschott, Louis B\u00fcchner, Wolff, Von\n Baer, or such men as Clausius, Tyndall, Spencer, and Comte, or as\n Huxley, Draper, and H\u00e4ckel\u2014a task not at all difficult, as these men,\n and others whom we might name, were all bound together in a\n mutual-admiration society, in which the celebrity of each member was an\n honor and an encouragement for all the other members, and the praises\n lavished upon each one were repaid with interest to all the others.\n Thus they have become great scientific oracles, each and all; and by\n ignoring as completely as possible the writings, the discoveries, and\n even the existence of those men of science who did not fall on their\n knees before the new ideas, they succeeded in creating a belief that\n they alone were in possession of scientific truth, and they alone were\n enlightened enough to point out with infallible certainty the hidden\n path of progress.\n\n Their success, to judge from the number and tone of their scientific\n publications, must have been very flattering to their vanity. It is\n probable, however, that their noise is greater than their success. The\n profligate and the sceptic may, of course, relish a theory which\n assimilates them to the ape or the hog, makes the soul a modification\n of matter, and suppresses God; but the honest, the pure, the thoughtful\n are not easily duped by the low hypotheses of these modern thinkers.\n Society in general rejects with disgust a doctrine which aims at\n degrading humanity and destroying the bases of morality, religion, and\n civilization. If there is no God, rights and duties, the main ties of\n the social body, must be given up; justice will become an unmeaning\n word, and civil and criminal courts a tyrannical institution. If man is\n only a modified beast, if his soul is not immortal, if his end is like\n that of the dog, then why should the stronger refrain from hunting and\n devouring the weaker? Do we not hunt and kill and eat other animals?\n Alas! the progress of humanity towards barbarism and cannibalism is so\n intimately and inevitably connected with Darwinism that even the most\n uncivilized of human beings would protest against its admission.\n\n That society is still unwilling to submit to the dictation of this\n advanced science, and that common sense is yet strong enough to silence\n the present scientific blustering, is a fact of which we find an\n implicit confession in the writings and addresses of anti-Christian\n thinkers. _Nature_, a weekly illustrated journal of science, the\n _Popular Science Monthly_, and other publications of the infidel party,\n do not cease to inculcate the introduction of science (materialism,\n evolution, pantheism, etc.) into the schools frequented by our\n children. They have found that our schools are not godless enough to\n secure the triumph of unbelief: they are godless in a negative sense\n only, inasmuch as they ignore God; but now they must be made positively\n godless by teaching theories which do away with creation, which deny\n providence, which leave no hope of reward, and ridicule all fear of\n punishment in an after-life; and they must be made positively immoral\n by teaching that man is always right in following his animal\n proclivities, as all other animals do, and that no human being can be\n justly called to account for his doings, it being demonstrated by\n science that what we call \u201cfree-will\u201d is an organic function subject to\n invariable laws, like everything else in the material world, with no\n greater freedom to choose its course than a stone has under terrestrial\n attraction. These doctrines are widely circulated in printed works, but\n make few converts, owing to the fact that they come too late, and find\n the minds of men already imbued with principles of an opposite nature;\n and, therefore, it is now proposed to instil all this poison into the\n minds of the young, who have no antidote at hand to counteract its\n destructive action. We hope that this new attempt will be defeated; but\n when we see that the attempt is considered necessary for a successful\n diffusion of the false scientific theories of the day, we cannot be\n much mistaken if we infer that the success of such theories up to the\n present time has been less satisfactory to the infidel schemers than\n their publications pretend.\n\n As for the _Descent of Man_, however, no amount of sophistry, in our\n opinion, will succeed in making it fashionable. The Darwinian theory is\n utterly unscientific and unphilosophical. Common sense, geology, and\n history condemn it; logic proclaims it a fraud; and human dignity\n throws upon it a look of pity and dismisses it with ineffable contempt.\n Mr. Darwin may yet live long enough to see his theory totally eclipsed\n and forgotten, when he will ask himself whether it would not have been\n better to devote his talents, his time, and his labor to striving to\n elevate rather than striving to debase his kind.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n MICKEY CASEY\u2019S CHRISTMAS DINNER-PARTY.\n\n In a large, gloomy, bald-looking house in Merrion Street, Dublin, lived\n a red-faced, red-haired little attorney rejoicing in the name of Mickey\n Casey. There is no man better known in Green Street than Mickey, and no\n member of the profession whose services are more eagerly retained by\n the luckless ones whose \u201cmisfortunes\u201d have brought them within range of\n the \u201cblessing of the recorder.\u201d Mickey knows the exact moment to bully,\n concede, or back out; and as for the law, it has been said of him that\n there is not a dirty lane or alley in the whole of the Acts of\n Parliament in which he has not mentally resided for the benefit of his\n _client\u00e8le_, as well as to his own especial emolument. When Mr. Casey\n was put up for membership of the Law Club, there was much muttering and\n considerable frowning in the smoking-room of that legally exclusive\n establishment while his chances of success were being weighed in the\n balance and found wanting; but the election being judiciously set down\n for the long vacation, and Mickey having offered several of the leading\n members unlimited shooting over his trifle of property in the\n neighborhood of Derrymachulish\u2014which, as all well-informed people are\n aware, lies in the very heart of the County Tipperary\u2014somehow or other\n he pulled through by the \u201cskin of his teeth,\u201d and became socially, as\n he was by act of Parliament, a _gentleman_ in the profession.\n\n Mickey was a cheery little man, who loved a drop of the \u201ccrayture\u201d not\n wisely but too well, and whose whole soul was wrapped up in his only\n child, a daughter, a mincing young lady, who was now close upon her\n nineteenth birthday, and who bore a most unmistakable resemblance to\n her sire in the color of her hair, her \u201cchaney blue\u201d eyes, and a\n bulbous-shaped\u2014vulgarly termed thumbottle\u2014nose.\n\n \u201cI\u2019ve spent oceans of money on me daughter\u2019s education, sir,\u201d Mickey\n would exclaim. \u201cOceans\u2014Atlantic and Pacific. She\u2019s had masters and\n mistresses, and tutors and governesses, and short lessons and long\n lessons, some at a guinea apiece, sir\u2014yes, begar, a guinea for thirty\n minutes jingling on a piana. But she\u2019s come out of it well; I\u2019ve got\n her through, and the sentence of the court is that she\u2019s as fine a\n performer as there is in Dublin in the way of an amatewer.\u201d\n\n Mrs. Casey was a very stout, very florid, very untidy lady, whose face\n never bore traces of any recent lavatory process, and whose garments\n appeared to have dropped upon her from the ceiling by chance, retaining\n their original _pose_. The parting of her hair bore a strong\n resemblance to forked lightning, and her nails reminded the visitor of\n family bereavement, so deep the mourning in which they were invariably\n enshrined. She, in common with her husband, was wrapped up in her\n daughter, and lost to every consideration other than the advancement of\n her child\u2019s welfare and happiness.\n\n Matilda Casey was spoiled in her cradle, spoiled at school, spoiled at\n home. Her word was law, her every whim gratified, her every wish\n anticipated. Her parents were her slaves. Dressed by Mrs. Manning, the\n Worth of Dublin, at fancy prices, the newest Parisian toilettes were\n flaunted upon Miss Casey\u2019s neat little figure, whilst her mother went\n in greasy gowns of antiquated date and old-world pattern. The brougham\n was at her beck, and Mrs. Casey was flattered beyond measure when\n offered a seat in it. She asked whom she pleased to Merrion Street, and\n many people came and went whom her mother never even saw. In\n furtherance of her musical talents she had boxes at the Theatre Royal\n and Gaiety for any performance it pleased her Serene Highness to\n select, while she forced her father to run the gauntlet of musical\n societies in order to ensure the necessary vouchers of admission.\n\n And yet Matilda Casey was by no means a bad sort of girl. Her heart was\n in the right place, but her brains were blown out\u2014to use a homely\n metaphor\u2014by the flattery and incense which were being perpetually\n offered up at her shrine, until she was seized with a mad craving to\n enter the portals of the best society.\n\n Hitherto she had but stood at the gate, like the Peri, gazing through\n the golden bars, and was more or less inclined to accept her position;\n but there came a time when she resolved upon endeavoring to _force_ her\n way through.\n\n The task that lay before her was a terrible one\u2014a task full of weeping,\n and wailing, and mortification, and heart-burning, and gnashing of\n teeth. Society in Dublin is as exclusive as in the Faubourg St.\n Germain. The line is so distinctly drawn that no person can cross it by\n mere accident. \u201cNo trespassers admitted\u201d is written up in letters of\n cold steel. The viceregal \u201cset\u201d won\u2019t have the professional set, save\n those whose offices entitle them to the _entr\u00e8e_, and then they are but\n tolerated. The professional set won\u2019t know the mercantile set, and here\n society stops short. A shopkeeper, be his store as large as Stewart\u2019s\n and be he as wealthy as Rothschild, has no chance. He is a Pariah, and\n must pitch his tent out in that wilderness peopled by nobodies. The\n great struggle lies with the mercantile people to become blended with\n the professionals. This is done by money. Of course there are\n exceptional cases, but such a case is _rara avis in terris_.\n\n Matilda Casey was in no set. The people with whom she was acquainted,\n though not amongst the outcasts, held no position whatsoever. Clerks in\n the Bank of Ireland residing at Rathmines; commercial travellers;\n custom-house employ\u00e9s; attorneys of cadaverous practice, or of a\n practice that meant no weight in the profession; needy barristers\n perpetually kotowing to her father for business, and obsequiously civil\n to her _as business_\u2014these people with their wives formed her\n surroundings, and she was sick of them, tired, disgusted, bored to\n death. Why should she not be acquainted with the daughter of Mr.\n Bigwig, Q.C., who resided next door? Surely she played better than Miss\n Bigwig, and dressed better, and rode in her brougham, while Miss B.\n trudged in thick-soled boots in the mud. She had left cards on the\n Bigwigs upon their coming to Merrion Street, but her visit had never\n been returned, while that shabby little girl, Miss Oliver, was for ever\n in and out there; and what was Miss Oliver\u2019s papa but an attorney?\n\n Why was she not at some of the balls perpetually going on around\n her?\u2014the rattling of the cabs to and from which, during the night and\n morning, kept her awake upon her tear-bedewed pillow.\n\n Why did the Serges, of the firm of Serge & Twist, the linen-drapers in\n Sackville Street, leave her out of their invitations to their afternoon\n teas? Assuredly they were no great swells, and she had driven Miss\n Serge on more than one occasion in her brougham, and had sent Mrs.\n Serge a bouquet of hot-house flowers when that lady was laid up with\n the measles.\n\n How came it that their social circle never increased save in the wrong\n direction? Had she not persuaded her papa to give a brief to young Mr.\n Bronsbill, who was possessed of as much brains as a nutmeg-grater, and\n whose advocacy cost Mr. Casey\u2019s client his cause, in order to become\n acquainted with his family?\u2014Mr. B. having informed her\u2014the treacherous\n villain!\u2014that his mother and sisters intended to call upon her.\n\n Had she not thrown open the house to Mr. and Mrs. Minnion, whom she had\n met at the Victoria Hotel, Killarney, the preceding summer, in the hope\n of those delightful introductions which the artful Mrs. M. had held out\n like a glittering jewel before her entranced and eager gaze? Had not\n Mr. and Mrs. Minnion eaten, drunk, and slept in Merrion Street? And\n whom did they introduce? A little drunken captain of militia, who\n insisted upon coming there at unlawful hours of the night, and in\n calling for brandy and soda-water, as if the establishment was a\n public-house, and not even a respectable hotel!\n\n But Fortune is not for ever cruel, and the wheel will turn up a prize\n at possibly the least expected moment.\n\n Mickey Casey knew his daughter\u2019s heart-burning, and strove might and\n main to ease it by even one throb. He gave dinner-parties to the best\n class of men with whom he was acquainted, feeding them like\n \u201cfighting-cocks\u201d upon _petit d\u00eeners_ served by Mitchell, of Grafton\n Street, and giving them wines of the rarest vintages from the cellars\n of Turbot & Redmond.\n\n \u201cYe\u2019ll come to see us again, won\u2019t ye?\u201d he would say to his guest. \u201cAnd\n I say, just bring your wife the next time. Me daughter will send the\n brougham\u2014cost a hundred and fifty at Hutton\u2019s\u2014say Monday next.\u201d\n\n The guest would declare how delighted his wife would be to make the\n acquaintance of so charming a young lady as Miss Casey; but when the\n Monday came round, and with it a dinner fit for the viceroy, the guest\n would arrive wifeless, the lady being laid up with a cold, or \u201cthat\n dreadful baby, you know,\u201d or \u201cvisitors from the country,\u201d and the\n banquet would be served in a lugubrious silence, save when the daughter\n of the house ventured upon some cutting sarcasm anent snobbery and\n stuck-up people.\n\n Matilda Casey could make such a guest wish himself over a mutton-chop\n in his own establishment, instead of the salmi of partridge or plover\u2019s\n eggs served in silver dishes at Number 190 Merrion Street: and she did\n it, too.\n\n \u201cI\u2019ve news for ye, Matilda,\u201d exclaimed Casey one evening as he took his\n seat at the dinner-table. \u201cI\u2019ve news for ye, pet. I defended old\n Colonel Bowdler in a case in which a servant sued him for wages, and\n got him off at half-price. He\u2019s on half-pay, lives with his wife in\n Stephen\u2019s Green, and is a tip-topper, mixing with the lord-lieutenant\u2019s\n household as if they were his own.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, and what is that to me?\u201d exclaimed Miss Casey with considerable\n asperity.\n\n \u201cThis, me darling: he was so pleased at the way I got him out on\n half-pay\u2014ha! ha! ha!\u2014that he and his wife\u2014wife, mind ye\u2014are coming to\n call on you to-morrow.\u201d\n\n Mrs. Casey was never taken into account, Matilda being the central\n figure.\n\n \u201cPshaw! I wonder you can be such a fool, papa. It\u2019s the old story,\u201d\n retorted his daughter. \u201cThis colonel will come here, eat our dinners,\n drink our wine, and perhaps drop his wife\u2019s card without her knowledge,\n as Mr. Neligan did\u2014as we found out to our mortification when we went to\n return a visit that was never paid, and were politely told by Mrs.\n Neligan that her husband had never even mentioned our names to her.\u201d\n\n \u201cNever fear, Matilda. We\u2019re in the right box this time. They\u2019ll be here\n to-morrow, you may depend upon it.\u201d\n\n Casey had his own good reasons for believing that the colonel would\n bide tryste\u2014of which more anon. The morrow came, and with it Colonel\n and Mrs. Bowdler.\n\n The colonel was a chatty, elderly gentleman of imposing aspect and dyed\n hair; his wife a tall, gaunt female, with a vulture-like appearance,\n and a sort of sergeant-major-in-petticoats look\u2014the outcome of many a\n hard-fought campaign. The colonel had sketched Casey and Casey\u2019s social\n desires, and Mrs. Bowdler, like the shrewd veteran that she was, took\n in the situation at a glance.\n\n The flutter of excitement at 190 Merrion Street was intense when the\n thundering knock came to the door, accompanied by a crashing pull at\n the bell.\n\n \u201cBe awfully civil to these people, Jemima,\u201d whispered the colonel as he\n entered, \u201cand we can forage here three times a week. Promise them the\n moon.\u201d\n\n Mrs. Casey fled to her bedroom for the purpose of arranging her person\n in a gorgeous mauve moire-antique all over grease-spots, and Matilda\n rushed frantically to the drawing-room, in order to be _en pose_ to\n receive the welcome visitors.\n\n The coachman, who acted also in the capacity of butler, was feverishly\n hurried from his den at the back of the house, bearing with him a\n gentle aroma of the stable, and, even while opening the hall-door, was\n engaged in thrusting his arms into the sleeves of a coat\u2014a perfect suit\n of mail in buttons.\n\n \u201cMrs. Casey at home?\u201d asked Mrs. Bowdler.\n\n \u201cI dunno whether the misthris is convaynient, ma\u2019am, but Miss Casey is\n above in the dhrawin\u2019-room. Won\u2019t yez come in anyhow?\u201d And the man\n motioned them to ascend with considerable cordiality and welcome.\n\n \u201cTake these cards, please.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, ma\u2019am, me hands is a thrifle dirty; but av it obliges ye\u2014\u201d and\n hastily brushing the fingers of his right hand upon the legs of his\n trowsers, he took the extended pasteboard in as gingerly a manner as if\n he expected it to explode there and then.\n\n The visitors stood in the hall, and so did Luke Fogarty.\n\n \u201cWhat am I for to do wud this ma\u2019am?\u201d he asked, eyeing it with a glance\n full of concern.\n\n \u201cHand it to Miss Casey,\u201d replied Mrs. Bowdler.\n\n \u201cOh! that\u2019s it, is it?\u201d And he darted up-stairs with an alarming\n alacrity.\n\n \u201cThis is a charming _m\u00e9nage_,\u201d said Mrs. Bowdler.\n\n \u201cA fine open country, my dear; no concealed enemy.\u201d\n\n \u201cYez are for to folly me,\u201d shouted Fogarty from the top of the stairs.\n\n Matilda was enchanted to see them, and ordered sherry and cake. Mrs.\n Bowdler professed herself charmed to make Miss Casey\u2019s acquaintance,\n and declared she quite resembled the lord-lieutenant\u2019s youngest\n daughter \u201cAnd in manner, too, Miss Casey, you quite remind me of her.\n We are perpetually at the Viceregal Lodge, and _very_ intimate with the\n Abercorns. We are asked to everything, and\u2014he! he! he!\u2014it costs us a\n small fortune for cabs.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou can have my brougham, Mrs. Bowdler.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! dear, no, my dear young lady, that would never do; but if you lend\n it to me occasionally to take out _dear_ Lady Maude Laseilles, who is\n _such_ an invalid. Do you know her?\u201d\n\n Matilda replied in the negative.\n\n As a matter of fact, no such person existed, but it suited Mrs. Bowdler\n to create her, Mrs. B. being a lady who would make a shilling do duty\n for half a crown. She was a veteran of infinite resources, who had\n borne the burden and heat of the day, and who was now bent upon taking\n her change out of the world. She had heard of the craving to enter the\n portals of society that was devouring Matilda Casey\u2014the attorney had\n openly confided the fact to the colonel\u2014and was resolved upon making\n the most of the situation. The Bowdlers were hangers-on at the Castle,\n mere hacks, who attended the drawing-rooms, the solitary state ball to\n which they were annually invited, and St. Patrick\u2019s ball with\n undeviating punctuality. They resided in a pinched-looking house in\n Stephen\u2019s Green, where Mrs. Bowdler \u201coperated\u201d the colonel\u2019s half-pay\n with the financial ability of a Dudelac, stretching every sixpence and\n racking the silver coin to its final gasp. They went everywhere,\n accepting every invitation, \u201cforaging on the enemy\u201d as the colonel\n expressed it, giving no return. Trading upon his military rank, they\n managed to go about a good deal amongst very third-rate people, who\n were glad to have a colonel to dinner, and a lady who could talk so\n familiarly of half the peerage as his wife. A more singularly worthless\n or selfish pair was not to be found, or a pair who better knew how \u201cto\n work the oracle,\u201d than Colonel Brownlow Bowdler, late of Her Majesty\u2019s\n Fifty-ninth Regiment of Infantry, and Jemima, his consort.\n\n Mrs. Casey came smilingly into the drawing-room and almost embraced\n Mrs. Bowdler.\n\n \u201cWhat will ye take, now? Sure ye must take something. Matilda, make\n Mrs. Colonel Bowdler take something. Colonel, you\u2019ll take a bottle of\n champagne\u2014do, now, that\u2019s right; and I\u2019ll get a little jelly for Mrs.\n Colonel Bowdler, and then Matilda will play for ye. She plays lovely.\u201d\n\n \u201cO mamma!\u201d exclaimed Matilda.\n\n \u201cNow, ye know ye do, darling.\u201d And Mrs. Casey, who is the soul of\n hospitality, joyously descended to the lower regions, in order to send\n up the delicacies she so temptingly set forth.\n\n \u201cAre you going to the ball the Twelfth are giving at the Royal\n Barracks?\u201d asked Mrs. Bowdler.\n\n \u201cI am not, Mrs. Bowdler, but I wish I was,\u201d replied Matilda.\n\n \u201cColonel, do you hear that? Miss Casey has not received a card for the\n Twelfth ball. _You_ must take care that she gets one.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019ll go to Major McVickers at once\u2014the old rascal and I served in\n India together\u2014and see what can be done.\u201d\n\n He had been to Major McVickers five times already to secure invitations\n for himself and wife, but without success.\n\n Luke Fogarty entered with an enormous silver salver bearing the\n champagne, jelly, fruit, and cake. He would have preferred to have been\n behind a runaway horse, ay, and down-hill to boot. He regarded the\n jelly with a savage eye, muttering \u201cWoa! woa!\u201d in an undertone as it\n shook from the movement of the tray, accompanying the exclamation by\n that purring sound so dear to grooms when closely applying the\n curry-comb.\n\n \u201cOpen the champagne, Fogarty,\u201d said Matilda in a tone of lofty command.\n\n \u201cTo be shure I will, miss,\u201d replied the willing retainer, diving into\n the pockets of his trowsers in search of an iron-moulded corkscrew,\n which he eventually brought to the surface after considerable effort.\n \u201cI\u2019ll open it in a jiffy.\u201d\n\n He tortured and twisted the wires until he was nearly black in the face\n from sheer exertion, but, although yielding to his pressure, they still\n clung perplexingly to the cork.\n\n \u201cBad cess to thim for wires! but they have the fingers nearly cut aff\n o\u2019 me. Curse o\u2019 the crows on them!\u201d making another despairing effort;\n \u201cbut I\u2019m not bet yit.\u201d\n\n The wire, slipping suddenly aside, gave freedom to the cork, which\n bounded gaily against the colonel\u2019s nose, and, ricochetting, lodged in\n the bosom of Mrs. Bowdler\u2019s dress, while the froth spurted high in the\n air, descending in seething showers upon the gallant warrior\u2019s head,\n disarranging the few brown hairs which were carefully laid across his\n bald, shining pate, resembling cracks upon an inverted china bowl, and\n causing him to utter maledictions strong and deep.\n\n \u201cSee that, now!\u201d exclaimed Fogarty, clapping his hand on the opening of\n the bottle. \u201cIt\u2019s livelier nor spirits. Hould yer glass, colonel, or\n the lickher \u2018ill be lost intirely.\u201d\n\n \u201cChampagne is my favorite wine,\u201d said Mrs. Bowdler, tossing off her\n glass without winking.\n\n \u201cAnd mine,\u201d added the colonel, filling it for her again, and then\n replenishing his own.\n\n \u201cOh! dear me, I\u2019m so glad to know that. Fogarty, bring another bottle.\n We\u2019ve heaps of it in the cellar at ninety-six shillings a dozen\u2014a top\n price. You\u2019ll always get good wine here,\u201d said Mrs. Casey.\n\n \u201cThe man who would give his guest bad wine ought to be blown from the\n muzzle of a gun,\u201d observed the colonel, plunging at the jelly.\n\n This came strangely from an individual who, whenever he gave a visitor\n a drink, gave it of a liquor warranted to kill at fifty yards. Young\n Bangs, of the Tenth, whose father instructed him to visit Bowdler, was\n laid up for an entire week after a teaspoonful of the colonel\u2019s tap.\n\n The second bottle of champagne appeared.\n\n \u201cYe\u2019d betther open this combusticle yerself, gineral,\u201d suggested\n Fogarty; \u201can mind ye hould on to the cork, or it \u2018ill give ye the slip\n as shure as there\u2019s a bill on a crow.\u201d\n\n \u201cI must introduce your dear daughter here to the Dayrolles,\u201d exclaimed\n Mrs. Bowdler, \u201cand to the Fitzmaurices. You will like Lady Fitzmaurice,\n Miss Casey, and I _know_ she will like _you_.\u201d\n\n \u201cDo you hear that, Matilda? Now, won\u2019t ye play for Mrs. Colonel\n Bowdler?\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m a very poor player,\u201d simpered Matilda.\n\n Nevertheless, she proceeded to the piano and dashed off a _morceau_ of\n Chopin with considerable vigor, during which the colonel improved the\n occasion by pocketing a bunch of grapes and a good-sized cut of\n seed-cake.\n\n \u201c_Bravissima!_\u201d he cried, as if in rapture. \u201cLord St. Lawrence must\n hear that, Jemima; we must try and get him to name a night.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe can reckon on Lady Howth.\u201d\n\n \u201cCertainly. She\u2019s always too glad to be asked.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd the Powerscourts?\u201d\n\n \u201cBy the way, that reminds me: we owe a visit at Powerscourt, do we\n not?\u201d\n\n \u201cI can\u2019t say, colonel, until I look at my list. We have such an\n enormous visiting list, Mrs. Casey,\u201d turning to that lady, who was\n nearly caught in a feeble attempt at winking at her daughter, in order\n to beget that young person\u2019s special attention to the delightful\n conversation going on between the visitors, and who was perfectly\n overwhelmed with dismay and apprehension lest she should have been\n perceived. \u201cI put my engagements down alphabetically, and\u2014he! he!\n he!\u2014I\u2019m so glad to think that _you_ are so high on our list.\u201d\n\n The Bowdlers took their departure, after having promised to dine in\n Merrion Street on the following day.\n\n \u201cTo-morrow will be Thursday, and we dine with the Commander of the\n Forces. Friday we dine at Lord Newry\u2019s.\u201d\n\n \u201cNever mind, my dear,\u201d interposed the colonel, \u201cI\u2019ll come _here_. I\u2019m\n heartily sick of those fearfully ceremonious banquets; besides,\u201d he\n added, \u201cwe are not asked here every day, and Newry or Strathnairn will\n be glad to get us when they can.\u201d\n\n When Mickey Casey returned that evening from his office he found his\n wife and daughter in ecstasies over their newly-made acquaintances.\n There were no words in the English language sufficiently strong to\n convey a tithe of the admiration they entertained for them. Such\n elegance, such urbanity, such distinguished manners, such amiability!\n\n \u201cI\u2019m going to the Twelfth ball,\u201d cried Matilda, \u201cand to be introduced\n to Lady Fitzmaurice and the Dayrolles, and dear Mrs. Bowdler is going\n to give a party for me, and to ask Lady Howth and Lord St. Lawrence and\n Lord Powerscourt all to hear me play. What _shall_ I play? I must begin\n to practise at once. I\u2019ll go to Pigott\u2019s to-morrow for something\n new\u2014_the_ newest thing\u2014and I\u2019ll get Mrs. Joseph Robinson to give me six\n lessons.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019ve asked them to dinner here,\u201d said Mrs. Casey; \u201cand only to think,\n Mick, I\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cI _do_ wish you\u2019d say Mr. Casey, or at all events Michael, mamma,\u201d\n burst in Matilda. \u201cYou see how _dear_ Mrs. Bowdler addressed her\n husband. You\u2019ll find it much more genteel.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhatever you say, me darling. Well, _Mister_ Casey\u2014oh! I can\u2019t do that\n after Micking him for twenty years,\u201d she cried. \u201cWell, Mick, what do\n you think, but the colonel gave up a dinner at the Commander of the\n Forces\u2019 to come to us on Thursday.\u201d\n\n \u201cThursday, did ye say, Mary?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s awkward; that\u2019s to-morrow, and your brother Tim Rooney comes up\n in the morning to stop for a month.\u201d\n\n Mrs. Casey glanced timidly at her daughter, who gave a little shriek.\n\n \u201cIt will never do, mamma. Uncle Timothy is too rough, too vulgar, and\n too careless of what he says and does, to meet Colonel and Mrs.\n Bowdler. It would destroy us at once. You must telegraph him, papa, not\n to come till Friday or Saturday.\u201d\n\n \u201cI can\u2019t, me honey, for he started this morning; and may be it\u2019s in\n Tullamore he is while I\u2019d be wiring to Inchanappa.\u201d\n\n Matilda clasped her hands in a sort of mute despair.\n\n \u201cHe _cannot_ dine at this table to-morrow,\u201d she cried. \u201cI\u2019d rather put\n off the Bowdlers, first.\u201d\n\n \u201cSuppose ye give him an early dinner and plenty of liquor, and send him\n with Fogarty to the play.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe will want Fogarty, papa. His livery opening the door looks very\n genteel.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt won\u2019t do to insult him. Tim has twenty thousand pounds, and you\u2019re\n his god-daughter, me darling,\u201d said Casey.\n\n \u201cI wonder, if we told him that these people were very ceremonious and\n very grand, if he\u2019d consent to dine alone,\u201d suggested Matilda.\n\n \u201cThat would only rouse Tim, my pet,\u201d observed Mrs. Casey. \u201cHe\u2019d just\n come in on purpose then, and if he got a sup in there would be no\n holding him.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat _is_ to be done?\u201d cried Matilda, starting from her chair and\n pacing the floor with long and hasty strides.\n\n At this moment a short, sharp double knock was heard at the hall-door.\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s Tim,\u201d groaned Mrs. Casey.\n\n \u201cA telegraph!\u201d roared Fogarty, bursting into the room as if a human\n life depended upon his celerity.\n\n \u201cYer in luck, Matilda, my pet; it\u2019s from your uncle. Read it.\u201d\n\n It ran thus:\n\n \u201c_From Tim Rooney, \u2018The Ram\u2019s Tail,\u2019 Inchanappa, County\n Tipperary, to Mickey Casey, 190 Merrion Street, Dublin_:\n\n \u201cI can\u2019t stir for a couple of days. I have to bolus a horse,\n and Phil Dempsey is after drinking a cow on me, the\n blackguard!\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat a relief!\u201d cried Matilda Casey, throwing herself into an\n easy-chair.\n\n The dinner at 190 was supplied by Murphy, of Clare Street, the Gunter,\n the Delmonico of Dublin.\n\n \u201cI don\u2019t care a farden about the price,\u201d said Mickey to the smiling\n caterer. \u201cI want it done tip-top, and let the ongtrays be something\n quite out of the common; for Colonel and Mrs. Colonel Bowdler are to\n dine with us, and me wife is very anxious to have everything spiffy.\u201d\n\n Mrs. Casey was in a fever of preparation the livelong day, washing\n glasses, getting out wine, laying the table, while Matilda with her own\n fair hands fitted up the _\u00e9pergne_ with rare hot-house plants and\n crystallized fruits.\n\n \u201cPapa will take Mrs. Colonel Bowdler in to dinner, and Colonel Bowdler\n will take you, mamma.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! no, me pet; I\u2019d rather he\u2019d take you.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut it\u2019s not etiquette.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! bother etiquette,\u201d exclaimed Mrs. Casey, wiping her face in a\n napkin.\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s all very fine to say bother etiquette; but if we do not show it\n now, what will Colonel and Mrs. Colonel Bowdler think of us?\u201d\n\n The appalling consequences attendant upon her refusal to be led to the\n banquet by the gallant colonel smote the mind of Mrs. Casey with such\n considerable force that she at once assented to the proposal, lauding\n her daughter\u2019s foresight to the very skies.\n\n \u201cYou\u2019re a wonderful child, dear; \u2018pon me word, you think of\n everything.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe colonel will sit here, and I\u2019ll put this bouquet opposite his\n chair with the menoo card; and Mrs. Bowdler will sit here, Fogarty,\u201d\n addressing Luke, who was standing by with a portion of harness about\n his neck. \u201cTake care that Colonel Bowdler gets enough of champagne.\u201d\n\n \u201cBe me faix, thin, Miss Matilda, ye\u2019d betther lave out a dozen anyhow,\n for he lapped it up yistherda like wather,\u201d replied that functionary\n with a broad grin.\n\n \u201cAnd see that Mrs. Colonel Bowdler\u2019s glass is always full.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m thinkin\u2019 she\u2019ll see to that herself wudout thrubblin\u2019 me,\u201d\n muttered Fogarty.\n\n \u201cAsk Colonel Bowdler if he\u2019ll take sherry or Madeira with his soup.\u201d\n\n \u201cTo be sure he will, miss.\u201d\n\n \u201cI say ask him which he\u2019ll take.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019ll make bould to say he\u2019ll take the both o\u2019 thim,\u201d grinned Fogarty,\n who, with that quick perception characteristic of his race, had already\n \u201cmeasured his man.\u201d\n\n \u201cBe very particular about the ongtray.\u201d\n\n \u201cI will, miss, an\u2019 the tay-thray too.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd above all things keep sober, Fogarty.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe\u2019s a teetotaler,\u201d chimed in Mrs. Casey. \u201cAren\u2019t ye a teetotaler,\n Luke?\u201d\n\n There was a comical expression upon Luke\u2019s face as he stoutly replied:\n \u201cI am, ma\u2019am; but _I\u2019m not a bigoted wan_.\u201d\n\n At about four o\u2019clock a note arrived from Mrs. Bowdler.\n\n \u201cOh! my gracious, I hope there\u2019s no disappointment,\u201d cried Matilda,\n turning very pale, while dire apprehension was written in the pallid\n features of her mamma.\n\n \u201cI hope not; that would be awful, me pet.\u201d\n\n The note ran thus:\n\n \u201c292 STEPHEN\u2019S GREEN, 3.30 o\u2019clock.\n\n \u201cMY DEAREST MISS CASEY: Our dear friend Major Beamish and his\n _charming_ daughter, nearly related to the Beamishes of Cork,\n have just written to say that they will dine with us to-day. I\n must, therefore, with the MOST _painful reluctance_, ask of you\n to allow us to cancel our engagement to you. I cannot tell you\n how sincerely this grieves me, but the B.\u2019s, though _very old_\n friends, are people of that _haute distinction_ that one cannot\n treat as one possibly could wish.\n\n \u201cWith kindest regards to your _dear_ mamma, and with united\n kind regards from the colonel to all _chez vous_, I am, my\n dearest Miss Casey, yours affectionately,\n\n JEMIMA BOWDLER.\u201d\n\n \u201cThis is agonizing!\u201d cried Matilda, ready to burst into tears.\n\n \u201cOur lovely dinner!\u201d moaned Mrs. Casey.\n\n \u201cThere is some fatality about us.\u201d\n\n \u201cWan pound five a head without wine, and seventeen and six extra for a\n pineapple.\u201d\n\n \u201cWas ever anything so provoking? It\u2019s enough to drive one mad!\u201d\n\n \u201cI suppose Mick must ask in the apprentice to eat the dinner, as we\u2019ve\n to pay for it. Such food for to cock up an apprentice with!\u201d sighed\n Mrs. Casey.\n\n Miss Casey perused the letter again, and finding P. T. O. in the\n corner, turned the page and read a postscript as follows:\n\n \u201cP. S.\u2014The colonel has just come in, and what do you think he\n has the audacity to suggest?\u2014that we ask your permission to\n bring the Beamishes to your dinner to-day. The colonel has\n taken such a fancy to you, _dearest young friend_, that he\n treats you as if he had been on intimate terms for years. He\n insists upon my writing this, but please to blame _him_ for\n this piece of audacity.\n\n J. B.\u201d\n\n Miss Casey\u2019s joy knew no bounds. The Beamishes of Cork, one of the\n oldest families in Ireland\u2014such a charming addition to the party. She\n would order round the brougham, and drive over to dear Mrs. Colonel\n Bowdler\u2019s at once to thank her for such a signal mark of kindness; as\n for the colonel, she could have hugged the gallant veteran from sheer\n gratitude.\n\n _She_ did not know that the Bowdlers wished to shelve the hungry major\n and his daughter in a polite way, and provide them with a sumptuous\n repast at the expense of Mickey Casey. Not she, indeed; so she stepped\n into her carriage, and having driven, first, round to the caterer\u2019s to\n order reinforcements, proceeded to Stephen\u2019s Green, where she was\n received by Mrs. Bowdler in a small, dingy front room _minus_ a fire,\n although it was late in December and bitterly raw and cold.\n\n Mrs. Bowdler kissed her, and gushed over her, and begged to be excused\n for hurrying her away for the tyrant post, as she was compelled to\n finish a letter to her _dearest_ friend, the wife of the\n governor-general of India. Miss Casey cut short her stay, as in duty\n bound, and Mrs. Bowdler ascended to the drawing-room, where three or\n four visitors were assembled around a fairly decent fire\u2014one of the\n ladies, during the temporary absence of the hostess, having\n surreptitiously stirred it up\u2014to whom she imparted the intelligence\n that she had just parted from the governess to Mrs. Geoffrey Ponsonby,\n whom that aristocratic personage had sent over in the Ponsonby brougham\n with a request that she and the colonel would dine in Fitzwilliam Place\n upon that day, whereat the visitors declared that Mrs. Geoffrey\n Ponsonby was evidently very desirous of Mrs. Bowdler\u2019s company, and\n that it was a very remarkable instance of her esteem and regard.\n\n At 6.30, military time, the company arrived, and were ushered into\n Mickey Casey\u2019s study in order to uncloak. Major Beamish wore a short\n brown wig on the top of a very high, a very bald, and very shiny head.\n His eyes were small and watery, and his moustache, greased with a cheap\n ointment, lay like a solid cushion of hair beneath a nose with nostrils\n as expansive as those of a rocking-horse. He was attired in a faded\n suit of evening clothes, his shirt-bosom bearing the indelible imprint\n not only of the hand of Time, but of the hand of a reckless laundress,\n who hesitated not to use her nails upon the sierras of its coy and\n threadbare folds.\n\n Miss Beamish was a gushing maiden of twenty anything, possessed of a\n profusion of frizzly fair hair, done in a simple and childlike fashion,\n and bound by a fillet of blue ribbon over a vast expanse of forehead.\n Her eyes were greenish gray, and not quite free from a suspicion of a\n squint. Her nose resembled that of her sire, and her mouth was almost\n concealed by her thin and bloodless lips. Her gaunt frame was enveloped\n in a gauzy substance over a pink silk, which betrayed the recent\n presence of the smoothing-iron. Bog-oak ornaments rattled around her\n neck, at her ears, and upon her lean and sinewy arms.\n\n \u201cColonel an\u2019 Missis Bowhowdler,\u201d roared Fogarty, as the guests entered\n the drawing-room. \u201cMajor an\u2019 Missis Baymish.\u201d\n\n \u201cMiss, fellow, Miss,\u201d impatiently cried the major.\n\n \u201cMiss Baymish, I mane,\u201d adding in an undertone: \u201cIt\u2019s not but she\u2019s\n ould enough and tough enough for to be a missis tin times over.\u201d\n\n \u201cThis is _so_ good of you,\u201d said Matilda, shaking hands all round, \u201cand\n _so_ good of _dear_ Mrs. Bowdler to give us the pleasure of having\n you.\u201d\n\n \u201cMonstrous fine gal. Right good quarters,\u201d observed the major to the\n colonel, glancing round the room at the superb mirrors, buhl cabinets,\n inlaid tables, rich hangings, and furniture upholstered in yellow\n satin.\n\n \u201cYou might do worse than take this girl. Casey\u2019s good for twenty\n thousand,\u201d suggested the colonel.\n\n \u201cIf Tibie was once quartered on the enemy I\u2019d enlist again\u2014I would,\n sir, by George! I\u2019d take the shilling from that seductive and dangerous\n recruiting sergeant, Hymen,\u201d exclaimed the major, wagging one soiled\n white glove and posing himself after a gratified and prolonged glance\n in the mirror.\n\n \u201cMiss Matilda,\u201d whispered Fogarty, who had just entered, and who was\n endeavoring to attract her attention. \u201cMiss Matilda! Miss Tilly!\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat is it, Fogarty?\u201d asked Miss Casey at length; and upon perceiving\n him, \u201cWhat _is_ it?\u201d she repeated somewhat testily, as Mrs. Bowdler was\n engaged in narrating a delightful conversation with the\n lady-lieutenant.\n\n \u201cThe masther\u2019s clanin\u2019 himself, an\u2019 he wants a lind av yer soap, miss,\n as there\u2019s not a screed in the house, be raisin\u2019 av the misthris\n washin\u2019 the glass an\u2019 chany wild the rest av it.\u201d\n\n The guests filed down in the order prescribed by Matilda, save that she\n fell to the arm of Major Beamish, who overwhelmed her with compliments,\n which only lasted until the soup was served, as from that moment his\n attention became concentrated upon the delicacies placed before him, on\n which he opened so murderous and effective a fire as almost to paralyze\n the energies of the ubiquitous and perspiring Fogarty, and the\n solicitous attentions of a young lady from the kitchen, whose\n stertorous breathing made itself heard above the din and clatter of\n knives, forks, and conversation, in a distinct and somewhat alarming\n manner.\n\n \u201cHi! some more soup. Another cut of fish. I\u2019ll try that _entr\u00e9e_ again.\n Let me have that last _entr\u00e9e_ once more. Some turkey and ham. Why\n don\u2019t you look alive with the champagne? A slice of roast\n beef\u2014underdone. Some pheasant; ay, I\u2019ll try the woodcock. Jelly, of\n course.\u201d And the gallant major kept the servants pretty busily engaged\n during the entire repast.\n\n Matilda was in a shimmer of delight. Her darling hopes were being\n realized at last, and society was budding for her. A colonel and his\n wife, a major and his daughter\u2014why, what higher rank need any person\n desire? How friendly, how gracious, and how charmingly they ate and\n drank and praised everything! This was life\u2014a life worth living; this\n was that delicious glow of which she had read in _Lothair_ and other\n novels portraying fashionable existence.\n\n While these rosy thoughts were coursing through her brain a noise was\n heard in the direction of the hall, and a man\u2019s voice in tones of angry\n expostulation.\n\n \u201cYour servants are quarrelling, Mrs. Casey,\u201d observed Mrs. Bowdler,\n holding up her hand to enjoin silence.\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s that Luke Fogarty; he can\u2019t keep his fingers off the dishes, and\n the girl is\u2014\u201d\n\n At this moment the individual in question burst into the apartment with\n an expression as if some fearful catastrophe had just happened.\n\n \u201cWhat is the matter, Fogarty?\u201d demanded Mrs. Casey, glancing at her\n retainer with an inquiring eye.\n\n \u201cWe\u2019re bet, ma\u2019am,\u201d responded Fogarty in a half-whisper.\n\n \u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d\n\n \u201cWe\u2019re bet up intirely. Misther Tim has came.\u201d\n\n Mrs. Casey felt as if she would have fainted, while Matilda bit her\n lips till the blood came; and as they were still gazing at each other\n in the direst consternation, Mr. Timothy Rooney entered the apartment,\n clad in a bulgy Ulster that had known fairs and markets and\n race-courses for several previous years, a felt hat of an essentially\n rakish and vulgar description, his pants shoved into his muddy boots\n after the fashion of a Texas ranger, while his hands were swollen and\n the color of beet-root.\n\n \u201cCompany, be the hokey crikey!\u201d he exclaimed, as he advanced to embrace\n the reluctant hostess. \u201cAh! Mary, ye didn\u2019t expect me,\u201d giving her a\n kiss that made the glass drops upon the chandelier jingle again.\n\n \u201cNo, we didn\u2019t expect you, Tim,\u201d gasped his sister.\n\n \u201cNo, of course not. Shure I sent ye a telegraph that that villyan of a\n Phil Dempsey drank me best cow on me\u2014tellin\u2019 ye that\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cWon\u2019t you take some dinner in your own room?\u201d interposed his niece,\n now the color of a peony.\n\n \u201cCome over here and kiss your uncle, ye young rogue. Up-stairs, indeed!\n What would I do that for?\u201d\n\n \u201cYou are not exactly dressed for dinner.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! I\u2019ve a shirt on under this Ulster, and I\u2019ll show a bit of the\n bussom, as the man said, never fear. Well, Mickey, me hearty, how goes\n it? Put it there,\u201d extending his beet-root fist to his brother-in-law.\n\n \u201cMy brother, a regular character, immensely wealthy; obliged to put up\n with his ways,\u201d explained Mrs. Casey, while her daughter retired with\n Mr. Rooney, with a view to inducing that gentleman to refrain from\n again putting in an appearance.\n\n \u201cA very fine, joyous son of the Emerald Isle,\u201d cried the colonel,\n helping himself to champagne.\n\n \u201cWhen I was quartered at Dum Dum,\u201d observed the major, following the\n good example of his senior officer, \u201cwe had just such a joyous,\n devil-may-care fellow in the Tenth. He resided in the bungalow with me,\n the compound being in common. One morning, while enjoying\n chotohassary\u2014the major aired his Indian experiences and Hindoo\n acquirements upon all occasions\u2014 I happened to call my kitmagar as well\n as my consumar, who was\u2014\u201d\n\n The narrative was interrupted by the entrance of Mr. Rooney and his\n despairing niece. Tim had given his face what is commonly known as a\n \u201cScotch lick,\u201d causing it to shine again. He was about forty years of\n age, rough-looking as a Shetland pony, and a \u201cwarm man\u201d\u2014_i.e._, the\n possessor of a few thousands in the bank and of a well-to-do,\n well-stocked farm.\n\n \u201cI\u2019m tidy enough now, I think; at all events, yer friends will be aisy\n on a traveller. Why don\u2019t ye introduce us, Mick? Where are yer\n manners?\u201d\n\n He was presented in due form by the abashed Casey, and, after having\n shaken hands with all round, commenced a vigorous attack upon a slice\n of turbot with his knife, plunging that useful instrument two or three\n inches into his mouth at every helping, until Miss Beamish, who was\n seated opposite, shuddered with apprehension.\n\n \u201cIs there anything the matter with ye, ma\u2019am?\u201d he demanded, upon\n observing a ghastly contraction of the muscles of her face.\n\n \u201cN-nothing,\u201d she stammered.\n\n \u201cYe haven\u2019t got a pain?\u201d\n\n \u201cUncle, help yourself to champagne,\u201d shrilly interposed Matilda.\n\n \u201cPshaw! get me some whiskey, me pet,\u201d adding, as he winked facetiously\n upon Mrs. Bowdler, \u201c_champagne is taydious_.\u201d\n\n \u201cBy and by, uncle,\u201d said the agonized girl.\n\n \u201cA little drop wouldn\u2019t harm Miss Baymish there, Matty; she looks as\n if\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cTake some more beef, Tim,\u201d put in Mrs. Casey.\n\n \u201cWell, just wan skelp more, Mary. Room for wan inside, as the man\n said.\u201d\n\n When the ladies had retired Mr. Rooney stretched his legs beneath the\n table and his body on the chair until his chin was nearly on a level\n with the table.\n\n \u201cNow, Mickey, in with the hot water, and let the girl put a kettle\n under the pump. Are ye fond of sperrits, major?\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, the fact is that spirits don\u2019t agree with me.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh, then, Mickey Casey has some that will oil the curls of yer wig for\n ye.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhen I was quartered at Dum Dum,\u201d observed the major hastily, \u201cthere\n happened to be a very rollicking, gay, charming fellow of our mess, who\n shared my bungalow with me\u2014the compound being in common. One morning I\n was engaged at chotohassary and\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat the dickens is chotohassary?\u201d\n\n \u201cBreakfast, Mr. Rooney.\u201d\n\n \u201cI never heard it called by that name before. Go on, you old son of a\n gun.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, sir,\u201d continued the major somewhat stiffly, \u201cI had occasion to\n call my kitmagar.\u201d\n\n \u201cKit who?\u201d asked Tim.\n\n \u201cKitmagar, one of my servants.\u201d\n\n \u201cAn Irishman, of course.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, sir, a Hindoo.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, this flogs; are ye listening to this, Mickey?\u201d addressing Casey,\n who had drawn off the colonel.\n\n \u201cAm I listening to what?\u201d asked the host rather gruffly.\n\n \u201cTo this old fogy here.\u201d\n\n \u201cReally, Mr. Rooney\u2014\u201d began the offended major.\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t mind him, Major Beamish,\u201d cried Casey, \u201cbut pitch into the\n claret; it\u2019s Ch\u00e2teau Lafitte of a comet vintage. At least, Redmond told\n me so, and he ought to know.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s a very fine wine, Casey\u2014a soft wine, sir, in superb condition,\n and heated to perfection,\u201d observed the major, tossing off a glassful\n and quickly replacing the goblet.\n\n \u201cGoes down like mother\u2019s milk,\u201d added the colonel, following suit.\n\n \u201cWell, major, go on about Kit Megar,\u201d urged Rooney.\n\n \u201cCoffee is in the dhrawin\u2019-room, jintlemin,\u201d yelled Fogarty, entering.\n\n \u201cWell, let it stay there, Luke.\u201d\n\n \u201cShall we join the ladies?\u201d asked Casey, with a society air.\n\n The colonel looked at the major, the major looked at the colonel, and\n both looked at the claret jugs.\n\n \u201cOh! hang it all, no,\u201d responded the major; \u201cthis wine is too good\u2014much\n too good.\u201d\n\n \u201cMore power to yer elbow, Baymish! An old dog for a hard road,\u201d laughed\n Tim Rooney. \u201cEh, Luke, this is a knowing old codger.\u201d\n\n Mr. Fogarty, being thus appealed to, gave a willing assent: \u201cUp to\n every trick in the box.\u201d\n\n After the gallant warriors had sufficiently punished Casey\u2019s cellar\n they repaired to the drawing-room. As they ascended the stairs they\n compared notes.\n\n \u201cDid you ever meet such a queer customer as this brother-in-law?\u201d\n\n \u201cNever. He\u2019s the most vulgar, insolent blackguard I ever encountered.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe has lots of money.\u201d\n\n \u201cI wonder does he play loo?\u201d\n\n \u201cWe can ask him.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe\u2019d play a lively game.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd could be plucked like a green gosling.\u201d\n\n To the intense relief of the Casey family, Mr. Rooney stoutly refused\n to adjourn to the upper regions, but remained in the dining-room\n smoking a short clay pipe and drinking whiskey-punch.\n\n Miss Beamish, upon hearing that he was enormously wealthy and unmarried\n to boot, began to build a castle in Spain, in which she figured as\n ch\u00e2telaine, while the uncultured proprietor was gradually toned down by\n those feminine influences which smooth the angles of the most rugged\n natures.\n\n \u201cI _do_ like this child of nature, Miss Casey,\u201d she gushed; \u201cit is\n sweet to hear the wild bird in the full, untutored sweetness of its\n note. Shall we see your uncle again to-night?\u201d\n\n \u201cI hope not,\u201d was Matilda\u2019s reply.\n\n \u201cOh! why? He reminds me so much of an _arri\u00e8re pens\u00e9e_, a bright oasis\n in the desert of my life, that I feel as if I could\u2014but why recall\n recollections that are fraught with bitterness, why strike a chord\n which produces but\u2014discord?\u201d letting her pointed chin drop upon the\n bog-oak necklet, which responded by a dull rattle.\n\n Matilda played for the major\u2014who marked her as the successor of the\n late Mrs. B\u2014\u2014, wagging his be-wigged pate to the music and applauding\n with maudlin vigor.\n\n \u201cExquisite! Divine! When I was quartered at Dum Dum\u2014\u201d And he jogged\n over the same road, to arrive as far as the consumar, when Mrs. Bowdler\n intimated that it was time to leave.\n\n \u201cBut ye won\u2019t go without supper? Just a sandwich and a glass of wine,\u201d\n entreated Mrs. Casey.\n\n Of course they wouldn\u2019t go, and they didn\u2019t go until they had partaken\n largely of both.\n\n \u201cNever was more charmed in my life,\u201d exclaimed the colonel, as he bade\n good-night. \u201cRight glad I refused Lord Howth.\u201d\n\n \u201cI thought it was the commander-in-chief,\u201d said Mrs. Casey artlessly.\n\n \u201cAhem! of course, and so it was; but I have so many invites, you see,\n that I forget.\u201d\n\n Gentlemen who draw upon their imagination for their facts must needs\n possess accurate memories.\n\n \u201cYou\u2019ll all dine with us on Christmas day,\u201d said Mrs. Casey.\n\n \u201cOh! yes, _do_, please,\u201d added Matilda.\n\n \u201cDo, colonel; do, major, like good fellows,\u201d urged Casey.\n\n \u201cWell, really, my dear, I don\u2019t know what to say,\u201d exclaimed Mrs.\n Bowdler, \u201cbut I fear we cannot get out of going to Lady Meath\u2019s.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! hang Lady Meath; _you_ may go to her, I\u2019ll come here,\u201d laughed the\n colonel.\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s fixed,\u201d said Casey; \u201cand you, major?\u201d\n\n \u201cI couldn\u2019t say no to such a good offer. When I was quartered in Dum\n Dum\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cIs this old fogy at it still?\u201d asked Tim Rooney, emerging from the\n dining-room into the hall where they were now all assembled.\n\n \u201cWe are coming to dine here on Christmas day, Mr. Rooney,\u201d said Miss\n Beamish, casting a languishing look at him.\n\n \u201cAre ye? Thin upon me conscience ye\u2019ll git a tail end of beef that will\n feed you for a fortnight\u2014wan of me own cows. And all Mary here has to\n do is see that the wisps of cabbage is plenty.\u201d\n\n With great hand-shaking, and a general buzz of pleased excitement, the\n guests took their departure.\n\n \u201cWhat a success!\u201d exclaimed Matilda, throwing herself on a sofa that\n had been wheeled out of the dining-room into the hall in order to make\n room, \u201cexcept for\u201d\u2014nodding towards Tim, who was endeavoring to light a\n bedroom candlestick with a singularly unsteady hand.\n\n \u201cThey all took to him,\u201d whispered Mrs. Casey.\n\n \u201cI never got such a turn as when he came in. O mamma! I thought I\n should have died.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, aren\u2019t the Bowdlers nice, agreeable people, Matilda?\u201d demanded\n Mr. Casey.\n\n \u201cDelightful, exquisite! Such elegant refinement. And the Beamishes are\n equally well bred.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat major is a downy old bird.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe is a most perfect gentleman. How he did praise my playing!\u201d\n\n The Caseys did not see much of the Bowdlers during the next few days,\n the colonel having over-eaten himself, and his wife being laid up with\n an attack of bronchitis; but Major Beamish and his daughter were most\n constant in their attentions, calling, staying to dinner, going to the\n theatre\u2014Casey paying for all, cabs included\u2014coming home to supper, and\n other attentions equally delicate and one-sided. The major was very\n _prononc\u00e9_ in his manner toward Matilda, who, while she accepted his\n homage, did not for a moment imagine it meant more than that excessive\n and chivalrous politeness which distinguishes the _vieux militaire_ of\n any nationality.\n\n Miss Beamish lay in wait for Tim Rooney, and spun her web as deftly as\n the uncouth movements of this desirable fly permitted. She adroitly\n learned his hours for going out, and invariably intercepted him.\n\n \u201cI\u2019m always meeting that wan,\u201d he observed to his sister. \u201cShe\u2019s for\n ever in the street.\u201d\n\n \u201cShe\u2019s a very elegant lady, Tim.\u201d\n\n \u201cElegant enough, but, as tough as shoe-leather.\u201d\n\n By degrees, however, the fair Circe interested him, and when the others\n were engaged in listening with rapt attention to the major\u2019s\n oft-repeated story commencing, \u201cWhen I was quartered at Dum Dum,\u201d Tibie\n Beamish, eyes plunged into those of the Tipperary farmer, would hang\n upon his accents as he detailed his own \u201ccuteness\u201d in the purchase of a\n drove of heifers at the great fair of Ballinasloe, or how he palmed off\n a spavined pony upon a neighboring but less wide-awake grazier.\n\n If a woman wants to win a man, let her listen to him, if he be fond of\n narrating his personal experiences; and what man does not revel in\n _ego_?\u201d\n\n \u201cShe _is_ a nice little girl, Mary, and is not above learning a trifle.\n I\u2019ll be bail she could go into Ballinasloe fair next October and finger\n a baste as well as that villyan Phil Dempsey, from the knowledge I give\n her.\u201d\n\n The spell was working.\n\n * * * * *\n\n Christmas day came, bright, crisp, and joyous. Snow had fallen for the\n previous few days, and was now hard and shining in the streets,\n rendering walking somewhat hazardous and sliding almost unavoidable.\n\n Colonel and Mrs. Bowdler arrived very early at Merrion Street\u2014in fact,\n just in time for luncheon\u2014and by a strange coincidence Major Beamish\n and his daughter dropped in almost at the same moment. A walk was\n proposed, but abandoned, and the party, broken up into two camps, sat\n chatting around the fires in the back and front drawing-rooms.\n\n Everybody is hungry on Christmas day. Everybody thinks of the boiled\n turkey, Limerick ham, roast beef, plum-pudding, and mince-pies. Why,\n then, should the guests of Mickey Casey prove an exception to the rule?\n\n Fogarty announced the dinner in a voice that savored of a joyous\n anticipation. He had had a private and confidential snack with the\n cook, but merely enough to make him wish for more.\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s me tail end of beef,\u201d exclaimed Tim Rooney, as the huge mound\n of golden fatted meat was uncovered, behind which the host sat in a\n state of total eclipse\u2014\u201cthat\u2019s me tail end, and a lovelier baste never\n nipped grass, nor the\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cWill you carve this turkey, Tim?\u201d interrupted his sister.\n\n \u201cTo be sure I will, Mary; but ye must let me do it me own way,\u201d\n divesting himself of his coat and proceeding to work with a will.\n\n \u201cO Tim!\u201d\n\n \u201cO uncle!\u201d\n\n \u201cLet him alone,\u201d exclaimed Mrs. Bowdler, whose teeth were watering for\n a slice of the breast. \u201cSuch a gigantic bird requires to be carved\n _sans c\u00e9r\u00e9monie_.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhen I was quartered at Dum Dum\u2014\u201d began the major.\n\n \u201cSee here, now, me ould codger, we\u2019ve had enough of that singsong.\u201d\n\n The major smiled grimly and tossed off a glass of Amontillado.\n\n \u201cYou _are_ a character, Rooney,\u201d he said.\n\n Tim acquitted himself admirably, cutting the bird and innumerable jokes\n at the same time, many of them of a personal nature, such as allusions\n to the gallant major\u2019s wig, which he called a \u201cjasey,\u201d the scragginess\n of Mrs. Bowdler, and the rosy tip at the extremity of the colonel\u2019s\n nasal appendage. However, as everybody was in good-humor, his _faceti\u00e6_\n passed off without exciting ill-feeling, and all went as merry as a\n marriage-bell.\n\n The dinner had disappeared, and the company sat tranquilly over the\n dessert. Tim, having resigned his post of honor, returned to his chair\n beside Miss Beamish, to whom he whispered a good deal, to the intense\n amusement of his brother-in-law, who declared that Tim Rooney had been\n hit at last.\n\n \u201cThere\u2019s many a true word said in jest, Mick,\u201d retorted Tim. Miss\n Beamish hung down her head and tried to blush, and, failing in this,\n essayed a cough, which proved more successful.\n\n \u201cOh! Tim is an old bachelor,\u201d cried Mrs. Casey, \u201cand a most determined\n one.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s never too late to mend, Mary.\u201d\n\n \u201c_You\u2019ll_ never mend, Tim.\u201d\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t be too sure of that,\u201d ogling his fair neighbor, who again tried\n a cough, which, however, terminated in a hoarse gurgle.\n\n Tim Rooney was possessor of twenty thousand pounds, all in the Bank of\n Ireland. His farm was valued at ten thousand, and his stock at five\n thousand more. He was Matilda\u2019s godfather, and, as a matter of course,\n all these good things would revert to her in time. It was a standing\n joke at Merrion Street that Tim should get married without delay.\n\n \u201cNot a bit of it,\u201d he would retort. \u201cI\u2019ll keep looking at them during\n the winter, and I\u2019ll take another summer out of myself.\u201d\n\n His joking now on the subject of Miss Beamish was exquisite fun to the\n family of Casey, who enjoyed it only as family jokes _can_ be enjoyed.\n\n \u201cYou\u2019ll ask me to the wedding, uncle?\u201d said Matilda.\n\n \u201cSure you\u2019ll be a bridesmaid, Matty.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd you\u2019ll have to give me a new dress, a real Parisian one; won\u2019t he,\n Miss Beamish?\u201d\n\n Miss Beamish bashfully tittered.\n\n \u201cWhen is it to be, Tim?\u201d asked Mr. Casey.\n\n \u201cNext Thursday, then,\u201d he grinned.\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s mighty quick.\u201d\n\n \u201cDelays is dangerous.\u201d\n\n \u201cRight, Tim,\u201d cried Casey. \u201cIf I hadn\u2019t asked your sister on the\n Friday, Joe Mulligan, the tailor would have\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cPapa, _do_ see that Colonel Bowdler takes his wine,\u201d almost shrieked\n Matilda.\n\n O agony! he was about informing their patrician guests that his rival\n had been a\u2014tailor!\n\n \u201cWell, see here, Mickey, and see here, Mary, and see here, Matty,\u201d said\n Mr. Rooney, rising, \u201cI\u2019ll give ye all a toast.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! toasts are vulgar; are they not, Colonel Bowdler?\u201d interposed\n Matilda.\n\n \u201cWell, ahem! except upon special occasions they are not in vogue,\u201d\n replied that gallant warrior.\n\n \u201cWell this _is_ a special occasion, and a _very_ special\n occasion\u201d\u2014Hear! hear! from the host\u2014\u201cand wan that calls for particular\n mention; an\u2019 it\u2019s health, long life, and happiness to Mrs. Tim Rooney\n that is for to be. Ye must all drink it on yer legs.\u201d\n\n Anything to humor Tim, now that the Bowdlers and Beamishes tolerated\n him. So with much laughing on the part of the gentlemen, and much\n giggling on the part of the ladies, the toast was drunk with all honor.\n\n \u201cAnd now, Mick, Mary and Matty,\u201d cried Tim, \u201cI may as well let the cat\n out of the bag. Me and Miss Tibie is to be married on Thursday.\u201d\n\n Had a bombshell fallen in their midst greater consternation could not\n have shown itself upon the countenances of the Casey family.\n\n \u201cYer not in airnest, Tim,\u201d said Casey, endeavoring to smile a sickly\n smile.\n\n \u201cTim must have his joke,\u201d observed Mrs. Casey, her face as white as a\n sheet.\n\n \u201cUncle is _so_ full of fun,\u201d tittered Matilda, dire apprehension in\n every lineament.\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s no jest; is it, Tibie?\u201d asked Tim of his _fianc\u00e9e_.\n\n \u201cNo, Timothy, I am proud to say it is not,\u201d responded Miss Beamish,\n placing her hand in the arm of her lover.\n\n * * * * *\n\n \u201cAnd to think I gave that Bowdler a hundred pounds for to lose us forty\n thousand,\u201d groaned Casey, as, seated with his weeping wife and\n daughter, he grimly surveyed the wedding-cards of Mr. and Mrs. T.\n Rooney. \u201cThis comes of yer infernal tomfoolery wantin\u2019 to get into\n society that wouldn\u2019t touch ye with a forty-foot pole. Serve ye right.\u201d\n\n \u201cServe us right indeed!\u201d echoed the two ladies.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n CATHOLIC \u201cCIRCLES\u201d FOR WORKING-MEN IN FRANCE.\n\n Immediately after the German invasion and the Paris Commune there\n existed already at Paris a Catholic \u201cCircle\u201d of working-men, distinct,\n if not in appearance, yet in reality, from the associations of young\n apprentices called by this name, or under the more appropriate one of\n _Patronages_. It was, in fact, a working-men\u2019s association\u2014a little\n Christian republic; self-governing, by means of a council chosen from\n among its own number, the members of which council were considered as\n irremovable. On its festivals the whole association assembled in the\n chapel belonging to the circle; there its elected functionaries were\n received into office at the foot of the altar, there they made frequent\n communions, and thence, in accordance with the customs of the ancient\n confraternities of craftsmen, they bore in procession the banners of\n their patron saints. There were formed earnest men, accustomed to hear\n the language of duty, and ready to make the sacrifices it demands, as\n those of their number who died in the war had testified, as well as the\n many more who did not cease to incur, with patience and steadfastness,\n the persecutions of their scoffing companions in the ateliers.\n\n This association was the work of a religious of the Institute of St.\n Vincent de Paul\u2014M. Maignen, Director of the Circle of Montparnasse. The\n subscriptions of the circle, however, which had previously sufficed for\n its support, were unequal to the burden incurred by its installation,\n and the external subscriptions which had hitherto aided it had become\n few in number and small in amount.\n\n M. Maignen then resolved to assemble in council, on the evening of\n Christmas day, a group of capitalists, among whom were three deputies,\n three well-known writers, and three military officers, scarcely known\n to each other except by name; but they were all good and earnest\n Catholics, and had, moreover, suffered and fought for their country.\n After uniting in prayer they resolved to seek, in the definitions of\n the church in regard to her relations to civil society, the germ of the\n sole social force capable of saving France from the consequences of her\n errors; and this force, they decided, should be constituted in the form\n of Catholic Circles for Working-men, similar to the one in which they\n were met together.\n\n They began, in the first place, by addressing to the Holy Father the\n expression of their resolution, to which he granted his benediction. In\n the next they sent, by thousands of copies, an energetic appeal to all\n \u201cmen of good-will.\u201d \u201cThe revolution,\u201d they said, \u201chas descended from\n the brains of (so-called) philosophers into the minds of the people.\n Are we to leave our misguided working-men to perdition\u2014a perdition in\n which they will also involve their country\u2014or, by drawing a\n supernatural strength from the heart of Jesus\u2014himself a\n working-man\u2014shall we not oppose the associations of men who love\n darkness rather than light by the Catholic Association, and meet the\n lessons of materialism by those of the Gospel, and a cold\n cosmopolitanism by the love of our country?\u201d\n\n Then the little group of men who signed the engagement further united\n themselves by a religious bond\u2014the daily recital of a prayer, and an\n annual communion for the intentions of the work, the duties of which\n the members distributed among themselves according to their respective\n facilities.\n\n Each section set to work under the direction of a chief: the first for\n the general promulgation of the work, the second for its foundations,\n the third for the creation of resources, and the fourth for the popular\n diffusion of its teaching. The sections worked independently of each\n other, but met in committee when there was any need for arranging or\n deciding as to any general plan of action. For the purpose of directing\n and controlling the action of the fourth section the committee also\n appointed a council under the name of _J\u00e9sus-Ouvrier_. Thus the work\n was constituted in its first _committee_\u2014that is to say, the first\n association of the directing class\u2014on the principle of its first\n \u201ccircle,\u201d the Catholic declaration and the division of\n responsibilities, and, lastly, as a sign and pledge of the union of the\n active members of the work, the religious bond.\n\n The association thus organized bore marvellous fruit, and in a few\n months the committee found itself able to relieve the Cercle\n Montparnasse by creating two similar ones in the quarters (of evil\n notoriety) of Belleville and Montmartre, which were chosen with the\n intention of a public expiation, and to furnish each of the circles\n with a council of its quarter.\n\n This was the golden age of the work, which was, as it were, crowned by\n the high testimony it received at the Congress of Directors of the\n Catholic Working-men\u2019s Associations assembled at Poitiers under the\n auspices of Mgr. Pie. It obtained also an exceptional _\u00e9clat_ from the\n remarkable eloquence of one of its initiators at the Cercle\n Montparnasse\u2014the intrepid Count Albert de Mun\u2014as well as from the fact\n of there being several other military officers among them. The work\n appeared to be marked with a providential character, having at its\n outset the stamp of trial, followed by that of rapid expansion, and\n possessing another in the saintly character of its first founder; for,\n although God may be pleased to employ unworthy instruments to promote\n his merciful designs, it will always be found that, in the first\n instance, they have been deposited, as in a chalice, in a holy and\n devoted soul.\n\n The impetus was given. The large towns of France answered the appeal by\n requesting the initiators to form, within them, committees like the\n Directing Committee at Paris. The principles of the constitution never\n varied; _i.e._, Catholic affirmation by the acceptance of the religious\n bond, and the general bases of the work, division of labor among the\n members of the local association, and periodic communication with the\n secretariate general.\n\n This in a short time was carried out at Lyons, Bordeaux, Marseilles,\n Lille, and many other places of importance, numerous smaller towns, and\n even villages, asking for the same institution. And everywhere it bore\n fruit, the formation of a committee being in every instance followed by\n the opening of a circle.\n\n At the same time the Council of _J\u00e9sus-Ouvrier_, and, following its\n example, the committees of the large towns, opened public conferences\n in popular quarters, where the people were addressed in frank and\n energetic language, inspired by the intimate union of religious and\n social faith, and the doctrines of liberalism boldly denounced, which\n substitute for the precepts \u201cLove one another\u201d and \u201cBear ye one\n another\u2019s burdens\u201d that of \u201cTo each according to his work\u201d\u2014a maxim good\n enough in itself, but which the employer translates into \u201cEach one for\n himself,\u201d and the employed into \u201cMy turn next for enjoyment.\u201d These\n declarations, repeated simultaneously in all parts of France, gave the\n work a remarkable unity of spirit, which was amply manifested at the\n first general assembly of its members, held in the spring of 1873.\n\n Difficulties, however, arose in proportion to the progress made. Few\n adherents were obtained from among the manufacturing chiefs, on whom\n depends the whole economy of the working-classes; while the committees,\n formed of men little accustomed to study the laws of labor, did not\n well observe its divisions, and thus dwindled away. That of Paris, to\n which had been allotted the most complete autonomy, and which was more\n especially devoted to the general propagation of the work, gave way\n beneath its accumulated burden.\n\n \u201cWe then\u201d (to quote the words of one of the members in his address to\n the Congress at Rheims)\u2014\u201cWe then turned our eyes with confidence to her\n who is the help of Christians, our ever Blessed Lady, resolving to go\n all together and invoke her aid in one of the sanctuaries of France\n where she has most anciently manifested her power, and where formerly\n the kingdom was dedicated to her by a solemn vow\u2014Notre Dame de Liesse.\n The funds of the Paris committee were already exhausted and the year\n only half over. We collected ten thousand francs, and unhesitatingly\n devoted them to defray the expenses of this distant pilgrimage.\n\n \u201cThe committees of the north were invited to join it at the head of the\n circles they had formed, and on the 17th of August, 1873, twenty-five\n hundred pilgrims arrived from their respective towns to form one\n procession to Notre Dame de Liesse. Half of the number, in spite of the\n fatigues of the way, there received Holy Communion, and we returned\n with renewed strength and confidence to our posts.\u201d\n\n We will not here give a detailed account of the toils and progress of\n the year which succeeded the pilgrimage. A brief of the Holy Father\n confirmed the constitution of the work by the grant of duly specified\n indulgences attached to it; it also received the canonical protection\n of a cardinal of the church.\n\n These favors brought a timely encouragement to the promoters of the\n work; for with its progress its trials also increased. Among the most\n painful were those of seeing it misunderstood by many persons who might\n have been expected to prove its warmest advocates. Some of these lost\n sight of its social character, and preferred to seek the good of a few\n individual souls instead of helping forward a Christian restoration of\n society; while others, again, mistook the part to be taken in the\n committees by the upper classes. \u201cOf what use,\u201d they asked, \u201cis a\n committee, unless to provide resources for an ecclesiastical director?\u201d\n\n This is a question which has been frequently asked. But it must be\n borne in mind that if the circle establishes among its members social\n _fraternity_, the director could not himself alone represent its\n _paternity_. To do this would be to deter other Christians of the upper\n classes from the unmistakable command they have received to exercise\n this social paternity which they have from God in the very advantages\n of their social condition.\n\n For why are riches and honors bestowed upon the few\u2014why the benefits of\n education, of leisure, of cultivation of the mind\u2014unless it be that\n they are to be consecrated to the moral guidance and material\n assistance of the classes who are deprived of such advantages? In\n regard to this social paternity, as in regard to that which creates the\n family, the priest must be the consecrator: but, in his turn, the\n father who would abandon to the priest the charges and responsibilities\n of the dignity which, by divine right, is his own, would only disappear\n from among his fellow-men to be confounded before the Eternal Father\u2014he\n and the two complaisant accomplices of his culpable abdication.\n\n After establishing social fraternity by the _circles_, and social\n paternity by the committees, it remained to restore the social\n _family_\u2014that is, to associate Christian families in the benefits of\n the work, after having associated in it the _heads_ of families of\n various conditions.\n\n The family is, in fact, the first association by natural right, and\n therefore every constitution which embraces it and does not take it for\n its foundation is vitiated and sterile. The founders of the work knew\n this, and were, moreover, not allowed to forget it by the daily\n reproaches they received\u2014\u201cYou are destroying the family; you are\n destroying the parish!\u201d\u2014and what not. But how to reach the family so as\n to be of service to it instead of injurious was not for some time made\n clear. The Circle of Montparnasse, the prototype of the rest, had\n avoided rather than faced the difficulty by disposing of its active\n functions in favor only of its unmarried members. But this was plainly\n not the solution.\n\n The solution had, however, been discovered, at no great distance from\n Rheims, in the great manufacturing region which has for the motive\n power of its machines the waters of the Suippe, for its boundary the\n extensive woods which form an oasis of verdure in the burning plains of\n Champagne, and for its population factory-men, who wander, at the\n bidding of the industrial fluctuations of the time, to and from the\n looms of the north, of Rheims, or of St. Quentin\u2014a population\n exceptionally indigent, since the struggle between capital and wages,\n inaugurated by liberalism, has become the normal condition of the\n producer and the consumer.\n\n In the hamlet of Val-des-Bois, in the centre of this district, an\n industrial family settled about half a century ago, and brought with it\n the example of every Christian virtue. Kind towards their workmen,\n generous even beyond their gains, Messieurs Harmel assembled around\n their vast establishment all the religious and philanthropic\n institutions by means of which it has hitherto been attempted to\n re-establish harmony in the world of labor.\n\n As is but too frequently the case, they failed in this attempt\n completely. But they were not daunted, nor did they rest satisfied with\n their past endeavors; for, if they loved the working-men, they loved\n their Lord still more, and desired as earnestly as ever that he should\n reign in the hearts of those in their employ.\n\n Not many years ago it occurred to one of them to introduce among the\n population of their factories\u2014which did not count a single practising\n Christian\u2014the principle of the Catholic Association. He determined to\n ask four men to join together to form the nucleus of a circle, and\n three young girls to be received as _Enfants de Marie_ and wear the\n badge. In proportion as the associations developed themselves he\n multiplied them according to the sex, age, and condition of each\n individual; and this with such success that at the present time the\n twelve hundred souls who people Val-des-Bois are united in a marvellous\n aggregation of pious confraternities, among whose members are made, in\n the course of a year, more than ten thousand communions, in the\n intention of making reparation to our Lord for the outrages he receives\n in the modern factory.\n\n Then, also, as earthly goods are often increased abundantly to those\n who seek first the kingdom of God, the principle of Catholic\n Association applied to the families of the Factory of the Sacred Heart\n (l\u2019Usine du Sacr\u00e8-C\u0153ur)\u2014for it bears this name\u2014has realized there\n innumerable economical benefits, a fact which will not surprise those\n who know the power of this principle. Assistance of every kind,\n clothing, food, and fuel at very reasonable prices, schools free of\n expense to the parents, and occasional holidays for recreation, have\n brought with them, together with economy, the comfort also and\n prosperity of the families. All these institutions, economic,\n charitable, and religious, are governed by those personally interested.\n The _circle_, which brings together the fathers of families, is, as it\n were, the centre of this machinery; and the master, who is its motive\n power, associates with himself not only all the members of his own\n family and the chaplain of the factory, but also his principal\n employ\u00e9s, to fulfil the paternal function of a protecting and directing\n committee, and so to secure to the association the chances of\n continuance as well as the fruits of example. To this end delegates are\n annually appointed, who, under the presidency of the master, are the\n guardians of the corporation.\n\n We will give the result of all these well-considered combinations in M.\n Harmel\u2019s own words:[113]\n\n \u201cBy the persevering endeavors of many years we have attained the end at\n which we aimed. Families are reconstituted, peace and love have taken\n the place of quarrels and disorder around the domestic hearth; the\n mother rejoices at the change wrought in her husband and children; the\n father finds in a new life the courage and happiness of labor; his home\n is delightful to him from the respect of his children, the ready\n cheerfulness of his wife, and the love of all. Economy has put an end\n to debts and created savings; the anniversary festivals of the family\n bring back that affectionate gayety and warmth which give repose amid\n the fatigues of life, and inspire fresh ardor to go bravely on the way.\n When we are in the midst of these good and honest faces transformed by\n Christian influences, we read there confidence and love, and thank the\n good God who has made the large family of Val-des-Bois.\u201d Such are the\n experiences there obtained, as if to complete those of the Cercle\n Montparnasse.\n\n Alone among the many excellent men who, after the war and Commune,\n arose to attempt some means of healing the internal wounds of France,\n the members of the _\u0152uvre Ouvri\u00e8re_ took a solemn engagement, the terms\n of which were marked out with precision. Each member affixes his\n signature to an individual and public act of devoted adhesion to the\n doctrines defined by the _Syllabus of the Errors of Modern Society_.\n Preserved, therefore, from the liberalism which in reality puts\n oppression into the hands of the strongest, and the socialism which\n demands it for the masses, they will pursue more efficaciously than\n either of these the vindication of the popular interests, such as the\n due observance of the Sunday and the protection of the family and home,\n and, guided by grace and supported by prayer, will find Christian\n solutions for all the social questions of labor.\n\n The work of the Catholic circles has set on foot a periodical for the\n study and discussion of these questions\u2014namely, the review which\n borrows its title from one of the principles of the work:\n _L\u2019Association Catholique_. It is open to all questions, but not to all\n doctrines, for a work which, at the head of its statutes, invokes the\n definitions of the Catholic Church cannot admit the errors which she\n has condemned. It numbers among its contributors some of the best\n social economists and solid Christian writers of the time, and thus\n provides weapons of proof to the polemics of the Catholic press,\n besides furthering the great social effort made by the association,\n which now reckons three hundred circles in all parts of France.\n\n In conclusion, we would mention that it must be borne in mind that the\n important part in this good work is not the exclusive institution of\n circles, this being only the first and one of the different forms under\n which the principle is brought to act. That principle is the direction\n and protection of the working-classes by the higher and more educated,\n and the association of the interests of both, as opposed to the\n lamentable antagonism of the same different classes which is, in our\n times, the great difficulty of social government and the source of\n increasing disorder and conflict. These associations are intended to\n react, by every possible means, against the erroneous social theories\n so numerous and so impotent for good, and to bring into practice the\n only true and effectual social law\u2014namely, conformity to the social\n duties of Catholics. Our religion has remedies for all evils; its\n practice is supreme political and social wisdom, and in the alarming\n state of society among the working-classes there cannot be, nor ever\n will be, found any other course to be adopted than to return to the\n rules of Christian life. It is evident, then, how wide a field is\n opened by such a desire breaking forth in the hearts and minds of\n fervent Christians such as M. de Mun and his friends, and it would be\n impossible to show in few words all that it has produced and is\n producing by the grace of God; and although this work of charity has\n originated in France, and at present exists only in France, it may, it\n is to be hoped, give rise to similar laudable efforts in all countries,\n where also, among their associations of Catholic circles for the\n working-classes, shall, as in this country, be raised the _labarum_ of\n Constantine and its sacred motto: \u201cIn hoc signo vinces.\u201d\n\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE RIVER\u2019S VOICE.\n\n I.\n\n\n Through the long hours the day\u2019s strong life had flowed\n In sunshine, working good deeds silently,\n In clouds whose shadows set new harmony\n Among the hills\u2014God\u2019s justice\u2019 old abode.\n Through mountain hollows had the wind swept down,\n Turning green leaves to silver in the sun,\n Winning the meadows in broad waves to run\n Where still unlevelled shone their grassy crown.\n The troubled river had no vision borne\n Of gleaming hill and tree-o\u2019ershadowed shore;\n The birches, bending their lost mirror o\u2019er,\n Met but the driven waves\u2019 unwilling scorn;\n Yet heaven\u2019s blue the broken waters bore,\n The breeze but strengthened as it hurried o\u2019er.\n\n\n II.\n\n\n Lightening their labor with a careless song,\n Birds o\u2019er the meadow swept with busy wing,\n Flashed in and out the forests\u2019 sheltering,\n While clamorous council held the crickets\u2019 throng.\n Swift fell the grass beneath the mower\u2019s stroke\n To win its perfect ripeness \u2018ere day\u2019s end,\n When should, the harvest bearing, meekly bend\n The mild-eyed oxen \u2018neath the unwieldy yoke.\n Broken with sound was even the noonday rest\u2014\n Shrill-piping locust called imperiously,\n Impetuous bee proclaimed its industry,\n And blue-mailed flies pursued an endless quest;\n Only from throbbing river rose no song\n Blending its music with life\u2019s murmuring throng.\n\n\n III.\n\n\n Day closed, and busy life lay down to rest.\n A shade that moved not held in cold embrace\n The yielding meadows and the hills\u2019 calm face,\n About whose silence burned the cloudless west.\n No leafy murmur rose from darkening wood,\n Hushed the pure gladness of the robins\u2019 trill;\n Called from low covert some lone whip-poor-will\n Only to heighten eve\u2019s still solitude.\n The wind asleep, the quiet waters bore\n Vision of sky and mountains\u2019 deepening shade,\n And touch of bending birches, softly laid,\n As the still stream gave back their glance once more.\n Clear, through the silence, drifted rippling tones\u2014\n The patient river singing to the stones.\n\n\n IV.\n\n\n So, through the day, had flowed the river\u2019s song,\n So borne the stream its burden of strong life\n Spite of its troubled waters\u2019 windy strife\u2014\n Heaven in its breast\u2014and, as it sped along,\n Bearing its loyal service to the sea,\n Praising the stones that gave it voice to sing,\n With constant sweetness, whose soft murmuring,\n Unwearying ever in its melody,\n Was hidden in life\u2019s song that filled the day\n With chords confused of labor manifold.\n Only with evening\u2019s peaceful skies of gold\n Came the lost music of the river\u2019s lay\u2014\n Like some brave life whose sweetness but is known\n When holy silence doth world-sounds dethrone.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n PAPAL ELECTIONS.\n\n I.\n\n The succession of the Roman pontiffs rests on the word of God; other\n lines of princes may fail, their line shall last until the end of the\n world. Still, although there will ever be a series of legitimate\n successors in the Papacy, the manner of succession has varied, being\n left to human prudence, which accommodates itself to times and places,\n yet ever under an overruling Providence that directs to its own ends no\n less the vices than the virtues of men.\n\n The election of a pope is the most important event that takes place in\n the world. It affects immediately several hundred millions of Catholics\n in their dearest hopes of religion, and it touches indirectly the\n interests of all other people on the earth besides. In the pope the\n world receives a vicar of Christ, a successor of St. Peter, and an\n infallible judge in matters of faith and morals. The Papacy was always\n conferred regularly by way of election\u2014from the chief of the apostles,\n chosen by our Lord himself, to Pius IX., now reigning, who was selected\n by the cardinals of the Holy Roman Church on the 17th of June, 1846.\n Between these there have been two hundred and sixty popes, if we follow\n the number given by the _Gerarchia Cattolica_, which is published\n annually at Rome.\n\n On the 25th of July, 1876, our Holy Father, in a discourse to the\n students of the several colleges in Rome subject to the Propaganda,\n took occasion to speak quite earnestly of attempts that were being made\n in Italy to unsettle the minds of Catholics on papal elections by\n teaching that they were originally _popular_ ones, and that the natural\n right of the laity in them (which, it was asserted, had been exercised\n without question for twelve hundred years) was arbitrarily and\n unlawfully taken away by Pope Alexander III. The errors of this new\n schismatical party may be reduced to two points\u2014viz., that the share\n which the people were once usually allowed to take in the election of\n sacred ministers was a right and not a privilege accorded by the\n visible head of the church to ages of faith and fervor; and that\n Alexander III. deprived the Romans of this right in the election of\n their chief pastor.\n\n Let us state, in the first place, that it is heretical to maintain that\n the laity have a strict\u2014_i.e._, inherent or divine\u2014right to elect their\n pastors, and historically false to assert that such a right was ever\n allowed by the rulers of the church or was ever exercised by the\n Christian people. The authorities to confirm our statement are so\n numerous as to cause almost an _embarras de richesses_. Besides the\n great collections which are the common sources of ecclesiastical\n erudition\u2014the Fathers, the councils, annals, papal bulls; the\n Bollandists, and particularly, as regards papal elections, the\n _Propyl\u00e6um ad septem tomos Maji_; the works of Thomassin, Gretser,\n Bellarmine, and others\u2014we may cite here Selvaggio\u2019s _Antiquitatum\n Christianarum Institutiones_, lib. i. par. i. cap. xxi.; Mamacchi\u2019s\n _Origines et Antiquitates Christian\u00e6_, tom. iv. lib. iv.; and\n Colenzio\u2019s _Dissertationi intorno varie Controversie di Storia ed\n Archeologia Ecclesiastica_, diss. vi. _Del preteso dritto del popolo\n cristiano nell\u2019 clezione dei Sacri Ministri_.\n\n The earliest manner of electing the popes was by the votes of the Roman\n clergy cast in the presence of the faithful, who assisted as witnesses\n to the godliness of the subject proposed, and to testify that besides\n his personal merits he was an acceptable person on account, perhaps, of\n his birth, his nationality, his appearance, or of some other\n adventitious circumstance which enhanced his popularity with the great\n body of the people, and would cause him, also, to be looked upon with\n less disfavor _by them who are without_.[114] Although these elections\n belonged to the clergy and laity of the Roman Church\u2014or we should say,\n rather, to the higher clergy and the representatives of the laity\u2014the\n relative rights or parts of each class of electors were not apparently\n determined by express enactment, but upon grounds of common sense and\n equity; such, for instance, as that _Episcopus deligatur, plebe\n pr\u00e6sente, qu\u00e6 singulorum vitam plenissime norit, et uniuscujusque actum\n de ejus conversatione prospexit_,[115] or that _Nullus invitis detur\n episcopus_.[116] Bellarmine,[117] Sixtus Senensis,[118] Petrus de\n Marca,[119] and Thomassin[120] prove that the people\u2019s part in such\n elections was more perfunctory than real, since testimony of a man\u2019s\n good repute could be otherwise obtained, and that even an expression of\n preference was not always heeded; as we learn from the same Pope\n Celestine, who wrote to the bishops of Apulia and Calabria: _Docendus\n est populus, non sequendus; nosque si nesciunt, eosquid liceat quidve\n non liceat, commonere non his consensum pr\u00e6bere debemus._[121] The\n Roman people, then, did not and could not have, except by usurpation\n and abuse, a decisive voice in the election of the pope; for such an\n act is by God\u2019s ordinance placed beyond the jurisdiction of the laity.\n\n After the martyrdom of St. Fabian, in January, A.D. 250, the Holy See\n remained vacant for a year and a half, until in the month of June, 251,\n Cornelius was raised to that post of perilous dignity under a tyrant\n like Decius, who had declared that he would sooner see a new pretender\n to the empire than another bishop of Rome. This election, although made\n almost unanimously by all orders, gave rise to the first schism,\n because Novatian, who headed the rigorous party in the affair of the\n _Lapsi_, was consecrated bishop and set himself up as anti-pope. We\n have an invaluable testimony to the election of St. Cornelius from the\n pen of St. Cyprian: _Factus est autem Cornelius episcopus de Dei et\n Christi ejus judicio, de clericorum p\u00e6ne omnium testimonio, de plebis,\n qu\u00e6 tunc adfuit, suffragio et de sacerdotum antiquorum et bonorum\n virorum collegio, cum nemo ante se factus esset, cum Fabiani locus id\n est cum locus Petri et gradus cathedr\u00e6 sacerdotalis vacaret._[122] From\n this passage of the great Bishop of Carthage we can obtain, says\n Baronius,[123] a tolerably good idea of a papal election in the early\n ages. Prayers were first offered up to God to obtain his assistance in\n making a choice; the desire of the faithful, or rather of their\n representatives, and such testimony to the worth of the subjects\n proposed as they were prepared to give was heard; the wish of the Roman\n clergy, and their willing assent to the proceedings, were inquired into\n and sought; and after maturely weighing the for and against, the\n bishops of the vicinity, with any others in communion with the Holy See\n who happened to be in Rome at the time, went into executive session and\n gave the decisive votes\u2014_in commitiis suffragia ferebant_. With regard\n to those among the laity who took part in these elections, we must\n observe that in the beginning, as long as the majority of Christians\n was composed of persons who had embraced the faith from pure and\n unworldly motives, whose aim was to behold the church prosperous and\n glorious, and whose charity, being yet warm, sought not their own end\n _but that which is another\u2019s_,[124] the whole body of Christians who\n had reached mature years and belonged to that sex which alone had a\n voice in the church[125] gave their testimony and assent in favor of\n that one whom it was proposed to elect;[126] but the evils of anything\n like a popular election in a great city were so manifest[127] that\n attempts were soon made to leave the choice of such on the part both of\n clergy and laity\u2014but earlier in the case of the latter order\u2014to a\n select body or committee, a general suffrage being gradually superseded\n by the votes of approval given by the rich only and the high in\n station.\n\n We find, perhaps, a germ of this even in the earliest times.[128] The\n Council of Laodicea (A.D. 365) clearly desired that the choice should\n be made by some definitely-organized body, and not by a mere\n mass-meeting; St. Leo and the Roman council of A.D. 442, and again the\n former in Epist. lxxxix.cvi., expressly mention the \u201c_Honorati_,\u201d the\n magnates at such elections.[129] The influence of the principal\n personages in a city was not to be ignored through the clamor of those\n who too often formed only a mob.[130] A letter of Pope Cornelius to\n Fabius, Bishop of Antioch, has fortunately been preserved by\n Eusebius,[131] which gives us the exact number of the Roman clergy of\n every grade, and a clue[132] to what may have been the Christian\n population of Rome, in the middle of the third century. According to\n these precious statistics, there were then belonging to the Roman\n clergy 46 priests, 7 deacons, 7 subdeacons, 42 acolytes, 52 exorcists,\n readers, and _ostiarii_. Fifteen hundred widows and orphans were\n provided for by the church, whose children composed an immense\n population in the capital of the empire. Hence we may rest assured that\n deliberations for the election of the Roman pontiff could not have been\n open to all of either clergy or laity, but must necessarily, in the\n interests of good order, and by reason of the small size of places of\n public meetings then possessed by the Christians, have been confined to\n a select number.\n\n The ancient records of the Roman Church reaching back to the beginning\n of the early middle ages, which have been published by Mabillon and\n Galletti, show us its clergy divided into three distinct classes\u2014viz.,\n priests, dignitaries, and inferior ministers. The priests were the\n seven cardinal suburbican bishops and the twenty-eight\n cardinal-priests; the dignitaries were the archdeacon and the seven\n palatine judges (prothonotaries-apostolic); the inferior ministers were\n the subdeacons, acolytes, and notaries without office at court. The\n laity was likewise divided into three classes\u2014viz., citizens, soldiers,\n and commoners; _i.e._, the nobility, the army, and the Third\n Estate.[133]\n\n After the death of Pope Zozimus, on the 26th of December, 418, a\n majority of the clergy and people elected the cardinal-priest Boniface\n to succeed him. A serious dispute immediately arose. Eulalius, the\n archdeacon, who, as such, had been practically the most important\n personage of the Holy See after the pontiff himself, and felt indignant\n at having been passed over in the election, held possession of the\n Lateran Palace, where he was chosen pope by a few of the clergy, to\n whose faction, however, _all_ the deacons and three bishops\n belonged.[134] The fear of future contests suggested to Pope Boniface\n I., who is described by Anastasius as unambitious, of mild character;\n and devoted to good works, to obtain from the Emperor Honorius, in the\n year 420, a rescript by which it was decreed that, in the contingency\n of a double election, neither rival should be pope, but that the clergy\n and people should proceed to another choice. The decree was almost\n textually inserted in the canon law.[135] This difference between St.\n Boniface and Eulalius, or rather the latter\u2019s schism, gave occasion to\n the first interference of the secular arm in the election of the Roman\n pontiffs. St. Hilary, who was elected in the year 461, convened a\n council of forty-eight bishops at Rome, and, among other provisions for\n filling worthily the Holy See, declared that _no pope should ever\n appoint his own successor_. Despite this recent enactment, Boniface\n II.\u2014in whose favor, however, it must be said that he sought to\n preclude, as even a greater evil than a passing violation of the\n canons, the threatened interference of the Gothic king, who wanted to\n put a partisan on the papal throne\u2014called a council at St. Peter\u2019s in\n the year 531, and there designated the celebrated deacon Vigilius as\n his coadjutor with future succession. Subsequently, repenting his\n action, he called another council, and with his own hand burned the\n paper appointing him.[136]\n\n Although the actual naming of his successor by the pope has never been\n tolerated, there have been several, and some very opportune, cases in\n which a pope on the point of death has recommended a particular person,\n more or less efficaciously, to the body of electors as one well fitted\n to succeed to the vacant throne. This was done by St. Gregory VII., who\n proposed three candidates to the cardinals\u2014namely, Desiderius,\n Cardinal-Abbot of Monte Casino; Otho, Cardinal-Bishop of Ostia; and\n Hugh, Archbishop of Lyons\u2014and particularly recommended the election of\n the first as the only one of the three who was in Italy at the time.\n Desiderius became Pope Victor III. Other similar, but not always\n equally successful, recommendations were made by popes of that era. In\n order finally to put the strongest official check upon the election of\n his own successor by a pope, Pius IV., after exposing in consistory his\n age and infirmities, reminded the cardinals that he was well aware how\n under his predecessor, Paul IV., the question was mooted whether this\n could be done, and that some theologians and cardinals held to the\n affirmative,[137] but that he would pronounce in the negative, and\n intended to issue a bull\u2014as in fact he did, on the 22d of September,\n 1561[138]\u2014declaring that no pope could do so, even with the consent of\n the Sacred College. His immediate predecessor had reaffirmed in 1558 an\n ordinance increasing the penalties of its violation, which had\n originally been passed over a thousand years before by Pope Symmachus\n in a council of seventy-two bishops convened at Rome in the year 499,\n forbidding, under pain of excommunication and loss of all dignities, to\n treat of a successor during the lifetime of the reigning pontiff.[139]\n From this we learn how some of the best and greatest popes have tried\n to frame such wise provisions as might assure an untainted election to\n the Papacy; yet they could not succeed in every case, because even the\n most stringent laws must be well executed to be effective, and must\n find docile subjects to obey them. The Romans do certainly appear to\n have been a stiff-necked people during many generations; and while we\n think it ungenerous continually to throw in their teeth the wretched\n opinion St. Bernard must have had of them, as we see by his treatise\n _De Consideratione_, addressed to Pope Eugene III., and hardly fair in\n the annalist Muratori to transfer so much of the blame for factious\n elections from the German emperors to the Roman populace, the least\n that even their best friend can honestly say is _that they might have\n done better_.[140]\n\n The election of the pope, says Cardinal Borgia,[141] was perfectly free\n during the first four centuries, being made by the clergy in presence\n of the people; but in process of time, as the papal dignity increased\n in wealth and splendor of temporal authority, it often became an object\n of human ambition, of which secular rulers were not slow to avail\n themselves, that by iniquitous bargains and preconcerted plans they\n might bind, if possible, the priesthood to the empire, and derive the\n immense advantage of the spiritual power administered by a subject or a\n dependant. The first instance of direct interference by the state in a\n papal election\u2014for the decision in the case of Boniface and the\n anti-pope was an arbitration invited by the church\u2014appears towards the\n close of the fifth century. Odoacer, a Gothic chief of the tribe of the\n Heruli, having deposed Romulus Augustulus, in whom the Western Empire\n came to an end, was proclaimed King of Italy, rejecting the imperial\n style of C\u00e6sar and Augustus for a title which he expressly created for\n himself. It would seem\u2014although even this is not beyond dispute\u2014that\n Pope Simplicius had requested Odoacer, in whom the powers of the state\n were now vested, to stand ready, in the common interests of order and\n good government, to repress the civil commotions which he foresaw were\n likely to arise after his death on the election of a successor. However\n this may be, the king went beyond a merely repressive measure, and,\n pretending that Simplicius had commissioned him to do so, published an\n edict on the pope\u2019s death in 483, forbidding the clergy and people of\n Rome to elect a successor without his intervention or that of his\n lieutenant, the prefect of the pr\u00e6torium. When, therefore, the elective\n assembly met in St. Peter\u2019s to fill the vacant see, Basil the patrician\n came forward and claimed in his master\u2019s name, and by virtue of the\n dying wish and even command of Simplicius, the right of regulating its\n acts and of confirming the election it might make. This pretension was\n firmly repelled, and, disregarding the tyrant, Felix III. was elected\n on March 8, 483. Baronius is of opinion that Simplicius never addressed\n such a requisition to the king, but that the story of his having done\n so was fabricated a few years later by the party of Lawrence, the\n anti-pope. The document purporting to emanate from Simplicius was\n rejected by a Roman council in 502 without further investigating its\n genuineness, than by exposing that it lacked the pope\u2019s signature, and\n was in any case opposed to the sacred canons and _ipso facto_ null and\n void.[142] On November 22, 498, St. Symmachus was elected pope, but a\n minority set up a certain Lawrence, and both were consecrated on the\n same day. Civil strife was imminent, and, although the most regular\n mode of action would have been to call a council of the provincial\n bishops, delay was too dangerous, and the prompt interference of\n Theodoric was asked and submitted to.\n\n Although this monarch was an Arian, he had protected the Catholics on\n many occasions, and had for prime minister the celebrated Cassiodorus,\n whose virtues, justice, and wisdom were renowned throughout Italy. Such\n considerations as these must have led the Roman clergy to submit a\n purely ecclesiastical matter to the court of Ravenna. On the advice of\n his minister the king decided that the one who had been first elected\n and had received the greatest number of votes should be recognized as\n the legitimate pope. Both conditions were verified in Symmachus. His\n first pontifical act was to summon a council in the basilica of St.\n Peter on March 1, 499, to regulate more effectively the mode of future\n elections. Seventy-two bishops, sixty-seven priests, and five deacons\n composed the council. Three canons were drawn up relative to this\n matter. By the first it was ordained that if any clergyman be convicted\n of having given or promised his suffrage for the pontificate to any\n aspirant during the pope\u2019s lifetime he shall be deposed from his\n office; by the second it was provided that if the pope die suddenly,\n and a unanimous election cannot be reached, the candidate receiving a\n majority of the votes shall be declared elected; by the third immunity\n from prosecution was promised to accomplices who should reveal the\n intrigues of their principals to obtain an unfair election.[143]\n\n Theodoric the Goth, having once been appealed to, now thought to take\n the initiative in the election of a successor to John I., whom he had\n left to die of starvation and neglect on his return from\n Constantinople, where he had spoken rather according to his conscience\n than in favor of the Arians, as the king expected. On his\n recommendation St. Felix IV. was elected pope on the 12th of July, 526.\n The Roman clergy and senate protested against this stretch of royal\n authority, although they had no objection to the nominee, who was\n simple, mild, and charitable. The affair was not adjusted until a\n compromise was effected under Athalaric, whereby the Roman clergy by\n their votes, and the Roman people by their assent, were to elect the\n Roman pontiff, who would then be confirmed by the king as a matter of\n course. The popes were elected in this way until the extinction of the\n Gothic kingdom of Italy in the person of Teias, who was defeated and\n killed by Narses, general of Justinian, in the year 553. The Greek\n emperor, having recovered his sway in Italy, continued the abuse, to\n which the Romans had submitted only through fear of the barbarians, and\n arrogated to himself and successors the right of confirming the\n election of the pope. Hence, as Baronius remarks, arose the prudent\n custom at Rome of electing to the Papacy those members of the clergy\n who had been _Apocrisiarii_\u2014_i.e._, agents or _nuncios_ of the Holy See\n at Constantinople, where it was presumed they had won the favor of the\n court and become versed in matters of state. Thus the right of\n confirmation was reduced in practice to a mere formality, although in\n principle ever so wrong. In this way were elected Vigilius in 550, St.\n Gregory I. in 590, Sabinian in 604, Boniface III. in 607, and others\n who were personally known to the Byzantine rulers.\n\n Avarice, or a love of money under some pretext or another, was a\n besetting sin of the Greeks, and from it arose a new and more degrading\n condition imposed on papal elections. The imperial sanction was given\n only on payment by the Holy See of a tax of 3,000 golden _solidi_, a\n sum equal to thirteen thousand dollars of our money.[144] The Emperor\n Constantine Pogonatus, at the request of the papal legates to the\n Fourth General Council of Constantinople in 681, exempted the Holy See\n from the further payment of the tax. He was moved to do so by the\n sanctity of St. Agatho; but he still retained the assumed right of\n forbidding the pope\u2019s consecration until his election had been\n confirmed. A few years later, however, he granted a constitution to\n Benedict II., his personal friend, and to whose guardianship he left\n his two sons, Justinian (II.) and Heraclius, in which he for ever\n abrogated this arbitrary law. The concession was ungratefully revoked\n by Justinian; and Conon, who was elected on October 21, 686, was\n obliged to ask the consent of the exarch of Ravenna, viceroy of the\n emperor, to his consecration. This necessity generally occasioned a\n delay of from six weeks to two months. The exarchs of Ravenna, having\n command of the troops and the key to the imperial treasury in the west,\n felt themselves in a position to abuse authority and try to set up\n creatures of their own in Rome. Often did the Roman clergy and many\n popes protest against their irregular acts. The choice of Pelagius II.,\n in 578, was not submitted to the customary ratification, because the\n Lombards around Rome had cut off all communication with the outer\n world.\n\n The historian Novaes says that although the Holy See resisted the\n interference of secular princes, yet the turbulent spirit of the\n Romans, often stirred up by unscrupulous ministers or by the sovereigns\n themselves, obliged the popes to have recourse to these same princes to\n maintain order at their consecration. Nothing, we think, better\n confirms the necessity of a temporal dominion whereby the popes can\n exclude the exercise of foreign influence in Rome, and themselves\n vindicate the character of good government for which they are\n responsible. Papal elections were of an absolutely peaceful nature only\n after Goths, Lombards, Greeks, and Germans ceased to support an armed\n force in Rome or its vicinity. Guarantees are deceitful; and a mere\n personal sovereignty of the pope without a territory attached would be\n insufficient to assure the independence of the Holy See.\n\n A very remarkable law found its way into Gratian\u2019s decree, under the\n name of Pope Stephen, by which it is ordained that the newly-elected\n pontiff shall be consecrated in presence of the imperial\n ambassadors.[145] The learned are divided in their opinion about which\n pope passed this law. Baronius, Papebroch, Natalis Alexander, and\n others attribute it to Stephen IV., elected in 816; Pagi inclines to\n Stephen VI., _alias_ VII.; Mansi to Deusdedit, elected in 615; while\n some think that it belongs to John IX., because it is found among the\n acts of a council held by him in 898. Novaes suggests that this council\n may only have given a more solemn sanction to an older law. When Eugene\n II. was elected on the 5th of June, 824, he concerted with Lothair, son\n of the Emperor Louis, who had named him King of Italy and his colleague\n in the empire, to put a stop to cabals and disorders among the Roman\n people. He issued a decree enjoining upon the Roman clergy to swear\n fealty to the Frankish emperors, but with this significant reservation:\n \u201csaving the faith that I have pledged to the successor of St.\n Peter\u201d\u2014_Salva fide quam repromisi Domino Apostolico_[146]\u2014and not to\n consent to an uncanonical or factious election of a pope. The same pope\n also voluntarily offered to bind the Roman pontiffs to be consecrated\n in the presence of the so-called _Rex Romanorum_, if he were in the\n city, otherwise of his envoy.[147] Pagi thinks that this was done to\n propitiate in advance these growing monarchs of the north, and distract\n them from the idea of continuing the policy of the Eastern emperors,\n who, as we have seen, would not allow the popes to proceed to\n consecration until their election had been confirmed. Eugene\u2019s act\n seems to us to have been a subtle stroke of diplomacy. While it\n flattered, by conveying the impression that the presence of C\u00e6sar (as\n he was pompously called) or of his legates gave splendor and\n magnificence to the ceremony of consecration, it disarmed the emperor\n by implying the right of the popes to be consecrated at their own\n convenience; for if his meaning had been that the presence of the king\n or of his ambassadors were a necessary condition to the legality of the\n act, he would have deliberately placed himself and successors in the\n same relation to these new rulers that his predecessors had been\n obliged, though under protest, to assume toward the emperors of the\n East\u2014which is manifestly absurd.\n\n Nevertheless, both the Frank and Saxon emperors frequently claimed the\n right to something more than a mere honorary part in papal elections,\n which led to long years of party strife and discord between church and\n state. Leo IV., in 847, confirmed the decree of Eugene, although, on\n account of the Saracens around Rome, he was consecrated without waiting\n for the imperial ambassadors; and the same was the case, but without\n any ostensible reason, with Stephen V., _alias_ VI. This shows that the\n presence of the envoys was an honorary privilege, which conferred no\n authority to go back of or revise the election itself, as Hadrian III.,\n Stephen\u2019s immediate predecessor, expressly affirmed in a decree given\n by Martinus Polonus,[148] Mabillon,[149] and Pagi.[150]\n\n It is but fair to confess that this decree is not considered authentic\n by all; but what historical document has not been called in question by\n some hypercritic or other, especially in Germany? That it is not\n apocryphal is shown by the fact that one of Hadrian\u2019s successors\u2014John\n IX., elected in 898\u2014annulled it in view of the peace ensured by the\n presence of the ambassadors, and restored the earlier ordinance of\n Eugene.\n\n The text of the canon law, and especially the passage _Canonico ritu et\n consuetudine_, has been often appealed to by C\u00e6sarists and Protestant\n historians, as though it demonstrated that a papal election not made\n according to its requirements was uncanonical and invalid. In the first\n place, Cardinal Garampi[151] remarks that Eugene\u2019s decree was a\n personal privilege _Advocati\u00e6_ given to the princes of the Carlovingian\n line; and in the second place Thomassin observes upon John\u2019s\n decree[152] that the imperial ambassadors were not admitted to the\n election, but only to the subsequent consecration; that they were there\n to overawe the turbulent; and that in time their presence became a\n custom and was looked on as a part, so to speak, of the external rite\n of consecration. It had, besides, become so useful as a repressive\n measure against the enemies of the Holy See that it received the high\n sanction of being countenanced by the canon law itself. Pope Nicholas\n II., in the eleventh century, explained the text _Quia Sancta_ in the\n same sense. It must be said, to the discredit of the Othos and the\n Henrys, that they too often slipped from the _inch_ of privilege to the\n _ell_ of (pretended) right, and went so far as to interfere in a direct\n and absolute sense at papal elections, intruding some less worthy\n subjects into the Papacy; but when once these occupied the seat of\n Peter they were to be recognized and respected on the same principle\n that the high-priests were in the irregular age of the Seleucid\u00e6 and\n the Romans when they sat upon the chair of Moses. Yet even the imperial\n influence, says Kenrick,[153] was beneficially exercised in several\n instances, particularly those of Clement II. and St. Leo IX. Dr.\n Constantine H\u00f6fler has written a work[154] replete with information\n about the German popes and the physical aspect, the morals, manners,\n and customs of the Romans in their time. Charles Hemans\u2019 books (we\n cannot seriously call them works) on _Ancient and Medi\u00e6val Christianity\n and Sacred Art in Italy_, while they show considerable acquaintance\n with the best authorities on the subject, manifest a detestable animus\n against the Holy See, which shows their writer to be as great an adept\n in the \u201cart of putting things\u201d as the far more learned author of the\n eight-volume _History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages_,\n Ferdinand Gregorovius. While the corruption of some popes and the\n depravity of the tenth century have been exaggerated by many\n historians, the condition of the Papacy at that time is certainly a\n warning against the interference of secular princes in the elections;\n for, as the great Baronius remarks (ad an. 900), _Nihil penitus\n Ecclesi\u00e6 Roman\u00e6 contingere potest funestius, tetrius nihil atque\n lugubrius, quam si principes seculares in Romanorum Pontificum\n electiones manus immittant._[155]\n\n In the middle of the eleventh century a movement was begun to reform\n the method of conducting papal elections, which eventually limited them\n within the legitimate circle of ecclesiastical prerogatives, totally\n excluding the direct influence of the inferior clergy and the\n aristocratic and popular element of the laity. Pope Nicholas II.,\n having assembled a synod of one hundred and thirteen bishops in the\n Lateran Palace in the month of April, 1059, passed a law to the\n following effect: On the death of the pope the cardinal-bishops shall\n first meet in council and with the utmost diligence treat of a\n successor; they shall next take joint action with the cardinal-priests,\n and finally consider the wishes of the rest of the clergy and of the\n Roman people. If a worthy subject can be found among the members of the\n Roman (higher) clergy itself, he is to be preferred, otherwise a\n foreigner shall be elected; so that, however, the honor and regard due\n to our beloved son Henry, now king, and soon, God grant, to be emperor,\n which we have seen proper to show to him and to his successors who may\n personally apply for it, be not diminished. If a proper election cannot\n take place in Rome, it may be held anywhere else.[156] In the year 1061\n another synod was held, in which it was distinctly stated that the mere\n fact of election in the foregoing manner placed the elect in possession\n of plenary apostolic authority; consequently, the emperor\u2019s\n confirmation was excluded, in the sense that without it the election\n was invalid. From this period, although the struggle was not yet over,\n the Papacy was completely emancipated from any kind of subjection to\n the empire. Alexander II., successor to Nicholas, did not communicate\n his election to the court; and although St. Gregory VII., glorious\n Hildebrand, did do so, it was partly from prudence in view of the\n excitement in Germany occasioned by the setting up of the anti-pope\n Cadolaus in resentment for his predecessor\u2019s neglect, and partly from\n his sense of honor, lest it should be thought (since he had taken a\n principal part in enacting the statute of Pope Nicholas) that he\n availed himself of an advantage which he had himself created\u2014artfully,\n as suspicious-minded persons might think\u2014in anticipation of one day\n ascending the papal chair. He was the last pope who ever informed the\n emperor of his election before proceeding to be consecrated and\n enthroned. The great Catholic powers still continue to exercise a\n measure of influence in these elections, but of a purely advisory\n character, except in the case of those few which enjoy the privilege of\n veto, or the _esclusiva_, as the Romans say. At the Third General\n Council of the Lateran, held in the year 1179 by Alexander III., a most\n important advance was made in the manner of holding the elections. The\n right of the cardinals to elect, without reference to the rest of the\n Roman clergy or of the people, was affirmed, and a majority of\n two-thirds of their votes required for a valid election. This law was\n readily approved by the bishops and members of the council, and\n incorporated in the canon law, where it is found among the decretals of\n Gregory IX.[157]\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n HOW STEENWYKERWOLD WAS SAVED.\n\n I.\n\n A few straggling lights gleamed pale and fitfully through the stormy\n mist as the travellers came to the foot of the principal street in\n Steenwykerwold on the night of December 23, 1831. The wind howled\n fiercely and the place was apparently deserted; no one was found to\n brave the force of the sleety tempest save Floog and his companion, and\n the weather-beaten, broken-nosed \u201cAdmiral\u201d that once did duty as\n figure-head for a Baltic trader of that name, and now stood sentinel at\n the door of Mathias Pilzer, the innkeeper, scowling defiance at the\n elements. The hail had drifted and accumulated in heaps against\n outlying angles of walls, and filled the narrow gutters. The progress\n of the travellers, which the storm had impeded, was now interrupted\n altogether and they came to a dead halt. The prospect was indeed\n discouraging, and the cheerless gloom of the situation seemed to enter\n into the soul of the boy; for he made a sudden movement towards a\n street doorway which afforded a little shelter, and, pulling his\n woollen cap tightly down over his eyes, began to cry.\n\n \u201cFerret,\u201d said his companion, \u201cif you don\u2019t stop that blubbering I\u2019ll\n take you back again to-morrow to paint dolls at Mme. Gemmel\u2019s; and\n see,\u201d he added somewhat more soothingly, as he caught the flicker of a\n candle through Pilzer\u2019s window, \u201chere we are at the inn.\u201d\n\n The Ferret, thus threatened and consoled, brushed away his tears with\n his sleeve, emitting a muffled grunt. He had commenced with a howl,\n but, as if finding the pitch too high, he lowered it suddenly and ended\n with a sort of guttural, fractured sob; then seizing the other by the\n skirt, in this order of procession they reached Pilzer\u2019s.\n\n Boreas, Euroclydon, Eolus! whew, you gusty deities, your rude\n familiarities are the reverse of endearing, and we, alas! have not\n discovered the secret of propitiating you. Yet you deepen the enchanted\n halo encircling the ruddy fireside by the very force of contrast, as\n you wail dismally at the door, rattle the window-pane, or shriek down\n the chimney in your baffled efforts to effect an entrance.\n\n The fatigue of their journey was soon forgotten by the wayfarers, their\n misery giving way to the placid emotions caused by an anticipated\n enjoyment of the warmth and well-earned repose so near at hand.\n\n There was much to study in these two, _because_ there was so little to\n discover. The elder was a man whose appearance guarded with sphinx-like\n obstinacy the secret of his age. He might be thirty or he might be\n sixty\u2014no one could tell, and it was abundantly evident that few cared.\n He was tall and spare, with features which, if remarkable at all, were\n rendered negatively so by the absence of all salient characteristics,\n except a certain peculiarity about the eyes, one of which was brown,\n and the other, the left, a weak, watery gray. Such was Floog, the only\n name by which he was known; if he ever had any other it is buried with\n him.\n\n The other member of the _duo_, of whom you have had a glimpse already,\n was nicknamed \u201cThe Ferret,\u201d by what authority I cannot say\u2014probably\n according to the accommodating law of contrariety, for there was\n nothing pertaining to him at all suggestive of that sprightly little\n quadruped. The ideal curve of beauty was straightened and flattened\n into obtuse angles in his contour in a way to make old Apelles or\n Phidias lament, however prized he might be as a subject for the pencil\n of Teniers. His features, too, were wanting in the seraphic beam of Fra\n Bartolomeo\u2019s cherubs. Nevertheless, in form and feature he was\n sufficiently quaint to make one laugh at and love him. At a little\n distance he resembled a well-stuffed pillow on short legs. On closer\n view a head was discernible, something like those sometimes seen on\n old-fashioned door-knockers. Large, puffy cheeks, half-hiding a pretty\n little turn-up nose, a pair of small but bright blue eyes, no eyebrows,\n but an enormous mouth, and still more enormous chin\u2014these belonged to a\n face in hue and texture very like putty, and formed altogether a\n combination which, if not very beautiful, had this counterbalancing\n attraction: that it was somewhat out of the commonplace.\n\n But no delineation of pen or pencil could do justice to his expression.\n The wells of laughter and of tears, assuredly close beneath the\n surface, were for ever commingling in his organization; and so evenly\n were the external symptoms balanced that my grandaunt, a close\n observer, who had seen him often (and from whom, by the way, we had\n most of these details), could not for the life of her tell whether he\n was going to laugh or to cry at times when, in fact, he had no desire\n or intention to do either, so indeterminate was his habitual and\n passive expression.\n\n The wooden hands of Pilzer\u2019s Dutch clock pointed twenty-five minutes\n past eleven as these itinerants entered. Mine host was half-sitting,\n half-reclining in a large, square, straw-bottomed chair just inside of\n and facing the glass door that separated the travellers\u2019 parlor from\n the front part of his premises. On hearing them enter he slowly roused\n from his semi-lethargy, and, taking his long pipe from between his\n lips, eyed the new-comers with a dubious glance, as if not quite\n satisfied whether they were customers or cut-throats, when Floog,\n drawing nearer to the glass door, brought him within range of that\n gentleman\u2019s mild eye and reassured him. Floog on his part hesitated\n with an embarrassed air, and looked cautiously around, as if he had got\n into a coffin-maker\u2019s shop by mistake. Presently he plucked up courage,\n and beckoning The Ferret, who stood sniffling at the front door, to\n follow him, advanced and knocked timidly at the dividing door.\n\n The presiding genius of the \u201cAdmiral\u201d was a very Machiavel of\n innkeepers. An experience of twenty-seven years had taught him a system\n of deportment toward, and treatment of, his customers measured and\n regulated\u2014a sort of mental gradient, of which the gauge was the\n prospective length of his guest\u2019s purse; and, to do him justice, he\n seldom erred in his calculations. On opening the door and confronting\n the strangers it was plainly visible that he was about to commence at\n zero in his welcome; for there was little prospect of pecuniary reward\n in the appearance of the man, his speculative gains being rendered\n still more doubtful by the additional allowance of a liberal discount\n for the appearance of the boy. His first word of chilly greeting\n removed all misgiving at one fell swoop; for, true to his system, at\n zero he began.\n\n \u201cWhat do you want at this time o\u2019 night?\u201d Just then he caught sight of\n a large portmanteau or travelling-wallet which Floog on entering had\n deposited on the floor. It was a favorable diversion, for no sooner had\n Pilzer espied it than his scale ascended two or three degrees, and,\n without waiting for an answer to his first inquiry, he added in a\n slightly altered tone: \u201cWhat can I do for you?\u201d\n\n \u201cI want lodging for me and my nephew,\u201d said Floog bravely, and with a\n cheerful disregard of syntax. \u201cWe can pay for it; we\u2019re not tramps.\u201d\n\n \u201cThis is a lovely night, and a pretty hour of this lovely night to come\n looking for lodging,\u201d said the innkeeper, with facile irony, at which\n he was an adept; \u201cbut if ye are respectable, and can prove it, and let\n me know what brings ye here when all honest folk is abed, I\u2019ll see what\n I can do.\u201d\n\n If Floog considered the last part of this speech with reference to its\n applicability to the maker of it, he kept his thoughts discreetly to\n himself.\n\n \u201cWe are strangers in the town. We arrived from Arnhem an hour ago, and\n this is the only public-house we can find open. This boy\u2019s father,\n Mynheer Underdonk, the merchant, died in Amsterdam last Thursday, and\n they sent me a letter to bring the boy, and make no delay, as they want\n to make a settlement for him. You see,\u201d he went on, growing\n confidential, \u201cmy brother left home eight years ago and no one knew\n what became of him. His poor forsaken wife died, and I took care of the\n orphan.\u201d\n\n All this he uttered rapidly, with few pauses, as if he had learnt it by\n heart. So he had. Alas! poor Floog, thou wert no hero, not even\n morally; but shall we, entrenched in a castle of virtue, thrown stones\n at thee? No, albeit there was no more truth in thy story than suited\n thy own purposes.\n\n\n II.\n\n\n The Ferret was of ancient and noble lineage. There, that secret is out.\n Frank like himself, his historian scorns the subterfuge of keeping it\n till the end for the purpose of giving _\u00e9clat_ to his exit, as they do\n in romances and on the stage. He was descended from Adam and Eve. This\n I am prepared to maintain in the face of the world, learned or\n unlearned. If any one wishes to be considered as descended from an\n oyster or an atom, we who are not so ambitious shall not cavil at their\n genealogy, but hope they find their protoplasms subjects of pleasant\n reflection. As for my hero, he was of a different breed. Whether the\n bars in his escutcheon were dexter or sinister did not concern him and\n need not concern us. Heraldry, in fact, disowned him; therein, however,\n heraldry was no worse than his own father. In his tenth year he was\n taken from the Asylum for Foundlings and indentured to Mme. Gemmel, who\n kept a manufactory of toys at Arnhem. On the day of his departure he\n went out into the large paved yard surrounded by an unbroken line of\n low stone buildings\u2014his well-known and familiar playground, the only\n _Arcadia_ he had ever known. Now that he was to bid it and his childish\n companions a long good-by, he felt irresolute and the farewell stuck in\n his throat. He tried hard to be brave, while little Hans, his\n inseparable playmate and bedfellow, stood regarding him with a sullen\n scowl, as if he considered it a personal insult to be thus suddenly\n left alone. The poor Ferret was entirely at his wits\u2019 end and quite\n dumbfounded. Another look at Hans broke the unutterable spell; for he\n saw stealing down the chubby cheek of that smirched cherub a big tear,\n marking its course by a light streak on his smutty little face. Gulping\n down his sobs and forcing back the tears that now suffused his own\n eyes, he laid his hand lovingly on the shoulder of little Hans, and,\n bending down until their faces were on a level, he looked at him, and\n said in a voice broken by varying emotions and the poignant sorrow of\n childhood:\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t\u2014don\u2019t cry, Hans; and when\u2014and when I earn a hundred guilders I\n will come back for you, and we will have lots of puddin\u2019 and new\n clothes, and I will buy you a pair of new skates.\u201d\n\n Then taking from his trousers\u2019 pocket all his treasures\u2014a large piece\n of gingerbread and a small old knife with a broken blade\u2014he pressed his\n little friend to take them, forcing them into his unresisting hand,\n looked around once by way of final adieu, and ran through the passage\n that led to the front hall, where Mme. Gemmel\u2019s man was waiting for\n him, and left poor little Hans bellowing as if his heart would break.\n\n The moral supervision exercised by Mme. Gemmel over her new charge was\n radical. Its cardinal principles were, first, the duty of obedience and\n gratitude, and, secondly, the healthfulness of abstinence. These\n principles she inculcated by precept and enforced in practice by\n prescribing due penalties for their infraction. The good lady taught\n her apprentice, by every means within her power, that his life-long\n devotion to her service would ill repay her for the inestimable\n blessing she conferred in removing him from the Foundling Asylum and\n taking him under her own fostering roof. She was mindful of his health,\n too, for among her sanitary tenets was one to the effect that butter is\n injurious to immature years; and this she was in the habit of\n persistently enforcing for the special benefit of her charge. Inasmuch\n as temptation is dangerous, especially to the weak, she prudently\n adopted preventive measures by removing at once the temptation and the\n butter whenever he appeared at meals. So well did he profit by her\n discipline that after six months\u2019 involuntary practice of it he\n determined to run away.\n\n In spite of these drawbacks, in spite of the discipline and the dry\n bread, he made famous progress at his trade, and felt an artist\u2019s glow\n of enthusiasm whenever he finished to his satisfaction the staring blue\n eyes and carmine cheeks of his waxen beauties. He felt, Pygmalion like,\n able to fall in love with them, could he but find the Promethean\n secret\u2014not, indeed, that his thoughts ever took the classic shape, for\n he had never heard of the old Grecian fable; these were only the vague\n and undefined feelings of his heart. True it is he had little else to\n love, so that his affections, being narrowed down to the dolls,\n increased for them in the ratio that it diminished for their owner.\n\n Yet there was one golden hour in his leaden existence\u2014the hour of nine\n _post meridian_, when he was dismissed to bed. Although behind her back\n he sometimes made faces at madame, and even went so far as to set up an\n image of her for the perverse pleasure of sticking pins in it, he\n forgave all at bedtime. After saying his prayers he would, with all the\n ecstasy of which his phlegmatic nature was capable, jump into his straw\n pallet, bound to solve an abstruse but agreeable problem which had\n engaged his thoughts nightly since his advent in his new home\u2014viz.,\n What to do with his first hundred guilders when he had earned them? But\n he never got much beyond the disposal of a twentieth part of the sum.\n That much he generously devoted to little Hans; but before he could\n decide whether the latter should have the skates, a miniature ship, a\n new jacket, or unlimited gingerbread, or all of these good things\n together, his fancies and finances became entangled. Hans\u2019 face shone\n with guilders; gingerbread sailors, in blue jackets, floated serenely\n away in a big ship till quite out of sight; anon they trooped rapidly\n past his entranced eyes, now scurrying all together, now slowly one by\n one; then there was a blank; again starting into view, the last\n fleeting image swept softly down the dim vista, fading\u2014fading\u2014gone! and\n he was a king in happy oblivion.\n\n Thus time passed tardily enough with The Ferret, the all-absorbing\n thought of his waking hours now being how to escape.\n\n Among the customers of Mme. Gemmel was one who had had several business\n transactions with her. This was a peripatetic showman, the delight of\n gaping children at country fairs. His entertainment consisted of music\n (mangled fragments of opera airs on a weazened key-bugle) and his\n wonderful and versatile puppets. These latter, when they had become too\n well known as hunters and huzzars, he would transform into knights and\n ladies, or Chinese mandarins, as circumstances might require or fancy\n suggest. The transforming process was very simple; it consisted merely\n of supplying them with new costumes and coats\u2014of paint\u2014at Mme.\n Gemmel\u2019s.\n\n This worthy was none other than our friend Floog. Even such as he have\n their place in art. They are pioneers who lead to the base of an\n \u00e6sthetic temple whose dome is elevated in circling azure, surrounded by\n golden stars.\n\n In the practice of his art, The Ferret it was on whom now devolved the\n duty of transforming Floog\u2019s automatons and kindred jobs. Whether owing\n to the satisfaction he gave, or to the occult, and often unaccountable,\n influences governing our sympathies and antipathies, certain it is that\n Floog had taken a violent fancy to him, and determined to entice him\n away at the first opportunity. The showman\u2019s moral sensibilities were,\n as has already been intimated, somewhat flexible, and yielded too\n readily, I am afraid, to the exigencies of the situation.\n\n Alas! how rigid are the inexorable verities of history. I cannot\n picture him as I would\u2014not even as a half-formed Bayard, who, if not\n quite _sans peur_, might be at least _sans reproche_; but as I had no\n hand in the formation of his character, I am not the apologist of his\n delinquencies. Did he recognize the violation of a right in his\n contemplated procedure? Oh! no; he placed his motive on a high moral\n pedestal, triumphant, unassailable\u2014the interests of humanity, the\n welfare of the boy. He never told us how far _his own welfare_ entered\n into his calculations. He felt, therefore, no scrupulous qualms as to\n the rectitude of his determination. What puzzled him was the _how_. Of\n that, however, he had no notion. Indeed, his thoughts upon the subject,\n so far from assuming a practical shape, were rather the pleasant\n emotions experienced in the contemplation of a cherished project,\n leaving out of sight the means of its attainment, even the possibility\n of its realization. A few days previous to his appearance in\n Steenwijkerwold he left his puppets to undergo the customary\n metamorphosis at Mme. Gemmel\u2019s, his head full of the pleasing fancy of\n securing The Ferret as a travelling companion and assistant. More than\n all this, he came to regard him with a rapture akin to that of an\n enamored lover for the mistress of his heart.\n\n The short winter day was closing in misty and chill around Arnhem. Away\n in the northwest the sun was setting through yellowish fog into the\n gray cold sea; the restless wail of the wind was heard now and again,\n presaging a storm. It was about half-past four o\u2019clock in the afternoon\n of this same day that Floog, undaunted by the threatening aspect of the\n weather, and pensively whistling his musical programme by way of\n rehearsal, arrived at Mme. Gemmel\u2019s. He found, upon inquiry, that his\n puppets were not quite finished. Wouldn\u2019t he wait? She expected them\n ready in a few minutes, and escorted him to the workshop in the third\n story, where they found The Ferret as busily engaged as his chill nose,\n his numb fingers, and the light of two tallow candles would allow. His\n mistress, after an authoritative command to her subordinate to make\n haste and finish his work, went down-stairs, leaving Floog to direct\n the work as he might see fit. The Ferret was shy by nature and by\n reason of his forced seclusion, and though the interruption\n disconcerted him a good deal, he made pretence of continuing labor\n without appearing to notice his visitor, whom he had several times\n seen, but never spoken to. Floog, after eyeing him a moment, asked if\n he was cold. The answer, though not quite courtly, was sufficiently\n explicit: \u201cYes, I am.\u201d \u201cWhy don\u2019t you work down-stairs in the back\n room, where \u2019tis warmer?\u201d A frown passed over the boy\u2019s face, but he\n made no reply. \u201cHere,\u201d said Floog in a kindlier tone, and, taking from\n his pocket a handful of lozenges, offered them to The Ferret, who\n hesitated a moment, looking at the donor, and then took them with a\n \u201cThank you, sir.\u201d In that moment the child\u2019s heart was gained and a\n deep sympathy established between the two, reciprocal, self-satisfying.\n\n Floog was no more a diplomat than a hero; for his next proposal was\n illogical, and would have been startling but for the peculiar\n circumstances that rendered it acceptable. \u201cRun away from Mme. Gemmel\n and come with me,\u201d he said. The Ferret did not hesitate this time, but\n answered eagerly: \u201cI will; I hate Mme. Gemmel. Let us go away now.\u201d\n This ready acquiescence staggered Floog, who, not being prepared for\n it, was at a loss how to proceed. Gathering all his faculties to meet\n the requirements of the crisis, he tried to devise some means of escape\n for The Ferret; but the more he pondered the more undecided he became,\n till at length, in sheer desperation, he said: \u201cWhen Mme. Gemmel sends\n you home with the puppets to-night we will go away together.\u201d With that\n he hurried down-stairs, paid for the puppets, asked Mme. Gemmel if she\n would send them to his lodging, stating that he would want them for an\n exhibition early the next day. This the obliging lady promised to do,\n whereupon Floog took his departure, his agitated manner escaping the\n notice of the doll-maker, who, although she had the vision of a lynx\n for money, to everything into which money did not enter as a factor was\n as blind as Cupid. Less than two hours after The Ferret, Floog, and the\n precious puppets were all in the mail-coach, rattling along for freedom\n and Steenwykerwold.\n\n As not unfrequently happens, mere chance afforded a better opportunity\n than elaborately-concocted plans would have done; for when, by\n appointment, The Ferret came, Floog precipitately, and without taking\n time to think of their destination, hurried with him to the coach-yard,\n where he learned that the night coach going north was ready to start,\n and secured passage for Steenwykerwold, whither Mme. Gemmel would be\n little likely to follow. So they arrived in the manner already related,\n amid hail and storm.\n\n\n III.\n\n\n After a storm comes a calm. Who was it that enshrined that remark in\n the sanctity of a proverb? This is like saying that day comes after\n night\u2014a truism that most of us will believe without the aid of any\n proverbial philosophy. If the calm comes not _after_ the storm, a\n person disposed to be critical might ask, _When_ does it come? We will\n leave the solution of this problem to interpreters as profound as the\n proverb-maker, and follow the fortunes of Floog and The Ferret.\n\n Calm _had_ succeeded storm as they turned their backs to the hostelry\n of Mijnheer Pilzer and bade adieu to its professional hospitalities.\n Not the listless calm of summer skies, of dreamy fields and waters.\n Clear and cutting, the icy air of morning quickened the nerves and\n caused the blood in livelier currents to tingle in the veins, so that\n even the sluggish Ferret, wincing, heightened his pace to a sturdy trot\n to keep abreast of Floog. The sun was up, burnishing the chimney-pots\n and sharp gables of the tall, bistre-colored houses, and converting\n into rare jewelry the fantastic frost-wreaths that adorned their eaves.\n Early as it was, the _Nieu Strasse_ was astir with pedestrians. The\n shop-windows, already unshuttered, were decorated gaily with ivy and\n palm. Unusual bustle and activity were everywhere discernible; and why\n not? Was it not Christmas Eve and f\u00eate-day at Van der Meer Castle?\n\n It was a beautiful and time-honored custom at Van der Meer Castle on\n every Christmas Eve to give a party to all the children of the\n neighborhood. Rich and poor, lofty and lowly, all were welcome. But\n although all were welcome, all did not come. The children of the rich,\n and those who had the means of indulging in the season\u2019s festivities at\n home, mostly kept aloof, or were made to keep aloof, lest they should\n incur by implication a suspicion of that fearful malady, poverty; for\n the light of nineteenth-century civilization had penetrated the by-ways\n of the world, and even Steenwykerwold had caught some of its oblique\n rays\u2014those that distort instead of illuminating, by which poverty is\n made to appear as the sum of all social crime. Well, then, the poor\n children for many years had had the party and banquet all to\n themselves, and such, in fact, was the desire of their present\n entertainer.\n\n The proprietor of the place and inheritor of its wealth and traditions\n was Leopoldine Van der Meer, who had been left an orphan in early\n childhood. I saw her once, and can never forget that sweet, serene\n face; for it is ineffaceably stamped on my memory. Although time had\n then added another score of years to her term of life, and sprinkled\n with silver the bands of dark-brown hair smoothed on either side of her\n placid forehead, still it dealt gently with that gentle lady, as if the\n old reaper had thrown down his reluctant sickle, unwilling to mark his\n passage by any tell-tale furrow, but softly breathed on her in passing,\n lulling her into a more perfect repose. At the time when the incidents\n I am relating took place, however, she was young and fresh and fair\n beyond expression. Her features, clear and well defined, possessed the\n delicate tracery and perfection of outline that sculptors dream of. Her\n air and carriage, her every gesture, from the movement of her shapely\n head to the light footfall, all queenly yet unaffected, might have\n inspired the genius of Buonarotti when he painted his wonderful Sibyls,\n while the gentle, half-shy, liquid gray eyes, tenderly glancing from\n behind their silken-fringed lids, would have graced the canvas of\n Murillo.\n\n These external graces were but tokens of a kindly heart and true soul\u2014a\n nature that imparted a breath of its own sweet essence to all who came\n within the charmed sphere of its influence. The festival looked forward\n to with such ardent longings by the young ones was now near at hand. It\n was Christmas Eve.\n\n The festival was held in the spacious banqueting-hall of the castle\u2014an\n oblong apartment, across the upper end of which extended a gallery for\n musicians, reached by a balustraded stairway on either side. The walls\n were gracefully festooned with wreaths of bright evergreens gemmed with\n haws and scarlet berries. In the centre stood a large table, upon which\n was placed a gigantic Christmas tree, sparkling with a thousand colored\n crystals and loaded with every variety of toy.\n\n Floog, who was acquainted with the annual custom, desirous of\n recompensing his youthful friend, made haste to conduct him thither.\n The Ferret needed neither introduction nor credential, his age and\n appearance being sufficient passports. He was kindly welcomed and\n ushered in. The grand hall, beaming with lustrous lamps and adorned\n with varied decorations, dazzled his eyes. The splendor, the music, and\n the toys nearly overpowered him, and he stood as if fixed in a trance,\n so like a brilliant dream did it all seem, which a stir, a breath might\n dispel. Gradually recovering his dazed faculties, he began to revel in\n the thrilling sense of its reality\u2014yes, real for himself as well as for\n the rest.\n\n When the children were all assembled they were marshalled into ranks\n two deep, the girls first, and marched twice round the room, singing.\n It was a simple Christmas carol, the refrain familiar to most of them;\n for it had been sung on similar occasions by similar choirs from time\n immemorial, and is, I hope, sung there yet:\n\n\n \u201cChristmas time at Van der Meer,\n Love, and mirth, and pleasant cheer;\n Happy hearts from year to year\n Hail each coming Christmas.\u201d\n\n\n If any misgivings had crept into their minds that they were to undergo\n the trying ordeal of a regular school drill for the delectation of\n patronizing visitors, their apprehensions were soon quieted. With the\n song ended all the formality. They appreciated their freedom, made the\n most of it, and abandoned themselves to unrestrained fun in uproarious\n hilarity. The Ferret caught the infection. Though not quite recovered\n from the fatigue of the last twenty-four hours, he forgot it, forgot\n his little cares, forgot his solitude, forgot all in the blessed\n dissipation of the hour. Unfortunately, he outdid himself.\n\n Floog had meanwhile betaken himself to the nearest tavern, intending to\n come for his little friend when the festivities were over. He did not\n retire to bed, but paid for a lodging on a settee in the tap-room. In a\n few minutes he was sound asleep. How long he slept he did not know, but\n some time during the night he awoke with a sudden start. A bell was\n pealing wildly in the still night air. A man partially dressed, his\n heavy shoes in his hand, dashed past and out into the street.\n Immediately there was commotion, and the sound of voices was heard in\n loud and eager discussion. In another moment the tap-room was full of\n men. Floog hurriedly arose, and, joining the excited group, they all\n went out. When they came to the triangular opening formed by the\n confluence of three streets\u2014The Square, as it was rather\n inappropriately called\u2014they were met by a crowd of men and women as\n anxious and excited as themselves, and all evidently at a loss what to\n do or whither to proceed.\n\n Louder and more clamorous the bell rang out its portentous notes;\n fitfully and frantically it rang in the ears of the now aroused\n populace. All at once it would stop suddenly, but for a moment only, as\n if pausing to take breath and gather fresh strength; then it would\n recommence wilder than before, producing an effect weird and\n terrifying. It was the old alarm-bell at Van der Meer Castle.\n\n This bell was very ancient, and it hung in a tower behind the castle,\n connected with it by an arched causeway. It was placed there in feudal\n times to call together the vassals and adherents of the place in cases\n of raid or invasion, if for no worthier purpose; and in later times a\n superstition attached to it that its reawakening portended some\n calamity, the nature of which, not being specifically stated, was left\n to conjecture, and gave scope to the prognostications of the\n wise-acres. Yes, these would say, with the self-complacent air of\n oracles, when the bell rings it will ring the death-knell of our\n liberties, and Holland will pass to an alien race. This was the\n interpretation generally received and accredited by those who had faith\n in the tradition\u2014a goodly number, which included almost all the old\n inhabitants. On the other hand, many among the junior members of the\n community ridiculed the whole thing, scoffed at the prophetic legend as\n an old woman\u2019s tale, and, spurred perhaps by what they termed the\n foolish credulity of the elders, who professed an abiding belief in it,\n they rushed to the opposite extreme, even to the extent of doubting, at\n least of denying, the very existence of the bell. At any rate it had\n long ago fallen into disuse, and those who heard it now heard it for\n the first time.\n\n In the market square this old civic story was anxiously revived and\n earnestly discussed, while the ominous import of the ringing was\n speculated upon with troublous forebodings, even by the sceptical, and\n its inharmonious clangor added tenfold significance to its history. In\n the midst of the tumult the crowd swayed with a sudden movement, and\n presently began to waver and divide, as a stalwart form appeared,\n forcing a passage, and shouting with a persuasive vigor heard above the\n din: \u201cTo the dike! to the dike!\u201d It was Peter Artveldt, the\n ship-carpenter. His words and example had the effect of an electric\n shock on the panic-stricken multitude. Shaking off their stupor, they\n followed him through the town, echoing his cry, \u201cTo the dike! to the\n dike!\u201d and, gathering strength as they proceeded, soon reached the\n dike, half a mile beyond the northern limit of the town.\n\n Imagination had diverted their fears, not allayed them; and, singular\n as it seems, no one thought of the dike until the voice of the\n ship-carpenter like a thunder-clap sounded a warning of the real\n danger. Up to that moment the dike was to them, as it had been for\n generations, the firm and effective bulwark of the land.\n\n Their worst fears were realized. The water was flowing through several\n fissures in the dike, noiselessly stealing in upon the land, until it\n had flooded the ground up to the cemetery palings. This was not all nor\n the worst. A hasty survey disclosed the appalling fact that at one\n point the force of the storm had sapped the foundation; some of its\n stones, having been displaced, were lying loose in the soft sand and\n ooze. An instant revealed their peril and the imminence of the danger;\n had they been but half an hour later nothing could have averted their\n fate\u2014Steenwykerwold would have been as effectually and irretrievably\n swallowed up by water as old Herculaneum was by fire, and sadder the\n story of its chroniclers.\n\n However, it was not a time for reflection, but for action. With such\n implements as in their haste they had been able to provide themselves\n after the real nature of the danger became known, they set to work with\n a will, aided by the invigorating example of Artveldt, who with heroic\n energy put forth his strenuous powers and directed all their movements.\n In less than ten minutes they had felled four or five of the cemetery\n trees; breaking through the gate, they dragged these to the dike,\n making an effective temporary barrier to the advance of the cruel\n waters. Yet to guard against a possible recurrence of danger from a\n renewal of the storm or any untoward accident, until the damage should\n be permanently repaired, an organized force was appointed, divided into\n squads of eight, whose duty it was to watch constantly, relieving each\n other every six hours. These precautions completed, the multitude, in\n the delirious joy of their deliverance, grew wild with delight and\n manifested symptoms of frantic disorder. Here again the ascendent\n spirit of Artveldt made itself felt. \u201cBrothers,\u201d said he, \u201cwe have\n finished a brave night\u2019s work; let us not undo it by making fools of\n ourselves. No; we will go peaceably to our homes, and a grateful\n country will say: \u2018They were as orderly in the hour of triumph as they\n were brave in the hour of peril.\u2019 Posterity will keep sacred your\n memory and look back with grateful eyes to this day, and every future\n Christmas will be happier for your deed.\u201d\n\n After this speech they were ready and willing to obey him. He now\n ranged the men in line of march, requesting them not to break rank\n until they reached Van der Meer Castle, where it was agreed they should\n disperse; then, with a long, full cheer, they returned triumphantly\n through the town, and _Steenwykerwold was saved_.\n\n After having been hospitably entertained at the castle, and thanking\n Lady Leopoldine for the timely warning whereby the threatened disaster\n was averted, they gave a parting salute\u2014three hearty cheers\u2014and then,\n as agreed upon, quietly dispersed.\n\n At that very time there was commotion within the castle. The eventful\n night was yet to be made memorable by another incident, as yet known\n only to its inmates, having been wisely withheld from the knowledge of\n the men who stemmed the fateful waters.\n\n The ringing had some time ceased. Now, every one supposed that Lady\n Leopoldine had caused the bell to be rung, knowing or divining their\n danger; but such, in fact, was not the case. She no more than the rest\n mistrusted the safety of the dike. You may imagine, then, her terror\n when first she heard the appalling sound. Like a summons from the grave\n it smote her ear. Was it a summons from the grave? At first she could\n scarce refrain from thinking that it was, so strange and startling on\n the pulseless air of night fell the unfamiliar peal. Again she believed\n herself the victim of some wild hallucination. She rose at once and\n summoned the servants.\n\n It was no illusion\u2014they had all heard it; they could not choose but\n hear, and it was while listening in agonizing suspense that the summons\n of their mistress reached them. It was obeyed with more than customary\n alacrity. They all rushed pell-mell into the hall. Lady Leopoldine\n instantly dismissed her own fears and allayed theirs, and caused a\n vigorous search to be made.\n\n The astonishment and alarm of the household will perhaps be more\n readily understood when it is remembered that the bell was entirely\n inaccessible. The tower was about sixty-five feet high, of somewhat\n rude construction. Walls of large, rough stones to an altitude of\n sixteen feet formed the base. Inside of these walls heavy oaken\n buttresses were placed, which had the appearance of strengthening them,\n but which in reality formed the support of the bell suspended above and\n hidden in a curious network of trellised beams. No appliances for\n reaching it were visible; and how it got there was a mystery. Indeed,\n the ringing of the bell on that night, as well as the bell itself and\n all its appurtenances, were regarded as very mysterious; and we may\n well excuse the simple-minded people, not yet imbued with modern\n materialism, if they conceived the whole affair to be the work of\n superhuman agency.\n\n No one had entered the causeway from the house, it was evident; no\n trace of disturbance could anywhere be discovered. Two of the men, the\n coachman and his assistant, braver than the rest, volunteered to go\n into the passage and thoroughly examine the premises. Providing\n themselves with lanterns, they went round to the old door in the rear\n of the tower. One glance convinced them that no one had recently gone\n in that way. The bolts were firm in the sockets, wedged tight by the\n rust of a century. With much exertion they were forced back, the door\n was unfastened, and the men entered. The damp, chill air caused them to\n shudder, and their first impulse was to beat a precipitate retreat.\n Pausing in doubtful perplexity of their next movement, afraid to\n advance, and ashamed to go back, they stood near the door, which they\n had considerately left ajar, fearing, yet hoping for some perceptible\n excuse to run. None came. The silence was broken only by the flutter of\n some startled bats aloft; the dingy walls alone met their scrutinizing\n gaze as they peered cautiously around, the glare of the lanterns\n shooting sharply-defined rays of yellowish gray light through the humid\n gloom. The first feeling of nervous trepidation past, reason asserted\n itself; they grew accustomed to the gloom and began to explore the\n passage deliberately and carefully. After having traversed it the\n entire length without making any discovery, they were about to retrace\n their steps when their attention was arrested by some fragments of\n mortar or plaster lying loosely on the flagged pavement about four feet\n from the further end next the house. These had the appearance of having\n recently fallen from the wall. Here was a probable clue. With renewed\n interest they now proceeded to examine the wall, and were rewarded by\n finding a small door, level with its surface and nearly concealed by a\n thin coating of plaster. On forcing it open they were surprised to find\n another passage, parallel with the main one, but so narrow as to admit\n of entrance only by single file. Another door, as secret as the first,\n opened from this narrow passage into a sort of recess behind the\n stairway, which, it will be remembered, led to the gallery in the\n banqueting-hall. The recess was known to the occupants of the castle,\n but never used by them. Its original purpose may have been a subject of\n momentary conjecture, but they did not trouble themselves much about\n it, being content, if they thought of it at all, to consider it an\n eccentricity of some former proprietor. Least of all did they dream of\n its communication with a hidden passage to the bell-tower. Following\n the passage back to the other end, their surprise was greatly augmented\n by the further discovery that, instead of opening into the main\n enclosure, like the large passage, as they naturally expected, it\n terminated in a sort of square sentry-box, enclosed at all sides except\n the top\u2014in reality a large wooden shaft. It was no other than what\n appeared from without to be a combination of four solid beams. In it\n hung the bell-rope. _At the bottom lay the bell-ringer_, The Ferret,\n exhausted and insensible.\n\n They carried him out into the hall. The mistress of the mansion sent at\n once for a physician, and, gently lifting his head, with delicate hand\n she chafed the poor pale brow and applied restoratives. Soon the doctor\n came, but his services were not needed.\n\n Another morning dawned. Again the slanting daybeams pierced the misty\n levels. The vapor of earth, as it felt the ray, was dissolved into\n purest ether, and, restoring to earth its grosser particles, ascended\n calmly to its native sky. Thus, too, The Ferret\u2019s Christmas carol,\n begun on earth, was finished in heaven, and another voice on that happy\n Christmas morning was added to the celestial choir singing, \u201cGlory to\n God on high, and on earth peace to men of good will.\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1877.\n\n There is little beyond the Russo-Turkish war that will mark this year\n apart from others in the annals of universal history. Questions,\n national and international, that we have touched upon time and again\n come up now unsettled as ever. It is tedious and profitless to go over\n well-trodden ground; to repeat reflections that have already been\n repeated; and to attempt a solution of problems, social, political, and\n religious, that are still working themselves out. We purpose,\n therefore, in the present review to follow up a few of the broad lines\n that have marked the year and given to it something of an individual\n and special character. If these are very few, perhaps it is the better\n for mankind. The more nations are occupied with their own affairs the\n better it is for the world at large.\n\n To begin with ourselves. We had a very vexed and very delicate problem\n to solve\u2014no less than to determine, on the turn of a single disputed\n electoral vote, who was to be our President. The circumstances that\n created this difficulty were dealt within our last year\u2019s review; they\n are in the recollection of our readers. On the casting of a single\n disputed vote lay the election to the Presidency of the United States.\n Such a contingency, accompanied as it was by peculiarly aggravating\n circumstances, had never before arisen in the history of this country.\n The wisest were in doubt what to do; the country was in a fever of\n expectation. The republic was on trial in itself and before the world.\n The written lines of the Constitution were found inadequate to meet so\n unlooked-for and peculiar a matter. It was not the mere fact of one\n disputed vote that was to turn the scale. There were many disputed\n votes, which rested with States whose administration was not above\n suspicion. Only in the event of all of these turning in favor of one of\n the candidates could the Presidency be awarded to him. Any one of them\n going to his opponent\u2014who, as far as the votes of the people went, had\n a decided and unmistakable majority\u2014would have settled the question at\n once. There was room and occasion for grave doubt on both sides. By\n mutual agreement of the representatives of the two parties that divide\n the country, a national court of arbitration, supposed to be, and\n doubtless with reason, above suspicion, was appointed to inquire into\n and decide upon the electoral returns. The court was chosen from both\n parties. It so turned out that a preponderating vote lay with one\n party. It might have rested with the other. It was a matter of\n accident; and it is to be hoped that, if not exactly a matter of\n accident, it was a matter of honesty that divided the court on each\n moot point into strict party lines, with, as final result, an award of\n the Presidency to Mr. Hayes, the Republican candidate. There the matter\n rested. The court had discharged itself of the very delicate task\n imposed upon it, and there was nothing left the country and the rival\n parties to do but accept a decision of its own creation, which might\n have gone the other way, but did not. It was the shortest way, perhaps,\n out of an immediate and pressing difficulty. It was none the less a\n strain on the Constitution and on the conscience of the people\u2014a strain\n that could not well be stood again. The republic cannot afford to hand\n this settlement down to posterity as a lawful and satisfactory\n precedent. The right way in which to regard it is as one of those\n unforeseen accidents that occur in the history of all peoples, that\n adjust themselves somehow for the time being, and that stand as a\n warning rather than a guide to future conduct.\n\n The country honestly and wisely accepted the decision. Of course there\n were sore feelings; there would have been sore feelings in any case;\n yet men breathed freely when what was a real, a painful, and a\n dangerous crisis was over. There are men\u2014sensible and patriotic men,\n too, as well as a vast multitude neither patriotic nor sensible\u2014who are\n ever ready to despair of the republic when events do not turn out\n exactly as they had predicted or desired. Let them take comfort. The\n republic is not yet dead; and it seems to us very far from dying. In\n other days, and perhaps in other peoples to-day who enjoy the privilege\n of a monarchical government, such a question would have resulted in a\n war of dynasties. The dynasty of Mr. Hayes or of Mr. Tilden troubles us\n but little. The disaffected may bide their time. They still hold their\n votes, and it is for them to see that they are not robbed of them. Mr.\n Hayes has taken to heart the lesson of the last elections, which\n pronounced not so much against a party as against the administration of\n his predecessor. The present administration has thus far, in the main,\n contrasted well with that which went before it. The President seems to\n be a man of right impulses and feeling and possessed of a good\n judgment. He has discarded many embarrassing associates and evil\n allies\u2014political parasites who battened on the life-blood of the state.\n If his moral vision is only broad enough to see that he is the\n President not of a party, but of a great people, with varied wants and\n some sore troubles and internal difficulties that need very cautious\n and delicate adjusting; if he honestly and persistently aims at doing\n right, the people, regardless of party, will be with him and support\n him. Thus far he has manifestly striven to do well. His beginning has\n been good. Trials will doubtless come. He has already shown himself too\n good for many influential men in the party that voted for him. If he\n only continues to disregard and brave all pettiness, he can safely turn\n from partisans to the people, and the people know how to judge and\n value honesty\u2014a quality that it was coming to be thought had almost\n died out of politics.\n\n There have been some indications of a revival of business; but such a\n revival, to be sure and general, must be slow. Our people have not yet\n recovered from the demoralizing effect of the rush of good-fortune\n which they so foolishly squandered. They look for miracles in finance\n and business, for a revival in a day. This cannot well come. The way\n for general prosperity, and that even of very moderate dimensions, must\n be paved by a return to general honesty in commercial dealings and in\n private life. Public honesty can alone restore public confidence, and\n public honesty is a matter of growth, education, and the apprehension\n and following of right principles. It can only come from faith in God\n and a sense of personal responsibility to God, as true faith in man can\n only come from true faith in God. The religion that constantly\n impresses this upon men\u2019s minds is the religion that will preserve and\n save from all dangers not this republic only but every government.\n These feelings, penetrating the hearts of the people, will best solve\n the vexed questions between labor and capital, between black and white\n and red and yellow. For a right sense of personal responsibility to God\n necessarily involves a right sense of personal responsibility to one\n another, of the duties we owe to society, of the duties we owe to the\n state. This country of all others is open to the free workings of\n religion. Indeed, it is as open to the devil as to God; and if the\n devil, according to some, seems to get the best of the battle, it can\n only be because \u201cthe children of darkness are wiser in their generation\n than the children of light\u201d; because Christians are not really and\n wholly true to Christ, and by their lives do not show forth the faith\n that is in them.\n\n\n THE RUSSO-TURKISH WAR.\n\n\n In Europe the event of the year that calls for most attention is the\n war between Russia and Turkey. On this subject we can say little or\n nothing probably that will not have already suggested itself to others.\n All have watched the progress of the painful struggle from day to day;\n have formed their own conclusions as to the manner in which it has been\n carried on on both sides; as to the necessity of such a war having\n taken place at all; as to its probable results to both parties and to\n Europe at large.\n\n At the time of our last review war between Russia and Turkey was\n thought imminent. We then wrote\u2014and we may be pardoned for quoting our\n own words, as some of them, at least, seem to us to apply equally well\n to the present situation\u2014as follows:\n\n \u201cIf we may hazard an opinion, we believe that there will be no war, at\n least this winter. As for the alarm at the anticipated occupation of\n Constantinople by Russia, while\u2014if the Russian Empire be not dissolved\n before the close of the present century by one of the most terrific\n social and political convulsions that has ever yet come to pass\u2014that\n occupation seems to lie very much within the order of possibilities, we\n doubt much whether it will occur so soon as people think.... It would\n seem to us difficult for Russia to occupy Constantinople without first\n mastering and garrisoning Turkey, and Turkey is an empire of many\n millions, whom fanaticism can still rouse to something like heroic, as\n well as to the most cruel and repulsive deeds.\u201d\n\n Those words seem to us to have forecast fairly enough the general\n aspects of the war. The war was declared because Russia burned to go to\n war\u2014Russia, or the Russian administration. The invasion of Turkey by\n Russia was not a thing of the past year. It was foreordained. It was\n dreaded from the close of the war in the Crimea. The only question with\n the other powers was how long or by what means could it be staved off.\n That Russia would invade Turkey as soon as she thought she could do so\n without much danger of outward interference and with good prospects of\n success was probably a fixed thought in the minds of all men who chose\n to give a thought to the matter. For almost a quarter of a century has\n Russia been girding herself for a fight that had become an essential\n part of her national policy. Within that period, under the wise\n guidance of Prince Gortschakoff, she has more than repaired the\n terrible losses sustained in the Crimean war. She grew stealthily up to\n a power and a status unexampled in her history. She guarded her\n finances, lived within her means, prospered, refused steadily to enter\n into any embarrassing European complications. She saw the European\n alliance that had crushed her in 1854 hopelessly dissolve, and a new\n and friendly power rise up and take the lead in European affairs. As a\n military power she was looked upon as having only one superior, or\n rival perhaps, in the world, and that her friendly neighbor. So strong\n was she, and so singularly had every change in European politics told\n in her favor, that when her opportunity came, with a word, a beck, a\n stroke of her chancellor\u2019s pen, she snapped asunder the iron gyves\n forged for her and laid on her by a united Europe, and no power dared\n whisper a protest. All the world saw whither she was drifting. She was\n drifting to the sea, stretching out her giant arms to clasp for ever\n those golden shores that she claimed as hers by destiny. The hour of\n destiny struck at last. The strifes of exhausted nations and the\n jealousies of others left her alone to deal with the power that held\n those shores and that to Russia was an hereditary foe. She proceeded\n cautiously to the last. She did all things with becoming decorum. She\n invited the nations to a conference, held in the Turkish capital, to\n determine once for all what was to be done with the Turk, while she\n mobilized her armies in order to give effect to her peaceful protest.\n\n What the conference of European diplomatists did, or rather did not do,\n is now matter of picturesque history. \u201cDeath before dishonor!\u201d was the\n ultimatum of the Turk. \u201cDeath, then, be it,\u201d said Russia, and the new\n \u201ccrusade\u201d began.\n\n It has been a sad \u201ccrusade\u201d for both parties, a disastrous one for\n Russia and the Romanoffs, even though there can be little doubt as to\n the final victory of Russia. What we may call the great Russian\n illusion has been dispelled by this war. It was speedily discovered\n that the feet of the giant who was running so swiftly and surely to the\n goal of his ambition were of clay. Why, victory invited him, danced\n before him, strewed flowers in his path. It was a very race with\n fortune. To a great military power half the battle was won before a\n single engagement worthy of the name had been fought. But it has\n stopped at that half. Russia is still knocking at the gates of Plevna,\n and even when Plevna is opened, as it will be probably soon, the\n inglorious victory will have been so dearly won that Russia herself\n may, with too much reason, be anxious for the peace which she wantonly\n broke.\n\n Fortune was too good to Russia at the opening of the war. Her smiles\n begat an overweening confidence. The destruction of a stubborn and\n warlike race was looked upon as a thing of a few months, as a game of\n war. Reverses came fast and thick\u2014reverses that were invited.\n Comparative handfuls of splendid soldiers were sent to destroy armies\n entrenched in natural fortresses. Then leaked out a fatal secret.\n Russia had everything but generals and competent military officers, or,\n if she had them, they were not with her armies, or were not allowed to\n take the lead. The dress parade to Constantinople was speedily and\n effectually checked, and Russia is to all intents and purposes as far\n from that city to-day as she was in the summer.\n\n The details of the campaigns must be looked for elsewhere. We can here\n only look at results. There are two or three reflections regarding the\n war itself which seem to us worthy of attention as affecting other\n interests than those immediately engaged in the contest.\n\n In the first place, the fact of the war having been declared at all\n showed the powerlessness of Europe to shape or deal with grave\n questions of international interest when any one strong power chooses\n not to be advised, coerced, or led. This practically places the peace\n of Europe in the hands of any power. For instance, there is no means of\n preventing Germany from declaring war against France to-morrow, should\n the German government so will. Early in the year, and at the invitation\n of Russia, the leading European powers sent their representatives to\n Constantinople to prevent, if possible, the outbreak of this war. These\n were doubtless experienced diplomatists. There is no reason to doubt\n that all of them\u2014save, perhaps, the Russian representative, General\n Ignatieff\u2014wished honestly and strove by every means in their power to\n prevent, or at least stave off, the war. They failed, because it was\n meant by the strongest there that they should fail. The only argument\n to sway Europe to-day is the sword.\n\n Thus the representatives of united Europe, backed by all the vast\n resources of their empires, could do nothing to prevent a war which at\n the outset looked as though it incurred the gravest consequences to\n Europe; and it may incur them still. Why was this? Simply because there\n is no such thing as a united Europe. The family and comity of European\n nations was, as we pointed out last year in dealing with this very\n subject, broken up by the Protestant Reformation. The catholicity of\n nations, which in the order of events would have become an accomplished\n and saving fact, from that date yielded to selfish and narrow\n nationalities which made a separate world of each people, bounded by\n their own domain. But humanity is greater than nationality, and the\n world wider than a kingdom\u2014a truth that will never be felt until one\n religion plants again in the leading nations of the world the great\n unity of heart and soul that God alone can give.\n\n As for Russia, however, the tide of events may turn; she has lost more\n than she will probably gain even by victory. Not in men and money and\n material alone has she lost, but in _morale_ and _prestige_. The czar\n may return in triumph to St. Petersburg, but his victorious ranks will\n show a grim and ominous gap of something like a hundred thousand of his\n bravest men, lost in less than a year against a foe whom Russia\n despised, and thousands of whom were sacrificed to incapacity. A\n careful estimate made in September last set the daily cost of the\n Russian army at about $750,000. That figure must have since increased;\n but take it as an average, and spread it over eight months, and we have\n the enormous sum of $184,500,000 as the cost of the campaign from May\n to December. Loans must be raised to meet such expenditure, and loans\n are only obtained at high interest.\n\n Victories bought at such prices are dear indeed. Taking the Russian\n victory for granted, it is likely after all to prove a barren one. The\n Turk is an impracticable foe, and, though the signs of his exhaustion\n are multiplying, he has made such a fight as, by force of arms at\n least, to vindicate his title to national existence. Indeed, his terms\n are apt to go up instead of down. Loss of money is nothing to him, for\n he has none to lose. His empire was bankrupt before the war. For trade\n or commerce he cares little. His life is easy and simple. He cares for\n little more than enough to eat, and a little of that seems to satisfy\n him. His fatalism robs life of the charm it has for other men. He would\n as lief die fighting as not, and he would sooner fight the Russian than\n any other foe. You cannot reason with men of this kind. They see one\n thing: that single-handed they made a very good fight against a most\n powerful antagonist; that they have hurt him badly, even if they have\n been worsted. The whole struggle can only be likened to an attack by a\n giant on a poor little wretch who was thought to be half-dead. If it\n takes the giant six months to thrash such an antagonist; and if during\n the fight the giant gets something very like a sound thrashing himself\n from his puny foe; and if, when both are pretty well exhausted, he\n succeeds in throttling the pugnacious little chap at last, the verdict\n of the world will be that there is something the matter with the giant,\n and the self esteem of the little fellow will rise proportionately.\n\n Of course it is idle to speculate on the end. Russia has lost so\n heavily that she may insist upon very tangible fruits of victory. On\n the other hand, the war has been such a butchery that humanity cries\n out against it, and the European powers will undoubtedly strive at the\n first opportunity to make a more effectual appeal than before to both\n the combatants. Peace rests on this: How much will Russia ask? How much\n will Turkey concede? How much will the jealousies of other powers allow\n Russia to take?\u2014questions all of them that are sure to be asked, but\n which we confess our inability to answer.\n\n\n FRANCE.\n\n\n The armed struggle in the East has scarcely attracted more universal\n attention than the civil struggle in France. France is trying to solve\n problems that touch her very life, and they are problems in which all\n men have a personal interest. The French questions are eminently\n questions of the day and of the age. The struggle going on there is one\n between the elements of society. MacMahon, Gambetta, \u201cHenri Cinq,\u201d\n \u201cNapol\u00e9on Quatre\u201d\u2014these are but names. The fight is not on them and\n their personal merits or demerits. It is at bottom between the men who\n find the \u201cbe-all and the end-all here\u201d in this world, and the men who\n believe that there is a God who made this world for his own purposes,\n who is to be obeyed, loved, and served, and according to whose law\n human society must conform itself, if it would fulfil the end for which\n it was created, have happiness in this world, and eternal happiness in\n the next.\n\n The first class is not restricted to the men and women who figured in\n the _Commune_. These only compose its rank and file, and their sin is\n less, for multitudes of them sin through ignorance. It embraces also\n the men of the new science, the professors in the atheistic\n universities; statesmen of the Falk and Lasker type; preachers of the\n Gospel as expounded by Dean Stanley; philosophers and scientists, like\n Darwin or Herbert Spencer, like Huxley and Tyndall, like, descending a\n grade, Professor Fisk or Youmans; women like some we know here at home,\n who tread the platform with so masculine a stride; the men of\n \u201cprogress\u201d such as Brigham Young was, such as, in a more intellectual\n sense, John Stuart Mill was, such as \u201ctribunes of the people\u201d like\n Charles Bradlaugh, or his friend M. Gambetta, or Garibaldi, are; poets\n like Victor Hugo or Algernon Swinburne. The men who have the teaching\n power in the secularized and secular universities of the day, who shape\n a purely secular education, who edit too many of our leading\n newspapers, who preach atheism or blasphemy from pulpits supposed to be\n consecrated to the service of Christ, are equally members of this party\n with the outcasts of society and the avowed conspirators against order.\n This it was that gave its significance to the late French elections;\n that induced men to study so carefully the name, character,\n antecedents, and political color of each man elected; that caused to be\n telegraphed on the very day of the elections the long files of the\n deputies to England, to Germany, to Austria, to Italy, even to these\n distant shores. Why, such a fact as that last mentioned is unexampled.\n For the time being the world centred in France.\n\n This is a dangerous pre-eminence for France. The country is for ever in\n a fever. It is in a constant state of crisis. Ministry after ministry\n is tried, found wanting, and thrown aside. The truth is the parties\n cannot coalesce. There is a barrier between them that it seems cannot\n be overthrown. The elections decided nothing. They left the country and\n parties in much the same condition as before. As a matter of fact the\n conservatives, if any, gained, but the gain was too small to indicate\n the will of the country. We doubt if the country has a will beyond the\n desire to be at peace, which the contentions of its own parties alone\n threaten. M. Gambetta, the leader of the radicals, is for ever\n clamoring for a republic. Well, he has a republic; why not make the\n most of it? He has certainly as good a republic as he could make. The\n difficulty with him is that the republic which he wishes to lead must\n be founded on the negation of Christianity. In France the dividing\n lines between creeds are very clearly drawn. Protestantism counts for\n nothing there, and the little that there was of it has gone to pieces.\n Gambetta\u2019s _b\u00eate-noir_ is \u201cclericalism\u201d\u2014_i.e._, Catholicity. He would\n abolish the Catholic Church, not merely as an adjunct of the state but\n altogether. No Catholicity must be taught in the schools; that is a\n vital principle with him. The pope must have nothing to say to\n Catholics in France. The clergy must receive no pay, scanty as it is,\n from the state. No such thing as a free Catholic university is to be\n tolerated. The children of France are to be brought up and educated\n free-thinkers, and be made to turn out true Gambettists. In a word, the\n foundation of M. Gambetta\u2019s scheme for the regeneration of France is to\n abolish the Christian religion there. Irreligion is to be the\n corner-stone of his republic.\n\n This is a pleasing prospect for French Catholics, and it may be\n necessary to remind our able editors who denounce \u201cclericalism\u201d so\n lustily, and see no hope for France but in the republic of M. Gambetta,\n that there are still Catholics in France; that the bulk of the nation\n is Catholic. It is a pleasing prospect, we say, for them to contemplate\n the suppression of their religion at the word of M. Gambetta. Is it\n very surprising that the oracle of the new republic should only bring\n hatred on the very name of republic to men who can see in it, as\n expounded by its oracle, nothing but the most odious tyranny? It was\n John Lemoinne, if we remember rightly, who in the anti-Christian\n _Journal des Debats_ said, on the retirement of Mr. Gladstone from\n office, that religion lay at the bottom of all the great questions that\n move the world. If that be so, and it is so, why not recognize the\n fact? Must the French republic which M. Gambetta advocates and our\n republican editors on this side advocate be first and above all an\n irreligious despotism? Must it begin with religious persecution? M.\n Gambetta says that it must.\n\n We are not accusing him wrongfully. His own words express his meaning\n plainly enough. It must be borne in mind that the epithet\n \u201cclericalism,\u201d in the mouths of French radicals, means Catholicity.\n Every French Catholic who believes in and practises his religion is a\n \u201cclerical\u201d; so every Catholic who believes and does the same all the\n world over is, in the mouths of anti-Catholics, an \u201cultramontane.\u201d If\n there is one lurid page in all history that sears the eyes of humane\n and sensible men, it is that of the French Revolution\u2014the most awful\n revolt, save its offspring, the _Commune_, against all order, human and\n divine, that the world has witnessed. Yet \u201cthe French Revolution,\u201d and\n none other, is M. Gambetta\u2019s _oriflamme_.\n\n Just on the eve of the elections he addressed an immense meeting at the\n _Cirque Am\u00e9ricain_ in Paris. \u201cAmongst those present,\u201d says the\n correspondent of the London _Daily Telegraph_, \u201cI observed the most\n prominent members of the various groups of the Left. When the great\n orator of the evening (M. Gambetta) appeared, he was received with a\n shout of welcome, renewed and continued for several minutes. There were\n only two cries issued from every lip: \u2018_Vive la R\u00e9publique!_\u2019 and\n \u2018_Vive Gambetta!_\u2019 ... On the latter rising to speak he was received\n with another storm of cheers.\u201d\n\n Well, and what had he to say to this enthusiastic assembly and to the\n leading deputies of the Left? We can only find space for a few\n sentences, though the whole speech is instructive, as giving the\n character and aims of the man:\n\n \u201cWhat is at stake?\u201d he asked. \u201cThe question is the existence of\n universal suffrage _and of the French Revolution_ (Loud cheers). That\n is the question.\u201d This declaration, which was so uproariously cheered,\n needs no comment. He made a little prophecy, that was unfortunate for\n him, regarding the returns of the elections. The prophecy turned out to\n be false, even though M. Gambetta assured his friends by saying: \u201cI\n should not risk my credit with you five days before the event on a rash\n statement.\u201d \u201cThe country will say,\u201d he thundered on, \u201cat the\n forthcoming elections that she wants the republic administered by\n republicans, and not by those who obey the voice of the Vatican.\u201d He\n appealed to the example of this country, where he said, with brilliant\n vagueness, \u201claw has taken the place of personal vanity, and conscience\n that of intrigue.\u201d We accept the example. There are millions of good\n enough republicans in this country who certainly \u201cobey the voice of the\n Vatican\u201d as faithfully as any \u201cclerical\u201d in all France, and who find\n that voice agreeing admirably with their republicanism. Indeed, that\n same voice has recently, with justice and openly, proclaimed that in\n the republic the Pope is more Pope than in any other country; and we\n have yet to learn that the republic has suffered any hurt from that\n declaration.\n\n \u201cThere is no principle,\u201d said M. Gambetta, \u201cthat binds together the\n three parties which are now opposed to us, and the nation will do\n justice to their monstrous alliance. There is but one binding force,\n and that is called clericalism. Those parties wanted a word of order to\n rally a formidable army against us; they found it in Jesuitism.\u201d And he\n closed his speech by saying:\n\n \u201cI feel that what Europe fears most is that France should again fall\n into the hands of the Ultramontane agents. I fear that the universal\n suffrage may not take sufficient account of surprise and intimidation.\n We must look this question in the face, and be able to say to Europe,\n pointing to clericalism, Behold the vanquished!\u201d\n\n As we said, M. Gambetta made a little mistake in his prophecy.\n Catholicity is not dead in France; Catholics are not a small fraction\n of the people, and in the government of the country of which they form\n so important a part they must be taken into account. They will not and\n cannot submit to have convictions which are sacred to them disregarded,\n to have necessary and national rights trampled under foot at the will\n either of M. Gambetta or of anybody else. He assumes altogether too\n much. What did the figures of the election show? As M. de Fourtou\n pointed out in his speech in the Chamber of Deputies, November 14,\n 1877: The Opposition had flattered itself that it would return with\n four hundred, and yet it lost fifty votes. \u201cIt required an astonishing\n amount of assurance for the Opposition, after such a check, to pretend\n to claim power in defiance of the rights of the Senate.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe Opposition,\u201d he continued, \u201chad obtained 4,300,000 and the\n Government 3,600,000 votes, France thus dividing herself into two\n almost equal parties. Instead of striving to oppress the one by the\n other, it would be better to seek a common link to bind themselves\n together. Candidates presented themselves to be elected in the name of\n a menaced Constitution, the public peace in jeopardy, and in the name\n of modern liberties and civil societies. But if the Opposition only\n asked for that, it had no adversaries; if it asked for something else\n it had no mandate. (Applause from the Right.)\u201d\n\n There is no denying the force of this reasoning. The parties in France\n show themselves almost equal, and the only hope of governing the\n country is by mutual concession and good-will. M. Gambetta must let the\n church alone, if he is so very anxious for peace.\n\n Frenchmen not blinded by passion might have taken warning from the\n attitude of Germany and Italy previous to and during the elections.\n These two powers\u2014for Italy has now become a sort of tender to\n Germany\u2014were earnest for the success of the party led by Gambetta. Why\n so? What sympathy can Prince Bismarck possibly have with Gambetta? What\n sympathy could he be supposed to have with a republic of the Gambetta\n stripe, of the red revolutionary stripe, as his next-door neighbor,\n while he so dreads his own socialists? The cause of his new-born\n sympathy for a red republic, or a republic of any color, is not far to\n find. It was the same sympathy that he had with the _Commune_ during\n the siege of Paris. He knows Gambetta, and has had a taste of \u201cthe\n tribune\u2019s\u201d effective generalship and governing qualities. He was in\n France when M. Gambetta made that famous \u201cpact with death\u201d of which we\n heard so much and so little came. He knows thoroughly the elements that\n make up the strength, the very explosive strength, of M. Gambetta\u2019s\n party, and there is probably nothing he would better enjoy than to see\n the _fou furieux_ at the helm of state once more. A few months of the\n Gambetta _r\u00e9gime_, and Prince Bismarck might say of France, as he said\n of Paris, \u201cLet it fry in its own fat.\u201d France is now a most dangerous\n foe to Germany\u2014negatively so, at least. She is growing more dangerous\n every year. Every year of quiet is an enormous gain to her. She is\n vastly richer than Germany. She can stand the strain of her immense\n army far more easily than Germany. She is winning back something of the\n old love and admiration of the outer world, which she had lost on\n entering into the war with Germany. She is patient, laborious,\n industrious, desirous of peace with all the world, and day by day\n becoming more able to maintain that peace even against Germany. But a\n revolution in France would destroy all this and throw the nation years\n behind. And so sure as Gambetta attained to power a revolution would\n follow; _i.e._, if he adhered\u2014and there is no doubt that he would\u2014to\n the programme of a republic which he has sketched in such bold colors.\n Once in power, once the strong but quiet hand of Marshal MacMahon was\n removed from the helm, the ship of the French state, with or without\n Gambetta\u2019s will, would go to speedy wreck.\n\n That is why Prince Bismarck so carefully encouraged the Gambetta\n faction. That is why his press thundered against a \u201cclerical\u201d\n government in France. That is why the Italian press took up the cry, as\n it explains in great measure the mysterious comings and goings between\n the courts of Berlin and the Quirinal. That is why, if France would\n abide in safety, she must retain her soldier at the head of affairs,\n and hasten during the next few years of his term to heal her internal\n discords and become one heart and one soul. Marshal MacMahon has\n attempted nothing against the republic that was confided to his\n safe-keeping. There is yet time, before his term of office expires, for\n all Frenchmen to come together and shape their government so as to\n ensure peace, freedom, and order in the future. If they cannot do this,\n the republic is hopeless in France. It will go out as its predecessors\n have gone out within a century, only to make room for a new usurper.\n\n\n GERMANY.\n\n\n There is every year less likelihood of a renewal of the dreaded war\n between Germany and France. France does not want to fight. Even if\n Germany did want to fight she must reckon on a far stronger and more\n dangerous foe than she encountered in 1870. Competent military critics,\n like the writer in _Blackwood\u2019s Magazine_, whose articles on the French\n army attracted such wide and deserved attention, assert that France,\n though probably unequal to an attack on Germany, is rather more than\n able to hold her own against attack. A stronger critic yet establishes\n this fact. In his famous speech in the German Parliament last April, in\n favor of the increase of one hundred and five captaincies in the\n army\u2014an increase that was bitterly opposed\u2014Count Von Moltke said:\n\n \u201cWhat the French press does not speak out, but what really exists, is\n the fear lest, since France has so often attacked weaker Germany,\n strong Germany should now for once fall upon France without\n provocation. This accounts for the gigantic efforts France has made in\n carrying through within a few years the reorganization of her army with\n so much practical intelligence and energy. This explains why, from the\n recent conclusion of peace till to-day, an unproportionately large part\n of the French army, chiefly artillery and cavalry, is posted, in\n excellent condition, between Paris and the German frontier\u2014a\n circumstance which must sooner or later lead to an equalizing measure\n on our part. It must also be taken into consideration that in France,\n where the contrast of political parties is even stronger than with us,\n all parties are agreed on one point\u2014viz., in voting all that is asked\n for the army. In France the army is the favorite of the nation, its\n pride, its hope; the recent defeats of the army have been condoned long\n since.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe total strength of all these [the French] battalions,\u201d he said in\n the same speech, \u201cin times of peace amounts to 487,000 men; whilst\n Germany, with a much larger population, has but little over 400,000\n under arms. The French budget exceeds the German by more than\n 150,000,000 marks (shillings), not including considerable supplementary\n sums that are there required. Even so wealthy a nation as the French\n are will not be able to bear such a burden permanently. Whether this is\n done at present for a distinct purpose, in order to reach a certain\n goal placed at not too great a distance, I must leave undecided.\u201d\n\n That speech alarmed Europe at the time. Yet it was only a plain\n statement of facts which it is as well for Europe to look in the face.\n It may seem strange that under the circumstances we should feel so\n sanguine about the preservation of peace between these two armed and\n hostile nations. But both want peace, and both are too strong to fight.\n Of course the unexpected may always occur. France does not disguise her\n purpose of revenge, and she means to \u201cmak siccer\u201d next time. But the\n gentle hand of Time softens the deepest hatreds; and if even this\n enforced peace can only be prolonged the war-fever may die away.\n Politics and administrations will change in both countries. Prince\n Bismarck will not live for ever. The French had just as bitter a\n resentment against England after Waterloo. The resentment died with the\n generation that bore it; and only for the evil legacy left by Prince\n Bismarck to the empire\u2014the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine\u2014we could\n fairly hope for better feeling between the two peoples at least within\n a generation.\n\n The smoke of battle cleared away, Germans are beginning to look around\n them and investigate civil affairs in a spirit not at all pleasing to a\n military administration. The word of command is no longer obeyed so\n blindly as before. Even the cabinet does not move to the tap of Prince\n Bismarck\u2019s drum as promptly as it was wont. Perhaps, after all, the\n chancellor did not gain so very much by his bitter prosecution of Count\n Arnim. There have been some notable resignations within the year, and\n rumors even, partially confirmed, and again renewed, of the\n chancellor\u2019s own resignation. The opposition increases at every\n election; and the response of Catholics to the men who make vacant the\n sees of their bishops is to return a stronger number of representatives\n to the Parliament at each new election. The social democrats do the\n same, and altogether the policy of blood and iron appears to be in\n strong disfavor.\n\n Even the \u201corthodox Protestants\u201d have at last openly revolted against\n the Falk laws, which were good enough for Catholics, and right in\n themselves so long as the orthodox Protestants did not feel them pinch.\n They see at last that such laws strike at all religion; that a\n generation brought up under them would have no religion at all; and\n that if they would retain the congregations who are so rapidly slipping\n from their grasp and melting away, they must strike out those laws from\n the calendar.\n\n The persecution of the Catholics goes on unrelentingly, but we have no\n doubt that better times are in store. The Catholics, as we pointed out,\n are gaining in the Parliament. The administration is weakening in unity\n and in the confidence of the country. Poverty is pressing upon the\n people. The emperor, in his speech from the throne early in the year,\n was compelled to allude to the continued depression of trade and\n industry. He might very easily have given one great reason for a large\n share of that depression in the vast armaments which he finds it\n necessary to maintain at a ruinous cost of men, money, and labor to the\n country. As recently as last November the London _Times_, which is\n certainly a friendly critic, in treating of \u201cPrussian Finance,\u201d took\n occasion to say: \u201cThe exaction of the five milliards was thought to\n crush for ever the growing wealth of France, and to be almost a\n superfluous addition to the abundant exchequer of Germany.... At least\n the state was rich for a generation to come. Five years have not yet\n passed since this huge mass of wealth was transferred, and already we\n find bankruptcy almost the rule among German traders, and hear cries\n rising on all sides of the hardness of the times and the impossibility\n of bearing much longer the crushing weight of taxation. In the hands of\n the government the French milliards seem for the most part to have\n melted away and left budgets which vary only in the shifts by which\n expenses are coaxed into an equality with receipts.\u201d\n\n The conclusion at which the writer arrives is a very suggestive one,\n and one that it would be well for Germany to take to heart:\n\n \u201cIt would be better that Germany should be content to remain for a year\n or two not quite prepared to meet the world in arms rather than that\n her citizens should find that the country so impregnably fortified\n offers them no life worth living. A man does not buy Chubb\u2019s locks for\n his stable-door when his steed is starving.\u201d\n\n Granting that the general peace of Europe is preserved during the next\n year, it would not surprise us at all to see a complete change of\n administration in Germany, and a consequent relaxation in the laws\n against Catholics. We do hope for this. Even Prince Bismarck must now\n see that the persecution of the Catholics was, in its lowest aspect, a\n political blunder. He miscalculated the faith of these German\n Catholics. The beating of his iron hammer has only welded and proved\n and tempered that faith, while the world resounded with his blows and\n all men saw that they were ineffectual. Thus has the very cradle of the\n Protestant Reformation borne noblest witness in our unbelieving age to\n the greatness, the strength, the invincibility of the faith and the\n church that Luther dreamed he had destroyed, out of Germany at least.\n Here is the result, as pictured by an adversary of the Catholic faith,\n within the past year: \u201cIt pleased Prince Bismarck\u2014whether, as he\n himself alleged, in consequence of the council or not\u2014to undertake a\n crusade against the Roman Catholic bishops and clergy which, to the\n vast body of their co-religionists all the world over, and to many\n others also, had all the look of downright persecution. They were\n challenged, not for submitting to the Vatican dogma, but for\n maintaining what they had always been accustomed to regard, before just\n as well as after the council, as the inalienable rights and liberties\n of their church. Only one course was open to them as ecclesiastics or\n as men of honor\u2014to resist and take the consequences. Some half-dozen\n bishops have accordingly been fined, imprisoned, or deprived; and\n several hundred\u2014we believe over a thousand\u2014priests have incurred\n similar penalties. Whether the policy embodied in the Falk laws was or\n was not a wise and a just policy in itself is not the point. If we\n assume for argument\u2019s sake that it has all the justification which its\n promoters claim for it, the fact remains equally certain that no\n greater service could well have been rendered to the cause of\n Vaticanism than this opportune rehabilitation of the German bishops.\n The bitterness of the antagonism provoked by the Falk legislation may\n be measured by the startling news recently given in the German papers,\n that an alliance, offensive and defensive, is being formed between the\n Catholics and democratic socialists, who can have hardly a single idea\n in common beyond hostility to the existing state.\u201d\u2014_Saturday Review_,\n February 24, 1877.\n\n\n THE CATHOLIC OUTLOOK.\n\n\n Of other states there is little that calls for special attention here.\n Italy is linked with Germany, but Italy can scarcely be regarded as a\n very strong ally. Its alliance, however, is useful and necessary to the\n leader of the conspiracy against the Catholic Church\u2014the conspiracy of\n the kings, into which some have entered in a half-hearted way like the\n Emperor of Austria, others with the most determined resolve like Prince\n Bismarck and the German emperor. These powerful men are doing all they\n can to destroy the Catholic Church; and undoubtedly they impede her\n growth, and harry and harass her in a thousand ways. It is easy to say\n that this is the best thing that could possibly happen to the church;\n that persecution is her very soul; that suffering begets repentance,\n and chastisement purity of life. That is all very well and true, but\n there is another aspect to the matter. Catholics have worldly rights as\n well as heavenly. They are here to live in this world, and to live\n happily and freely, and to do their work in it. No prince or government\n introduced them into life; no prince or government escorts them out of\n life. No prince, or government, or state can absolutely claim human\n life as theirs. Life is a free gift of God, to be used freely.\n Government is not divine, save in so far as it conforms to the\n divinity. Men are not chattels and tools to be used as things of no\n volition. The government of a people is only a human institution\n erected for the people, by the people, and of the people. It cannot lay\n claim to superhuman power, and where it does it is an infamous\n assumption. The _numen imperatorum_ is more than a myth; it is a devil.\n The \u201cdivine C\u00e6sar\u201d is but a man, and generally a very disreputable man.\n The assumptions of many modern states to absolute rule over man\u2014states\n that for the wickedness of those ruling them have been turned\n topsy-turvy time and again by the subjects whom they absolutely\n ruled\u2014is a return to paganism, and a very artful return. Obey us, it\n says, and we will set you free\u2014free from the Christian God and the laws\n that go against your nature. Obey us, and you need bow the knee to no\n God; you need have no religious belief or practice; we will abolish sin\n for you; you shall marry and unmarry as you please, and as often as you\n please; you shall do what you like and have no one to gainsay you. Fall\n down and worship us, and all the kingdoms of the world are yours.\n\n This is only a true reading of the pet measures of modern governments:\n of the divorce court, of civil marriage, of civil baptism, of schools\n into which everything but God may enter. And this is the drifting of\n the age: the Gambetta party in France, the revolutionary party in\n Italy, of which Victor Emanuel is the regal tool and ornament; the\n Bismarckian and Falk party in Germany; the Josephism of Austria; the\n \u201cfree\u201d thought of all lands. It is this that is in conflict, eternal\n conflict, with the Catholic Church. It calls itself liberalism; it is\n the tyranny of paganism. It does not threaten the Catholic Church\n alone. It only threatens that openly, because it feels it its necessary\n foe; it threatens the world and carries in its right hand the social\n and moral ruin of nations. There is no possible _modus vivendi_ between\n it and men who believe in Christ; and men who believe in Christ form\n the bulk of all civilized peoples. There will be no peace in the world,\n no peace among nations, until religion is free to assert itself. While\n the creeds of Christendom are still divided there must be freedom for\n all\u2014freedom to adjust their differences and come back once again to the\n lost unity for which all honest men sigh. Politics are the affairs of a\n day; religion an affair of Eternity to be settled in Time. It must have\n freedom to work; and the attempt to restrict and restrain that freedom\n is the secret of more than half the troubles that afflict mankind.\n\n This freedom is all that the head of the Catholic Church demands. He\n has no other quarrels with princes than this. He blesses and loves\n Protestant England, for it recognizes this freedom; he blesses and\n loves this country, for it also recognizes this freedom. The wonderful\n reign of Pius IX. will, in after-time, be most memorable for this: that\n in a deafening and confused time, in a time when all things were called\n in question and all rights invaded, his voice and vision were for ever\n clear in upholding the most sacred rights of man, in detecting and\n exposing what threatened them, and in maintaining the truth by which\n the world lives, at all hazard and in the face of all sacrifice. The\n truth of which he is the oracle is the faith in God that makes men\n free\u2014faith in the undying church founded by the Son of God, in its work\n and its mission among men, in the present and the future of a human\n society spreading over the world and built upon that faith. And the\n world has recognized this. It recognizes in the Pope, not because he is\n Pius the Ninth, but because he is Pope and head of the Church Catholic,\n the centre of this society, the head of Christendom; for Christendom is\n wider than nations; it embraces them in its arms; they are children of\n it, and the Pope is their spiritual father. Is not this truth plain?\n Whither have the eyes of the world been turned during the year? Less to\n the bloody battle-fields of the East, less to the hearts of European\n nations and the courts and cabinets of kings, than to the sick bed in\n the Vatican. The gaze of many has been that of brutal intensity; the\n gaze of many more, and those not all Catholics, has been one of\n affectionate and tender regard. Speculations as to the future are not\n in place here. The Pope, of course, will die some day. He has stood the\n brunt of the battle. He has lived a great life, given a great example,\n and done great things for the church of God. Not a stain, not a breath\n or whisper of reproach, mars that long career of mingled triumph and\n suffering. He has witnessed strange events. He has seen the church\n discarded by all the powers that were once her faithful children. He\n has seen the sacred territory of the church invaded and torn from his\n grasp. He sees himself in his old age and at the close of a stormy life\n imprisoned in his own palace. He has seen the world and the princes of\n the world do their worst against the church of which he is the earthly\n guardian. And yet he sees the church spreading abroad, growing in\n numbers and in virtue, borne on the wings of commerce and carrying its\n message of peace and good-will to all lands. There is no faltering in\n the faith. His eyes have been gladdened, even if saddened, by as noble\n confessors, of all grades, rising up to testify to it as the church in\n her history of nineteen centuries has ever known. When he obeys the\n last call of the Master he has served so well, there will pass from\n this world the greatest figure of the age, and as holy a man as the\n ages ever knew. But his work will not pass with him. That will remain,\n and the lesson of his life will remain to the successor, on whom we\n believe that brighter times will dawn\u2014a brightness won out of the\n darkness, and the sacrifice, and the storm braved by the good and\n gentle man who so resolutely bore Christ\u2019s cross to the very hill of\n Calvary and lay down on it and died there.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n NEW PUBLICATIONS.\n\n\n MONOTHEISM. The Primitive Religion of Rome. By Rev. Henry Formby. 1\n vol. 8vo. London: Williams & Norgate; New York: Scribner, Welford &\n Co. 1877.\n\n This is a very interesting and, in some respects, a learned work; but\n we are fain to confess that we have been disappointed in it. If the\n author, instead of attempting to show that the worship of the one true\n God was the early religion of Rome, had contented himself with proving\n it to have been professed by the primitive Gentile nations in general,\n we should agree with him, and thank him for unfolding in our English\n language the incontrovertible truth that polytheism and idolatry are\n but corruptions of great primeval traditions collected, preserved, and\n handed down by Noe, and that heathen mythology can be made to bear\n witness to the original idea of the unity and spirituality of God. This\n view of the religious errors of the ancients has been held up by\n several eminent writers, and particularly by two who deserve to be\n rescued from an unjust oblivion\u2014by Monsignor Bianchini (1697) in _La\n Storia Universale provata con Monumenti e figurata con Simboli\n Antichi_; and by Abb\u00e9 Bergier (1773) in his _Origine des Dieux du\n Paganisme_. While we do not accuse our reverend author of a want of\n modesty precisely in stating his prime opinion about the monotheism of\n the second king of Rome, we do think that he writes a little too\n dogmatically and as though he had discovered some historical\n treasure-trove wherewith to enrich his arguments; whereas no new\n documents or monuments whatever have been brought to light to throw a\n different or brighter ray upon the character of Numa Pompilius, in\n connection with whom, moreover, he seems to us to confound idolatry and\n polytheism. We confidently believe that the _C\u0153leste Numen_ of Numa, on\n which so great stress is laid, like the _Deus Optimus Maximus_ of\n Tully, or the _Div\u00fbm pater atque hominum rex_ of Virgil, was nothing\n more than another form of man\u2019s continual, almost involuntary, protest\n against the falling away of the human race from the worship of the\n Creator, but practically did not betoken more than a recognition of one\n among many greater than his fellow-gods. While Numa forbade the worship\n of _idols_ in Rome, and consequently professed a less corrupt error\n than did many contemporary rulers, he never asserted the unity or, we\n prefer to say, the _oneness_ of God. He was a prolific polytheist,\n multiplying divinities and introducing new superstitions among his\n people. Father Formby has brought up nothing in his favor unknown to\n Arnobius, Orosius, St. Augustine, and Tertullian. This last writer,\n although he absolves Numa from the crime of idolatry, distinctly\n charges upon him a many-parted god: \u201cNam a Numa concepta est curiositas\n superstitiosa\u201d (_Apol._ xxv.)\n\n Our author\u2019s present work is an amplification of a smaller one\n published in pamphlet form two years ago, in which he shows the \u201ccity\n of ancient Rome\u201d to have been \u201cthe divinely-sent pioneer of the way for\n the Catholic Church.\u201d On this subject we cannot too closely agree with\n him, or sufficiently thank him for turning towards our students and\n illustrating for them a side of Roman history which is so important.\n Our own studies have always pointed in the same direction, and we\n cannot better conclude this notice of Father Formby\u2019s work and show our\n sympathy with him than by a brief extract from our commonplace book,\n made up many years ago in Rome itself:\n\n \u201cThe celebrated Gallo-Roman poet and statesman, Rutilius Numatianus,\n was much attached to the false ancient divinities of Rome and no small\n help to the political party of Symmachus, which so stubbornly fought\n St. Ambrose and the Christians. The following lines from his\n _Itinerarium_ (i. 62 _et seq._) are truly beautiful and express a grand\n idea, but one that is still grander in another sense than his; for if a\n heathen understood it to be a blessing in disguise upon the conquered\n peoples of the earth to be brought under the domination of Rome on\n account of the prosperity and civilization that accompanied her rule,\n how shall not a Christian admire the action of divine Providence,\n preparing the world for the New Law, and applaud those triumphs that\n brought so many countries through the Roman Empire into the Church of\n Christ. Of Christian less than of pagan Rome we shall interpret the\n poet\u2019s sentiment:\n\n\n \u201c\u2018Fecisti patriam diversis gentibus unam;\n Profuit invitis, te dominante, capi;\n Dumque offers victis patrii consortia juris\n Urbem fecisti quod prius orbis erat.\u2019\u201d\n\n\n THE ILLUSTRATED CATHOLIC FAMILY ALMANAC for 1878. New York: The\n Catholic Publication Society Co.\n\n This annual, neat, compact, and perfect in all its mechanical\n arrangements\u2014the labor of many busy and well-stored minds condensed\n into a portable form\u2014has just been issued. To say that it equals its\n predecessors, which have found so much favor with the public, would be\n doing it great injustice. In every respect it is far superior, and\n shows palpable evidence that its conductors, appreciating the growth in\n public taste as well as the increasing desire for reliable information\n on important Catholic subjects, have left no effort untried to satisfy\n the wishes of their readers. This is particularly noticeable in the\n illustrations, which we consider to be not only good pictures but\n genuine works of art. The portraits of Archbishop Bayley, Bishops Von\n Ketteler and De St. Palais, and the venerable Jesuit Father McElroy are\n not only excellent likenesses of those deceased prelates, but the best\n specimens of wood-cut portraiture we have yet seen on this side of the\n Atlantic. The other engravings, of which there are about a dozen, are\n alike creditable to the artist and suitable for the pages of such a\n publication. The reading matter, however, will probably most attract\n the attention of the majority of purchasers, many of whom will\n doubtless wonder where a great portion of it could possibly have been\n discovered. Thus, in addition to the lives of the ecclesiastics above\n mentioned, and biographical sketches of the venerable Sister Mary\n Margaret Bourgeois, Frederic Ozanam, Columbus, and others, we have an\n elaborate History of Printing, a description (with fac-similes) of \u201cThe\n Earliest Irish Madonna,\u201d accounts of the Libraries of the Bollandists\n and of the Eremites of York; an arch\u00e6ological sketch of the oldest\n churches of the world, an explanation of the antique Cross of St.\n Zachary, a _r\u00e9sum\u00e9_ of the labors of the Franciscans in California, and\n a well-digested mass of astronomical, chronological, and statistical\n information which cannot help proving of incalculable value as matters\n of reference.\n\n\n EVIDENCES OF RELIGION. By Louis Jouin, S.J. New York: P. O\u2019Shea. 1877.\n\n There is nothing more gratifying to Catholics who watch the progress of\n their religion in this country than to find that the church in the\n United States is beginning to supply her own literature, and more\n especially her polemical literature, which she needs most of all.\n Within the last few years several controversial works and books of\n instruction have been written in this country which are far better\n adapted to our people than the standard works of foreign authors; and\n the time, we trust, is not far distant when we shall be fully supplied\n with a well-adapted course of polemics of our own, and be no longer\n dependent on the writings of men in lands which are often more or less\n out of harmony with the American mind. _The Evidences of Religion_ is\n one of the books of which we stood most in need, and the wonder is that\n it was not written long before. Perhaps, however, it is as well that no\n one attempted it before Father Jouin; for we doubt if any other attempt\n could have been so entirely successful.\n\n The book is a marvel of condensed matter and thought and argument. In\n its 380 octavo pages are summed up the philosophical treatise _De\n Certitudine_ and theological tract _De Locis Theologicis_; and it\n contains in addition a refutation, short, sharp, and decisive, of the\n latest errors in philosophy, politics, and religion.\n\n Christianity rests on facts, not on mere theories. The science of the\n day pretends to deal with facts, and in every case to accept them, so\n that in our controversies with the pseudo-science of the times there is\n nothing more important than to bring out clearly and strongly the facts\n on which the certainty of the Christian faith rests. This Father Jouin\n has done, and in his book we have the whole groundwork on which\n Christianity is based spread out before us in perspective; the outline\n is complete, though of course, in the limited space which he allowed\n himself, he has not been able to bring out each detail in full. Yet he\n assures us in his preface that nothing essential has been left out, and\n we have verified his assertion. Altogether this is just the sort of\n book, in our opinion, that is needed to combat the errors of the age,\n and to serve as an antidote to the poison of rank infidelity and\n materialism with which the very atmosphere around us is charged.\n\n The author tells us that he designs the work more especially as a\n text-book for students in the higher classes of our Catholic colleges,\n and we sincerely hope that it may be adopted in every Catholic college\n throughout the country. Our Catholic instructors fully realize the\n importance of giving their students a thorough grounding in the\n evidences of their religion, and Father Jouin\u2019s book in the hands of a\n good professor can be made the basis of a thorough course of such\n instruction.\n\n Not alone to students in colleges do we recommend the study of this\n work, but to every intelligent educated Catholic, who should\n investigate the reasons on which his religion is founded, and be able\n to answer for the faith that is in him. Let our Catholic lawyers and\n doctors and business men take it up, and they will find in it\n sufficient to convince them of the reasonableness of their creed. It\n will furnish them, moreover, with conclusive arguments against the\n absurd theories and false views of religion which are being advanced\n every day in their hearing.\n\n The greatest enemy that the Catholic Church has to contend with, both\n without and within, at the present day, is ignorance of her true\n position and teaching, and we eagerly invite and encourage every study\n and investigation that may in any way help to dispel it.\n\n It is to be regretted that so valuable a work has not been brought out\n in a worthy manner. It is neither well printed nor well put together.\n\n\n THE NEW VESPER HYMN-BOOK: A companion to _The New Vesper Psalter_;\n containing a collection of all the hymns sung at Vespers throughout\n the year (classified according to metre), set to music, either for\n unison or four voices, with accompaniment, and including the best of\n the plain chant melodies, together with the words in full, and the\n versicles and responses proper to each hymn. The whole compiled and\n edited by Charles Lewis, Director of the Cathedral Choir, Boston,\n Mass. Boston: Thos. B. Noonan & Co.\n\n At the present stage of the revival of Gregorian Chant, the true song\n of the church, we can commend this little work as one which will\n doubtless be found useful in many churches whose organists are unable\n to harmonize the chant or the singers to read its proper notation. We\n wish, however, that the editor had given all the hymns as found in the\n _Vesperale_, as the musical airs which are substituted are not worthy\n to supplant the original melodies. The style of notation is that\n usually adopted in translations from the old form of four lines and\n square notes. Could not the editor have done better, so as to give to\n those unaccustomed to plain chant some idea of its movement and\n expression? There is no mark given to designate accented from\n unaccented notes, and, lacking this, we defy any one who is not\n familiar with the traditional movement of a phrase to give its true\n expression.\n\n We think the spacing of notes and phrases as given in the old style\n should be preserved\u2014that is, the notes upon each syllable should be\n printed close together, and a wider and distinct space left between\n syllables and words. An intelligent system of writing plain chant upon\n the modern musical staff is yet to be invented. We have been told that\n in some places the Tonic Sol-Fa system is being attempted, with what\n success we have not learned.\n\n\n LOTOS FLOWERS, GATHERED IN SUN AND SHADOW. By Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum.\n New York: D. Appleton & Co. 1877.\n\n Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum is already known to the readers of THE CATHOLIC\n WORLD through her poems, \u201cAdvent\u201d and \u201cA Birthday Wish\u201d (appearing\n under the name of \u201cTwenty-one\u201d in the present collection), published in\n its pages during the present year. Her verse is pure in thought and\n written out of a woman\u2019s heart full of love and enthusiasm. With true\n Southern fervor she revels in the luxuriant flora of her home, and in\n the landscape of all her pictures she takes a dear delight. Even so\n unsightly an object as a Mississippi steamboat-landing grows\n picturesque under her hand, and do we not feel soft Italian air as we\n read?\u2014\n\n\n \u201cPeaceful stand\n The sentinel poplars in their gold-green plumes\n Beside the Enzo bridge. Where late the hoofs\n Of flying squadrons scared th\u2019affrighted land\n The soft cloud-shadows chase each other now\n O\u2019er violet gardens.\u201d\n\n\n As with many another poet, the ease with which Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum\n writes is at times a snare, leading her to accept too readily a\n hackneyed term or word, surrendering after too slight a struggle to the\n tyranny of rhyme. In her verse, also, there is sometimes a lack of\n smoothness that would set despair in the heart of the faithful scanner.\n\n Was it because our ears were sick with a certain slang of \u201cculture\u201d\n that, when we stumbled over Krishna in the \u201cChristian Legend,\u201d we felt\n a strong desire to banish these Indian immortals to that Hades where\n languished the gods of Greece until Schiller called them forth to run\n riot in the field of religion as well as of art? And is not the term\n \u201clegend\u201d a strange misnomer, for the New Testament narrative of the\n raising of Lazarus? For Mrs. Chambers-Ketchum\u2019s verse is essentially\n Christian and womanly, and even so short a notice of it would scarcely\n be complete without a mention of \u201cBenny,\u201d who, with his kitten and his\n \u201cbaby\u2019s sense of right,\u201d is already dear and familiar to the mothers\n and children of our whole country, whose kindly hearts will surely give\n to Benny\u2019s mother their sympathy in his loss.\n\n\n SURLY TIM, AND OTHER STORIES. By Francis Hodgson Burnett. New York:\n Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1877.\n\n Unfortunately for our first impression of the merit of the little\n volume of which \u201cSurly Tim\u201d is the initial story, we began our reading\n with \u201cLodusky,\u201d attracted to it by the locality of the tale, its hill\n people and dialect being a loadstone to us, but lately returned from\n similar surroundings. But as even in our mountain Edens we find the\n trail of the serpent, so in \u201cLodusky\u201d we seemed to be treading the\n familiar path of moral irresponsibility and the tyranny of personal\n magnetism, and we craved the flaming sword of the archangel to put the\n evil to flight.\n\n Nor did our impression grow fairer on turning to \u201cLe Monsieur de la\n Petite Dame.\u201d But in \u201cOne Day at Arle\u201d and in \u201cSeth\u201d we welcomed truly\n the author\u2019s strong and exquisite pathos. In these pictures of the\n sorrow of the laboring classes the author draws with a pencil full of\n feeling, working under a sky whose hue is the leaden monotone of modern\n French landscape painting; a break of sunshine here and there, but the\n light seems to fall, after all, on earthly stubble and the dumb, almost\n soulless faces of patient cattle that know nothing beyond their daily\n furrow and the mute, faithful service they bear a kindly hand at the\n plough.\n\n We are reminded of the pathos of Robert Buchanan\u2019s North-Coast verse,\n and we close the little volume sadly, almost as if all human sorrow\n wherein is no Christian joy stood at our threshold, asking from us an\n alms we had no power to give.\n\n\n REPERTORIUM ORATORIS SACRI: Containing Outlines of Six Hundred Sermons\n for all the Sundays and Holidays of the Ecclesiastical Year; also\n for other solemn occasions. Compiled from the works of eminent\n preachers of various ages and nations by a secular priest. With an\n introduction by the Rt. Rev. Joseph Dwenger, D.D., Bishop of Fort\n Wayne. New York and Cincinnati: Fr. Pustet, Typographus Sedis\n Apostolic\u00e6. 1877.\n\n This publication is to be continued in monthly parts, each part\n containing the outlines of two sermons for each Sunday and holiday for\n one quarter of the year. There will be four volumes of four parts each,\n so that when the work is completed there will be eight sermons for each\n occasion.\n\n It will, if it fulfils the promise of this first number, be the best\n and most complete collection of the kind ever published so far as we\n are aware. It hardly needs to be said that plans of sermons such as are\n here given are very much more valuable to a preacher than the actual\n sermons themselves; for there are few who can give with much effect the\n words of another, to say nothing of the trouble involved in committing\n them to memory. The sermons of great pulpit orators are indeed\n extremely useful and deserving of study as models of style; but a few\n will answer that purpose as well as a thousand.\n\n The work is in English, being designed principally for use in this\n country. It is most earnestly to be hoped that it will receive the\n liberal support which it certainly deserves.\n\n\n NICHOLAS MINTURN. A Study in a Story. By J. G. Holland. 1 vol. 12mo.\n New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1877.\n\n We prefer Dr. Holland\u2019s stories to his essays. He possesses fine\n descriptive powers; his genial humor captivates the reader; his power\n of analysis is searching. No one can read _Nicholas Minturn_ without\n recognizing the author\u2019s ability to lay bare the vices and follies of\n the various classes with whom his hero is brought in contact. In doing\n this, however, Dr. Holland is apt to forget their redeeming virtues.\n This is his great fault as a novelist. He lacks the power to vitalize\n the subtle traits that appeal to our humanity. There is no bond of\n union between his people and us. He is unable to centralize our\n interest. When disaster overtakes the ocean steamer there is not a\n single figure to start out from the group and wring a groan of\n compassion from us. We listen to the wailing of despair and the shriek\n of terror with as much apathy as if it arose from a distant\n battle-field. In all other respects the story is far superior to the\n great mass of light literature.\n\n\n THE ETERNAL YEARS. By the Hon. Mrs. A. Montgomery, author of _The\n Divine Sequence_, also _The Bucklyn Shaig_, _Mine Own Familiar\n Friend_, _The Wrong Man_, _On the Wing_, etc. With an introduction\n by the Rev. S. Porter, S.J. London: Burns & Oates. 1877.\n\n _The Eternal Years_ is a republication of a series of articles from THE\n CATHOLIC WORLD. A number of thoughtful readers of our magazine have\n expressed the great interest with which they have read those articles\n and their desire to know the name of the author. They will be pleased\n to see that they are now published in a volume under their author\u2019s\n name. _On the Wing_ will be remembered as having been one of the most\n popular of the series of sketches taken from scenes in European life\n and incidents of travel which we have from time to time published. Mrs.\n Montgomery possesses a very versatile talent as a writer, and passes\n with facility \u201cfrom grave to gay, from lively to severe.\u201d Whatever she\n writes is always both instructive and pleasing.\n\n\n THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER\u2019S MANUAL; or, The Art of Teaching Catechism.\n For the use of teachers and parents. By the Rev. A. A. Lambing,\n author of _The Orphan\u2019s Friend_. New York: Benziger Brothers. 1877.\n\n Father Lambing has done for Sunday-school teachers what M. Amond, the\n cur\u00e9 of St. Sulpice, and Father Porter have done for those engaged in\n the sacred ministry of the pulpit.\n\n This manual, written in a clear and popular style, supplies a need that\n should have been more felt than it was. It gives those in charge of\n Sunday-schools a true idea of their very important mission, a deep\n sense of the responsibility that rests upon them, points out the\n various qualifications necessary for the faithful discharge of their\n duties, and contains many useful instructions which will aid them in\n becoming effective catechisers.\n\n\n IZA: A STORY OF LIFE IN RUSSIAN POLAND. By Kathleen O\u2019Meara. London:\n Burns & Oates. 1877. (New York: The Catholic Publication Society\n Co.)\n\n This book, by a lady who since its first appearance has become\n distinguished in the higher walks of literature, has been republished\n at a very seasonable time, when the Eastern war, and the novel\n pretensions of Russia to be considered the friend and protector of\n oppressed nationalities, have once more called public attention to her\n barbarous treatment of the gallant Poles. The scenes are laid in\n Poland; the characters, which are few and clearly drawn, are Polish or\n Muscovite, and the plot, though simple and natural, is well and\n artistically wrought out. The theme of the whole story is the\n oppression of the Polish nobility by the shrewd, keen, and unscrupulous\n agents of the czar, wherein the generous, high-spirited and confiding\n patriotism of the one class is strongly contrasted with the\n accomplished villainy of the other. Though the superstructure is, of\n course, a work of pure fiction, it is based on well known historical\n facts. The entire work is written with great care and accuracy as to\n names, places, costumes, and local customs, the situations are highly\n dramatic, and the moral effect produced on the reader is healthful and\n salutary.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n The attention of readers will be directed to the advertisement of\n complete sets of THE CATHOLIC WORLD and THE YOUNG CATHOLIC as suitable\n and valuable Christmas presents. Bound volumes of THE YOUNG CATHOLIC\n make the very best present that could be offered to children. The\n reading matter is interesting, the illustrations are really excellent,\n and the puzzles and charades afford unfailing amusement for the long\n winter evenings.\n\n THE CATHOLIC WORLD is now in its twenty-sixth volume. It constitutes a\n library, and a most valuable and varied library, in itself. In it is\n everything that could be desired. Theology and philosophy have their\n departments, filled by men of known and recognized competence, master\n minds indeed in those higher sciences. The literary articles and\n reviews are acknowledged by the secular press to be unsurpassed in\n power, grace, and strength. The polemics of the day find their true\n solution in THE CATHOLIC WORLD, which has told upon the non-Catholic\n mind in this country as no other magazine or publication has been able\n to tell. There is an abundance of fiction and light literature in its\n pages, a fiction that has known how to be interesting without being\n dangerous, and good without being dull. Many stories that have already\n made their mark in the literary world and won deserved fame for their\n authors began by passing through the columns of this magazine. All the\n leading and absorbing questions of the day are taken up and discussed\n in it by men thoroughly equipped and fitted for so important a task.\n Indeed THE CATHOLIC WORLD may fairly claim to be a channel through\n which the very best Catholic literature of the day, in all its forms,\n passes, a guide to and in all the questions of the day, and a\n compendium from year to year of all that is best and most worthy of\n attention in the higher sciences, in physical science, in politics, in\n literature, and in art. His Eminence the Cardinal has recently kindly\n taken occasion to \u201ccongratulate the Catholics in America on possessing\n a magazine of which they may be justly proud,\u201d and trusts \u201cthat they\n will contribute their share to make THE CATHOLIC WORLD still more\n useful to themselves and to the Church at large.\u201d No words could add\n strength to this commendation and appeal; and it is to be hoped that\n Catholics will take both to heart. No intelligent Catholic in this\n country should be without a magazine that is peculiarly and designedly\n his own. Yet are there thousands of intelligent persons who are without\n it, who probably do not know of its existence. It is for those who do\n know it and appreciate it to make it known among their friends. Taken\n in the very lowest sense, no man has yet complained that in THE\n CATHOLIC WORLD he did not receive the full, and more than the full,\n value of his money.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n THE\n\n CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n VOL. XXVI., No. 155.\u2014FEBRUARY, 1878.\n\n CEADMON THE COW-HERD, ENGLAND\u2019S FIRST POET.\n\n BY AUBREY DE VERE.\n\n The Venerable Bede\u2019s _Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation_\n contains nothing more touching than its record of Ceadmon, the earliest\n English poet, whose gift came to him in a manner so extraordinary. It\n occurs in the 24th chapter: \u201cBy his verses the minds of many were often\n excited to despise the world, and to aspire to heaven. Others after him\n attempted in the English nation to compose religious poems, but none\n could ever compare with him; for he did not learn the art of poetry\n from man, but from God, for which reason he never would compose any\n vain or trivial poem.\u201d ... \u201cBeing sometimes at entertainments, when it\n was agreed, for the sake of mirth, that all present should sing in\n their turns, when he saw the instrument come towards him he rose from\n the table and retired home. Having done so on a certain occasion, ... a\n Person appeared to him in his sleep, and, saluting him by his name,\n said, \u2018Ceadmon, sing some song for me.\u2019 He answered, \u2018I cannot sing.\u2019\u201d\n Ceadmon\u2019s song is next described: \u201cHow he, being the Eternal God,\n became the author of all miracles, Who first, as Almighty Preserver of\n the human race, created heaven for the sons of men, _as the roof of the\n house_, and _next_ the earth.\u201d ... \u201cHe sang the Creation of the world,\n the origin of man, and all the history of Genesis, ... the Incarnation,\n Passion, Resurrection of our Lord, and His Ascension.\u201d[158] Ceadmon\u2019s\n poetry is referred to also in Sharon Turner\u2019s _History of the\n Anglo-Saxons_; and Sir Francis Palgrave points out the singular\n resemblance of passages in _Paradise Lost_ to corresponding passages in\n its surviving fragments. To the history of Ceadmon Montalembert has\n devoted some of the most eloquent paragraphs in his admirable work,\n _Les Moines d\u2019Occident_\u2014see chapter ii., vol. iv., page 68.\n\n\n Sole stood upon the pleasant bank of Esk\n Ceadmon the Cow-herd, while the sinking sun\n Reddened the bay, and fired the river-bank\n With pomp beside of golden Iris lit,\n And flamed upon the ruddy herds that strayed\n Along the marge, clear-imaged. None was nigh:\u2014\n For that cause spake the Cow-herd, \u201cPraise to God!\n He made the worlds; and now, by Hilda\u2019s hand\n He plants a fair crown upon Whitby\u2019s height:\n Daily her convent towers more high aspire;\n Daily ascend her Vespers. Hark that strain!\u201d\n He stood and listened. Soon the flame-touched herds\n Sent forth their lowings, and the cliffs replied,\n And Ceadmon thus resumed: \u201cThe music note\n Rings through their lowings dull, though heard by few!\n Poor kine, ye do your best! Ye know not God,\n Yet man, his likeness, unto you is God,\n And him ye worship with obedience sage,\n A grateful, sober, much-enduring race\n That o\u2019er the vernal clover sigh for joy,\n With winter snows contend not. Patient kine,\n What thought is yours, deep-musing? Haply this\u2014\n \u2018God\u2019s help! how narrow are our thoughts, and few!\n Not so the thoughts of that slight human child\n Who daily drives us with her blossomed rod\n From lowland valleys to the pails long-ranged!\u2019\n Take comfort, kine! God also made your race!\n If praise from man surceased, from your broad chests\n That God would perfect praise, and, when ye died,\n Resound it from yon rocks that gird the bay:\n God knoweth all things. Let that thought suffice!\u201d\n\n Thus spake the ruler of the deep-mouthed kine:\n They were not his; the man and they alike\n A neighbor\u2019s wealth. He was contented thus:\n Humble he was in station, meek of soul,\n Unlettered, yet heart-wise. His face was pale;\n Stately his frame, though slightly bent by age:\n Slow were his eyes, and slow his speech, and slow\n His musing step; and slow his hand to wrath,\n A massive hand, but soft, that many a time\n Had succored man and woman, child and beast;\n Ay, yet could fiercely grasp the sword! At times\n As mightily it clutched his ashen goad\n When like an eagle on him swooped some thought:\n Then stood he as in dream, his pallid front\n Brightening like eastern sea-cliffs when a moon\n Unrisen is near its rising.\n\n\n Round the bay Meantime with deepening eve\n full many a fire Up-sprung, and horns were heard. Around the steep With\n bannered pomp and many a dancing plume Ere long a cavalcade made way.\n Whence came it? Oswy, Northumbria\u2019s king, the foremost rode, Oswy\n triumphant o\u2019er the Mercian host, To sue for blessing on his sceptre\n new; With him an Anglian prince, student long time In Bangor of the\n Irish, and a monk Of Gallic race far wandering from the Marne: They\n came to look on Hilda, hear her words Of far-famed wisdom on the\n Interior Life: For Hilda thus discoursed: \u201cTrue life of man Is life\n within: inward immeasurably The being winds of all who walk the earth;\n But he whom sense hath blinded nothing knows Of that wide greatness:\n like a boy is he That clambers round some castle\u2019s wall extern In\n search of nests\u2014the outward wall of seven\u2014 Yet nothing knows of those\n great courts within, The hall where princes banquet, or the bower Where\n royal maidens touch the lyre and lute, Much less its central church,\n and sacred shrine Wherein God dwells alone.\u201d[159] Thus Hilda spake; And\n they that gazed upon her widening eyes Low whispered, each to each,\n \u201cShe speaks of things Which she hath seen and known.\u201d\n\n On Whitby\u2019s crest The royal feast was\n holden: far below, A noisier revel dinned the shore; therein The\n humbler guests partook. Full many a tent Glimmered upon the white\n sands, ripple-kissed; Full many a savory dish sent up its steam; The\n farmer from the field had driven his calf; The fisher brought the\n harvest of the sea; And Jock, the woodsman, from his oaken glades The\n tall stag, arrow-pierced. In gay attire Now green, now crimson, matron\n sat and maid: Each had her due: the elder, reverence most, The lovelier\n that and love. Beside the board The beggar lacked not place.\n\n When hunger\u2019s rage, Sharpened by fresh\n sea-air, was quelled, the jest Succeeded, and the tale of foreign\n lands; But, boast who might of distant chief renowned, His battle-axe,\n or fist that felled an ox, The Anglian\u2019s answer was \u201cour Hilda\u201d still:\n \u201cIs not her prayer puissant as sworded hosts? Her insight more than\n wisdom of the seers? What birth like hers illustrious? Edwin\u2019s self,\n D\u00ebira\u2019s exile, next Northumbria\u2019s king, Her kinsman was. Together bowed\n they not When he of holy hand, missioned from Rome, Paulinus, poured\n o\u2019er both the absolving wave And knit to Christ? Kingliest was she,\n that maid Who spurned earth-crowns!\u201d The night advanced, he rose That\n ruled the feast, the miller old, yet blithe, And cried, \u201cA song!\u201d So\n song succeeded song, For each man knew that time to chant his stave,\n But no man yet sang nobly. Last the harp Made way to Ceadmon, lowest at\n the board: He pushed it back, answering, \u201cI cannot sing:\u201d Around him\n many gathered clamoring, \u201cSing!\u201d And one among them, voluble and small,\n Shot out a splenetic speech: \u201cThis lord of kine, Our herdsman, grows to\n ox! Behold, his eyes Move slow, like eyes of oxen!\u201d\n\n\n Sudden rose\n Ceadmon, and spake: \u201cI note full oft young men\n Quick-eyed, but small-eyed, darting glances round\n Now here, now there, like glance of some poor bird,\n That light on all things and can rest on none:\n As ready are they with their tongues as eyes;\n But all their songs are chirpings backward blown\n On winds that sing God\u2019s song, by them unheard:\n My oxen wait my service: I depart.\u201d\n Then strode he to his cow-house in the mead,\n Displeased though meek, and muttered, \u201cSlow of eye!\n My kine are slow: if I were swift my hand\n Might tend them worse.\u201d Hearing his steps the kine\n Turned round their horn\u00e8d foreheads: angry thoughts\n Went from him as a vapor. Straw he brought,\n And strewed their beds; and they, contented well,\n Down laid ere long their great bulks, breathing deep\n Amid the glimmering moonlight. He, with head\n Propped on the white flank of a heifer mild,\n Rested, his deer-skin o\u2019er him drawn. Hard days\n Bring slumber soon. His latest thought was this:\n \u201cThough witless things we are, my kine and I,\n Yet God it was who made us.\u201d\n\n As he slept,\n Beside him stood a Man Divine and spake;\n \u201cCeadmon, arise, and sing.\u201d Ceadmon replied,\n \u201cMy Lord, I cannot sing, and for that cause\n Forth from the revel came I. Once, in youth,\n I willed to sing the bright face of a maid,\n And failed, and once a gold-faced harvest-field,\n And failed, and once the flame-eyed face of war,\n And failed once more.\u201d To him the Man Divine,\n \u201cThose themes were earthly. Sing!\u201d And Ceadmon said,\n \u201cWhat shall I sing, my Lord?\u201d Then answer came,\n \u201cCeadmon, stand up, and sing thy song of God.\u201d\n\n At once obedient, Ceadmon rose, and sang,\n And help was with him from great thoughts of old\n Within his silent nature yearly stored,\n That swelled, collecting like a flood that bursts\n In spring its icy bar. The Lord of all\n He sang; that God beneath whose hand eterne,\n Then when he willed forth-stretched athwart the abyss,\n Creation like a fiery chariot ran,\n Inwoven wheels of ever-living stars.\n Him first he sang. The builder, here below,\n From fair foundations rears at last the roof,\n But Song, a child of heaven, begins with heaven,\n The archetype divine, and end of all,\n More late descends to earth. He sang that hymn,\n \u201cLet there be light, and there was light\u201d; and lo!\n On the void deep came down the seal of God\n And stamped immortal form. Clear laughed the skies,\n While from crystalline seas the strong earth brake,\n Both continent and isle; and downward rolled\n The sea-surge summoned to his home remote.\n Then came a second vision to the man\n There standing \u2018mid his oxen. Darkness sweet,\n He sang, of pleasant frondage clothed the vales,\n Ambrosial bowers rich-fruited which the sun,\n A glory new-created in his place,\n All day made golden, and the moon by night\n Silvered with virgin beam, while sang the bird\n Her first of love-songs on the branch first-flower\u2019d\u2014\n Not yet the lion stalked. And Ceadmon sang\n O\u2019er-awed, the Father of all humankind\n Standing in garden planted by God\u2019s hand,\n And girt by murmurs of the rivers four,\n Between the trees of Knowledge and of Life,\n With eastward face. In worship mute of God,\n Eden\u2019s Contemplative he stood that hour,\n Not her Ascetic, since, where sin is none,\n No need for spirit severe.\n\n And Ceadmon sang\n God\u2019s Daughter, Adam\u2019s Sister, Child, and Bride,\n Our Mother Eve. Lit by the matin star,\n That nearer drew to earth, and brighter flashed\n To meet her gaze, that snowy Innocence\n Stood up with queenly port. She turned: she saw\n Earth\u2019s King, mankind\u2019s great Father. Taught by God,\n Immaculate, unastonished, undismayed,\n In love and reverence to her Lord she drew,\n And, kneeling, kissed his hand: and Adam laid\n That hand, made holier, on that kneeler\u2019s head,\n And spake; \u201cFor this shall man his parents leave,\n And to his wife cleave fast.\u201d\n\n When Ceadmon ceased\n Thus spake the Man Divine: \u201cAt break of day\n Seek thou some prudent man, and say that God\n Hath loosed thy tongue; nor hide henceforth thy gift.\u201d\n Then Ceadmon turned, and slept among his kine\n Dreamless. Ere dawn he stood upon the shore\n In doubt: but when at last o\u2019er eastern seas\n The sun, long wished for, like a god upsprang,\n Once more he found God\u2019s song upon his mouth\n Murmuring high joy; and sought a prudent man,\n And told him all the vision. At the word\n He to the Abbess with the tidings fled,\n And she made answer, \u201cBring me Ceadmon here.\u201d\n\n Then clomb the pair that sea-beat mount of God\n Fanned by sea-gale, nor trod, as others used,\n The curving way, but faced the abrupt ascent,\n And halted not, so worked in both her will,\n Till now between the unfinished towers they stood\n Panting and spent. The portals open stood:\n Ceadmon passed in alone. Nor ivory decked,\n Nor gold, the walls. That convent was a keep\n Strong \u2019gainst invading storm or demon hosts,\n And naked as the rock whereon it stood,\n Yet, as a church, august. Dark, high-arched roofs\n Slowly let go the distant hymn. Each cell\n Cinctured its statued saint, the peace of God\n On every stony face. Like caverned grot\n Far off the western window frowned: beyond,\n Close by, there shook an autumn-blazoned tree:\n No need for gems beside of storied glass.\n\n He entered last that hall where Hilda sat\n Begirt with a great company, the chiefs\n Down either side far ranged. Three stalls, cross-crowned,\n Stood side by side, the midmost hers. The years\n Had laid upon her brows a hand serene,\n And left alone their blessing. Levelled eyes\n Sable, and keen, with meditative strength\n Conjoined the instinct and the claim to rule;\n Firm were her lips and rigid. At her right\n Sat Finan, Aidan\u2019s successor, with head\n Snow-white, and beard that rolled adown a breast\n Never by mortal passion heaved in storm,\n A cloister of majestic thoughts that walked,\n Humbly with God. High in the left-hand stall\n Oswy was throned, a man in prime, with brow\n Less youthful than his years. Exile long past,\n Or deepening thought of one disastrous deed,\n Had left a shadow in his eyes. The strength\n Of passion held in check looked lordly forth\n From head and hand: tawny his beard; his hair\n Thick-curled and dense. Alert the monarch sat\n Half turned, like one on horseback set that hears,\n And he alone, the advancing trump of war.\n Down the long gallery strangers thronged in mass,\n Dane or Norwegian, huge of arm through weight\n Of billows oar-subdued, with stormy looks\n Wild as their waves and crags; Southerns keen-browed;\n Pure Saxon youths, fair-fronted, with mild eyes\n (These less than others strove for nobler place),\n And Pilgrim travel-worn. Behind the rest,\n And higher-ranged in marble-arched arcade,\n Sat Hilda\u2019s sisterhood. Clustering they shone,\n White-veiled, and pale of face, and still and meek,\n An inly-bending curve, like some young moon\n Whose crescent glitters o\u2019er a dusky strait.\n In front were monks dark-stoled: for Hilda ruled,\n Though feminine, two houses, one of men:\n Upon two chasm-divided rocks they stood,\n To various service vowed, though single. Faith;\n Nor ever, save at rarest festival,\n Their holy inmates met.\n\n \u201cIs this the man\n Favored, though late, with gift of song?\u201d Thus spake\n Hilda with placid smile. Severer then\n She added: \u201cSon, the commonest gifts of God\n He counts his best, and oft temptation blends\n With powers more rare. Yet sing! That God who lifts\n The violet from the grass as well could draw\n Music from stones hard by. That song thou sang\u2019st,\n Sing it once more.\u201d\n\n Then Ceadmon from his knees\n Arose and stood. With princely instinct first\n The strong man to the abbess bowed, and next\n To that great twain, the bishop and the king,\n Last to that stately concourse ranged each side\n Down the long hall; and, dubious, answered thus:\n \u201cGreat Mother, if that God who sent the song\n Vouchsafe me to recall it, I will sing;\n But I misdoubt it lost.\u201d Slowly his face\n Down-drooped, and all his body forward bent\n As brooding memory, step by step, retracked\n Its backward way. Vainly long time it sought\n The starting-point. Then Ceadmon\u2019s large, soft hands\n Opening and closing worked; for wont were they,\n In musings when he stood, to clasp his goad,\n And plant its point far from him, thereupon\n Propping his stalwart weight. Customed support\n Now finding not, unwittingly those hands\n Reached forth, and on Saint Finan\u2019s crosier-staff\n Settling, withdrew it from the old bishop\u2019s grasp;\n And Ceadmon leant thereon, while passed a smile\n Down the long hall to see earth\u2019s meekest man\n The spiritual sceptre claim of Lindisfarne.\n They smiled; he triumphed: soon the Cow-herd found\n That first fair corner-stone of all his song;\n Then rose the fabric heavenward. Lifting hands,\n Once more his lordly music he rehearsed,\n The void abyss at God\u2019s command forth-flinging\n Creation like a Thought:\u2014where night had reigned,\n The universe of God.\n\n The singing stars\n Which with the Angels sang when earth was made\n Sang in his song. From highest shrill of lark\n To ocean\u2019s deepest under cliffs low-browed,\n And pine-woods\u2019 vastest on the topmost hills,\n No tone was wanting; while to them that heard\n Strange images looked forth of worlds new-born,\n Fair, phantom mountains, and, with forests plumed,\n The marvelling headlands, for the first time glassed\n In waters ever calm. O\u2019er sapphire seas\n Green islands laughed. Fairer, the wide earth\u2019s flower,\n Eden, on airs unshaken yet by sighs\n From bosom still inviolate forth poured\n Immortal sweets. With sense to spirit turned\n Who heard the song inhaled those sweets. Their eyes\n Flashing, their passionate hands and heaving breasts,\n Tumult self-stilled, and mute, expectant trance,\n \u2019Twas these that gave their bard his twofold might,\n That might denied to poets later born\n Who, singing to soft brains and hearts ice-hard,\n Applauded or contemned, alike roll round\n A vainly-seeking eye, and, famished, drop\n A hand clay-cold upon the unechoing shell,\n Missing their inspiration\u2019s human half.\n\n Thus Ceadmon sang, and ceased. Silent awhile\n The concourse stood (for all had risen), as though\n Waiting from heaven its echo. Each on each\n Gazed hard and caught his hands. Fiercely ere long\n Their gratulating shout aloft had leaped\n But Hilda laid her finger on her lip,\n Or provident lest praise might stain the pure,\n Or deeming song a gift too high for praise.\n She spake: \u201cThrough help of God thy song is sound:\n Now hear His Holy Word, and shape therefrom\n A second hymn, and worthier than the first.\u201d\n\n Then Finan stood, and bent his hoary head\n Above the Scripture tome in reverence stayed\n Upon his kneeling deacon\u2019s hands and brow,\n And sweetly sang five verses, thus beginning,\n \u201c_Cum esset desponsata_,\u201d and was still;\n And next rehearsed them in the Anglian tongue:\n Then Ceadmon took God\u2019s Word into his heart,\n And ruminating stood, as when the kine,\n Their flowery pasture ended, ruminate;\n And was a man in thought. At last the light\n Shone from his dubious countenance, and he spake:\n \u201cGreat Mother, lo! I saw a second Song!\n T\u2019wards me it came; but with averted face,\n And borne on shifting winds. A man am I\n Sluggish and slow, that needs must muse and brood;\n Therefore that Scripture till the sun goes down\n Will I revolve. If song from God be mine\n Expect me here at morn.\u201d\n\n The morrow morn\n In that high presence Ceadmon stood and sang\n A second song, and manlier than his first;\n And Hilda said, \u201cFrom God it came, not man;\n Thou therefore live a monk among my monks,\n And sing to God.\u201d Doubtful he stood\u2014\u201cFrom youth\n My place hath been with kine; their ways I know,\n And how to cure their griefs.\u201d Smiling she answered,\n \u201cOur convent hath its meads, and kine; with these\n Consort each morning: night and day be ours.\u201d\n Then Ceadmon knelt, and bowed, and said, \u201cSo be it\u201d:\n And aged Finan, and Northumbria\u2019s king\n Oswy, approved; and all that host had joy.\n\n Thus in that convent Ceadmon lived, a monk,\n Humblest of all the monks, save him that slept\n In the next cell, who once had been a prince.\n Seven times a day he sang God\u2019s praises, first\n When earliest dawn drew back night\u2019s sable veil\n With trembling hand, revisiting the earth\n Like some pale maid that through the curtain peers\n Round her sick mother\u2019s bed, misdoubting half\n If sleep lie there, or death; latest when eve\n Through nave and chancel stole from arch to arch,\n And laid upon the snowy altar-step\n At last a brow of gold. From time to time,\n By ancient yearnings driven, through wood and vale\n He tracked D\u00ebirean or Bernician glades\n To holy Ripon, or late-sceptred York,\n Not yet great Wilfred\u2019s seat, or Beverley:\u2014\n The children gathered round him, crying, \u201cSing!\u201d\n They gave him inspiration with their eyes,\n And with his conquering music he returned it.\n Oftener he roamed that strenuous eastern coast\n To Yarrow and to Wearmouth, sacred sites,\n The well-beloved of Bede, or northward more,\n To Bamborough, Oswald\u2019s keep. At Coldingham\n His feet had rest\u2014there where St. Ebba\u2019s Cape\n That ends the lonely range of Lammermoor,\n Sustained for centuries o\u2019er the wild sea-surge\n In region of dim mist and flying bird,\n Fronting the Forth, those convent piles far-kenned,\n The worn-out sailor\u2019s hope.\n\n Fair English shores,\n Despite the buffeting storms of north and east,\n Despite rough ages blind with stormier strife,\n Or froz\u2019n by doubt, or sad with sensual care,\n A fragrance as of Carmel haunts you still\n Bequeathed by feet of that forgotten saint\n Who trod you once, sowing the seed divine!\n Fierce tribes that kenned him distant round him flocked;\n On sobbing sands the fisher left his net,\n His lamb the shepherd on the hills of March,\n Suing for song. With wrinkled face all smiles,\n Like that blind Scian upon Grecian shores,\n If God the song accorded, Ceadmon sang;\n If God denied it, after musings deep\n He answered, \u201cI am of the kine and dumb\u201d;\u2014\n The man revered his art, and fraudful song\n Esteemed as fraudful coin.\n\n Music denied,\n He solaced them with tales wherein, so seemed it,\n Nature and Grace, inwoven, like children played,\n Or like two sisters o\u2019er one sampler bent,\n One pattern worked. Ever the sorrowful chance\n Ending in joy, the human craving still,\n Like creeper circling up the Tree of Life,\n Lifted by hand unseen, witnessed that He,\n Man\u2019s Maker, is the Healer too of man,\n And life his school, expectant. Parables\u2014\n Thus Ceadmon named his legends. They who heard\n Made answer, \u201cNay, not parables, but truths;\u201d\n Endured no change of phrase; to years remote\n Transmitted them as facts.\n\n Better than tale\n They loved their minstrel\u2019s harp. The songs he sang\n Were songs to brighten gentle hearts, to fire\n Strong hearts with holier courage, hope to breathe\n Through spirits despondent, o\u2019er the childless floor\n Or widowed bed, flashing from highest heaven\n A beam half faith, half vision. Many a tear,\n His own, and tears of those that listened, fell\n Oft as he sang that hand, lovely as light,\n Forth stretched, and gathering from forbidden boughs\n That fruit fatal to man. He sang the Flood,\n Sin\u2019s doom that quelled the impure, yet raised to height\n Else inaccessible, the just. He sang\n That patriarch facing at Divine command\n The illimitable desert\u2014harder proof,\n Lifting his knife o\u2019er him, the seed foretold:\n He sang of Israel loosed, the twelve black seals\n Down pressed on Egypt\u2019s testament of woe,\n Covenant of pride with penance; sang the face\n Of Moses glittering from red Sinai\u2019s rocks,\n The Tables twain, and Mandements of God.\n On Christian nights he sang that jubilant star\n Which led the Magians to the Bethlehem crib\n By Joseph watched, and Mary. Pale, in Lent,\n Tremulous and pale, he told of Calvary,\n Nor added word, but, as in trance, rehearsed\n That Passion fourfold of the Evangelists,\n Which, terrible and swift\u2014not like a tale\u2014\n With speed of things which must be done, not said,\n A river of bale, from guilty age to age,\n Along the lamentable shore of things\n Annual makes way, the history of the world,\n Not of one race, one day. Up to its fount\n That stream he tracked, that primal mystery sang\n Which, chanted later by a thousand years,\n Music celestial, though with note that jarred\n (Some wandering orb troubling its starry chime),\n Amazed the nations\u2014\u201cThere was war in heaven:\n Michael and they, his angels, warfare waged\n With Satan and his angels.\u201d Brief that war,\n That ruin total. Brief was Ceadmon\u2019s song:\n Therein the Eternal Face was undivulged:\n Therein the Apostate\u2019s form no grandeur wore:\n The grandeur was elsewhere. Who hate their God\n Change not alone to vanquished but to vile.\n On Easter morns he sang the Saviour Risen,\n Eden regained. Since then on England\u2019s shores\n Though many sang, yet no man sang like him.\n\n O holy House of Whitby! on thy steep\n Rejoice, howe\u2019er the tempest, night or day,\n Afflict thee, or the craftier hand of Time,\n Drag back thine airy arches in mid spring;\n Rejoice, for Ceadmon in thy cloisters knelt,\n And singing paced beside thy sounding sea!\n Long years he lived; and with the whitening hair\n More youthful grew in spirit, and more meek;\n And they that saw him said he sang within\n Then when the golden mouth but seldom breathed\n Sonorous strain, and when\u2014that fulgent eye\n No longer bright\u2014still on his forehead shone\n Not flame but purer light, like that last beam\n Which, when the sunset woods no longer burn,\n Maintains its place on Alpine throne remote,\n Or utmost beak of promontoried cloud,\n And heavenward dies in smiles. Esteem of men\n Daily he less esteemed, through single heart\n More knit with God. To please a sickly child\n He sang his latest song, and, ending, said,\n \u201cSong is but body, though \u2019tis body winged:\n The soul of song is love: the body dead,\n The soul should thrive the more.\u201d That Patmian Sage\n Whose head had lain upon the Saviour\u2019s breast,\n Who in high vision saw the First and Last,\n Who heard the harpings of the Elders crowned,\n Who o\u2019er the ruins of the Imperial House\n And ashes of the twelve great C\u00e6sars dead\n Witnessed the endless triumph of the just,\n To earthly life restored, and, weak through age,\n But seldom spake, and gave but one command,\n The great \u201c_Mandatum Novum_\u201d of his Lord,\n \u201cMy children, love each other!\u201d Like to his\n Was Ceadmon\u2019s age. Weakness with happy stealth\n Increased upon him: he was cheerful still:\n He still could pace, though slowly, in the sun,\n Still gladsomely converse with friends who wept,\n Still lay a broad hand on his well-loved kine.\n\n The legend of the last of Ceadmon\u2019s days:\u2014\n That hospital wherein the old monks died\n Stood but a stone\u2019s throw from the monastery:\n \u201cMake there my couch to-night,\u201d he said, and smiled:\n They marvelled, yet obeyed. There, hour by hour,\n The man, low-seated on his pallet-bed,\n In silence watched the courses of the stars,\n Or casual spake at times of common things,\n And three times played with childhood\u2019s days, and twice\n His father named. At last, like one that, long\n Begirt with good, is smit by sudden thought\n Of greater good, thus spake he: \u201cHave ye, sons,\n Here in this house the Blessed Sacrament?\u201d\n They answered, wrathful, \u201cFather, thou art strong;\n Shake not thy children! Thou hast many days!\u201d\n \u201cYet bring me here the Blessed Sacrament,\u201d\n Once more he said. The brethren issued forth\n Save four that silent sat waiting the close.\n Ere long in grave procession they returned,\n Two deacons first, gold-vested; after these\n That priest who bare the Blessed Sacrament,\n And acolytes behind him, lifting lights.\n Then from his pallet Ceadmon slowly rose\n And worshipped Christ, his God, and reaching forth\n His right hand, cradled in his left, behold!\n Therein was laid God\u2019s Mystery. He spake:\n \u201cStand ye in flawless charity of God\n T\u2019wards me, my sons, or lives there in your hearts\n Memory the least of wrong or wrath?\u201d They answered:\n \u201cFather, within us lives nor wrong, nor wrath,\n But love, and love alone.\u201d And he: \u201cNot less\n Am I in charity with you, my sons,\n And all my sins of pride, and other sins,\n Humbly I mourn.\u201d Then, bending the old head\n Above the old hand, Ceadmon received his Lord\n To be his soul\u2019s viaticum, in might\n Leading from life that seems to life that is,\n And long, unpropped by any, kneeling hung\n And made thanksgiving prayer. Thanksgiving made,\n He sat upon his bed, and spake: \u201cHow long\n Ere yet the monks begin their matin psalms?\u201d\n \u201cThat hour is nigh,\u201d they answered; he replied,\n \u201cThen let us wait that hour,\u201d and laid him down\n With those kine-tending and harp-mastering hands\n Crossed on his breast, and slept.\n\n Meanwhile the monks\n (The lights removed in reverence of his sleep)\n Sat mute nor stirred such time as in the Mass\n Between \u201c_Orate Fratres_\u201d glides away,\n And \u201c_Hoc est Corpus Meum_.\u201d Northward far\n The great deep, seldom heard so distant, roared\n Round those wild rocks half way to Bamborough Head;\n For now the mightiest spring-tide of the year,\n Following the magic of a maiden moon,\n Had reached its height. More near, that sea which sobbed\n In many a cave by Whitby\u2019s winding coast,\n Or died in peace on many a sandy bar\n From river-mouth to river-mouth outspread,\n They heard, and mused upon eternity\n That circles human life. Gradual there rose\n A softer strain and sweeter, making way\n O\u2019er that sea-murmur hoarse; and they were ware\n That in the black far-shadowing church whose bulk\n Up-towered between them and the moon, the monks\n Their matins had begun. A little sigh\n That moment reached them from the central gloom\n Guarding the sleeper\u2019s bed; a second sigh\n Succeeded: neither seemed the sigh of pain:\n And some one said, \u201cHe wakens.\u201d Large and bright\n Over the church-roof sudden rushed the moon,\n And smote the cross above that sleeper\u2019s couch,\n And smote that sleeper\u2019s face. The smile thereon\n Was calmer than the smile of life. Thus died\n Ceadmon, the earliest bard of English song.\n\n\n Copyright: Rev. I. T. HECKER. 1878.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n CONFESSION IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.[160]\n\n The subject of confession has of late been brought prominently before\n the British public. We need hardly say that a storm of indignation has\n been raised. Parliament has been called upon to put a stop to a\n practice which is generally believed to be quite at variance with the\n spirit of the Church of England, and many of the bishops have publicly\n condemned it. It may, however, be doubted whether any effect has really\n been produced; for as long as clergy are found who claim the power of\n forgiving sin, and as long as people feel the need of absolution, it is\n certain that confession will be practised.\n\n A Catholic must necessarily look on confession, as existing in the\n Anglican communion, with feelings of a very mixed nature. On the one\n hand it is impossible not to appreciate the sincerity and humility\n evinced by those who voluntarily seek what they believe to be a means\n of grace. It is hard to doubt that the habit of self-examination and of\n watchfulness naturally resulting from confession must have its value;\n above all, it seems as if we might fairly hope that the spirit of\n obedience and the faithfulness in acting on conviction will be rewarded\n by fuller light and knowledge.\n\n On the other hand, it is equally impossible to shut our eyes to the\n great dangers which beset confession among Anglicans. In the first\n place, there is the absence of all sacramental grace; secondly, of\n training, and even of theological knowledge, in the clergy; and,\n thirdly, those who use confession are in an exceptional position, which\n of itself is fraught with peril to the soul.\n\n Of course no Catholic supposes Anglican clergymen to have true orders.\n Confession in the English communion is simply a conversation between\n two lay people on some of the most important subjects that can occupy\n the thoughts of human beings. There may be on either side sincerity,\n piety, and earnestness, but sacramental grace there is not. Relations\n so close between two souls are certainly not without peril; we do not\n speak of the danger to morals which the Protestant party constantly\n insists upon, and whose existence we cannot altogether deny, but of the\n tyranny on the part of the minister, and of the unreasonable obedience\n yielded by the penitent to a self-appointed guide.\n\n Those who have looked a little into their own hearts, and who have\n reflected on the subtle influences which have told on their characters,\n must feel that dealing with another soul is no light matter; that the\n chances of doing harm are many and great; and that special graces are\n needed by those who are called to so sacred an office. The need of\n training, too, is obvious; he who is to be the physician of the soul\n ought to be as well acquainted with moral theology as a physician\n should be with medical science. Among the clergy of the Church of\n England there is an absolute want of theological knowledge. It would be\n hard to mention an Anglican book on any subject connected with moral\n theology. Anglican clergymen, even where they have learnt to believe\n many of the dogmas of the Catholic faith, are, generally speaking,\n ignorant of the difference between mortal and venial sin. Hence results\n a spirit of severity on the part of the confessor which tends to\n produce scrupulosity and depression in the penitent. Converts have\n declared that the first time they heard Catholic teaching as to the\n nature of sin it seemed to them the most consoling doctrine possible.\n\n It is true that of late years some Catholic manuals have been\n translated and \u201cadapted\u201d to the Anglican use. In the recent\n controversies regarding the _Priest in Absolution_ some of the leading\n High-Church clergy have proclaimed their ignorance of the book, and\n have asserted that experience had taught them all that they could learn\n from its pages; but while they were gaining their experience what\n became of the poor souls who were the subjects of their study? In the\n Catholic Church a person cannot be said in any way to distinguish\n himself by going to confession; he does what has to be done if he would\n save his soul. Among Anglicans, although the practice is now pretty\n widely spread, the case is very different; the man or woman who goes to\n confession occupies a somewhat exceptional position, and is more or\n less considered as a support of the church, as one of those through\n whose influence that church is gradually to be reformed and restored.\n\n It is hard to get at statistics as to the actual strength of the\n extreme High-Church party, and even among those who call themselves\n High Church there are many shades and differences of opinion; the\n amount of notice which it has attracted is due rather to the adoption\n of practices unknown in the Church of England, and to the earnestness\n and activity of its clergy, than to the great number of its adherents.\n If we were to count one-tenth part of the members of the Church of\n England as High Church we should probably be overshooting the mark; and\n of these it is by no means to be assumed that the greater number go to\n confession. Personal inquiry in at least one so-called centre of\n ritualism has led us to believe that it is the practice of a mere\n minority.\n\n We believe that the practice of confession may be said to be pretty\n nearly universal in the case of the Anglican religious communities\n (which are about thirty in number). Many people living in the world are\n accustomed to go to confession weekly or fortnightly, and in some few\n London churches the practice is probably followed by the majority of\n the congregation; children are trained to it from their earliest years,\n and it is boldly proclaimed to be the \u201cremedy for post-baptismal sin.\u201d\n\n As far as we can gather from the testimony of those who have confessed\n and heard confessions as Anglicans, we should say that confession is\n often an actual torture to the soul; that penances are often imposed\n altogether without proportion to their cause; that a kind of obedience\n unknown among Catholics is claimed and is rendered. This, after all, is\n the great danger. It will never be known till the last day how many\n souls have been kept out of God\u2019s church by the authority of their\n Protestant \u201cdirectors.\u201d A director finds that one of his penitents\n begins to think that the Catholic Church has claims worthy, at least,\n of being examined. At once active works of charity are proposed as a\n remedy; all reading of Catholic books, or intercourse with Catholic\n friends or relations, is forbidden; the director is not afraid to say\n that leaving the Church of England is a sin against the Holy Ghost, and\n furthermore will promise to answer at the last day for the soul that,\n in reliance on his dictum, suspends all search after truth and blindly\n obeys. The moment of grace is too often lost; the soul holds back and\n will not respond to God\u2019s call. Too often those things which it had are\n taken from it, and the sad result is an utter loss of faith.\n\n A Catholic\u2019s interest in the working of the Anglican Church is solely\n in reference to the work of conversion. Those who in one sense are said\n to come nearest to the Catholic Church are often in reality the\n furthest off; for they believe Catholic doctrines not because they are\n proposed by a divine authority, but because they consider them\n reasonable, or find that they are in accordance with the testimony of\n antiquity. Their religion is as much a matter of private judgment as\n that of the Bible Christian; the difference lies in the fact that the\n ritualist exercises his private judgment over a more extended field\n than the other.\n\n An Anglican who goes to confession must be an object of great anxiety\n to a Catholic friend. In such a case, at least where the practice has\n been voluntarily and earnestly adopted, we feel that God is calling\n that soul to his church; that he has awakened in it a sense of need, a\n craving for the grace and aid which, generally speaking, are only to be\n found in the sacraments. We can hardly doubt that, if that soul is true\n to grace, it will ere long be in the one true fold; but the position is\n one of peculiar difficulty, and the temptations which beset it are of\n no common kind. Minds of a weak order naturally yield to anything that\n bears the semblance of lawful authority; the conscientious fear to go\n against those whom they believe to be wiser and better than themselves;\n a peace of mind often follows the confession of an Anglican. Perhaps it\n is the natural result of having made an effort and got over what is\n supposed to be a painful duty; perhaps it is a grace given by God in\n consideration of an act of contrition. How is the poor soul to discern\n this peace from the effect of sacramental grace? So the very goodness\n of God is turned into a reason for delay and for resting satisfied.\n\n Hitherto we have looked on the subject of confession in the Anglican\n communion chiefly from the side of the penitent; the case of the clergy\n who hear confessions is widely different and is beset with many\n difficulties. Generally speaking, the only question arising in the mind\n of the penitent would be: Can I get my sins forgiven by going to\n confession? Of course the reality of the absolution turns primarily on\n the validity of orders; strange to say, a vast number of the laity of\n the Church of England are contented to take the validity of the orders\n of their ministers as an unquestioned fact. The clergy naturally are\n most positive in the assertion that their orders are valid; as the\n nature and the necessity of jurisdiction are alike unknown to the\n ordinary Anglican mind, the matter seems pretty clear. The laity in the\n Anglican body are not in any very definite manner bound by the\n Prayer-book or by any of the authorized documents of that body; there\n is nothing anomalous in the idea of Anglican lay people, especially\n women, going to confession without even asking themselves whether the\n practice is in accordance with the mind of the communion to which they\n belong. Moreover, High-Church Anglicans are avowedly bent on improving\n their church; their church is not their guide or their mother, but\n rather an institution which has so far fulfilled its purpose but\n imperfectly, and which, by a judicious process of reformation, they\n hope to assimilate to an ideal existing in their own minds. Many\n conscientious Anglicans would therefore deem any objection founded on\n the evident want of encouragement of their views by their church as\n quite irrelevant. The Church of England does not forbid such and such a\n practice, they would say; we are convinced that it is in accordance\n with the teaching of antiquity, that it is useful, and therefore we\n encourage it.\n\n The clergy, however, are bound not only to follow the voice of\n individual conscience, but to keep certain solemn promises by which\n they have voluntarily bound themselves. Even if a clergyman be fully\n convinced that he possesses the tremendous power of the keys, it does\n not necessarily follow that he should feel at liberty to exercise it at\n all times or in all places. We do not go at all into the question of\n Anglican orders, except to remark in passing that it seems strange that\n the majority of the clergy should give themselves so little trouble on\n the subject; they know that, to say the least, grave doubts as to their\n position are entertained by Christendom in general, and yet it is very\n seldom that any one of them takes the same trouble to investigate his\n orders that a reasonable man would take in regard to his title-deeds,\n if a doubt were thrown on them. We believe that the feeling which we\n once heard expressed by a clergyman said to be High Church is not very\n uncommon; being told by a friend that there were serious reasons for\n doubting Anglican orders, and consequently Anglican sacraments, he made\n no attempt to defend them, but simply remarked: \u201cI don\u2019t suppose that\n God would let us suffer for such a trifle.\u201d To make the position of the\n Anglican clergy clear to our readers, we must begin by citing from \u201cThe\n Form and Manner of making Priests\u201d the solemn words which a Protestant\n bishop, \u201claying his hands upon the head of every one that receiveth the\n order of priesthood,\u201d pronounces over him:\n\n \u201cReceive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a priest in\n the church of God, now committed unto thee by the imposition of\n our hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven; and\n whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained. And be thou a\n faithful dispenser of the word of God, and of his holy\n sacraments: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of\n the Holy Ghost. Amen.\u201d\n\n By the thirty-sixth canon of the Church of England, published and\n confirmed in 1865, it is required that the following Declaration and\n subscription should be made by such as are to be ordained ministers:\n\n \u201cI, A. B., do solemnly make the following declaration: I assent\n to the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion, and to the Book of\n Common Prayer, and of Ordering of Bishops, Priests, and\n Deacons; I believe the doctrine of the United Church of England\n and Ireland, as therein set forth, to be agreeable to the word\n of God; and in public prayer and administration of the\n sacraments, I will use the form in the said book prescribed,\n and none other, except so far as shall be ordered by lawful\n authority.\u201d\n\n An Anglican clergyman, again, pledges himself at his ordination to\n minister the doctrine and sacraments and the discipline of Christ as\n our Lord hath commanded, _and as this church and realm hath received_\n the same. The subject of confession is mentioned three times in the\n Book of Common Prayer, which, as our readers may perhaps be aware, is\n the only authorized formulary of devotion possessed by the Church of\n England. There is no separate ritual for the clergy; the Common Prayer\n is the one comprehensive whole and is in the hands of everybody.\n\n In the exhortation which is appointed to be read on the Sunday\n immediately preceding the celebration of the Holy Communion, and which,\n by the way, a great many regular church-goers seldom or never have\n heard read, the concluding paragraph runs as follows:\n\n \u201cAnd because it is requisite that no man should come to the\n holy communion, but with a full trust in God\u2019s mercy, and with\n a quiet conscience; therefore if there be any of you, who by\n this means, (_i.e._, by self-examination and private\n repentance,) cannot quiet his own conscience herein but\n requireth further comfort or counsel, let him come to me, or to\n some other discreet and learned minister of God\u2019s word, and\n open his grief; that by the ministry of God\u2019s holy word he may\n receive the benefit of absolution, together with ghostly\n counsel and advice, to the quieting of his conscience and\n avoiding of all scruple and doubtfulness.\u201d\n\n The next occasion on which we find confession in the pages of the\n Prayer-book is the Visitation of the Sick. A rubric lays down the\n \u201cpriest\u2019s\u201d duty in these words:\n\n \u201cHere shall the sick person be moved to make a special\n confession of his sins, if he feel his conscience troubled with\n any weighty matter. After which confession the priest shall\n absolve him (if he humbly and heartily desire it) after this\n sort: Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath left power to his church\n to absolve all sinners who truly repent and believe in him, of\n his great mercy forgive thee thine offences; and, by his\n authority committed to me, I absolve thee from all thy sins, in\n the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.\n Amen.\u201d\n\n Lastly, in the twenty-fifth of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion,\n which are subscribed by all the clergy, we read:\n\n \u201cThere are two sacraments, ordained of Christ our Lord in the\n Gospel\u2014that is to say, baptism and the Supper of the Lord.\n Those five commonly called sacraments\u2014that is to say,\n confirmation, penance, orders, matrimony, and extreme\n unction\u2014are not to be counted for sacraments of the Gospel,\n being such as have grown partly of the corrupt following of the\n apostles, partly are states of life allowed in the Scriptures;\n but yet have not like nature of sacraments with baptism and the\n Lord\u2019s Supper, for that they have not any visible sign or\n ceremony ordained of God.\u201d\n\n As the Church of England has but one authorized book of devotion, she\n has but one book of instruction; her Homilies are declared, in the\n thirty-fifth of the Thirty-nine Articles, \u201cto contain a godly and\n wholesome doctrine and necessary for these times,\u201d and it is directed\n that they should \u201cbe read in churches by the minister diligently and\n distinctly, that they may be understanded of the people.\u201d\n\n The Homilies are not read in churches; in fact we believe it would be\n safe to assert that they are hardly ever read anywhere, and we might\n almost suppose them to be obsolete, were it not that every candidate\n for orders signs the statement that they are \u201cnecessary for these\n times.\u201d The second part of the Homily on Repentance says:\n\n \u201cAnd where they (the Roman teachers) do allege this saying of\n our Saviour Jesus Christ unto the leper, to prove auricular\n confession to stand on God\u2019s word, \u2018Go thy way, and show\n thyself unto the priest,\u2019 do they not see that the leper was\n cleansed from his leprosy, before he was by Christ sent unto\n the priest for to show himself unto him? By the same reason we\n must be cleansed from our spiritual leprosy\u2014I mean our sins\n must be forgiven us\u2014before that we come to confession. What\n need we, then, to tell forth our sins into the ear of the\n priest, sith that they may be already taken away? Therefore\n holy Ambrose, in his second sermon upon the 119th Psalm, doth\n say full well: _Go show thyself unto the priest_. Who is the\n true priest, but he which is the priest for ever after the\n order of Melchisedech? Whereby this holy Father doth understand\n that, both the priesthood and the law being changed, we ought\n to acknowledge none other priest for deliverance from our sins\n but our Saviour Jesus Christ, who, being our sovereign bishop,\n doth with the sacrifice of his body and blood, offered once for\n ever upon the altar of the cross, most effectually cleanse the\n spiritual leprosy and wash away the sins of all those that with\n true confession of the same do flee unto him. It is most\n evident and plain, that this auricular confession hath not the\n warrant of God\u2019s word, else it had not been lawful for\n Nectarius, Bishop of Constantinople, upon a just occasion to\n have put it down.\n\n * * * * *\n\n \u201cLet us with fear and trembling, and with a true contrite\n heart, use that kind of confession which God doth command in\n his Word, and then doubtless, as he is faithful and righteous,\n he will forgive us our sins and make us clean from all\n wickedness. I do not say but that, if any do find themselves\n troubled in conscience, they may repair to their learned curate\n or pastor, or to some other godly learned man, and show the\n trouble and doubt of their conscience to them, that they may\n receive at their hand the comfortable salve of God\u2019s word; but\n it is against the true Christian liberty, that any man should\n be bound to the numbering of his sins, as it hath been used\n heretofore in the time of blindness and ignorance.\u201d\n\n Such are the scanty devotional and dogmatical utterances of the Church\n of England on the subject of confession. The only other instruction\n given to her clergy in regard to their duties as confessors is to be\n found in the one hundred and thirteenth canon, which treats of the\n presentment of notorious offenders to the ordinaries. Parsons and\n vicars, or in their absence their curates, may themselves present to\n their ordinaries\n\n \u201cAll such crimes as they have in charge or otherwise, as by\n them (being the persons that should have the chief care for the\n suppressing of sin and impiety in their parishes) shall be\n thought to require due reformation. Provided always, that if\n any man confess his secret and hidden sins to the minister, for\n the unburdening of his conscience, and to receive spiritual\n consolation and ease of mind from him; we do not any way bind\n the said minister by this our Constitution, but do straitly\n charge and admonish him, that he do not at any time reveal and\n make known to any person whatsoever any crime or offence so\n committed to his trust and secrecy (except they be such crimes\n as, by the laws of this realm, his own life may be called into\n question for concealing the same), under pain of irregularity.\u201d\n\n As far as we can gather, the belief of the Church of England on the\n subject of confession may be summed up in the following propositions:\n\n 1. Penance is not a sacrament, but\n\n 2. Her ministers have the power of forgiving sins.\n\n 3. This power is exercised after confession made by the penitent.\n\n 4. But such confession is not to be made, save in case of serious\n illness or of great disquiet of mind.\n\n 5. The absolution of the priest is not the ordinary means by which sins\n are forgiven.\n\n 6. The penitent is to be the judge in his own case. If he feels very\n much in want of confession, he may have it; if not, he is to do without\n it. His own feeling is the only rule in the matter.\n\n We think our readers will admit that the above statements are in no way\n an unfair summary of the teaching of the Church of England as\n represented by her formularies. Certainly they give no warrant for the\n assertion now made by the High-Church party that confession is the\n ordinary remedy for post-baptismal sin, or to the practice of frequent\n and regular confession which is now so widely advocated and followed.\n Confession is evidently, according to the teaching of Anglicanism, what\n it has been well called by an Anglican, a \u201cluxury.\u201d How, it may be\n asked, can men who are pledged to teach and maintain the doctrines of\n the Church of England act in direct opposition to the instructions\n which she has given them? We do not maintain that those instructions\n have the appearance of being all the expression of the same\n convictions. There is an apparent discrepancy existing amongst them;\n they are not consistent with each other. But the one broad fact is\n plain as daylight: they do not countenance the present action of\n extreme Anglicans. Lookers-on constantly ask, Are these men sincere?\n Why do they not \u201cgo over to Rome\u201d? Are they not traitors in the\n Anglican camp? To these questions we can only reply: We judge not; each\n individual must stand or fall to his own master; but we cannot hesitate\n in saying that ritualism as a system is dishonest, and that the\n position occupied by its adherents is the most untenable that any man\n can undertake to defend.\n\n If we seek for the reason why men whom we are ready to believe upright\n and honorable act in a manner which is apparently absolutely\n incompatible with their solemn engagements, it may perhaps be\n discovered by a consideration of one of the chief characteristics of\n the Church of England.\n\n St. Paul speaks of the church of Christ as \u201cthe pillar and ground of\n the truth.\u201d The Church of England is essentially a compromise. Some of\n her dignitaries even look on this as her glory: the High-Churchman can\n find his belief in the Real Presence supported by her catechism, but\n the Low-Churchman has the black rubric, which is equally strong in\n favor of his opinion; her prayers are for the most part preserved from\n the days of Catholic piety, and her Articles bear the impress of\n foreign heresy; she prays against \u201cfalse doctrine, heresy, and schism,\u201d\n and devotes one of her Articles to the assertion that all churches have\n erred. Her clergy are required to accept anomalies and inconsistencies;\n and we cannot but do them the justice to say that they accept them with\n great equanimity. Every one has something to get over: the\n High-Churchman could wish some things altered, and the Low-Churchman\n would be glad to see others omitted; the result seems to be that every\n one subscribes with a kind of laxity which, if it does not imply a want\n of honesty, at least betrays an absence of accuracy and of definite\n conviction. Subscription to articles and formularies seems to sit very\n lightly on the Anglican conscience; it is a mere means to an end.\n\n But the Anglican clergyman not only pledges himself to the doctrines of\n the Prayer-book and Articles; he also promises obedience to his bishop.\n Here is something apparently definite. In the voice of a living bishop\n there can hardly be the same scope for diversity as the pages of the\n Prayer-book afford. Generally speaking, the Anglican bishops condemn\n the practice of confession; if they were really rulers in their\n communion there can be no doubt that the High-Church party would long\n since have been extinct. As a fact, the Anglican does not obey his\n bishop; at this very moment one of the leading High-Church clergy of\n London has definitely and deliberately refused to obey his bishop by\n removing from his church a crucifix and a picture of Our Lady, which he\n believes tend to promote devotion among his flock.\n\n For the reasons which lead conscientious men to disobey the ordinary\n whose godly admonitions they have engaged with a glad mind and will to\n follow, and to whose godly judgments they have promised with God\u2019s help\n to submit, we must again look to the peculiar theories of the Church of\n England. It is hardly necessary to say that the Church of England does\n not in any way or under any circumstances claim infallibility; nay,\n more, she goes out of her way to deny its very existence. One of her\n Articles asserts that the churches of Jerusalem, Alexandria, Antioch,\n and Rome have erred in matters of faith, and another follows up this\n assertion by the kindred statement that general councils may err, and\n sometimes have erred, even in things pertaining to God. She indeed\n daily professes her belief in One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic\n Church, but she does not inform her children where and how the voice of\n that church is to be heard. She constantly asserts the authority of\n Holy Scripture, but she recognizes no authority competent to interpret\n Scripture in a decisive manner. Under the influence of such teaching it\n is not surprising that there should exist in the Church of England two\n theories regarding authority in matters of faith. One is that there is\n no authority save Holy Scripture. Everything must be proved by\n Scripture; and as there is no one necessarily better entitled than\n another to explain Scripture, this virtually amounts to a recognition\n of the right and duty of private judgment to its fullest extent. The\n other theory is based on belief in the One Catholic Church. It admits\n that our Lord appointed his church to teach men all truth; it believes\n that the voice of the church in primitive times was the voice of God;\n it doubts not that at a former period the church was guided by the\n Spirit of God, but it holds that supernatural guidance to be in\n abeyance; it recognizes no _living_ voice of the church; it looks\n forward with a vague hope to the reunion of Catholics, Greeks, and\n Anglicans, and the possibility in such a case of a general council\n being held, whose decisions would bind all Christendom. In the meantime\n the church is dumb, if not dead, and all that can be done is to turn\n with a reverent mind to the study of antiquity, to an examination of\n what has been handed down from the days of pure and undoubted faith.\n This last is the theory of the High-Church party in general. To their\n mind a bishop is a necessity; he is required for the conferring of\n orders and for giving confirmation; he is not the centre of sacrificial\n power in his diocese, nor the source of jurisdiction; he is not a\n teacher in any other sense beyond that in which they are themselves\n teachers; their obedience to him is not an obedience to one whom our\n Lord has set over his flock with a special charge to feed his sheep as\n well as his lambs; it is an obedience rendered to one who is officially\n a superior\u2014an obedience which has no direct reference to God, and which\n is constantly evaded (it may be in perfect good faith) on the principle\n that \u201cwe ought to obey God rather than man.\u201d\n\n Another cause which has probably much to do with the apparent\n inconsistencies of the High-Church Anglican clergy is the fact that\n they are in a great many cases absorbed and overwhelmed by an amount of\n active work which leaves little leisure for the serious examination of\n their position. It is admitted on all sides that the last century was a\n period of spiritual apathy and deadness as far as the Church of England\n was concerned. The movement of the past forty years has not been merely\n in the direction of Catholic doctrine, but it has also led to a renewal\n of zeal, to energy and self-sacrifice, which we cannot but appreciate.\n The poor, the young, the ignorant, and the fallen are cared for with a\n charity whose root is, we trust, to be found in the increased knowledge\n of the life and of the love of our Lord. But even works of mercy have\n their snares; a man who is toiling night and day among the outcast and\n the poor of great cities, who sees the results of his labor in the\n reformed life of many a wanderer, and who also sees pressing on him\n needs which he can never fully satisfy, must be sorely tempted to turn\n a deaf ear to all such questionings as would stay his course. He hears\n people\u2019s confessions, and he sees them turn to God and lead better\n lives; naturally he concludes that all is right, and he resents any\n interference with a practice which is apparently so salutary.\n\n We have now given a short and, we hope, a fair idea of confession as it\n exists at present in the Anglican communion. We must add, for the\n information of those who have not had the opportunity of watching the\n progress of events in England, that the practice of confession was\n unknown, or almost unknown, in the Anglican communion until about\n five-and-thirty years ago. It was one of the first fruits of that\n turning back to the old Catholic paths which by God\u2019s blessing has led\n so many souls into the Church. The movement still goes on; it has\n passed through different phases, and year by year it brings one after\n another to the very threshold of their true home; they enter in and are\n at rest, and find the reality of all that they had hitherto sought and\n longed for.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n MICHAEL THE SOMBRE.[161]\n\n AN EPISODE IN THE POLISH INSURRECTION, 1863\u20131864.\n\n It is a trite remark that every age has produced its heroes, its\n saints, and its martyrs; but there are few amongst us who have\n sufficient discernment to recognize them when they cross our path in\n life. \u201cShould we know a saint if we met him?\u201d asks Father Faber. And so\n if we were to meet the heroine of this tale, quietly working in her own\n village or busy with the _ouvroir_ for young girls she has just\n established in her province in France, we should be far indeed from\n guessing that we saw with our own eyes a woman who had equalled, if not\n surpassed, Joan of Arc in heroism, devotion, and courage, and who had\n done deeds which would be incredible, if not attested by a multitude of\n living witnesses.\n\n She was born in one of the departments of France unhappily annexed\n during the war of 1870\u201371. Having lost her mother in infancy, she was\n brought up by her father, an old officer under Louis XVIII. and Charles\n X., who educated her entirely as a boy. At twelve years of age she was\n a complete mistress\n\n of the art of fencing, riding, shooting, and other manly\n accomplishments. Then, fearing lest she should be altogether unfitted\n for the society of those of her own sex, her father suddenly determined\n to send her to a convent, where her extraordinary cleverness soon\n enabled her to conquer all difficulties, and she made the most rapid\n progress in every branch of study. A vein of earnest Catholic piety ran\n through her whole character, coupled with an equally earnest devotion\n to her country and her king.\n\n We do not know what family circumstances induced her father to part for\n a time from a child on whose education he had lavished such thought and\n care. But at eighteen we find her established in Poland as an inmate of\n one of its noblest families. After two years thus spent, during which\n she acquired a thorough knowledge of the Polish and German languages,\n she returned to France and had the melancholy consolation of nursing\n and assisting her father in his last moments; after which she was\n entreated to return to the Countess L\u2014\u2014 in Poland, and become the\n adopted child of the house, to which she consented. So that, when the\n insurrection in that country broke out in 1863, \u201cMika,\u201d as she was\n affectionately called by the whole family, rejoiced in the opportunity\n it afforded her of repaying the debt of gratitude she owed to those who\n had been as her second parents, by a devotion which was ready to\n sacrifice life itself in their service.\n\n It is an episode in this war which we are about to give to our readers,\n and which we think will be doubly interesting at the present moment,\n when all eyes are fixed on the terrible struggle going on in the East.\n The story is told in the heroine\u2019s own words.\n\n * * * * *\n\n It was on the 22d January, 1863, that the Poles, in little bands of ten\n or twenty men, met by a cross raised in honor of Kosciusko in the\n palatinate of Radom, and made a vow to deliver Poland from the\n Muscovite yoke or perish in the attempt. Let those who blame them\n remember the intolerable persecution which they had patiently endured\n for years\u2014a persecution which deprived them of their faith, their\n language, their rights as citizens, and all that men hold most dear.\n\n On the 24th they marched on Miechow, having no other arms than scythes\n and sticks and old-fashioned fowling-pieces. Led by inexperienced\n chiefs, who, in their ardor, fondly imagined that patriotism and a holy\n cause would carry the day against military tactics, they were foolish\n enough to attack, in broad daylight, a strong body of Russians, well\n armed and superior to them in numbers, who occupied an almost\n impregnable position on the heights above the town. The result may be\n easily imagined. The Poles were repulsed with heavy loss, and the\n Russians, who delight in celebrating their triumphs by a bonfire, burnt\n down the town and massacred all the Poles who came within their reach.\n\n Ten of the Polish wounded were secretly brought to the castle, where we\n had established a subterranean ambulance. It was my business to dress\n the wounds of these poor fellows, assisted by a holy nun, the Mother\n Alexandra, who played too important a part in my future history not to\n be mentioned here. The Count L\u2014\u2014 did not approve of the insurrection\n and considered it hopeless from the first; but he would not abandon his\n brave peasants. Towards the 30th of this month our couriers gave us\n warning that the Russians were aware of the wounded men being under our\n care, and that they were marching on the castle for the purpose of\n burning it down. The count refused to fly, saying that his place was\n amongst his own people at Syez, of whom he had always been both the\n father and protector. But he called me into his counsels, and implored\n me to carry off his wife and children and his sister-in-law (who lived\n with us) to Mislowitz, a little manufacturing town on the frontier of\n Silesia and Poland. After all it was a false alarm; and after a\n fortnight\u2019s exile, which anxiety and fear had doubled, a letter from\n the count recalled us. We had nearly reached the end of our journey\n when we were attacked by a mob of Russian fanatics, who endeavored to\n seize the carriage. I was on horseback at the head of the little\n cavalcade, and I managed by means of my revolver to keep these\n miscreants at bay. The coachman profited by this moment\u2019s respite to\n lash his horses into a gallop, by which means we escaped the ambush and\n reached the castle in safety.\n\n But our tranquillity was not destined to be of long duration. About a\n fortnight later eight insurgents of the legion called of \u201cDespair\u201d\n sought refuge in our house. We concealed them as well as we could; but\n in the middle of the night notice was sent us that the Russians were on\n their track and had discovered their hiding-place. We hastened to send\n them off to a part of the forest where a cavern had been prepared to\n receive any such fugitives. They reached it in safety, but unhappily\n were betrayed by a peasant to whom the secret had been confided. The\n exasperated Russians again threatened the castle; and again the count\n insisted on our flight. On our way an alarm was given of some sort\n which so terrified the coachman that he threw down his whip and fled\n for his life, leaving us and the carriage at the mercy of the four\n horses, which were strong beasts and very fresh. Luckily, they stood\n still for a moment, and, as I was used to driving, I reassured the\n countess and jumped on the box. Hardly, however, had I taken the reins\n than the wheels of the carriage became wedged in the sand. I jumped off\n the box, and, seizing one of the leaders by the bridle, urged him\n forward with all my might. The animal made so violent an effort that he\n threw me down and dragged me some twenty paces; but as I held on for\n dear life, he ended by stopping, and, the carriage being thus released,\n we went on as fast as we could, continually in dread of pursuit, till\n we reached the house of Countess N\u2014\u2014, who received us with the warmest\n kindness and hospitality. Our stay here, however, was not of long\n duration, for my poor friend, the Countess L\u2014\u2014, was in an agony to\n return to her husband, who had been left alone in the castle; and so,\n at the risk of being again captured, we returned to Syez. Fortunately,\n this time we had no alarms on the road, and the joy of the family at\n their safe reunion was as great as their thankfulness.\n\n But our happiness was short-lived. Although the count did not take any\n part in the insurrection, it was well known that his sympathies were\n with his people, and this was sufficient to make him a marked man with\n the Russian authorities. At last we heard from undeniable authority\n that his arrest had been determined upon, and that he had been already\n condemned to Siberia. Then followed a heartrending scene\u2014his wife and\n children (whose whole future would have been wrecked had his\n deportation been carried into effect) imploring him to take refuge in\n Germany, where he had a small property, and to remain there till the\n storm was past; while he clung tenaciously to his old home and to his\n duties as a proprietor during the struggle. Finally, he yielded to our\n tears and entreaties; but before leaving he sent for me and solemnly\n commended his wife and children to my care. I swore to defend them or\n to die in the attempt. It was agreed that we were to watch our\n opportunity, and, if possible, obtain an escort so as to cross the\n frontier and rejoin the count as soon as we could. Three days only\n after his departure we received intelligence that the Russians were\n close to our gates and were going to insist on a domiciliary visit. I\n flew to the count\u2019s private room and commenced making an _auto-da-f\u00e9_\n of every compromising letter or paper I could find and of all suspected\n newspapers. Whilst I was fanning the flames the count\u2019s sister came in,\n and, seeing what I was about, exclaimed with horror:\n\n \u201cO Mika! for God\u2019s sake stop. You don\u2019t know what you are doing. All\n Arthur\u2019s gunpowder is hidden and stowed away in that chimney!\u201d\n\n I was almost paralyzed with fear, but I said:\n\n \u201cFly for your life and get the countess and the children out of the\n house.\u201d And then, with a fervent ejaculatory prayer to God, I tore the\n burning papers out of the grate before the flames had had time to\n ignite the gunpowder, which, luckily for me, had been carefully done up\n in packets and placed in a metal box. I managed to drag the papers into\n another fireplace, and had time to see that they were all burnt, and to\n conceal the tinder, before the Cossacks surrounded the house and\n summoned us to open the doors. Their officers made the most minute\n examination of everything, but found nothing that they could lay their\n hands on, and went away disgusted, while I escaped with a few trifling\n burns on my hands and arms.\n\n A few days after this scene Mme. de I\u2014\u2014 and I were sitting talking in\n the room where we generally met and waited before dinner, when the\n countess came in with an open letter in her hand and looking more sad\n and pale than usual. \u201cWhat has happened?\u201d we both exclaimed; and I\n added, smiling: \u201cAre we condemned to the knout? Or do the Russians\n reserve us the honor of a hempen collar?\u201d But my dismal pleasantry\n produced no response, and the poor lady silently came and sat down by\n me, taking my hand. After a pause she said:\n\n \u201cMika, I have been unwittingly guilty of a great indiscretion. You know\n how miserably anxious I am for news of Arthur\u2019s safety. A servant whom\n I had sent to the post, in hopes of finding a letter from him, brought\n me back this one; and, full of my cruel anxiety, I tore it open without\n looking at the address, being fully convinced it came from him.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell?\u201d I inquired, as she hesitated to go on.\n\n \u201cWell, this letter was a terrible disappointment. It wasn\u2019t from Arthur\n at all, or for me, but for you, and from your own family, who, dreading\n the consequences of this sad insurrection, insist on your immediate\n return to France.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs that all?\u201d I asked, smiling.\n\n \u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d she replied. \u201cI only read enough to find out my\n mistake, and I was so absorbed by my own anxiety that I hardly took in\n the meaning of the words at first.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut that is not what I ask,\u201d I rejoined. \u201cI want to know what there\n was in that letter which makes you look so sad.\u201d\n\n The countess\u2019 eyes filled with tears. \u201cI own, Mika, that the thought of\n losing you breaks my heart. You know, at the first moment of alarm,\n Miss B\u2014\u2014 and Fr\u00e4ulein F\u2014\u2014 left the children and returned to their\n homes. I fancied you would follow their example; but seeing you so\n brave and so ready to share in all our dangers, I had been completely\n reassured, until God allowed this letter to fall into my hands.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd what have you concluded from that letter?\u201d I asked rather coldly.\n\n \u201cI have made up my mind, Mika, that it would be the height of\n selfishness on my part to strive to induce you to stay on with us in a\n country where desolation and terror reign supreme; where we are not\n safe from one moment to the other; where neither human nor divine laws\n are respected, and where even ladies are not spared the lash or the\n stake. Yesterday, as you well know, Countess P\u2014\u2014, for having worn\n mourning for her brother, who had been massacred by the Russians, was\n flogged publicly in the market-place and hanged afterwards. Fly, then,\n my dearest Mika, while there is yet time. Already you have done far\n more than your duty. You have risked your life over and over again for\n us. I cannot, I must not, exact any further sacrifice. Leave us, Mika,\n leave us to our sad fate, and may God be with you!\u201d\n\n Here the poor wife and mother hid her face in her hands, and I saw\n great tears coursing down her cheeks through her clasped fingers. Mme.\n de I\u2014\u2014 and the children, who had come in during the interval and had\n heard their mother\u2019s words, clustered round me and cried too. When I\n could command my own voice I turned towards the countess and said:\n \u201cDearest madam! seven years have now elapsed since I first became an\n inmate of your home. When I arrived here, Poland, if not happy, was at\n least at peace, and I reckoned you among the limited number of the\n truly happy ones on this earth. You received me (I, whom a deep sorrow\n had driven from my native land) as a friend, as a child, as a sister;\n and this affection and consideration for me have never failed for a\n single moment. When the insurrection broke out your English governess\n left you; and I think she was right. A sacred duty was laid upon\n her\u2014that of supporting her old mother, who lived entirely on her\n earnings. As to Fr\u00e4ulein F\u2014\u2014, that is quite another matter. I expected\n she would go away on the very first alarm. With Prussians devotedness\n does not exist. I believe they have tomatoes in place of hearts! As for\n me, I have only one brother in the world, and he is good enough to\n think of me only when his purse is empty. I have, therefore, not the\n same excuse as Miss B\u2014\u2014, still less that of Fr\u00e4ulein F\u2014\u2014; for if I\n chose to live independently, the little fortune left me by my father\n would be enough for my wants. If I returned to Poland after his death\n it was to find the same disinterested love and affection I had left\n there. I have found more than a duty to fulfil: I have a debt of\n gratitude to pay; and I thank God for the portion he has assigned to\n me.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut your family?\u201d again urged the countess, whose face began to\n brighten.\n\n \u201cSince my father and sister died,\u201d I replied, \u201cI do not consider I have\n any family claims. Now, listen to me, contessina,\u201d I continued,\n clasping her two hands in mine. \u201cGod has put into my heart an\n inexhaustible treasure of devotedness and tenderness. He has given me\n likewise unusual courage and strength; and now I thank him that he has\n also given me the occasion to employ these, his gifts, in your service.\n Your husband is in exile; you are threatened in your home, in your\n children, in your property, and by everything around you; and you could\n imagine for a moment that, under such circumstances, I should go and\n abandon you! Thank God! that there never has been a stain yet on our\n family name, and my father, an old soldier, impressed upon me, from a\n child, the strongest feelings of duty and honor. I swear, therefore, in\n the sight of God, that as long as this war lasts your country shall be\n my country, your children shall also be mine, and as long as my heart\n beats not a hair of your dear head shall be touched! When happier days\n arise for Poland, and peace shall be restored, then, but not till then,\n I shall remember that France is my country, and that I have left\n well-beloved tombs on her soil.\u201d\n\n The countess threw her arms round me in a close embrace and cried on my\n shoulder. Mme. de I\u2014\u2014 looked at me with the sweetest smile. \u201cThanks,\n Mika,\u201d she murmured in a broken voice. \u201cI never believed for a moment\n that you would leave us. You!\u201d\n\n The children seized hold of my hands and covered them with kisses. It\n was a moment of the purest happiness I had known on earth.\n\n In proportion to the progress and extent of the insurrection the\n cruelty of the Russians increased. Every day brought new vexations or\n fresh tortures. We lived in constant fear, and our position became\n really insupportable. Almost every noble family in the neighborhood had\n fled and left the country, and we should long before have followed\n their example had it not been for the great distance we were from the\n railroad. The count had arrived safely at Dresden, whence he wrote\n imploring his wife to join him. But we were at least forty versts from\n the nearest station, and to go there without an escort would have\n exposed us inevitably to fall into the hands of the Russians, who had\n lately ranked emigration in the category of crimes of high treason. And\n how was it possible to form an escort? The peasants, in the pay of the\n _Raskolnicks_ (or old believers), would refuse to march, and the\n servants would, in all probability, have betrayed us. In vain I racked\n my brains to find some way out of this difficulty, and every day the\n danger became more imminent. Providence at last had pity upon us, and\n disposed events in a way which became eventually the salvation of those\n so dear to me.\n\n Every evening, when the rest of the family were gone to bed, I went\n alone into the library to answer letters, verify the steward\u2019s\n registers, and look after the accounts. In the absence of the count\n there was no one to see after these necessary duties but myself, and I\n looked upon them as my right. One night, when this work had kept me up\n later than usual, I heard some one knocking at the door. It was past\n midnight. I rose to open it, very much surprised at any one coming to\n me at that hour, and all the more as no servant would venture into that\n part of the house at night, as it was reported to be haunted. What was\n my astonishment at finding the countess herself outside the door in a\n pitiable state of agitation.\n\n \u201cO Mika!\u201d she exclaimed, almost falling into my arms as I led her to a\n seat, \u201cI am in the most horrible perplexity and anxiety. I have just\n received an entreaty to send a despatch instantly to General B\u2014\u2014, my\n husband\u2019s oldest and dearest friend. He is encamped with his squadron\n at Gory, on the property of Count Dembinski; and he does not know that\n eight hundred Russians are in the immediate neighborhood and have laid\n an ambush to surprise him. This despatch is to warn him of it; for he\n has only three hundred men with him, who will all be cut to pieces, if\n he should not be warned in time. Who knows? perhaps already it may be\n too late. But you, Mika, who are always so clear-headed\u2014can you suggest\n anything? Can you advise me what to do?\u201d\n\n \u201cBut the man who brought this despatch,\u201d I exclaimed\u2014\u201cwhere is he? Why\n cannot he go on instantly to Gory?\u201d\n\n \u201cAlas! it is impossible,\u201d replied the countess. \u201cHe has just galloped\n seven leagues without stopping to take breath, and his horse dropped\n down dead at the entrance of the village. The poor fellow himself is\n half dead with fatigue and exhaustion.\u201d\n\n I thought for a minute or two, and then said:\n\n \u201cLeave the despatch with me. I will go and rouse the steward, and\n between us we will find some one who will undertake this perilous\n mission.\u201d\n\n \u201cDo you really think so, Mika?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, I am sure of it,\u201d I replied.\n\n \u201cOh! what a weight you have lifted off my heart,\u201d said the countess\n joyfully. \u201cGo at once, dearest child. I will wait for you, and not go\n to bed till I have heard the result of your consultation.\u201d\n\n When the countess had gone back to her own room a terrible struggle\n arose in my heart. I had studied the peasants and servants well enough\n to know that in such a moment of extreme danger not one of them was to\n be trusted. The steward himself did not inspire me with much\n confidence; and, besides, he was the father of a family. On the other\n hand, the lives of three hundred men hung upon the delivery of this\n message. I knelt down and prayed with my whole heart for guidance. When\n I rose my resolution was taken. The hour was come for me to pay my debt\n of gratitude towards this Poland which had become so dear to me, and\n perhaps in this way alone could I save the family to whom I had devoted\n my life. I wrote a few lines to the countess, and then went and woke my\n own maid.\n\n \u201cMarynia,\u201d I said, \u201cin half an hour, but not before, you must take this\n note to the countess, who is sitting up for me. And if to-morrow, when\n you get up, I am not come back, you must take another letter to her,\n which you will find on my chest of drawers.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut, Holy Virgin of Czenstochowa!\u201d exclaimed the poor girl, \u201cyou are\n not going out at this time of night?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes; I am starting this very instant.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut then I will wake the whole house. I won\u2019t have you go alone at\n this hour.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, you will stay quiet,\u201d I said to her in a tone which admitted of no\n reply, \u201cand in half an hour you will do what I have told you.\u201d\n\n So saying, I left Marynia to her lamentations and went out. The first\n thing I had to do was to put on a man\u2019s dress\u2014I had received permission\n to do this from Rome in case of an emergency like the present\u2014and then,\n taking my pistols, which were always ready, I went to the stable and\n picked out the best horse I could find, which I saddled myself,\n blessing again the education my father had given me, that made me\n independent of any assistance.\n\n The road which I took passed in front of the castle. There was a light\n in the countess\u2019 room where she was waiting for me. Good, gentle,\n loving woman with a child\u2019s heart! Twice I saw her shadow pass and\n repass across the curtain, and twice my heart failed me. This feeling\n only lasted a minute; but this minute might have been a century for the\n agony concentrated in it. There to the left was the old castle which\n held those two young women so dear to me, and those children whose\n birth I had witnessed and who loved me so tenderly. To the right\n stretched the road that was to lead me\u2014to Siberia, perhaps, or to a\n sudden and violent death. If at this thought my heart failed me, and if\n for a moment I hesitated, God will, I hope, have forgiven it. At\n twenty-four years of age one does not fling away life without one look\n back. I stopped my horse instinctively, fully realizing the almost\n foolhardiness of my attempt. But then my thoughts reverted to those\n three hundred brave fellows whose lives I held, as it were, in my hand,\n and, with a sigh which was more like a sob, I dug my spurs into my\n beautiful \u201cKirdjcali,\u201d who bounded into the air with surprise and pain,\n and commenced galloping at a furious pace along the road\u2014a pace I did\n not even try to check, for it seemed to relieve my bursting heart. Now\n and then I had to lie down on his mane to take breath. But by degrees\n the cold and calm silence of the night, and the satisfaction of feeling\n that I was accomplishing a great and sacred duty, restored my peace of\n mind. I checked the pace of my horse, and after about three-quarters of\n an hour came to a thick fir-wood, through which I was quietly ambling\n when Kirdjcali stopped suddenly, and I instantly perceived the cause.\n On the edge of the wood, about five hundred paces off, a great fire was\n crackling, round which were grouped a number of men and horses. It was\n either a Russian or a Polish patrol; but in either case my situation\n was a critical one. I had no \u201csafe-conduct\u201d papers, and no password\n save for General B\u2014\u2014. I should be taken for a spy and hanged without\n form or ceremony. What was to be done? Go back? That would be the\n height of weakness. Take another road? There was no other. Yet to go on\n was undoubtedly to run the risk of falling directly into their hands.\n Again I lifted up my whole heart in prayer; after all I had God and the\n right on my side, and so I decided to venture it, feeling besides that\n my good Kirdjcali had the legs of a race-horse and could beat almost\n any other animal, if it came to a chase. The moon, which till then had\n guided my path, was suddenly hidden behind a thick cloud that concealed\n me from the enemy. I made my horse walk, and, lying flat on his neck, I\n went on to within fifty paces of the Cossacks (for they were Russian\n Cossacks) without their dreaming of my vicinity; for the soft sand\n deadened the sound of my horse\u2019s feet. All of a sudden Kirdjcali threw\n up his head and sniffed the wind with ever-widening nostrils. And then\n what I most dreaded came to pass. He recognized some companion of the\n steppes and gave a loud neigh, which was answered instantly by a hurrah\n from the children of the Don, who were on foot in a moment. Making the\n sign of the cross, I dug my spurs once more into my poor Kirdjcali\u2019s\n flanks, and passed like a flash of lightning before the astonished\n Cossacks. \u201cStoj!\u201d (stop) they cried with one voice. My only answer to\n this summons was to urge on my steed to still greater speed. Then they\n had recourse to a more active means of arresting my course. Two flashes\n lit up the darkness of the night, and one ball whistled past my ear,\n grazed my head, and cut off a lock of my hair close to the temple; the\n other passed through a branch of a tree some paces before me. But\n Kirdjcali flew like the wind, and I was soon out of the reach of\n pursuit. As soon as I dared I stopped him to let him breathe; five\n minutes more of this furious pace, and the poor beast would have\n dropped down dead.\n\n By the time I had reached General B\u2014\u2014\u2019s column it was three o\u2019clock in\n the morning.\n\n \u201cWho goes there?\u201d cried the sentinel.\n\n \u201cMilitary orders,\u201d I replied.\n\n \u201cThe password?\u201d\n\n \u201c_Polska \u00e8 Volnoszez_\u201d (Poland and liberty). He let me pass, and I was\n received by M. D\u2014\u2014, one of the general\u2019s aides-de-camp. I gave him the\n despatch, which he hastened to take to his chief. Hardly had he left\n me, and before I had time to rejoice at having accomplished my mission,\n when a discharge of musketry, accompanied by the savage Russian\n war-cry, was heard to the left. In spite of the fearful speed of my\n ride, I had arrived too late! The enemy had almost surrounded the\n little camp. A few minutes sufficed for the general to throw himself\n into the saddle and place himself at the head of his column.\n\n \u201cFirst squadron, forward!\u201d he cried in a stentorian voice.\n\n Not a man stirred.\n\n \u201cSecond squadron, forward!\u201d The same result. The poor fellows, worn out\n with fatigue, exhausted from hunger, and totally unprepared for this\n attack, remained, as it were, paralyzed. To me this first moment was\n terrible; and those who boast of never having been afraid the first\n time they take part in a battle either deceive themselves or they lie.\n It took me a few minutes to master my emotion; but Kirdjcali too made a\n diversion by furious bounds and neighing, which proved that for him\n also this was the first baptism of fire.\n\n Seeing the demoralization of his soldiers, the brave general made a\n desperate charge in the very midst of the enemy\u2019s ranks, followed by a\n handful of dragoons under the orders of Count K\u2014\u2014. I followed his\n movements with my eye in a mechanical sort of way, when all of a sudden\n I saw the unhappy general staggering rather than falling from his\n horse, while an infernal hurrah of triumph burst from the Russians.\n Then all my fears vanished. I thought of my father, and all that was\n French in my blood was roused. I seized a sword that lay close by, and\n turning towards the troops, who were still hesitating and wavering, I\n cried out: \u201cCowards, if you have allowed your chief to be murdered, at\n least do not let his dead body bear witness of your shame by leaving it\n in the hands of your enemies. Come on and rescue it, and wash out in\n your blood the stain you have set on Polish honor!\u201d\n\n Saying those words, and recommending my soul to God in one fervent\n aspiration, I threw myself impetuously into the strife, followed by all\n the soldiers, whom my words had roused from their stupor. The whistling\n of balls, the smell of powder, the cries of the dying and the dead, and\n more than all the savage howlings of the Russians, threw me into a sort\n of mad rage and furious excitement which made me insensible to anything\n but a longing for vengeance. Every time I rose in my stirrups to wield\n my sword a man bit the dust. I felt a sort of superhuman strength at\n that moment, and never ceased to strike till I saw the Poles driving\n the defeated Russians completely out of the camp, from whence they fled\n in the utmost disorder. I woke then as from a horrible nightmare, and\n felt an inexpressible disgust and horror at the sight of the dead and\n dying bodies of horses and men all round me weltering in their blood.\n At that moment an orderly officer galloped up to me.\n\n \u201cSir,\u201d he exclaimed, \u201cthe general desires you to come to him\n immediately.\u201d\n\n \u201cYour general!\u201d I exclaimed joyfully. \u201cWhy, I saw him fall with my own\n eyes. He is not dead, then?\u201d\n\n \u201cNot yet; but his wounds are mortal, and I fear there is no hope of\n saving him.\u201d\n\n I followed the officer hastily to a tent where the poor general was\n lying on a camp-bed. His face was literally hacked with sabrecuts; one\n ball had gone through his chest, and the surgeon, who was bending over\n him, was trying in vain to stanch the blood which was escaping in a\n black stream from this gaping wound. I took off my cap and bowed low\n before the dying hero.\n\n \u201cSir,\u201d he said in so weak a voice that I had to bend down my ear close\n to him to be able to hear, \u201cI do not know you, and I do not remember\n ever to have seen you before; but whoever you may be, may God bless you\n for what you have done this day! You have saved my troops from\n dishonor, and me from having my last moments embittered by the cruelest\n sorrow I could ever have experienced.\u201d\n\n At this moment a rush of blood from his mouth threatened to stifle the\n dying man. When he had a little recovered he spoke again:\n\n \u201cWhence do you come, and what is your name?\u201d\n\n \u201cI am French, and my name is Michael,\u201d I replied, blushing deeply. Here\n the general drew off a ring from his finger. It was a signet-ring used\n throughout the war as a password of command.\n\n \u201cTake this,\u201d he said, \u201cand swear to me not to leave my troops till the\n Central Committee have sent another officer to take my place. This is\n the last request of a dying man, and I feel sure that you will not\n refuse it to me.\u201d\n\n I hesitated an instant. How reveal my secret and explain my anomalous\n position at such a moment? The general, striving to raise his voice,\n reiterated his dying entreaty:\n\n \u201cSwear not to leave them!\u201d\n\n I felt I could not resist any longer.\n\n \u201cI swear it, general, but on one condition: that your soldiers consent\n to serve as escort to Countess L\u2014\u2014 from her ch\u00e2teau to the frontier, as\n she wishes to escape with her children and rejoin her husband, who is\n in exile.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat! Countess L\u2014\u2014, Arthur\u2019s wife?\u201d\n\n \u201cThe same, general,\u201d I replied; \u201cand it was to implore your protection\n for her in her hour of need, as well as to convey to you the\n information she had received of the Russian ambuscade, that determined\n me to accept this dangerous mission.\u201d\n\n \u201cThanks, my child\u2014thanks for her and thanks for me. Gentlemen,\u201d he\n added, turning to his officers, who, silent and sad, were standing at\n the other end of the tent, \u201cyou will obey this young officer until my\n successor be appointed from headquarters. This is my last order, my\n last prayer. And as long as he, though a stranger, fights at the head\n of your column, you will not again forget, I hope, that the cause for\n which you are fighting is a sacred one, the most holy of all causes,\n for it is the cause of God and your country.\u201d\n\n The officers hung their heads at this tacit reproach\u2014the only one\n addressed to them by the hero whom they had allowed to be slain in so\n cowardly a manner. After another fainting fit the general made me a\n sign to draw close to him. I knelt down by his side. \u201cIf death spares\n you,\u201d he said, \u201cgo and tell my poor mother how I died. Console her, and\n try and replace me to her; for I am the only thing she has left in the\n world.\u201d\n\n Here tears filled his eyes, which he turned away to hide his emotion\n from his officers. The surgeon had just finished dressing his wounds,\n but he shook his head sadly as he rose. The general perceived the\n movement and said:\n\n \u201cMy poor friend! you have given yourself a great deal of trouble, and\n all for nothing; but I am just as grateful to you.\u201d\n\n The surgeon wrung his hand, too much moved to speak. Then I took\n courage and said:\n\n \u201cGeneral, when the doctor of the body can do no more, and science is\n exhausted, a Christian has recourse to another Physician.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou are quite right, my child,\u201d replied the good general gravely; \u201cand\n I have no time to lose, for I feel my life is ebbing away every\n moment.\u201d\n\n He made a sign to one of his aides-de-camp, and whispered his\n instructions to him, which the latter hastened to obey. He returned in\n a few minutes with a young Capuchin, who was the chaplain of the corps.\n The officers left the tent, and I was about to do the same when a\n sudden thought struck me.\n\n \u201cOne word more, general. I want three days to make my arrangements and\n get my kit ready.\u201d\n\n \u201cTake them, my son; but do not be away longer, for when you return I\n shall be no more here.\u201d\n\n \u201cNot here, perhaps, but in a better world,\u201d I exclaimed. \u201cGod bless\n you, general! I cannot replace you, but I may perhaps be able to show\n your troops how those should fight and die who have had General B\u2014\u2014 for\n their leader!\u201d\n\n \u201cThanks, my child, and may God bless you! Adieu!\u201d\n\n I pressed the hand which the dying man held out to me with respectful\n tenderness; and then, hurrying from the tent to hide my emotion, I\n obtained a \u201csafe-conduct\u201d passport, and, remounting my horse, stopped\n at the best inn I could find in the next village, and wrote a few lines\n to Countess L\u2014\u2014, not to tell her of the extraordinary position in which\n I had been placed or the fearful events of the past night, but to\n reassure her, and bid her to hold herself in readiness for a speedy\n departure, as an escort had been promised for her. Thence I rode as\n fast as I could to the convent of the Bernardines at Kielce, and asked\n to see Father Benvenuto immediately\u2014that eloquent preacher and holy\n confessor who had lingered for twenty years in a Siberian dungeon. He\n was my confessor, and at this moment of all others in my life I needed\n his advice and guidance. Fortunately for me, he was at home, and I\n instantly told him all that had happened, and of the almost compulsory\n promise which had been extorted from me by the brave and dying general.\n The good old father listened in silence, and then said:\n\n \u201cMy child, what you have done is heroic and great; but if you were to\n return to the camp, and had to bear alone this terrible secret, it\n would crush you with its weight.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut, good God! what can I do?\u201d I exclaimed. \u201cMust I give it up and\n forfeit my word?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo; because God, in permitting these extraordinary events, had\n evidently his divine purpose for you. You must return and fulfil your\n vow, but you must not go alone. More than a month ago I asked\n permission of my superiors to be allowed to carry the consolations of\n religion to our brave troops in the field. This permission I received\n yesterday; and so I can at once precede you to the camp, and when you\n arrive will be your safeguard and protector.\u201d\n\n An enormous weight was taken off my mind by this proposal. I thanked\n him with my whole heart, and he then insisted on my going to sleep for\n some hours; for all that I had gone through had nearly exhausted my\n strength. After a good night\u2019s rest I woke, refreshed in body and\n relieved in mind, to ride to Breslau, where I completed my military\n equipment and then returned to the camp.\n\n [TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT MONTH.]\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n A FINAL PHILOSOPHY.[162]\n\n The war waged by modern thought against supernatural revelation in the\n name of the so-called \u201cadvanced\u201d science is looked upon in a different\n light by Catholic and by Protestant thinkers. Catholic philosophers and\n divines look upon it as a noisy but futile effort of modern\n anti-Christianism to shake and overthrow the mighty rock on which the\n incarnate God has been pleased to build his indefectible church. They\n know, of course, that they must be ready to fight, for the church to\n which they belong is still militant; but, far from apprehending a\n coming defeat, they feel certain of the victory. God is with them, and,\n on God\u2019s infallible promise, the church whose cause they serve is sure\n of her final triumph. Protestant divines, on the contrary, hold no\n tokens of future victories, and look upon infidel science not as an\n enemy whom they have to fight, but as an old acquaintance, and a rather\n capricious one, whom they must try to keep within bounds of decency,\n and from whom they may borrow occasionally a few newly-forged weapons\n against the Catholic Church. Some sincere Protestants, considering the\n tendency of scientific thought to destroy all supernatural faith, saw,\n indeed, the necessity of resisting its baneful incursions; but their\n resistance did not, and could not, prove successful. Protestantism is\n the notorious offspring of rebellion; it is not built on the rock; it\n has no claims to special divine assistance; it cannot reckon but on\n human weakness for its support; it is supremely inconsistent; in short,\n it is no proof against the anti-Christian spirit of the age, and, what\n is still more discouraging, it is fully conscious of its progressive\n dissolution.\n\n These considerations and others of a like nature kept continually\n coming to our mind as we were perusing the pages of the singular work\n whose title stands at the head of this article. The great object of Dr.\n Shields is to reconcile religion with science by means of what he calls\n _final philosophy_.\n\n In the introduction to the work the author points out the limits and\n the topics of Christian science; the logical, historical, and practical\n relations of science and religion; the possibility of their\n reconciliation, and the importance of their harmony to science, to\n religion, to philosophy. The work is divided into two parts. The first\n part is a review of the conduct of philosophical parties as to the\n relations between science and religion; whilst the second part\n propounds and explains the philosophical theory of the harmony of\n science and religion, as conceived by the author. The first part opens\n with a chapter on the early _conflicts_ and _alliances_ between science\n and religion, where the author investigates the causes of the present\n disturbed relations between religion and science, and traces them from\n the dawn of the Greek philosophy to the Protestant Reformation;\n describes the conflicts of philosophy and mythology in the\n pre-Christian age; the wars of pagan philosophy against Christianity in\n the first centuries of the present era; the alliance of theology with\n philosophy in the patristic age; the predominance of theology and the\n subjugation of philosophy in the scholastic age; and, lastly, the\n revolt of philosophy against theology in the age of the Reformation.\n\n In a second chapter he describes the _modern antagonism_ between\n science and religion, the conflict in astronomy, in geology, in\n anthropology, in psychology, in sociology, in theology, in philosophy,\n and in civilization.\n\n The third chapter, which fills more than two hundred pages, describes\n the _modern indifferentism_ between science and religion, under the\n name of \u201cschism\u201d or \u201crupture\u201d in all the branches of science already\n enumerated\u2014viz., the schism in astronomy, in geology, in anthropology,\n etc., to which is added the schism in metaphysics.\n\n In the fourth chapter the author examines the _modern eclecticism_\n between science and religion: eclecticism in astronomy, eclecticism in\n geology, and so on through the other branches of knowledge already\n mentioned.\n\n The fifth and last chapter describes the _modern scepticism_ between\n science and religion: scepticism in astronomy, in geology, in\n anthropology, and in all the aforesaid branches of human knowledge,\n with a conclusion about \u201ceffete religious culture.\u201d\n\n The second part of the work, though much shorter than the first, is\n divided also into five chapters, of which the first aims to show that\n philosophy is the natural _umpire_ between religion and science,\n wherever they are in conflict; the second expounds and refutes the\n _positive_ philosophy; the third examines and criticises the _absolute_\n philosophy; the fourth states that _final philosophy_, or _a theory of\n perfectible science_, may bring about the conciliation of positivism\n and absolutism; and the last offers a sketch of the _ultimate\n philosophy_, the science of sciences, derived scientifically from their\n own historical and logical development, and whose characteristic\n features the author thus glowingly describes in the closing sentence of\n his work:\n\n \u201cThe summary want of the age is that last philosophy into which\n shall have been sifted all other philosophy, which shall be at\n once catholic and eclectic, which shall be the joint growth and\n fruit of reason and faith, and which shall shed forth, through\n every walk of research, the blended light of discovery and\n revelation; a philosophy which shall be no crude aggregate of\n decaying systems and doctrines, but their distilled issue and\n living effect, and which shall not have sprung full-born from\n any one mind or people, but mature as the common work and\n reward of all; a philosophy which, proceeding upon the unity of\n truth, shall establish the harmony of knowledge through the\n intelligent concurrence of the human with the divine intellect,\n and the rational subjection of the finite to the Infinite\n reason; a philosophy, too, which shall be as beneficent as it\n is sacred, which in the act of healing the schisms of truth\n shall also heal the sects of the school, of the church, and of\n the state, and, while regenerating human art, both material and\n moral, shall at length regenerate human society; a philosophy,\n in a word, which shall be the means of subjecting the earth to\n man and man to God, by grouping the sciences, with their fruits\n and trophies, at the feet of Omniscience, and there converging\n and displaying all laws and causes in God, the cause of causes\n and of laws, of whom are all things and in whom all things\n consist; to whom alone be glory\u201d (pp. 587, 588).\n\n These are noble words. It is certain that our age is in great need of a\n philosophy at once catholic and eclectic, as the author very wisely\n remarks. But it is our firm conviction that if Dr. Shields had studied\n our great Catholic authors, he would know that there is a philosophy\n and a theology which does already all that he wishes to do by his\n projected final philosophy, and much better too. We praise his\n excellent intention; but we do not think that his project has any\n chance of being carried out in a proper manner. We even doubt if a\n _new_ system of philosophy can be found so comprehensive, coherent,\n impartial, and perfect in all its parts as to justify the high\n expectation entertained by the author.\n\n This new system of philosophy cannot be the product of infidel thought,\n as is evident. Hence none of the advocates of advanced science can have\n a part in the projected work, except as opponents whom philosophy shall\n have to refute, or as claimants upon whose rights philosophy has to\n pronounce its judicial sentence.\n\n Nor will the new system be the product of Catholic thought; for we\n Catholics are under the impression that the world has no need of _new_\n philosophical systems. As for us, we have a philosophy of admirable\n depth, great soundness, and incomparable precision, which has ever\n successfully refuted heresy, silenced infidelity, and harmonized the\n teachings of revelation and science to our full satisfaction. This\n philosophy can, indeed, be improved in some particulars, and we\n continually strive to improve it: but we are determined not to change\n its principles, which we know to be true, and not to depart from its\n method, which has no rival in the whole world of speculative science.\n\n Who, then, would frame and develop the new and \u201cfinal\u201d philosophy?\n Free-thinkers? Freemasons? Free-religionists? These sectaries would\n doubtless be glad to dress philosophy in a white apron, with the square\n in one hand and the triangle in the other; for, if the thing were\n feasible, they would acquire at once that philosophical importance\n which they have not, and which they have always been anxious to secure,\n but in vain, by their united efforts. But then we are sure that they\n would only develop some humanitarian theory calculated to flatter the\n sceptical spirit of the age, and to merge all creeds in naturalism and\n free-religion; and this, of course, would not do, for the \u201cfinal\n philosophy\u201d should, according to Dr. Shields\u2019 view, maintain the rights\n of supernatural revelation no less than of natural reason.\n\n Should, then, the great work be abandoned to the hands, industry, and\n discernment of the Protestant sects? Men of talent and men of learning\n are to be found everywhere; but as to philosophers, we doubt whether\n any can be found among Protestants who will be honest enough to draw\n the legitimate consequences of their principles, when those\n consequences would imply a condemnation of their religious system. In\n other terms, if the work were to be entrusted to Protestant thinkers,\n one might, without need of preternatural illumination, boldly predict\n that the whole affair must end in nothing but failure. What can be\n expected of a Protestant thinker, or of any number of Protestant\n thinkers, whether divines or philosophers, but an inconsistent and\n preposterous tampering with truth? Protestantism lacks, and ever will\n lack, a uniform body of doctrines, whether philosophical or\n theological; it has no head, no centre, no positive principle, no\n recognized living authority, no bond of union; it has only a mutilated\n Bible which it discredits with contradictory interpretations; it is\n neither a church nor a school, but a Babel confusion of uncertain and\n discordant views; and it has no better foundation than the shifting\n sand of private judgment. On what ground, then, can a Protestant\n apologist force upon modern thought those shreds of revealed truth\n which he claims to hold on no better authority than his own fallible\n and changeable reason? And what else can he oppose to the invading\n spirit of unbelief? Alas! Protestantism is nothing but a house divided\n within itself, a ship where all hands are captains with no crew at\n their orders, an army whose generals have no authority to command and\n whose soldiers have no duty to obey. Such a House cannot but crumble\n into dust; such a ship must founder; and such an army cannot dream of\n Christian victories, as it is doomed to waste its strength in perpetual\n riots, unless it succeeds in putting an end to its intestine troubles\n by self-destruction. It is evident, then, that \u201cfinal philosophy\u201d\n cannot be the product of Protestant thought.\n\n Dr. Shields seems to have seen these difficulties; for he holds that\n such a philosophy must not spring full-born from any one mind or\n people, but mature \u201cas the common work and reward of all.\u201d Here,\n however, the question arises whether this mode of working is calculated\n to give satisfactory results. When a number of persons contribute to\n the execution of a great work, it must be taken for granted that, if\n their effort has to prove a success, they must work on the same plan\n and tend in the same direction, so that the action of the one may not\n interfere with the action of the other. If all men were animated by an\n intense love of truth, and of nothing but truth, if they all could\n agree to start from the same principles, if they were all modest in\n their inferences, if they were so humble as to recognize their error\n when pointed out to them, and if some other similar dispositions were\n known to exist in all or in most students of science and philosophy,\n Dr. Shields\u2019 plan might indeed be carried out with universal\n satisfaction. But men, unfortunately, love other things besides truth\n and more than truth: they love themselves, their own ideas, and their\n own prejudices; they ignore or pervert principles; they defend their\n blunders, and even embellish them for the sake of notoriety, and they\n are obstinate in their errors. On the other hand, we see that an\n ignorant public is always ready to applaud any philosophic monstrosity\n which wears a fashionable dress; and this is one of the greatest\n obstacles to the triumph of truth, as error grows powerful wherever it\n is encouraged by popular credulity. Thus error and truth will continue\n to fight in the future as they did in the past. The history of\n philosophy is a history of endless discords. The wildest conceptions\n have ever found supporters, and charlatanism has ever been applauded.\n The only epoch in which error had lost its hold of philosophy, and was\n compelled to retire almost entirely from the field of speculation, was\n when theology and philosophy, bound together in a defensive and\n offensive alliance under the leadership of the great Thomas Aquinas, so\n overpowered the Moorish philosophers and confounded their rationalistic\n followers that it was no longer possible for error to wear a mask. Then\n it was that the principles of a truly \u201cfinal\u201d philosophy were laid\n down, faith and reason reconciled, and false theories discredited. And\n it is for this reason that the disciples of error, who after the time\n of the Lutheran revolt have never ceased to attack some religious\n truth, style that scholastic epoch a _dark age_. Dark, indeed, for\n error, which had lost much power of mischief, but bright for\n philosophy, which had triumphed, and glorious for Christianity, which\n reigned supreme. If any age must be called _dark_, it is the one we\n live in, owing to the numbers of ignorant scribblers, unprincipled men\n in responsible positions, and illogical scientists who disgrace it.\n\n This state of things is the product of free thought, which has\n disturbed and nearly destroyed the harmony of all the sciences, and all\n but extinguished the light of philosophical principles. The idea of\n employing free thought as an auxiliary for the defence of philosophy is\n so preposterous on its very face that none but a sectary or a sceptic\n could have entertained it. It must be pretty evident to all that such a\n course is like introducing the enemy into the fortress. Introduce\n Draper and B\u00fcchner, Tyndall and Moleschott, Haeckel and Darwin, Huxley\n and Clifford into the parlor of philosophy, and you will see at once\n how utterly mistaken is Mr. Shields if he reckons on them for his great\n work; you will see with what self-reliance, arrogance, and intolerance\n they condemn everything contrary to their favorite views. Tell them\n that they must help you to make a \u201cfinal philosophy\u201d which shall\n reconcile Scripture and science, Christianity and human reason. What\n would they think of such a proposal? Would they condescend to answer\n otherwise than by a sneer? But let us admit that they will favor you\n with an honest answer. What will they say?\n\n Draper would probably remark that philosophy cannot undertake any such\n task, as the conflict between religion and science has its origin and\n reason of being in the nature of things, which is unchangeable.\n\n B\u00fcchner would laugh impertinently at the idea of a God, a Scripture,\n and a religion.\n\n Tyndall would have nothing to do with the scheme; for modern science\n cannot shake hands with revelation without encouraging a belief in\n miracles and in the utility of prayer\u2014both which things science has\n exploded for ever, as conflicting with inviolable laws.\n\n Moleschott would object that revelation and science are irreconcilable,\n at least, as to psychology; for the study of physiology has made it\n clear that thought consists in a series of molecular movements, and he\n is not willing to renounce this new dogma of science or to modify in\n any manner his view of the question for the sake of a new philosophy.\n\n Haeckel would indignantly protest against the scheme, for there is no\n philosophy but the Evolution of species and the Descent of man; and he\n would turn to the great Darwin, his respected friend, for an approving\n smile.\n\n The great Darwin would then smile approvingly on his loving and\n faithful disciple, and remark that Logic, for instance, which is\n believed to be a part of philosophy, and his Descent of man are on such\n bad terms that it would be but a waste of time to attempt a\n reconciliation between them, so he would let them alone.\n\n The talkative Huxley would gladly second Mr. Darwin\u2019s resolution by the\n further remark that a logic or a philosophy which cannot be weighed in\n the balance of the chemist, or be verified by the microscope, or be\n illustrated by the series of animal remains preserved in\n pal\u00e6ontological museums, has no claims to engage the attention of the\n noble scientists present in the room.\n\n Clifford would scout the idea of a philosophy enslaved by theological\n prejudices. For free thought cannot come to terms with theology; it\n must combat it in the name of progress and civilization with all\n available weapons, and with an ardor proportionate to the grandeur and\n importance of the cause.\n\n This sketch, which is certainly not over-colored, might be enlarged\n almost indefinitely by the introduction of other living or dead\n materialists, pantheists, atheists, theists, idealists,\n free-religionists, etc., whose discordant views would have to be either\n accepted, reformed, or refuted, as the case may be. John Stuart Mill\n and Comte, Bain and Spencer, Kant and Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, Hume\n and Hobbes, and a host of other minor lights of heterodox thought,\n would have to be harmonized, if possible, or else condemned and\n forgotten. But let the dead rest in peace and suppose that none but\n living thinkers are to be consulted. A dilemma presents itself: either\n Dr. Shields and his co-operators get the best of fashionable errors,\n and reject them, or not. If _not_, then a final philosophy _reconciling\n revelation with science_ will be out of the question. If _yes_, then\n the final philosophy will be denounced by the evicted party as a mass\n of unscientific and _\u00e0 priori_ reasoning, a counterfeit of medi\u00e6val\n metaphysics, a tardy and clumsy attempt at resuscitating the\n discredited notions of a slavish and intolerant past. Newspaper\n writers, pamphleteers, lecturers, and professors would sneer at your\n final philosophy, as they now sneer at the scholastic doctrine; and the\n ever-increasing mass of sciolists, who think with the brains of others,\n would take up the sneer and propagate it even to the ends of the world.\n Thus science and religion, so long as human pride and human obstinacy\n are not curbed by the keenest love of truth, will remain antagonistic,\n and the present war will continue in spite of the \u201cfinal philosophy.\u201d\n\n Dr. Shields very explicitly declares that he believes in God, in\n Christ, and in the Bible. For this we cannot but praise him. Yet his\n book leads thoughtful readers to suspect that his faith is still\n undeveloped, uncertain, indefinite, and, as it were, in an embryonic\n condition. In fact, religion and science, as he conceives, are still at\n war, and revelation must yet be reconciled with reason by the aid of\n final philosophy; and this final philosophy is a thing of the future.\n What will he believe meanwhile? What will all other Protestants\n believe? Must they adopt a provisional scepticism? This is, indeed,\n what most of them do; nor can we see that any other course is open to\n them, if they are waiting for the final philosophy. But, since \u201cwithout\n faith it is impossible to please God,\u201d how will they be saved? The\n question deserves an answer.\n\n There is a science which teaches that man\u2019s soul is not immortal, not\n spiritual, not even a substance, but only a molecular function, which\n cannot survive the body. Must Dr. Shields\u2019 disciples remain uncertain\n about this point of doctrine until the final philosophy is published?\n And there is a science which maintains with the greatest assurance that\n what we call \u201cGod\u201d is nothing more, in reality, than nature, or the\n universe and its forces and laws. Must we suspend our judgment on this\n all-important subject on the plea that final philosophy has not yet\n shed its brilliant light on the question? And there is a science, too,\n which contends that the human will, though long believed to be free, is\n nevertheless determined by exterior and interior causes according to a\n law of strict physical necessity which admits of no exception. Ought\n we, then, to consider ourselves irresponsible for our deliberate\n actions, till the final philosophy shall teach us that we are not mere\n machines, and that the freedom of the human will has at last been\n reconciled with the general laws of causation? To our mind, a Christian\n divine cannot for a moment admit that such a provisional scepticism\n could be recommended as a healthy intellectual preparation for the\n attainment of truth. Nor could a Christian divine fancy for a moment\n that a provident God has hitherto left mankind without sufficient light\n to understand and solve such capital questions as we have mentioned,\n and many others whose solution was equally indispensable for the moral\n and the religious education of the human race. The truth is that\n mankind has been endowed from the beginning with the knowledge of the\n principles of moral science, the laws of reasoning, the precepts of\n religion, and the eternal destiny of the just and the unjust. This\n knowledge was transmitted from fathers to sons, but was soon obscured\n by the surging of turbulent passions and a proud desire of\n independence. The human family soon emancipated itself from the moral\n law, and learned to stifle the voice of conscience by false excuses and\n by worldly maxims. Nations fell into polytheism, idolatry, revolting\n superstitions, and barbarism. Indeed, a few pagan philosophers, still\n faintly illumined by the remnants of the primitive tradition, attempted\n the reconstruction of human science; but they were only partially\n successful, and their names became famous no less for the errors with\n which they are still associated than for vindicated truths. Even the\n Jews, who were in possession of an authentic record of the past, and\n could read the Law and the Prophets, often adopted pagan views, or at\n least mistook the spirit of their sacred books by a too material\n adherence to the killing letter. At last Jesus Christ, God and man, the\n light that enlightens the world, the new Adam, the divine Solomon,\n came, and brought us the remedy of which our ignorance and corruption\n had so much need. He gave us his Gospel of truth and life, and not only\n restored but increased and perfected the knowledge of divine and human\n things; he founded his church; and he appointed, in the person of his\n vicar on earth, a permanent and infallible judge of revealed doctrine.\n The two hundred and odd millions of Christians who recognize this\n infallible judge know distinctly what they ought to believe. They need\n not await the decisions of any \u201cfinal philosophy\u201d in order to be fixed\n on such questions as the origin of matter, the creation of man, the\n liberty of the soul, the existence of a personal God, and the worship\n acceptable to him. And as to the scientific questions, these millions\n very naturally argue that any theory which clashes with the doctrine\n _defined_ by the church bears in itself its own condemnation, whilst\n all the other theories are a fit subject of free discussion by the\n rational methods. This is our intellectual position in regard to\n science; and we venture to say that even Dr. Shields could not find a\n better one either for himself or for his pupils and friends. But he,\n unfortunately, does not belong to the true and living church of Christ;\n he belongs to a spurious system of Christianity, which countenances\n intellectual rebellion, and which, after having imprudently fostered\n free thought, is now at a loss how to restrain its destructive\n influence. Hence he is anxious to be on good terms with all\n free-thinkers, in the hope, we assume, that, by yielding in a measure\n to the spirit of infidelity, some arrangement may be arrived at,\n equally acceptable to both sides, by which Protestantism, as an old but\n now useless and despised accomplice, may be left to die a natural\n death. Thus the \u201cfinal philosophy\u201d of Dr. Shields, so far as we can\n judge from the details of his work, will put in the same balance God\n and man, revelation and free thought, wisdom and folly, with the\n pitiful result that we have briefly pointed out.\n\n Final philosophy, as conceived by our author, can be of no service to\n the Catholic, and of no great benefit to the Protestant, world. At any\n rate a truly \u201cfinal\u201d philosophy has scarcely a chance of seeing the\n light in the present century, especially through the exertions of\n Protestant divines. The century to which we belong, though famous for\n many useful discoveries, is even more conspicuous for its great\n ignorance of speculative philosophy. In the middle ages, which were not\n half so dark as modern thinkers assume, there was less superficial\n diffusion of knowledge, but a great deal more of philosophy. Giants,\n like St. Anselm, Albert the Great, St. Thomas Aquinas, had collected,\n sifted, and harmonized the philosophical lore of all the preceding\n ages, refuted the errors of a presumptuous pagan or heretical science,\n shown the agreement of revelation with reason, reconciled metaphysics\n with theology, and made such a body of philosophical and theological\n doctrines as would, and did, satisfy the highest aspirations of\n deeply-cultivated intellects. It is men of this type that could have\n written a \u201cfinal\u201d philosophy. But who are we men of the nineteenth\n century? Are we not mere pigmies when compared with these old masters?\n Where do we find profound metaphysicians and profound theologians?\n Some, of course, are to be found in the Catholic Church, which alone\n has preserved the traditions of the ancient intellectual world; but we\n do not think that any one of them would consider himself clever enough\n to write a \u201cfinal\u201d philosophy. And should such a competent man be\n found, who would care for his doctrine? Scientists would certainly not\n bend to his authority, as they only laugh at metaphysics, nor to his\n arguments, which they would scarcely understand; and unbelievers would\n probably not even listen to him, as they would be afraid of being\n awakened from their spiritual lethargy.\n\n On the other hand, to expect that a Protestant divine, or a body of\n Protestant divines, will be able to compose such a final philosophy as\n Dr. Shields describes in the passage we have quoted is the merest\n delusion. Not that there are not able and learned men in the Protestant\n sects, but because the Protestant mind is trained to look at things in\n the light of expediency more than of principles, and, besides other\n disqualifications already referred to, it sadly lacks the jewel of\n philosophical consistency. Dr. Shields, who holds, as we gladly\n recognize, a prominent place among the learned men of his own\n denomination, is by no means exempt from the weaknesses of his\n Protestant compeers. For example, he is apt to confound things which\n should be distinguished, and to draw consequences which go farther than\n the premises; he frequently yields to partisan prejudices; he makes\n false assumptions; he seems ready to sacrifice some religious views to\n modern thought; and he misrepresents or misinterprets history. A few\n references to his book will suffice to substantiate this criticism.\n\n Thus, in the very first chapter of his work he says that in the first\n age of Christianity there was on the side of the church \u201can apparent\n effort to supplant philosophy\u201d (p. 31); and to prove this he alleges\n that \u201cthe apostles had scarcely left the church when there sprang up,\n in the unlettered class from which the first Christians had been\n largely recruited, a weak jealousy of human learning, which, it was\n claimed, had been superseded in them by miraculous gifts of wisdom and\n knowledge.\u201d This statement is captious. From the fact that the first\n Christians, guided by the wisdom of the Gospel, had come to despise the\n absurd fables of pagan philosophy, it does not follow that they\n rejected human learning, but only that they had common sense enough to\n understand and to fulfil the duties of their religious position. On the\n other hand, to imagine that \u201cthe unlettered class\u201d could have thought\n \u201cof supplanting human learning\u201d is as ridiculous as if we pretended\n that our carpenters and blacksmiths might conspire to supplant\n astronomy. The author adds that \u201cClement of Rome was held by his party\n to have enjoined abstinence from mental culture as one of the apostolic\n canons,\u201d that \u201cBarnabas and Polycarp were classed with St. Paul as\n authors of epistles which carry their own evidence of imposture,\u201d and\n that \u201cHermas, as if in contempt of scholars, put his angelical\n rhapsodies in the mouth of a shepherd.\u201d We scarcely believe that these\n three assertions will enhance the credit of Dr. Shields as a student of\n history. Clement was himself a theologian and a philosopher; \u201chis\n party\u201d is a clumsy invention; \u201capostolic canons\u201d never condemned mental\n culture; St. Paul\u2019s epistles bear no evidence whatever of imposture;\n and, as to Hermas, it is well known to the learned that he put his\n instructions in the mouth of a shepherd, not that he might show his\n \u201ccontempt of scholars\u201d\u2014for he himself was a scholar\u2014but because his\n guardian angel, from whom he had received those instructions, had\n appeared before him in the garb of a shepherd.\n\n The author says (p. 33) that in the age of the Greek Fathers \u201cthere was\n a false peace between theology and philosophy; and religion and\n science, in consequence, became more or less corrupted by admixture\n with each other.\u201d This statement is another historical blunder.\n\n \u201cThe doctrines of St. John were sublimated into the abstractions of\n Plato.\u201d This, too, is quite incorrect.\n\n \u201cThe Son of God was identified as the divine Logos of the schools.\u201d By\n no means. The Logos of the schools was only a shadow as compared with\n the Son of God; the Logos of the schools was an abstraction, whereas\n the Logos of the Fathers was a divine Person.\n\n \u201cEusebius, Athanasius, Basil, the two Gregories, Chrysostom, and the\n two Cyrils did scarcely more than consecrate the spirit of the Academy\n in the cloisters and councils of the church.\u201d This statement has no\n need of refutation. The works of all the Fathers here mentioned are\n extant, and they eloquently protest against the slander. But Protestant\n authors are anxious to show that the Catholic Church was corrupted from\n its very first age; and to do this they do not scruple to gather lies\n and misrepresentations from all accessible sources, to transform\n history into a witness to facts that never had an existence.\n\n \u201cPhilosophy,\u201d continues the author, \u201cbecame not less corrupted through\n its forced alliance with the new theology.\u201d Who ever heard of a _new_\n theology in the patristic age? or of a theology with which philosophy\n could not make an alliance, except by force, and without being\n corrupted?\n\n \u201cIf philosophy gained somewhat on its metaphysical side by having its\n own notional entities traced up to revealed realities as the flower\n from the germ of reason, yet it lost quite as much on its physical side\n through a narrowing logic and exegesis which bound it within the letter\n of the Scripture, and turned it away from all empirical research; and,\n consequently, even such crude natural science as it had inherited from\n the early Greeks was soon forgotten and buried under a mass of\n patristic traditions\u201d (p. 34). From this we learn that logic, according\n to Dr. Shields, \u201cnarrows the physical side of philosophy,\u201d and exegesis\n opposes \u201cempirical research\u201d! Is it not surprising that such assertions\n could find a place in a work which purports to be serious and\n philosophical? And as to the \u201ccrude natural science\u201d of the early\n Greeks, which was a confused mass of conflicting guesses, does the\n author believe that it had a right to the name of science? or that it\n commanded the respect of theologians? or does he think that the\n Scripture has not a literal sense, which contains more truth than all\n the crude natural science of the early Greeks?\n\n \u201cIn geology the speculations of Thales, Anaximenes, and Heraclitus,\n tracing the growth of the world from water, air, or fire, were only\n exchanged for the fanciful allegories and homilies of Origen, Basil,\n and Ambrose on the Hexa\u00ebmeron, or six days\u2019 work of creation.\u201d Dr.\n Shields has just complained that the Fathers bound science \u201cwithin the\n letter of the Scripture\u201d; and he now complains of Origen abandoning the\n literal for the allegorical sense! Such is his need of quarrelling with\n the Fathers. We may grant that some of Origen\u2019s allegorical\n interpretations were rather \u201cfanciful\u201d; but since such interpretations\n were generally rejected even in his own time, it is difficult to\n understand how they could supersede the speculations of philosophers.\n As to St. Basil and St. Ambrose, however, no one who has studied their\n works will dare to maintain that they have indulged in fanciful\n theories. Of course they were not professors of science but of\n Christianity; nor were they obliged to forsake Moses for Anaximenes or\n Heraclitus, whose theories were nothing but dreams. Geology, as a\n science, was yet unborn; and we are certain that, had the Fathers\n embraced the theories which they are denounced for ignoring, Dr.\n Shields or some of his friends would have considered the fact as\n equally worthy of censure. Such is the justice of certain critics.\n\n \u201cIn astronomy the heliocentric views of Aristarchus and Pythagoras had\n already given place to the Ptolemaic theory of the heavens.\u201d This does\n not prove that the Fathers have corrupted astronomy; it shows, on the\n contrary, that the false system of astronomy originated in what was\n then considered science. It is to false science, therefore, and not to\n false theology that we must trace the false explanation of astronomical\n phenomena.\n\n \u201cIn geography, the corruption of natural knowledge with false Biblical\n views became even more remarkable, and the doctrine of the earth\u2019s\n rotundity and antipodes which had been held by Plato and Aristotle, and\n all but proved by the Alexandrian geometers, was at length discarded as\n a fable not less monstrous than heretical.\u201d We wonder how it could have\n been possible to prove \u201cby geometry\u201d the existence of men at the\n antipodes, and we still more wonder how could the doctrine of the\n earth\u2019s rotundity, which is a Scriptural doctrine, be discarded as a\n monstrous and heretical fable by men familiar with the teachings of the\n Bible. But what is the fact? Did any of the Fathers suggest that the\n words _orbis terr\u00e6_, which are to be found in many Scriptural texts,\n could be understood to mean anything but the earth\u2019s rotundity? Or did\n any of them maintain that the earth\u2019s rotundity was a \u201cfalse Biblical\n view\u201d? The author replies by quoting the _Topographia Christiana_ of\n Cosmas Indicopleustes, who teaches that the earth is flat. But we\n answer that Cosmas was not a father of the church, and that his work\n has never been considered \u201ca standard of Biblical geography,\u201d as the\n author assumes. The theory of this monk was not the result of\n \u201ctheological\u201d learning, as Dr. Shields imagines, but the offspring of\n Nestorian ignorance and presumption. Nor does it matter that Cosmas\n cites \u201cpatriarchs, prophets, and apostles in its defence as doctrine\n concerning which it was not lawful for a Christian to doubt\u201d (p. 35);\n for we know, on the one hand, that there is no monstrosity which\n heretics are not apt to defend obstinately with Scriptural texts, and\n on the other that the theory of the Indicopleustes made no fortune in\n the Christian world; which further shows that the theological mind was\n not \u201cinwrought\u201d with any such fancies as the author pretends to have\n swayed the doctors of the Catholic Church. We know, of course, that our\n old doctors did not admit that the antipodes were inhabited by men; but\n this scarcely deserves criticism, as it is plain that before the\n discovery of the new world no serious man could take the responsibility\n of affirming a fact of which there was not a spark of evidence.\n\n The author adds: \u201cAt the same time all the issuing interests of this\n paganized Christianity could not but share in its hybrid character. Its\n piety became but a mixture of austerity and license.\u201d He then says that\n the Christian ritual \u201cwas a mere medley of incongruous usages\u201d; that\n \u201cthe sign of the cross became a common charm as well as a sacred rite\u201d;\n that Pachomius organized monasteries and nunneries as sanctuaries of\n virtue \u201camid a social corruption too gross to be described\u201d; that\n \u201cChristian and pagan factions contended for supremacy in the Roman\n senate\u201d; that \u201cthe Lord\u2019s day was observed by imperial edict on a day\n devoted to the god of the sun,\u201d etc., etc.; and he winds up his survey\n of the patristic age by the remark that \u201cthe patristic type of\n Christian science has been likened to a twilight dream of thought\n before the long night-watches of the middle ages\u201d (p. 35, 36).\n\n It would be useless to ask Dr. Shields how he has ascertained that\n Christianity was \u201cpaganized,\u201d and that the sign of the cross had become\n a \u201ccharm\u201d; he would tell us simply that these gems of erudition have\n been culled by him from Protestant or infidel books. As to the \u201cmixture\n of austerity and license\u201d nothing need be said, for the contradiction\n is glaring. That the social corruption was \u201ctoo gross to be described\u201d\n is not astonishing, as the world was still more than half pagan; but to\n connect social corruption with the monasteries and nunneries organized\n by St. Pachomius, in order to denounce them as a mixture of austerity\n and license, is a proof not only of bad taste, but of bad will and of\n want of judgment. The author forgets to tell us why the Christian\n ritual should be called \u201ca mere medley of incongruous usages\u201d; and yet,\n as our present ritual does not substantially differ from that of the\n patristic age, it would have been easy to point out a few of such\n usages, were it not that their incongruity is only a crotchet of\n Protestant bigotism. That the Lord\u2019s day was observed \u201cby imperial\n edict\u201d may indeed seem scandalous to free-thinkers and\n free-religionists, but not to Protestant doctors; for they must know\n that in Protestant countries the Lord\u2019s day is still observed by a law\n which has the same power as an imperial edict. But Protestants are\n perhaps scandalized at the Lord\u2019s day being kept on the \u201cday devoted to\n the god of the sun\u201d instead of the Sabbath; and from this they argue\n that the Church of God has been utterly corrupted and paganized. If so,\n then they should either prove that the Lord\u2019s day, the day of Christ\u2019s\n resurrection, was the Sabbath, or denounce Jesus Christ himself for\n doing on the day \u201cdevoted to the god of the sun\u201d what he ought to have\n done on the Sabbath. O the Pharisees! We cannot wonder if they despise\n the \u201cpatristic type of Christian science\u201d as a dream when we see how\n shamelessly they strive to misrepresent the most glorious ages of\n Christianity, and to turn truth itself into poison.\n\n The few quotations we have here made, and the remarks we have appended\n to them, are far from giving an adequate idea of the partisan spirit\n and unreliable statements with which Dr. Shields has filled the first\n part of his book. What we have given is only a small sample of the\n rest, and was extracted from three pages. Were we to extend our\n criticism to only ten pages more, we would find matter enough for a\n volume. Our author, as nearly all Protestant authors, characterizes the\n scholastic age as one of philosophic bondage. Theology subjugates\n philosophy: \u201cThe church is the only school; orthodoxy the one test of\n all truth; the traditions of the Fathers the sole pabulum of the\n intellect; and the system of Aristotle a mere frame-work to the creed\n of Augustine.\u201d Peter Lombard \u201cnarrowed the circle of free thought by\n putting the authority of the church above that of Scripture\u201d; Alexander\n of Hales \u201crendered the thraldom of the intellect complete by\n systematizing the patristic traditions or sentences with Aristotelian\n logic.\u201d Alas! we know only too well that Protestantism detests logic as\n much as the patristic traditions. But, then, why should a Protestant\n D.D. undertake to harmonize philosophy and theology? Is there any\n philosophy without logic, or any theology without patristic traditions?\n\n Thomas Aquinas \u201cdazzled all Europe\u201d; but Duns Scotus \u201cproceeded to\n evaporate the distinction of Aquinas in a jargon which defies modern\n comprehension.\u201d This does little credit to modern comprehension; for\n the jargon of Scotus is nothing but the Latin tongue adapted to\n philosophical use. \u201cPhilosophy,\u201d at this time, \u201ccould only succumb to\n theology.\u201d \u201cIn logic any deflection in mere form as well as matter was\n enough to draw down the anathemas of the church.\u201d Roscellin \u201cwas\n arraigned as a tritheist,\u201d William of Champeaux \u201cwas pursued as a\n pantheist,\u201d Abelard \u201cwas forced to cast his own works into the fire,\n and condemned to obscurity and silence.\u201d It is evident that these\n facts, and others of a similar nature, must fill with horror our\n liberal Protestants and all free-religionists, just as prison and\n capital punishment fill with horror a convicted criminal. But if Dr.\n Shields condescends to examine the doctrines of Roscellin, William of\n Champeaux, and Abelard in the light of Scripture, as they are\n faithfully portrayed in reliable works (such as St. Thomas\u2019 life by\n Rev. Bede Vaughan, for example), he will see that all three were guilty\n of heresy, and that they richly deserved the treatment to which they\n were subjected. We cannot, of course, enter here into a discussion of\n such doctrines; we merely state that they have been fully examined and\n debated in the presence of the interested parties with all the calm,\n patience, and impartiality which characterize the proceedings of the\n Catholic Church.\n\n As to the singular notion entertained by Dr. Shields, that philosophy\n \u201ccould only succumb to theology,\u201d we wish to tell him that no man can\n be a theologian unless he be also a philosopher; whence it follows that\n philosophy and theology are naturally friendly to one another, and, if\n they ever happen to disagree, they do not fight like enemies, but they\n state their reasons like good sisters equally anxious to secure each\n other\u2019s support. Philosophy is like a clear but naked eye; theology is\n the same eye, not naked, but armed with a powerful telescope. Will Dr.\n Shields maintain that the eye succumbs when it sees by the telescope\n what the naked eye cannot discover? Yet this is the idea latent in his\n notion of philosophy succumbing to theology. What succumbs to theology\n is not philosophy, but error masked in the garb of philosophy. The\n author himself tells us that \u201creason and revelation are complemental\n factors of knowledge, the former discovering what the latter has not\n revealed, and the latter revealing what the former cannot discover.\u201d\n This is exactly what we were saying; for the science of reason is\n philosophy, and the science of revelation is theology.\n\n We would never end, if we were to follow our author through the five\n hundred and eighty-eight pages of his book. We only add that the\n theological and philosophical erudition which he parades throughout the\n whole work has been derived from the same baneful sources from which\n Dr. Draper collected the materials of his _History of the Conflict\n between Religion and Science_, and deserves the same heavy censure. The\n late Dr. O. A. Brownson, when Dr. Draper\u2019s work was published, said of\n it: \u201cThe only thing in Dr. Draper\u2019s book that we are disposed to\n tolerate is his style, which is free, flowing, natural, simple,\n unaffected, and popular. Aside from its style, the book cannot be too\n severely censured. It is a tissue of lies from beginning to end. It is\n crude, superficial, and anything but what it professes to be. It\n professes to be a history of the conflict between religion and science.\n It is no such thing. It is a vulgar attack on Christianity and the\n Christian church, in which is condensed the substance of all that has\n been said by anti-Christian writers from the first century to the\n nineteenth.\u201d We do not say that Dr. Shields\u2019 intention has been to\n attack Christianity in general as Dr. Draper did; he, on the contrary,\n professes to labor for a reconciliation of Christianity and reason.\n But, good as the intention is, the book will do as much harm as that of\n Dr. Draper. Its style is as good, to say the least, as Dr. Draper\u2019s,\n and its subject-matter is well distributed and orderly developed; but\n these and other good qualities, instead of redeeming its numerous\n misrepresentations of truth, make them more dangerous by adding to them\n a charm against which the average reader can ill defend himself.\n Besides, Dr. Draper\u2019s work, owing to its shameless infidelity, disgusts\n the Christian reader and makes him unwilling to swallow the poison it\n contains; whereas Dr. Shields\u2019 book has such an attractive title,\n professes such a reverence for Scripture, and displays such an\n earnestness and ingenuity in the holy task of reconciling religion with\n science, that the unsophisticated reader (the Protestant reader in\n particular) will follow him, not only with great pleasure, but also\n with great docility and deference, till he persuades himself that\n religion is now in such a state that it needs to be purified by\n philosophy, and that reason must be made the _umpire_ between revealed\n and scientific dogmas. The consequence is that the author\u2019s \u201cfinal\n philosophy\u201d will serve the interests of rationalism rather than of\n religion. The more so as the author shows himself well acquainted with\n the errors of modern thought, some of which he exposes and refutes in a\n truly philosophical spirit, and with a talent and ability of which we\n see few instances in modern thinkers. We have been particularly struck\n by his powerful handling of positivism and absolutism, not to mention\n many other topics which he has treated in a very fair and intelligent\n manner. Had he not taken his stand on the shifting ground of Protestant\n opinions, he might have achieved a very meritorious task. He speaks of\n catholic views, catholic philosophy, and catholic spirit as something\n indispensable to carry on the much-desired conciliation of natural with\n supernatural knowledge. But what can the word \u201ccatholic\u201d mean on the\n lips of one who does not listen to the Catholic doctors, and who is a\n stranger to the Catholic Church? His \u201ccatholic\u201d spirit cannot but be a\n spirit of compromise, and a kind of rationalistic eclecticism, ready to\n accept only so much of revelation as men will condescend to authorize\n on a verdict of their fallible reason, and no less ready to sacrifice\n and ignore as much of it as human reason cannot explain or harmonize\n with natural science. It is evident that such a spirit can lead to\n nothing but religious scepticism. And this should convince even Dr.\n Shields that his \u201cfinal philosophy\u201d will never achieve a success. The\n Catholic thinker, if he had to compose a final philosophy, would place\n himself on much higher and much securer ground; he would first range in\n a series all the truths which the Catholic Church has defined to be of\n faith; he would then range in another series all the _demonstrated_\n truths of the natural sciences, and all the principles, axioms, and\n propositions of philosophy which are generally received by the\n different schools; he would next inquire whether any proposition of\n this second series clashes with any of the truths contained in the\n first series; and, as he would be unable to find any truth of science\n or of philosophy conflicting with any revealed truth, he would conclude\n that the world is not just now in need of a final philosophy for\n settling a conflict which has no existence except in the imaginative\n brains of scientific charlatans. Dr. Shields may think that this course\n is not calculated to secure the alliance of religion and science; but\n let him read the magnificent article published by Dr. Brownson in his\n _Quarterly Review_ (April, 1875), on Dr. Draper\u2019s pretended history of\n the conflict between religion and science, and he will see his mistake.\n\n The \u201cfinal philosophy,\u201d as we have already remarked, will be of no use\n to the Catholic world. Protestants may, perhaps, relish it all the\n more. But no class of men will, in our opinion, be more gratified with\n it than the sceptics, the free-thinkers, and the enemies of\n supernatural truth; for they will not fail to see that to set up\n philosophy as \u201cumpire\u201d between religion and science is to make men\n distrust the doctrines of religion, and to prepare, though with the\n best intentions, the triumph of religious scepticism.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A GREAT BISHOP.\n\n In writing the lives of saints their biographers often forget that they\n are writing history, and telling the part which a wise, strong, and\n manly character bore in that history. William Emmanuel von Ketteler,\n the late Bishop of Mayence, might by many be reckoned among saints, so\n holy was his life and so like the primitive Christian ideal. But he has\n another claim to fame, as one of the greatest modern champions of order\n against socialism, and of the church against organized godlessness. The\n \u201ciron bishop,\u201d the \u201cfighting bishop,\u201d were nicknames given him by his\n foes, and, though given in hate and derision, they unconsciously set\n forth one side of his powerful character. A man of his reach of mind,\n however humble, could not have taken a less prominent part and position\n in the struggle of principle against license of which the present\n religious disturbances in Germany are the type. It fell naturally to\n his share to be the speaker and standard-bearer of the cause of church\n liberties, and the representative of the episcopal order. His legal\n studies and experience, as well as his hardy habits and magnificent\n _physique_, seemed to have prepared him and pointed him out among all\n others for the championship of his party, including all the bodily\n fatigue and mental anxiety incident to such a leadership. He was as\n thorough a man as he was an ideal bishop and exceptional orator, and\n this manliness, physical and intellectual, was the basis of his simple\n and grand character. His chosen motto, \u201cLet all be as one,\u201d is no bad\n interpretation of the leading ideal which he tried through life to\n realize: church unity and Christian loyalty, served by the whole round\n of his exceptional and perfectly-developed faculties. Before setting\n forth the fruits of his special studies, and examining his life and\n personality from the point of view most important in this century of\n social strife, we purpose giving a short biographical sketch of the\n Bishop of Mayence.\n\n He was born on Christmas day, 1811, at M\u00fcnster in Westphalia, of a\n noble family, one branch of which, embracing the doctrines of the\n Reformation, had in the sixteenth century migrated to Poland and become\n hereditary dukes of Courland, and a second, remaining German and\n Catholic, had been distinguished by giving more than one member to the\n Order of St. John of Jerusalem. His own branch, the third, known as\n that of Alt-Assen, was worthily represented by his father, a stern,\n faithful, and upright man, an uncompromising Christian, and a moralist\n of what our easier age calls the \u201cold school.\u201d As in every great\n character, there was something of the soldier in Baron Frederick von\n Ketteler of Harkotten, and this streak was reproduced in at least two\n of his sons, William and Richard. His mother, Clementina, Baroness von\n Wenge of Beck, was a woman of superior character, as it is noticed that\n the mothers of remarkable men almost invariably are, and one of the\n bishop\u2019s biographers is certainly entitled to dwell as he does, with\n special force, on the fact of the home-training of young Ketteler\n having had more real influence in shaping his character than either the\n schooling he got at the cathedral school of M\u00fcnster until he was\n thirteen years of age, or the atmosphere of the Swiss Jesuit College at\n Brieg, where he studied until he was eighteen. The two most conspicuous\n traits in the youth were his passion for hunting and sport of all\n kinds, athletic games, Alpine climbing, and all exercises requiring\n hardiness and disregard of wind and weather, and his earnest and\n unobtrusive piety. He was spared the trial through which so many noble\n natures pass before fully identifying themselves with the spirit of the\n church, whose letter they have been early taught to obey: he\n experienced no time of doubt, of wavering, of temptation, and the\n modern sore of unbelief never seems to have even come near his mind.\n From a youth passed in alternate study and sport and a free,\n out-of-door life he grew to a manhood serious and industrious, with a\n routine of work always hallowed by early prayer and daily attendance at\n Mass, and a social position in his native town, as counsel or referee\n for the government, which was, if not fully worthy of his talents, yet\n sufficiently honorable as the beginning of a professional career. His\n university life had, like that of most young Germans, been marked by\n one duel, which seriously displeased his father, and his military\n obligations had been discharged, according to the laws as they then\n stood, by his service as a \u201cone-year volunteer\u201d in the local militia.\n His legal career seemed assured, though there were many among his early\n friends who foresaw that his entering the church was not unlikely. The\n incident that determined this change was the outbreak of Cologne in\n 1838, when the first note of the coming ecclesiastical troubles was\n sounded by a municipality that went to the length of imprisoning the\n archbishop, Clement von Droste-Vischering; the friend of Stolberg, and\n the primate of the Rhine provinces.\n\n Ketteler, never averse to Prussia, in whose mission to Germany he\n believed, even up to the late Falk or May Laws which tore away the\n veil, could, nevertheless, not reconcile himself to serve any longer a\n government that allowed such violations of personal freedom and of the\n principles which underlie that freedom. In the autumn of the same year\n he went to the M\u00fcnich Theological College and began his ecclesiastical\n studies. Among his professors were D\u00f6llinger and G\u00f6rres, and others\n whose fame is less European but scarcely less great in Germany itself;\n and among his fellow-students Paul Melchers, the present Archbishop of\n Cologne, who, like himself, had been a lawyer of great promise. Coming\n at the age of twenty-seven to study among a body of whom many members\n were hardly more than boys, it may have been a hard task to preserve\n humility and charity; yet the verdict of his fellow-students, summed up\n by one of themselves, was to the effect that Ketteler\u2019s simplicity and\n good-nature were in every way as marked as his intellectual\n superiority. These qualities came out again later in his intercourse\n with his country parishioners, each of whom, peasants as they were, he\n treated with the cordiality and respect of a neighbor and an equal. He\n was no demagogue, and had no theories save the everlasting theories of\n the Gospel and the church; but, as is usually the case, his practice\n with his social inferiors went far beyond the noisy and deceiving show\n of equality made by professional agitators. After four years\u2019 study in\n M\u00fcnich he devoted one year more to theological subjects in the\n episcopal seminary at M\u00fcnster, and received holy orders in 1844, when\n he was sent as curate to Beckum, a small town in Westphalia. He was\n then thirty-three, and had reached half his allotted years; for it has\n been noticed that his term of service as priest and bishop was also\n thirty-three years. The coincidence of his last illness having lasted\n thirty-three days also struck many persons who are fond of these\n calculations.\n\n At Beckum, where he was associated with two other young priests (one of\n whom, Brinkmann, is now Bishop of M\u00fcnster), he led a life as near as\n possible to one of his ideals\u2014still unfulfilled in practice, but only\n postponed in his mind because of more urgent and present needs\u2014the life\n in common of the secular clergy. He and his fellow-curates lived in a\n small house, where each had one room besides the common gathering-room,\n and one purse for all uses, whether personal or charitable. He and\n Brinkmann founded a hospital during their short stay, and this grew\n afterwards to very satisfactory proportions; but Ketteler had\n opportunities of proving himself a good nurse under his own roof, where\n his third colleague was often bedridden for months at a time. His\n public ministry, however, never suffered, and his assiduity at the\n bedside of his sick parishioners and in the confessional at all times,\n in season and out of season, were remarkable. If all priests would\n reflect how momentous, nay, how awful, is the responsibility incurred\n in this matter of ever-readiness to hear a man\u2019s confession, they would\n less seldom deviate from the self-sacrificing example which Bishop\n Ketteler gave consistently throughout his life. His zeal in this\n particular was not inferior, however, to his care of the schools which\n in his public career so distinguished him; and both led his diocesan\n after two years to remove him from Beckum, to a full parish, that of\n Hopsten.\n\n His life here was a repetition of the life at Beckum; his ministry was\n so efficacious that the spiritual life of the parish resembled a\n permanent \u201cmission,\u201d or revival, and his active charity had a large\n field for exercise in the famine and the fever which visited his people\n during his incumbency. It is related of him that, his sister coming to\n visit him at Hopsten, he proposed to take her to see some of his\n friends in the neighborhood, and accordingly took her to his poorest\n people, begging for each a gift sorely needed, which resulted in her\n emptying her purse so effectually that she had to borrow money for her\n journey home. He provisioned his parish during the famine, and got his\n rich relations to help him in the work; and in the fever, besides his\n gifts of food, bedding, and medicines, and his regular offices as their\n pastor, he literally became his people\u2019s physician and nurse.\n\n It was no wonder that he should so have won the respect and trust of\n his neighbors that, even in that very Protestant borough of Lengerich,\n of which his parish formed part, he was unanimously returned as deputy\n to the Frankfort Parliament in 1848. It was here that he first came\n publicly before Germany as an orator and a statesman, and that he made\n that famous speech at the funeral of the Prussian delegates, Lichnowsky\n and Auerswald, murdered during the riots, which has become the most\n popular and widely known of any of his discourses. After his retirement\n from Parliament, and his attendance in the same year at the first\n meeting of the Catholic Union at Mayence, he was asked to give a course\n of lectures in the cathedral on the social and political problems of\n the day. It is said that Catholics, Protestants, and Jews, besides\n free-thinkers, crowded to hear these eloquent and exhaustive lectures,\n and that the competition for seats was a fitting type of the\n intellectual stir they made in the city. His physical endurance was no\n less marvellous, and added much to the impressiveness of the\n discourses, delivered in close succession, with a full, melodious,\n resounding voice under perfect control of the speaker, and carefully\n husbanded, so that neither enthusiasm nor emotion should drive it into\n shrillness or sink it into huskiness. That year saw the preacher\n transferred to the provostship of St. Hedwige\u2019s Church in Berlin, which\n he occupied only for ten months, but long enough to win the love of his\n city congregation as he had that of his country parish. His younger\n brother, Richard, who had left the army to become a priest, succeeded\n him at Hopsten, but left the place later to become a Capuchin; he was\n long known as Father Bonaventure. In 1849 Provost Ketteler was chosen\n Bishop of Mayence, after a stormy election and dispute in the cathedral\n chapter. The first nominee, Doctor Leopold Schmid, professor of\n theology at Giesen, the local university, being, on grounds of \u201cundue\n influence,\u201d strongly disapproved of by a large minority of the canons,\n they and their opponents of the majority agreed to a re-election and to\n an appeal to the Holy See, upon which, out of the three names sent in,\n the Pope chose the provost of St. Hedwige. He was not consecrated till\n July, 1850, by the archbishop of Freiburg, assisted by the bishops of\n Limburg and Fulda. Thenceforward one may say that his life was entirely\n a public one, so intimately was it connected with the living and\n burning questions of the time. Each year the crisis between church and\n state seemed to draw nearer; and, if one may say so, the gap between\n the two has become complete since the promulgation of the May Laws. In\n this struggle, which lasted all through his episcopate, the state\n certainly proved the aggressor, for the lukewarmness of German\n Catholics in the last generation was a proverb; and Ketteler succeeded\n to a diocese in very different order from the one he has left. Things\n were working, or rather lapsing, into the hands of the church\u2019s\n enemies, had they been wise enough to wait and watch; by hurrying\n matters they roused the spirit of Catholics, and raised against\n themselves a zealous band firmly attached to their faith and determined\n to vindicate its rights and liberties.\n\n Of this band Bishop Ketteler, whether as deputy, pamphleteer, lecturer,\n or spiritual guide, was practically the head. His first works in\n Mayence were, on a wider scale, the repetition of those in Hopsten. He\n instituted reforms and amendments in every department; gathered the\n clergy together in yearly retreats, during which the exercises of St.\n Ignatius, which he held in high esteem, were made the basis of\n instruction; founded several Capuchin convents for the purpose of\n giving missions, especially in the country, and one Jesuit college, on\n the occasion of whose establishment he had to bear the brunt of a\n determined journalistic opposition; set up schools and an orphanage for\n girls under the care of the Sisters of Mercy, an asylum for repentant\n women under the nuns of the Good Shepherd, a refuge for servant-maids\n out of employment, a community of Poor Clares to visit and relieve the\n poor in their own homes, a Boys\u2019 Orphanage, Boys\u2019 Reformatory, and\n Boys\u2019 Refuge, several unions and brotherhoods to keep the people\n together and preserve them from the snares of irreligious\n associations\u2014notably a Working-men\u2019s Catholic Union\u2014and last, not\n least, a school taught by the Christian Brothers, which soon won such\n golden opinions that Protestants by scores withdrew their children from\n the communal schools and placed them under the new teachers. With rare\n liberality a Lutheran clergyman was allowed free access to the school\n to teach these children the religion of their parents. The bishop\u2019s\n care for, and personal visitation of, the hospitals also reacted on the\n management of these institutions, so that they were more than ever well\n conducted during his episcopate. Though his enemies, despairing of\n finding other sins to lay to his charge, accused him of undue harshness\n as a taskmaster in the things he required of his clergy, this body\n itself never found fault with his zeal for discipline and austerity. He\n counselled nothing which he did not perform and, indeed, far surpass;\n for, unlike many bishops, estimable and even holy men, he did not\n consider his rank as exempting him from the most ordinary duties of a\n priest; he sat as many hours on regular days in the confessional as any\n country curate, and his daily Mass at five o\u2019clock was always said in\n the cathedral instead of a private house-chapel\u2014that is, until the last\n four or five years of his life, when old age made this indulgence\n necessary. He preached almost incessantly; the Sundays in Lent and\n Advent always in his own cathedral, other Sundays alternating with his\n clergy, and in the evenings of Sundays and week-days alike in any\n church, chapel, or even hall, where he was asked to further any good\n cause. His confirmation and church-visitation journeys were remarkable;\n he returned to the rightful custom of confirming, no matter how few the\n candidates, separately in each parish, instead of lumping many parishes\n together in one central ceremony, and this in order that he might gain\n a personal knowledge of each place, its needs and workings. On these\n occasions he would give a preliminary introduction on the eve of the\n confirmation, then hear confessions far into the night or morning, say\n Mass early, and confess again till he preached the sermon and\n administered the sacrament; in the afternoon inspect the schools,\n catechise the children, and visit any sick persons there might happen\n to be; conduct the evening service himself and preach a second time,\n the intermediate moments being passed again in the confessional or in\n private intercourse with any one who asked for special advice or\n comfort.\n\n His daily life at home was as simple, hardy, and frugal as it had been\n at Beckum: he rose at four and worked incessantly, yet finding time,\n besides his Breviary, to say the rosary and the office of the Third\n Order of St. Francis every day. Add to this his writings, his minute\n supervision of the ecclesiastical machinery of his diocese, his\n conferences with political leaders, his necessary journeys or\n excursions, besides his frequent undertaking of the duties of the\n archbishop of Freiburg after the latter grew too infirm to go on long\n confirmation rounds, and it will be easily seen that he was far from an\n ordinary man. In virtue of his office he was entitled to a seat in the\n Upper House (in the grand-duchy of Hesse), with the right of sending a\n representative, if he chose, which he did, sending one of his canons,\n Dr. Monsang, who, among other things, distinguished himself by voting\n for the freedom of the Jewish religious bodies, in the matter of\n internal reform, from state interference, and for their right to\n receive state aid, provided they themselves solicited it. In the German\n Reichstag, however, where Bishop Ketteler represented the borough of\n Tauberbischofsheim, he sat in person, and was numbered among the\n members of what was known as the Fraction of the Centre, of whom\n Windthorst, his friend, was and is the leader. During the two German\n wars, 1866 and 1870, he, though deploring the civil nature of the\n first, according to the tradition of the greater part of the\n Westphalian nobility, leaned to the side of Prussia, in whose mission\n to unite Germany his belief never wavered, and whose influence in\n things purely political he always upheld. His very patriotism and\n enlightened views in this direction made his firm stand against the\n Prussian aggression on the church of more weight and importance\u2014a fact\n which his enemies fully appreciated and often tried to make capital of,\n dubbing him as inconsistent with himself. Every one will see how\n one-sided this view was.\n\n He was so far modern in his ideas that he claimed not to have lost any\n of the rights of a citizen by becoming a priest; but the way in which\n he used those rights, civic and parliamentary, roused the anger of men\n whose interpretation of the same principle led them to see in a priest\n nothing more than a military serf of the empire. He never claimed for\n the church any privilege or any exemption, only the full meed of\n liberty due to any other corporation; the exception need not be in her\n favor, but should not be directed specially against her. The state and\n the church were separate bodies, indeed, and well for the latter that\n such a doctrine could be conscientiously held; but the very separation\n involved perfect autonomy for the church, and forbade any interference\n on the part of political authorities, while her influence in social\n questions was to be exerted only through her direct influence on\n individuals; for a state under bondage to the church never occurred to\n him as desirable. Meanwhile, he labored to carry out his ideal of\n internal church government, a noble and primitive one, based upon the\n importance of parish organization and of the thorough efficacy of the\n parish clergy, to whom the religious orders, in his view, were to act\n as helpers and subordinates. To the disuse of ancient church laws and\n customs he attributed the troubles that have often come upon the church\n in all times; for he held her discipline, and even her ritual, to be no\n less than her doctrine under the direct guidance of the Holy Ghost.\n This alone would have made him a reformer in a lax and lukewarm age,\n when it was the fashion for Catholics themselves to join in mild or\n witty reflections upon their own faith, and to remain outwardly in\n conformity with that faith only by habit and by intellectual\n sluggishness. But this, joined to his powerful zeal in matters more\n prominent and public, made him specially the leader of a spiritual\n revival among the people of his city, his diocese, and Germany at\n large. It was not in vain that he sat in the see of St. Boniface; and\n when he encouraged the celebration of his predecessor\u2019s eleventh\n centenary, it was fully as much to stir up the zeal of his people for\n church liberty as to honor the memory of the great missionary. His five\n journeys to Rome on various solemn anniversaries, and notably that on\n the occasion of the Vatican Council, were the only other incidents of\n his life that remain to be noticed; on his way back from the last, in\n 1876, when the Holy Father received him with special marks of esteem\n and rejoiced to have him as a witness of his \u201cgolden\u201d anniversary,\n Bishop Ketteler fell ill at Alt-Oetting, a shrine where he had\n encouraged and taken part in many a pilgrimage. He could get no farther\n than the Capuchin convent of Burghausen, where he died on the 13th of\n July, of typhoid fever; on the 18th he was buried in his own cathedral\n amidst the lamentations of his clergy and people. The country people,\n to whom he had always had a special leaning, and who knew him as\n familiarly as his own canons did through his frequent presence at and\n ministry in the great Rhine pilgrimages, were loud in their expressions\n of grief; all felt that they had lost a father, but those whose chief\n concern was in temporal matters felt also that a great speaker and\n thinker had departed. Of his style, his mode of thinking, and the zeal,\n always burning yet never intemperate, which he brought to his work even\n so early as 1848, one can judge by the famous passage of his speech at\n the funeral of Lichnowsky and Auerswald at Frankfort: \u201cWho are the\n murderers of our friends? Are they the men who shot them through the\n breast, or those who clove open their heads with their axes? No, these\n are not the murderers. Their murderers are the principles which produce\n both good and evil deeds upon the earth, and the principles which\n produced this deed are not born of our people. I know the German\n people, not, indeed, by the experience of conventions, but by that of\n its inner, daily life.... I have devoted my life to the service of the\n poor people, and the more I have learnt to know them the more have I\n learnt to love them; I know what a great and noble character our German\n people has received from God. No, I repeat it: it is not our noble, our\n honest German people who are answerable for this wicked deed.... The\n true murderers are those who, before the people, seek to bring into\n contempt and to soil with their low ribaldry both Christ, Christianity,\n and the church; those who strive to efface from the heart of the people\n the healing message of the redemption of mankind; those who do not look\n upon revolution as a sad necessity under certain circumstances, but\n erect revolution into a principle, and hurry people from revolution to\n revolution; ... those who would take from the people the belief in the\n duty of man to command himself, to curb his passions, and to obey the\n higher laws of order and of virtue, and would, on the contrary, make\n laws of those passions and therewith inflame the people; those men who\n would set themselves up as lying gods over the people, in order that it\n may fall down before them and worship them.\u201d\n\n Ketteler\u2019s first well-known speech on social subjects was delivered on\n the 4th of October, 1848, at the original meeting of the Catholic Union\n at Mayence\u2014a body whose \u201ccongresses\u201d have been held yearly since that\n time, and have been distinguished by speeches such as those of\n Montalembert, Dupanloup, Manning, D\u00f6llinger, before 1870, and others\n whose names are public property. His subject was \u201cThe Freedom of the\n Church, and the Social Crisis\u201d; and says one of his biographers, \u201cIt is\n no mean testimony to his far-sightedness that he already foresaw and\n took part in the importance of the social question.\u201d His lectures in\n the cathedral took in such themes as these: \u201cThe Catholic Doctrine of\n Property,\u201d \u201cRational Freedom,\u201d \u201cThe Destiny of Man,\u201d \u201cThe Family, based\n on Christian Marriage,\u201d \u201cThe Authority of the Church, based on Man\u2019s\n Need of Authority.\u201d Of the impression these discourses made on all\n classes we have spoken already. To show how liberal were his views on\n the form of government, it may be mentioned that it was one of his\n axioms that it mattered little _who_ ruled, but much _how_ he ruled.\n All forms of legitimate government were practically alike to him,\n though his own ideal for Germany was a revival of the old unity of\n confederation, with the equal representation of the burghers and of the\n peasantry by the side of the clergy and nobility; but the manner in\n which the government, no matter what it called itself, dealt with\n weighty questions of morals was in his view a touchstone. It will be\n seen from this that if his foes delighted in calling him the most\n ultramontane of ultramontanes, they had no reason, politically\n speaking, to call him retrograde, absolutist, or even monarchist. In\n fact, it seems as if one might sum up his political character thus: a\n citizen of a free imperial city of the middle ages, imbued with the\n keenness of sight and the versatility of tongue peculiar to the modern\n European politician.\n\n In 1851 and 1852 a new phase of unbelief, dubbing itself \u201cGerman\n Catholicism,\u201d did its best to bewilder the mind of Catholic Germany,\n and the bishop plainly warned his people against it, saying: \u201cThough I\n should incur hereby the reproach of intolerance, I must warn you\n against \u2018German Catholicism,\u2019 for it denies the Godhead of Christ,\n revelation, and redemption, and makes itself a god according to its own\n fancy.\u201d In 1852, in his Lenten pastoral, he touched upon the connection\n between this belief and political radicalism; also upon the common\n reproach of rebellion against authority or of flattery towards princes\n which these new philosophers were constantly bringing against the\n church. \u201cWhen the church,\u201d he says, \u201cadvises the people to submit to\n the civil power, she is thus attacked: \u2018See the flatterer of princes,\n the protectress of all abuses, the willing instrument of the oppression\n of the people.\u2019 When, on the other hand, she reminds the state of its\n obligations, and, under certain circumstances, proclaims that God is to\n be obeyed rather than man, the spirit of deception cries out: \u2018See the\n rebel, the seeker after undue authority.\u2019\u201d In 1873, when a new attack\n was made on religion by the establishment of communal schools, he\n resisted, by writing and preaching, \u201cthese institutions which\n contradict all the principles of religion, disturb Christian education,\n contradict and confuse the understanding and the nature of childhood,\n and damage all the interests of the Christian family.\u201d In 1851, when\n every government in Germany had been more or less remodelled, and many\n fetters of old prescription and prejudice had been shaken off by the\n revolution of 1844, the bishops of the Upper Rhine province came\n together at Freiburg, and presented a memoir on church relations with\n the state to the neighboring rulers of Hesse, W\u00fcrtemberg, Baden, and\n Nassau. No notice was taken of it, and two years later it was repeated\n with almost the same result, save that in Hesse the grand-duke and his\n prime minister, Dalwigk, called a convention in 1854, and established\n the liberty and autonomy of the church upon a legal basis. Ketteler\u2019s\n pamphlet in the same year, three months previous to the convention, had\n some influence on the course of affairs; it was on \u201cThe rights, and the\n right to protection, of the Catholic Church in Germany, with special\n reference to the claims of the episcopate of the Upper Rhine and the\n present struggle,\u201d and may be summed up in this quotation from it: \u201cThe\n rights of sovereignty are doubtless holy. They belong to God\u2019s\n ordinances, and are therefore of God; but those indefinite, boundless,\n unhistorical, unfounded rights of sovereignty stand exactly on a level\n with the equally indefinite, boundless, unhistorical, unfounded rights\n of humanity. They are distorted images of lofty truths, and are born of\n the same fallacy as absolutism. Once face to face with them, the church\n must either allow herself to be ravaged or must begin a struggle for\n life and death.\u201d\n\n However well known and widely spread were Ketteler\u2019s influence and\n writings, the latter partook of the local and circumstantial nature\n of most political writings: they were not solid, dignified, technical\n treatises of theology, nor popular and \u201ctaking\u201d books of devotion,\n but the outcome of present necessities, quick and vigorous protests\n against injustice, weapons specially adapted to the ever-shifting\n warfare between socialism and religion. His pamphlets were mostly\n short, terse, and to the point; he slept in his armor and was always\n on the watch. He speaks of his work in this direction with great\n simplicity to Prof. Nippold, of Heidelberg: \u201cBesides my spiritual\n ministry in my diocese, I follow and observe all the movements of my\n time, and cannot help meeting with all the injustices which men do to\n one another, not always, indeed, of malice prepense, but often\n through misunderstandings, prejudices, and false representations.\n Then, if I can spare time from my work, I make an effort towards\n clearing up those unfortunate misunderstandings....\u201d But though he\n spoke and felt thus modestly about his important part in the\n questions of the day, we know how impossible it is for a man of his\n stamp not to rise to his natural level. He was born to be a leader,\n and neither necessity nor humility could block the path to political\n prominence. Such a man, weighted with even more absorbing work than\n his, would have made time for occupations so naturally fitted for\n him; such a mind, even had it been in a less robust body, would have\n overcome disease and weakness, and wrested from them the power to\n make itself known. A list of a few of his writings will show how\n universal was his watchfulness: _Can a believing Christian be a\n Freemason? The True Foundations of Religious Peace. The Defamation of\n the Church by the Tribune. The Right of Free Election of the\n Cathedral Chapter. Germany after the War of 1866. The Fraction of the\n Centre at the First German Reichstag. Catholics in the German Empire.\n Freedom, Authority, and the Church, considerations upon the Great\n Problem of the Day. The Labor Question and Christianity. Liberalism,\n Socialism, and Christianity. The General Council and its Influence on\n Our Time. The Doctrinal Infallibility of the Pope after the\n Definition of the Vatican Council._\n\n What he has said and written on the social question, including the\n subjects of marriage, the family, education, and the relations between\n capital and labor, even most of his opponents judge to belong to the\n quota of wisest utterances extant on the subject. His gift of\n opportunity, or of speaking always to the point, has been noticed\n already. Here is what a German contemporary says of it: \u201cThe bishop did\n not devote himself to journalism as a profession, for he looked upon\n his ministry as immeasurably more precious and higher than political\n influence. But he used it as a weapon at every important turning-point\n of contemporary German history, when dangers threatened the moral order\n of German society, and when the rights of the church were violated and\n her institutions hampered; and precisely because his writings sprang\n from instant necessities or the peculiarities of the day, they were, in\n the noblest sense of the word, _timely_\u2014not productions of labored\n pulpit-wisdom, but the forcible words, piercing through bone and\n marrow, of a powerful voice sounding the battle-cry of a mind-conflict;\n of a man whose keen and far-sighted look measured the heights and\n depths of the mind-disturbances of his day, and shared heartily in the\n joys and sorrows of his time.\u201d\n\n It is worth while to notice his usual method in these earnest\n pamphlets. It consisted, as a rule, of taking his opponents\u2019 own\n arguments or \u201caccomplished facts\u201d nakedly as they stood, and carrying\n them on to their strictly legitimate but startling consequences. Yet,\n in the whole course of his polemical writings, he carefully abstained\n from the least personality. In this he might with advantage be taken as\n a model by most schools of political pamphleteering. Soon after his\n speech at Frankfort his fame as an orator was already held so high that\n it suggested the following poetical portrait of him by Bede Weber, in a\n work entitled _Historico-Political Sketches_. This is almost a literal\n translation:\n\n \u201cThe parish priest of Hopsten has a tall and powerful figure, with\n sharply-cut features, in which speak a fearlessness impelling him\n irresistibly to \u2018do and dare,\u2019[163] joined to an old Westphalian\n tradition of loyalty to God and church, to emperor and realm. To his\n discerning spirit the German nation, in its unity, its history, and its\n Catholic traditions, is still living and strong. Luther and\n Melanchthon, Charles the Fifth and Napoleon, the Peace of Basle and the\n cowardly Pillersdorf, are nothing in his eyes but passing shadows over\n the black, red, and gold shield of the German people. From the blood of\n General Auerswald and of Prince Lichnowsky, from the murder of Lamberg\n and Latour, the roses of hope spring only more obstinately for him, and\n his tears hang on them only as the pearly dew of the dawn of German\n freedom, German loyalty to the faith, and German order. He bears the\n great, brave German people, with the everlasting spring of its virtues,\n in the innermost depths of his heart, and from this union, or rather\n identification, flows the peculiar pride of his address, which, in the\n evil seething of elements in the \u2018days of March,\u2019 still points out the\n means of building up the cathedral of the German Church sooner and more\n beautifully than the cathedral of Cologne. Therefore was it that his\n words impressed his hearers with a resistless might. When I think of\n the orator Ketteler, I see before me a thorough man, who can awake fear\n in many a heart, but whose individuality is in itself a right to do\n so.\u201d\n\n Most of his bitterest opponents in the Reichstag acknowledged his power\n in speaking, and respected the fearless use he made of his position to\n remind them of their duties as men, Christians, and lawmakers; and when\n circumstances made it impossible for him to combine his duties as\n deputy with his dignity as bishop, and caused him to retire from his\n place, his party felt the loss of his voice as much as his adversaries\n rejoiced in their deliverance from a parliamentary \u201cSon of Thunder.\u201d\n His lectures and sermons, even on ordinary days and stereotyped\n subjects, were always startling and mind-compelling by the manner in\n which old truths were handled and new meanings brought out therefrom;\n while his open-air preaching at pilgrimages, where he was often heard\n by ten thousand people, bore an equally powerful and peculiar stamp,\n and, though his thoughts were then clothed in simpler language, they\n lacked none of the breadth which distinguished his more finished\n speeches.\n\n In a monthly magazine edited at Mayence by the bishop\u2019s friends\n Heinrich and Monsang, both dignitaries of his cathedral chapter, is a\n review of his life which gives a prominent place to his opinion on the\n importance and seriousness of social questions:\n\n \u201cHe was deeply and firmly convinced that political and social problems\n are so inseparably connected with religious questions that any one\n aiming at defending religion from a high stand-point and in a\n comprehensive manner cannot indifferently pass by these problems.\u201d\n\n A newspaper generally opposed to his political views, the _Catholic\n Voice_ (or \u201cOpinion\u201d),[164] speaks in the same sense:\n\n \u201cOne of the most noteworthy traits in the life and works of Bishop\n Ketteler is the lively interest which he took, by deed, word, and\n writing, in the social question. It is precisely in this direction that\n most misunderstandings take place. But we would remind the public that\n the attitude of the bishop towards this problem was wholly shaped by\n his Catholic principles and his priestly duties. Nothing was further\n from his mind than the wish to use the needs of the laborer as a basis\n for political agitation, or to carry out any chimerical theories of a\n general millennium. He took a part in the labor question, because he\n saw in working-men the victims of so-called liberal lawgivers, and\n because he found it his duty as a pastor to care for the poor. These\n high and noble motives were not always appreciated, but working-men\n themselves have repeatedly testified their confidence in him, and after\n his death were published many gratifying tributes from the same\n source.\u201d\n\n The sense in which he took part in this question is again impressed on\n the German public by means of the article from which we have quoted\n before\u2014namely, that it was determined by personal experience and a\n sensitive consciousness of his duties as a priest.\n\n \u201cWhat he wrote and did concerning this subject proceeded not from mere\n theoretical interest, still less from political reasons, but from\n Christian love and brotherly feeling towards the people, especially the\n poorer classes, and from the ardent wish to further their eternal and\n temporal welfare, as well as to save them, together with the whole of\n society, from the terrible chaos towards which we are being hurled, if\n the old maxims and practice of Christian charity and justice do not\n prevail against the principles of modern liberalism and\n pseudo-conservatism.\u201d\n\n In his political prominence, and his fearless handling of questions\n often, under specious pretexts, withdrawn from the allowed limits of\n clerical oratory, Ketteler seems to invite a comparison with Dupanloup,\n the Bishop of Orleans, who, having fought in the earlier struggle for\n freedom of education in France, has lived to take part in a struggle\n more vital and less local\u2014that of the whole field of Christian doctrine\n in arms against systematized revolution. Occasion naturally moulds the\n men it needs; the material of such characters is always present, but in\n the church, as in the world, \u201cmute, inglorious Miltons\u201d and \u201cvillage\n Hampdens\u201d die and leave no mark. This explains the rush of talent to\n the rescue of every cause seriously imperilled by its successful\n adversaries; among others the cause of the church, under whatsoever\n persecution it may chance to suffer. This also explains the present\n superiority, as a body, of the German episcopate. In the first quarter\n of this century the reconstruction of society in France, and the\n reorganization of the church on a basis less majestic but more\n dignified than that of the _ancien r\u00e9gime_, brought about the same\n bristling of great gifts greatly used around the threatened liberties\n of the church. In Poland, during the two insurrections which this\n century has witnessed, heroes rose up naturally wherever there was a\n priest or a bishop; in the late French war, and its sequel, the\n Commune, the martyrdoms and Christian stoicism of 1793 were repeated\n and nearly surpassed, while the present more tedious, less brilliant\n struggle of the church in Germany has called forth men of iron will and\n fathomless patience to resist, legally and passively, an active,\n goading injustice. In countries where there is no need for it there is\n less of this public display of unusual powers; bishops who might be\n statesmen remain simply administrators, priests who might be heroes\n remain obscure pastors; in literature it is research, learning,\n theology which take up their leisure time, not public speaking or\n political writing; the silent, healthful life of the church goes on,\n without struggle and hindrance, and work is done indeed, but it seldom\n becomes known beyond a small local circle. And even this happens only\n under the shadow of suppressed hostility to the church, such as there\n exists at present in almost every country; for there have been times\n when, splendid as the outward position of the church has been, or\n seemingly unfettered her organization, there was at the core a\n spiritual drowsiness which was far from honorable. Such a period came\n before the first French Revolution; another earlier, before the German\n Reformation; another later, before Catholic Emancipation in England;\n and another before the late Prussian church laws in Germany. There was\n either security or sovereignty; no shade of persecution; at most a\n polished indifference or a scornful toleration, and hence no revival,\n no earnest, quick-pulsing life.\n\n We have omitted to mention one of Bishop Ketteler\u2019s most important\n undertakings\u2014that of the theological institute in Mayence, to replace\n the education given to the clergy at the local university of Hesse,\n Giesen. The grand-duke heartily approved of the plan of restoring to\n the episcopal seminary the whole training of the diocesan clergy,\n instead of the taking on, as a secondary branch, of a chair of theology\n to Giesen; and the bishop was enabled to carry out his plans in this\n matter, and to leave behind him a body of priests, zealous, loyal,\n whole-hearted, and imbued with his own spirit.\n\n Ketteler was in every sense a great man, and no less a man of his age.\n He accepted everything as it legitimately stands, with no hankerings\n after the old order of things, no political, or rather romantic,\n longings after forced revivals of bygone conditions; but he took his\n stand firmly on the principle that the church has her own appointed and\n immutable place in every successive system, and ought to stand by her\n claim to this place. This is the basis whence every member of her army\n should in these days fight her battles, and, taking up the new weapons,\n make them his own. Ketteler has shown them the way.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE OLD STONE JUG.\n\n A TALE OF THE NEUTRAL GROUND.\n\n A century ago on the post-road to Boston, and sixteen miles from the\n city of New York, stood a tavern called the Old Stone Jug. It was a\n one-story building of dark-colored stone, with a single window fronting\n upon the highway\u2014a quaint, lozenge-shaped window, of thick, dingy\n glass, through which the sun\u2019s rays penetrated with difficulty. The\n chimney, battered by two generations of northwest winds, sagged\n considerably to the south; a frowning rock rose close behind the house;\n and altogether the Old Stone Jug wore a sinister appearance, which\n tallied well with the stories told about it. A band of Indians had come\n in the night-time and massacred the first family who dwelt here; a\n peddler had been seen to enter the doorway and never been heard of\n afterwards; a cavern of fathomless depth was said to connect the cellar\n with the rock; and certain it is that no one who had made this spot his\n home had either remained long or prospered there, except Peter Van\n Alstyne\u2014better known in the township of East Chester as Uncle Pete\u2014who\n kept the tavern at the opening of the Revolution.\n\n But he did well; the poorer his neighbors became, the more\n light-hearted did he grow and the richer, and all because the fox which\n prowleth about in the dark was not cunninger than Uncle Pete.\n\n His wife was dead, but he had a daughter named Martha, who kept house\n for him, and whom he tenderly loved and strove to bring up in his own\n principles\u2014namely, to be all things to all men. \u201cFor these are critical\n times,\u201d he would say, \u201cand who can tell, child, which side will win?\u201d\n\n Martha was just twenty years of age, and, if not what we might call a\n handsome girl, had something very attractive about her. She was tall\n and graceful and abounding in spirits. She knew everybody for miles\n around, and everybody knew her; and if the more knowing ones shook\n their heads and looked a little doubtful when they spoke of Van\n Alstyne, all agreed that Martha was a fine young woman.\n\n The only member of the household besides herself and parent was a\n diminutive negro boy christened \u201cPopgun.\u201d And at the moment our tale\n begins Popgun is perched on the topmost limb of a wild-cherry tree hard\n by, Martha is in the kitchen making doughnuts, while the publican is\n standing in the middle of the road gazing up at the sign-board which\n hangs immediately above the entrance\u2014and, considering that he painted\n it himself, \u2019tis not a bad work of art. Here we see King George with a\n crown on his head; at the royal feet crouches a lion, and around the\n two figures, in big red letters, are the words, \u201cGod save the King!\u201d\n\n He was still contemplating the features of his sovereign when a shrill\n voice cried down from the sky, \u201cBe ready, sir.\u201d In an instant Uncle\n Pete\u2019s face lost its tranquil expression, and putting his hand to his\n ear, so as to catch well Popgun\u2019s next warning note, he listened\n attentively.\n\n In another minute came the voice again: \u201c\u2018Lisha Williams, sir, on Dolly\n Dumplings.\u201d\n\n \u201cHo! Then I must be brisk, for the mare travels fast,\u201d muttered Van\n Alstyne, hastening toward a ladder which lay a few yards off in\n readiness for these occasions. In less time than it takes to relate the\n sign-board was turned round, and, lo! in place of King George and the\n lion behold now George Washington, holding in his hand a flag whereon\n are thirteen stripes and thirteen stars, and circling the picture are\n the words, \u201cGod save our Liberties.\u201d\n\n \u201cChild, here\u2019s \u2018Lisha coming,\u201d shouted Uncle Pete, thrusting his head\n into the doorway.\n\n \u201cElisha! Indeed!\u201d exclaimed Martha, letting drop the cake she was\n rolling in her hands. \u201cOh! how glad I am. Haven\u2019t seen the dear boy for\n an age.\u201d Then away she flew to make ready for her lover, or rather for\n one of her lovers. And now, while the girl is putting on another gown,\n let us speak a few words about the horseman who is approaching.\n\n Elisha Williams was a young man of five-and-twenty, with sandy hair and\n blue eyes, and whose father owned a farm half a mile east of the inn.\n He and Martha had been friends from childhood, and when at length the\n time came for him to think of matrimony there was no lass whom he\n desired more for his wife than Martha.\n\n She was a girl after his own heart: not demure and timid and silent as\n a tombstone, but brave and full of fun; he had even known her to pursue\n and kill a rattlesnake; and she was as fond of a horse as he was\n himself.\n\n When news came of the fight at Lexington Elisha openly took the patriot\n side, bought Dolly Dumplings of Martha\u2019s father (a mare so given to\n kicking and jumping fences that, although of unstained pedigree, Uncle\n Pete was fain to part with her), and now he is one of the most daring\n troopers in the Continental army, and is known far and wide as The\n Flying Scout.\n\n But Elisha was not the only one who courted Martha. He had a rival\n named Harry Valentine, son of Doctor Valentine, the most notorious Tory\n in East Chester; and this caused Elisha not a little anxiety. For,\n although Martha always received him very cordially when he paid her one\n of his flying visits, and seemed pleased to hear of his exploits, she\n never would listen when he said anything harsh of the Tories.\n\n Elisha\u2019s heart was beating quite as fast as her own when presently he\n reined in his foaming steed before the tavern door. Martha was standing\n on the threshold, looking, in his eyes, never so bewitching. Between\n her fingers she held a lump of sugar for Dolly Dumplings\u2014she seemed to\n care only for Dolly; her long, luxuriant brown hair, which flowed loose\n down her shoulders, had a spray of wild honeysuckle twined through\n it\u2014you might have fancied she had been wandering through the woods, and\n that the flowers had got tangled there by accident. Her cheeks were\n slightly tinged by the sun; but what of it? They were plump, healthy\n cheeks, adorned by two pretty dimples; and Elisha, who loved cherries,\n felt his mouth water when he looked on Martha\u2019s lips.\n\n \u201cHow is my Martha?\u201d he exclaimed, sliding nimbly off the saddle.\n\n \u201c_Your_ Martha, indeed!\u201d answered the girl, tossing her head; then with\n a smile, as he caught both her hands: \u201cWell, I\u2019m alive and well, and\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cNot at all pleased to see me, eh?\u201d interrupted Elisha.\n\n \u201cDelighted to see you,\u201d she added, a sweet pink blush spreading itself\n with the quickness of light over her face.\n\n \u201cReally? Truly? \u2018Pon your honor?\u201d cried Elisha, squeezing her hands\n tighter.\n\n \u201cCome inside and let\u2019s have a talk,\u201d said Martha, trying to free\n herself from his grasp. But she only half tried; and when presently\n they were seated side by side he was still holding fast to her right\n wrist.\n\n \u201cWhat delicious flowers!\u201d observed Martha, looking down at a nosegay\n which the youth had stuck in his belt. \u201cWild-flowers give no such\n perfume.\u201d\n\n \u201cThese are for you,\u201d said her lover, presenting them to her. \u201cThey came\n from Van Cortlandt\u2019s garden. I spent last night at the Manor. Van\n Cortlandt is a patriot, and is not ashamed to offer a farmer\u2019s son\n hospitality.\u201d\n\n \u201cHow delicious!\u201d said Martha, bringing the nosegay to her nose.\n \u201cColonel Delancey\u2019s hot-house plants cannot surpass them.\u201d\n\n \u201cDelancey! The Tory! The Cowboy chief! What do you know about his\n flowers, Martha?\u201d\n\n \u201cHarry Valentine brought me a magnolia from there a few days ago,\u201d\n replied Martha frankly.\n\n The other murmured something to himself, then burst out: \u201cConfound and\n hang the Tories!\u201d\n\n Martha was silent a moment, then remarked: \u201cWell, however much you\n dislike them, I hope you will not harm Harry Valentine, if he ever\n falls into your hands.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt being your wish, I will always aim a mile above his precious head,\u201d\n returned Elisha.\n\n \u201cYou are a good fellow\u2014a real good fellow; just the same as you always\n were,\u201d continued Martha tenderly. \u201cOh! I often think of our old frolics\n together, Elisha.\u201d\n\n \u201cDo you, really? Well, Martha, I often think of them too. What happy\n days those were!\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, much happier than these. O Elisha! you can\u2019t think how changed\n everything is since this dreadful war began. Not a sloop sails up the\n creek now; no carriages pass along the road; no bees, no husking\n parties\u2014everybody is gloomy. First this man\u2019s barn is burnt, then that\n man\u2019s; and chickens and horses and cattle are stolen. In short, between\n the Skinners and the Cowboys poor Westchester County is fast becoming a\n desert.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, for all that it is a glorious war, and will end in freeing us\n from England,\u201d said Elisha, thumping his fist upon his knee.\n\n \u201cAy, to be sure it will. God save our liberties! Hurrah for the\n Continental Army!\u201d cried Uncle Pete, waddling into the house. Then, as\n he opened a cupboard which contained a number of bottles of rum and\n cherry-bounce: \u201cTell me, \u2018Lisha, how you like Dolly Dumplings.\u201d\n\n \u201cLike her? Why, Uncle Pete, she\u2019s just the best animal that ever was\n shod. Nothing can catch her\u2014not even the wind.\u201d\n\n \u201cRight, my boy! Colonel Livingstone, who imported her sire from\n England, and who sold the mare to me five years ago, declared that she\n has in her veins the blood of the Flying Childers, and you know he ran\n a mile a minute.\u201d\n\n \u201cFather, Popgun is calling,\u201d said Martha, with a disturbed air.\n\n \u201cIs he?\u201d And Van Alstyne hurried away as fast as possible; but before\n you could count ten he was back again.\n\n \u201cToo bad, \u2018Lisha,\u201d he said, \u201cthat you must quit us so soon\u2014hardly time\n to take one drink. But some enemy\u2019s cavalry are in sight and they\u2019re on\n a trot.\u201d Then out he went again to fetch Dolly Dumplings.\n\n \u201cWell, dear boy, may the Lord watch over you and keep you safe!\u201d spoke\n Martha, in a tone of deeper feeling than she had yet evinced toward her\n lover. The latter gazed earnestly in her face a moment, then said:\n \u201cMust I bid good-by and depart in uncertainty? O Martha dear! tell me\n what I so long to know: will you be my wife?\u201d\n\n Her response was: \u201cElisha, I love the brave, and the bravest shall win\n me.\u201d\n\n \u201cThen, by Heaven, I\u2019ll be a hero!\u201d cried Elisha. These were his last\n words; in another moment he was gone. But ere Dolly Dumplings had\n galloped fifty paces the sign-board was turned round and King George\n came once more in view.\n\n \u201cWho are they, pa\u2014Hessians or real Britishers?\u201d inquired Martha calmly;\n for she knew they could not overtake Elisha.\n\n \u201cHessians, I believe,\u201d replied Van Alstyne.\n\n \u201cDetestable creatures!\u201d exclaimed the girl, withdrawing into the house.\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t say that, child. They\u2019re as good as any soldiers who fight for\n the king; and if they halt here they\u2019ll leave more than one guinea\n behind them.\u201d\n\n And so they did, for they were a party of very thirsty and hungry men\n who shortly arrived; and for the next hour and a half the Old Stone Jug\n was as busy as a bee-hive. Many a bottle of spirits was emptied, every\n doughnut and pie was devoured; and in consideration of his being a\n staunch loyalist they paid Uncle Pete without grumbling, albeit the\n score was rather high.\n\n \u201cThey\u2019re gone at last\u2014what a blessing!\u201d said Martha, while her father\n was counting over the money to make sure it was all good coin.\n\n \u201cWhy, how foolish you talk!\u201d said happy Uncle Pete.\n\n \u201cWell, father, I\u2019m in earnest. I don\u2019t dislike real Britishers or\n Tories; but these German mercenaries I do detest.\u201d\n\n \u201cBah! bah!\u201d growled Van Alstyne. \u201cPerhaps to-morrow we\u2019ll have a band\n of Continentals or some roving Skinners; then perhaps, day after,\n \u2018tother side may visit us again. Why, child, I\u2019m getting rich out of\n this war.\u201d\n\n \u201cTake one side or the other,\u201d returned Martha, shaking her head. \u201cI\u2019d\n rather be fair and open, even if we made less money.\u201d\n\n \u201cHumph! We\u2019d be in a pretty fix if I did that, child\u2014a pretty fix. Why,\n this tavern wouldn\u2019t stand a week, except for my double-faced\n sign-board; whereas now George Washington might be entertained here and\n depart highly edified, and so might King George. The only\n unpleasantness would be if they both happened to come at the same time.\n And so, child, you ought not to be finding fault.\u201d Then, after pausing\n long enough to take a chew of tobacco: \u201cAnd besides,\u201d he went on, \u201c\u2019tis\n not easy in this world always to see the clear path we ought to follow.\n Why, you yourself are in a fix; and I don\u2019t wonder at it, for in this\n township I can\u2019t name two honester, jollier more manly fellows than\n \u2018Lisha Williams and Harry Valentine. And if I were a girl with those\n two boys for sparks, I believe I\u2019d jump into East Chester Creek, so\n that neither of \u2019em might be disappointed.\u201d\n\n Here Martha\u2019s merry laugh rang through the house; then, taking Elisha\u2019s\n bouquet in one hand and Harry\u2019s magnolia in the other, she stretched\n forth her arms and stood exactly half-way between the two love-gifts,\n and said: \u201cWell, yes, I am in a fix.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd a very, very sweet fix,\u201d mumbled Uncle Pete, rolling the quid\n about in his capacious mouth. \u201cMany a young woman might envy you.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, I do wonder how long it will last. I must decide one of these\n days.\u201d\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t be in a hurry, child. Wait; have patience. If we are beaten and\n forced to remain colonies, marry Harry Valentine; if we secure our\n independence, then choose \u2018Lisha. For \u2019twill go hard with the party\n that\u2019s beaten; their land will be confiscated.\u201d\n\n \u201cDear, darling flowers! How delicious you are!\u201d said Martha, bringing\n the magnolia and the nosegay together and pressing both to her lips;\n and she kept kissing them and smelling them, and smelling and kissing\n them, till at length her father said:\n\n \u201cHumph! they\u2019ll soon wilt, if you treat the pretty things that way.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! I\u2019ll get fresh ones afore long,\u201d answered Martha. \u201cHowever, I will\n put these in water. They may as well last a few days.\u201d\n\n But a week went by, and then another week, without bringing again\n either of her suitors. The weather was delightful, for it was early\n June. The summer heat had not yet begun; and if it were not for war,\n ruthless war, how fair all nature would have appeared! But although the\n meadows were spangled with dandelions and buttercups, the woods scented\n with dogwood blossoms, and the air full of the melody of bobolinks and\n orioles, the people of East Chester were more depressed than ever. Bob\n Reed\u2019s mill had just been burnt by the Cowboys; in revenge the Skinners\n had scuttled a Tory sloop anchored in the creek; while some miscreants\n had even made an attempt to fire St. Paul\u2019s Church in the village. But,\n sad as all this was, nothing caused Martha Van Alstyne so much distress\n as the doings at the Old Stone Jug. For two whole nights she was kept\n awake and bustling about, attending to the wants of a set of profane\n marauders who belonged both to the British and American side. These\n villains, sinking all difference of opinion, would occasionally unite\n to rob friend as well as foe;[165] and it was to the Old Stone Jug they\n carried their plunder, which Uncle Pete would hide in the cavern behind\n the house.\n\n \u201cWell, don\u2019t blame me, child,\u201d said Van Alstyne. \u201cRemember how I am\n situated. Why, if I had refused to conceal those bags of gold I\u2019d like\n enough have been hung forthwith; for among the men who were here last\n night and the night before are some of the greatest scoundrels in\n America.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, I am going to choose my husband afore long,\u201d answered\n Martha\u2014\u201ceither Elisha Williams or Harry Valentine; and then you must\n abandon this tavern and come live with me. For if you stay here\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cO child! I sha\u2019n\u2019t stay after you\u2019re gone. But why marry so soon? Why\n not wait a while?\u2014at least, until we see what Burgoyne does with his\n army, which is large and well appointed. He may sweep everything before\n him; and if he does, then you\u2019ll see your way much clearer, and I\u2019ll be\n the first to tell you to wed Harry Valentine.\u201d\n\n Martha shook her head: \u201cI\u2019ll give my hand to the bravest, father, no\n matter which side he is on. And it is because they are both so good and\n so brave that I hesitate.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, now, child, if you\u2019re not careful you may cause the death of \u2019em\n both. Ay, \u2019tis hard to say what wild, foolhardy deed they may not\n attempt in order to win you.\u201d\n\n \u201cDo you think so?\u201d exclaimed Martha, pressing her hand over her heart\n and turning pale. This thought had not occurred to her before. But it\n was too late. She had already told each wooer that the bravest one\n should have her.\n\n The girl was inwardly lamenting her folly when a voice from the\n cherry-tree cried: \u201cBe ready, sir.\u201d And immediately she and her father\n listened with all their ears for the next call.\n\n \u201cRed-coats!\u201d shouted Popgun in about three minutes.\n\n \u201cAll right,\u201d said Uncle Pete, and off he went to get the ladder. But\n quick Martha checked him, saying: \u201cWhy, father, the sign-board is all\n right for Britishers.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! so it is,\u201d ejaculated Uncle Pete; then, with a grin: \u201cThe fact is,\n child, I\u2019m so used to turning it round and round\u2014first to King George,\n then to George Washington, then back again to King George\u2014that I\u2019m\n afraid some day I\u2019ll make a mistake, and I\u2019ve half a mind to give you\n charge of it.\u201d\n\n \u201cIf you do I\u2019ll either nail the sign fast to the house, or else take it\n away entirely,\u201d answered Martha.\n\n Her parent was still laughing at this innocent, unbusiness-like speech\n when the British dragoons arrived, and at their head was Harry\n Valentine.\n\n Harry was a very different looking man from Elisha Williams: not only\n was he clad in a brilliant scarlet uniform, but he had more refined\n features and courtly manners, which seemed to confirm the view that\n Martha\u2019s father held\u2014namely, that the most genteel people were Tories.\n And now, while Harry clasped the hand of his sweetheart, the latter\n forgot altogether Elisha\u2019s freckled but honest face, his sandy hair and\n homespun coat, with naught to distinguish him from an ordinary citizen\n save a black cockade and eagle feather in his hat, and she thought to\n herself: \u201cWas there ever such a magnificent wig as my Harry\u2019s! \u2019Tis\n powdered to perfection! Dear, darling boy!\u201d\n\n \u201cAh! there is the magnolia I gave you,\u201d said Harry, smiling, as they\n entered the little sitting-room, where Martha passed most of her time\n when not engaged in the kitchen.\n\n \u201cHow fresh it looks! Yet \u2019tis a good while since I brought it.\u201d\n\n \u201cAn age,\u201d returned Martha, eying him fondly.\n\n \u201cAnd what pretty flowers those are yonder!\u201d he continued, looking\n toward the other end of the mantel-piece.\n\n \u201cNone could be prettier,\u201d said Martha in a quiet voice, yet she felt\n the blood stealing over her cheeks.\n\n \u201cFrom Reverend Doctor Coffee\u2019s garden, perhaps?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo indeed! They were given me by one whom nobody can come up to\u2014one\n who keeps ahead of everybody. Now guess his name!\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! I know\u2014that Skinner, Elisha Williams,\u201d said Harry with apparent\n indifference, but inwardly groaning.\n\n \u201cHe is not a Skinner, any more than you are a Cowboy. You are both in\n the regular armies,\u201d said Martha; then, laying her hand on Harry\u2019s\n shoulder: \u201cAnd, Harry, I hope, if Elisha is ever your prisoner, that\n you will treat him kindly.\u201d\n\n \u201cFor your sake he who in your eyes is ahead of all the rest of the\n world shall have not a single one of his red hairs injured,\u201d answered\n Harry, making a low bow. \u201cBut might I venture to ask what valiant\n exploit has Elisha performed that you say he is ahead of me, his open,\n determined, but honorable rival?\u201d\n\n \u201cO Harry! your dear brains are running away with you,\u201d said Martha.\n \u201cYou speak hastily. I only meant that Dolly Dumplings is so fleet that\n not a trooper in the king\u2019s army can catch Elisha. That is all I\n meant.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs that really all?\u201d exclaimed Harry, giving a sigh of relief.\n\n \u201cYes, upon my word it is.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, Elisha must look out,\u201d continued the young man, his countenance\n beaming once more. \u201cHe must not presume too much on the fleetness of\n his steed; for a hundred pounds reward has just been offered to whoever\n will capture Dolly Dumplings.\u201d\n\n \u201cIndeed! A hundred pounds!\u201d exclaimed Martha. \u201cWell, for all that Dolly\n will still continue to show you her heels.\u201d\n\n At this Harry laughed, then said: \u201cMartha, I hope the next time you see\n me I\u2019ll have a decoration; we expect stirring events soon.\u201d\n\n \u201cO Harry! pray don\u2019t be rash,\u201d said the girl. \u201cDo, do take care of\n yourself.\u201d\n\n \u201cStop no preaching, dear Martha. I love you too much to heed the\n bullets. You remember you said the bravest should possess you; and you\n are a treasure worth shedding blood for.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! did I say that?\u201d Here she pressed her hand to her brow. \u201cWell,\n yes, I believe I did. But I was a fool, for who can be braver than you\n and Elisha? Who can doubt the courage of either of you?\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, then, precious Martha, why not decide at once between us? Oh! I\n assure you \u2019tis a great trial for me, this long uncertainty.\u201d\n\n When he had spoken these words Martha turned her eyes upon Elisha\u2019s\n nosegay, which, despite the water, was beginning to fade; then from the\n flowers her eyes dropped to the floor, while her heart throbbed\n violently. Then, looking up, she was on the very point of uttering\n something of vast moment, when, lo! a bullet crashed through the\n window, whizzed close by her head, and buried itself in the\n wainscoting, half blinding her with whitewash and mortar.\n\n Immediately there was a great stir and confusion in the bar-room, where\n Harry\u2019s company were drinking and smoking their pipes.\n\n Quick the troopers were on their feet and rushing pell-mell out of the\n house, while their horses were pawing the earth and neighing furiously,\n for \u201cwhizz!\u201d \u201cwhizz!\u201d \u201cwhizz!\u201d like so many bees the balls were flying\n past them.\n\n \u201cGood Lord! here they come, and close upon us!\u201d gasped Uncle Pete,\n shaking like an aspen leaf as he glanced up the highway, then looking\n toward the sign-board. Would he have time to make the sign change\n front? Momentous question! And on the American cavalry were coming\u2014a\n whole regiment\u2014on, on, at full speed. But, rapidly as they approached,\n the Britishers were too quick for them; every man of the latter was\n already in the saddle, and Martha, although seeing but dimly, was\n giving Harry\u2019s hand a parting squeeze, heedless of the danger she was\n in and deaf to his urgent entreaties to withdraw.\n\n \u201cNo, no, I\u2019m not afraid,\u201d she said. Nor did she retire until he had\n pressed his lips to her cheek; then back she flew into the house.\n\n Scarcely had Harry put spurs to his horse when Uncle Pete\u2014his movements\n happily hidden by a cloud of dust\u2014sprang up the ladder, turned the\n sign-board round in a jiffy, then, pulling from his pocket a bit of\n chalk, drew it thrice across George Washington\u2019s benign visage. After\n which down he came, or rather down he tumbled; the ladder was hastily\n flung aside, and through the doorway after Martha he ran, shouting:\n \u201cSmash the bottles, child! Smash a lot of \u2019em!\u201d\n\n Poor Martha, who was cleansing the mortar from her eyes, was filled\n with amazement at these words. Had her parent suddenly lost his wits?\n Ay, surely he had, for he was already hard at work breaking bottle\n after bottle, and by the time Colonel Glover\u2019s regiment, which pursued\n the enemy only half a mile, drew up at the Old Stone Jug, two pounds\n ten shillings would not have made good the damage which Uncle Pete had\n wrought to his own property.\n\n \u201cGod save our liberties, and the devil take King George!\u201d cried Van\n Alstyne as the American colonel dismounted; then, pointing indignantly\n at the sign-board: \u201cLook, sir, what the British villains have done!\n Look!\u201d\n\n \u201cAy, disfigured our noble commander-in-chief,\u201d answered the officer.\n\n \u201cBut now come, sir, and see what they have done inside,\u201d continued\n Uncle Pete, foaming at the mouth.\n\n In a few minutes the tavern was crowded with officers and soldiers\n heaping maledictions upon the British for having destroyed so much\n excellent rum; the whole floor was reeking with spirits.\n\n But Uncle Pete, in consideration of his loyalty to the American cause,\n recovered all he had lost, and more too; for the cavalry-men made the\n inn merry until the day was well-nigh spent. And when at length they\n departed there was not a more contented citizen in the township than\n Peter Van Alstyne.\n\n \u201cWhat a narrow escape we had!\u201d he said to Martha when they were once\n more alone.\n\n \u201cVery; and we may thank God \u2019tis all over without one drop of blood\n being spilt,\u201d answered the girl.\n\n \u201cWell, no, \u2019tisn\u2019t quite over yet,\u201d added the publican; then, going to\n the door, he shouted: \u201cPopgun, come down.\u201d\n\n Popgun obeyed, but his movements were slow; he moved like one who has\n the rheumatism, and he took double the usual time to descend the tree.\n\n \u201cI say, you little black imp,\u201d growled Uncle Pete as soon as the boy\n got within reach\u2014\u201cyou little black imp, you fell asleep on your perch\n to-day. Now, don\u2019t lie; you did, and you\u2019re \u2018sponsible for the broken\n bottles, and the disfigured sign, and the bullets in the wall. Ay,\n you\u2019re \u2018sponsible for every penny\u2019s worth of damage, and now I\u2019m going\n to punish you.\u201d\n\n \u201cO massa! please don\u2019t make me dance a hornpipe,\u201d said the unhappy boy,\n whining and wringing his hands. \u201cDon\u2019t! don\u2019t! I\u2019ll never fall asleep\n again\u2014no, never.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, it\u2019s a hornpipe I\u2019m going to make you dance; and now begin.\u201d So\n saying, Uncle Pete lifted up a stout ox-gad and brought it down with\n all his might on Popgun\u2019s legs. The blow was followed by a piercing\n cry. Martha implored her father not to strike him again, but Van\n Alstyne was deaf to her appeals for mercy, and during several minutes\n Popgun continued to hop about like a dancing bear, and you might have\n heard his screams as far as East Chester village.\n\n Finally, Uncle Pete having broken the whip over the poor child\u2019s legs,\n Martha, who was truly vexed at such cruelty, led Popgun into the\n kitchen, intending to console him with something good to eat. But Van\n Alstyne, who knew how soft her heart was, said:\n\n \u201cMartha, I positively forbid you to give him one mouthful of\n sweetmeats, and not a single doughnut or tart. Obey me!\u201d\n\n The girl made no response, but, having fastened the kitchen door and\n brushed a tear out of her eye, bade the little sufferer sit down; then\n said: \u201cNow, mind, you are to have no sweetmeats and no tarts and no\n doughnuts, so here\u2019s some honey and a corncake.\u201d\n\n Popgun looked up in her face, and Martha was not a little surprised to\n see him recovering so rapidly from his terrible castigation; so broad\n was his grin that every one of his gleaming teeth was visible.\n\n \u201cI\u2019d like to dance a hornpipe every day, Miss Martha,\u201d he said, \u201cfor I\n love corncake and honey.\u201d\n\n \u201cDo you? Well, then, you shall have plenty.\u201d\n\n But before the urchin began his feast he whispered: \u201cMiss Martha, you\n won\u2019t tell anybody if I tell you a secret, will you?\u201d\n\n \u201cOf course not,\u201d answered Martha, who was anxious to please him, and\n thus make amends for the barbarous treatment he had received.\n\n \u201cWell, then, Miss Martha, look here.\u201d And Popgun stooped, and, turning\n up the rim of his light linen trowsers, revealed underneath a pair of\n cowskin breeches about a quarter of an inch thick; and these breeches\n had proved a good friend to him, for he had danced many a hornpipe.\n\n \u201cOh! fie, you naughty boy!\u201d exclaimed Martha; and she was strongly\n tempted to take away the honey-jar. But after reflecting a moment she\n burst into a laugh, while Popgun tried to laugh too, but did not\n succeed for the honey which filled his mouth.\n\n Never had Martha known so much anxiety as during the four months which\n followed Harry Valentine\u2019s last visit. Neither of her lovers came to\n see her. Never had they stayed away so long before; and whenever any\n one arrived at the tavern with news she would listen with rapt\n attention and a sinking heart, fearful lest she might hear that some\n evil had befallen them. Often and often Martha would turn from her\n spinning-wheel to gaze on the flowers they had given her\u2014poor faded\n flowers, but more precious now than diamonds in her sight; and instead\n of keeping them far apart, Martha set the nosegay and magnolia near\n together\u2014so near that she might circle them both in one fond embrace.\n\n It was an anxious, trying summer, too, for the patriots. Washington was\n suffering defeats in Pennsylvania; two important posts on the Hudson\n River\u2014Fort Montgomery and Fort Clinton\u2014were captured by the British;\n and Congress had fled from Philadelphia to York. Nothing seemed likely\n to rescue the cause of independence from utter ruin, save the army\n under General Gates, which was marching to meet Burgoyne; and every\n breath of rumor from the north was eagerly listened to.\n\n \u201cA crisis is approaching, child,\u201d Uncle Pete would say, \u201cand I guess\n you\u2019ll be able to select your husband afore the next moon.\u201d\n\n But Martha had grown too down-hearted to heed what her father said, and\n more than once he found tears in her eyes.\n\n By and by autumn came\u2014rich, ripe, golden autumn. But in many an orchard\n the apples were left unpicked, for the young men were gone to the war\n and the old folks had no heart for the labor. The blackbirds were\n flocking, and Martha would watch them as they took wing for the south,\n and she felt toward the little birds as never before; for perhaps in\n their long journey they might pass over Harry and Elisha; in New\n Jersey, in Delaware, in Maryland, or even in the far-off Carolinas,\n they might see their camp-fires, might hear the cannon booming.\n\n \u201cSweet birds, you will come back in spring-time,\u201d she sighed. \u201cWill\n Harry and Elisha come back?\u201d\n\n \u201cChild, here is something that may cheer you up,\u201d said Uncle Pete one\n October evening. The girl looked round, and, lo! he had a letter for\n her. Martha\u2019s hand trembled as she took it.\n\n A century ago people did not write as often as nowadays; indeed,\n comparatively few knew how to read and write. Hence it was not so very\n strange that Martha was unable to tell at a glance from whom the letter\n came. Was it from Elisha? or Harry? or from some comrade of theirs\n imparting sad news?\n\n Few moments in life are more big with keen suspense than the moment\n between the breaking of a letter\u2019s seal and the reading of the first\n line, when the missive is from one very dear to us and far away. This\n interval of time\u2014brief as three heart-throbs\u2014may prove the\n boundary-line where happiness ends for ever and dark days begin, or it\n may set us smiling as Martha is smiling now; therefore let us peep over\n her shoulder and learn what the glad tidings are:\n\n \u201cI am coming in three days, dearest Martha, to take you to St.\n Paul\u2019s Church and make you my darling wife. Now, don\u2019t say nay.\n I implore you not to break my heart. I have won two\n decorations, and am a major, and in all America nobody loves\n you more truly than your devoted\n\n \u201cHARRY VALENTINE.\u201d\n\n Although an exceedingly short letter, it required some little time for\n Martha to spell it all out; and when she did get to the end she was in\n such a flurry that she could barely speak when Uncle Pete asked what\n was the matter.\n\n \u201cO father! Harry Valentine says he will be here in\u2014in three days to\n marry me. And\u2014and he has won two decorations, and he is a major, and I\n don\u2019t know what to think about it.\u201d\n\n \u201cHumph! he has risked his life twice for you, has he? Got two\n decorations! Well, that ought to count a good deal in his favor.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, yes, it ought, father.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd do you know, child, there is a rumor flying about that Gen. Gates\n has found Burgoyne too strong for him, and that he is retreating.\n Therefore, all things considered, I think you may bet on King George\n and marry Harry.\u201d\n\n \u201cO father! how little you understand me,\u201d exclaimed Martha with a look\n of reproach. \u201cI may seem a flirt, a coquette, but I\u2019m not. My heart is\n not like your sign-board, and I have suffered more than you imagine\n from not being able to decide between Harry and Elisha, who love me so\n truly, and each of whom is so worthy of my love.\u201d Then, pressing her\n hands to her bosom: \u201cPoor heart!\u201d she cried, \u201cwhat must I do? Oh! tell\n me, what must I do?\u201d Then, hastening into the sitting-room, where she\n kept the nosegay and the magnolia, she put her lips to Elisha\u2019s\n withered love-gift, then carried it off, leaving the magnolia alone in\n its glory. But ere Martha reached the window, where she meant to fling\n the flowers away, the glass which held them slipped from her quivering\n hand, and in an instant it lay shattered at her feet.\n\n \u201cWell, really, child, you do astonish me,\u201d said her father the\n afternoon of the day when Harry Valentine was expected. \u201cYou can\u2019t\n sleep, you\u2019ve lost your appetite, and all because \u2018Lisha\u2019s posy dropped\n on the floor. Why, what nonsense!\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, yes, it is silly,\u201d said Martha. \u201cOne of the two I will wed, and\n I have made up my mind it is to be Harry, and I doubt not Elisha will\n live fifty years and be happy too. Any one might let a glass break.\u201d\n\n \u201cAy, ay. I\u2019ve smashed scores of \u2019em, child, and never knew any ill to\n follow\u2014except once, when I stumbled and fell on top of the broken bits\n and cut my finger.\u201d\n\n Martha now made a strong effort to dispel the sense of approaching evil\n which for three days had been haunting her, and during the next hour\n she kept in good spirits. She had on her best gown, there was a flush\n upon her cheeks, and every few minutes she would go to the foot of the\n cherry-tree and ask if Harry Valentine were in sight.\n\n \u201cNo, miss,\u201d answered Popgun the last time she put the question to him.\n \u201cBut there is a man in the cedars yonder making signs; I guess he wants\n to speak with you or master. He looks like an Indian.\u201d\n\n Martha did not hesitate to go herself and see what the stranger wanted;\n and after the latter had spoken a few words to her and she turned to\n leave him, the bright color had fled from her face and she trembled.\n\n A half-hour later a cavalcade of gay horsemen arrived at the tavern,\n and, as we may imagine, Van Alstyne wondered very much why his daughter\n was not present to greet Harry Valentine. He searched all through the\n house for Martha; he called her name, but she did not answer. Where\n could Martha be?\n\n In the meanwhile Harry, directed by Popgun\u2019s finger, which pointed to\n the woods, had set out in quest of his love.\n\n And Martha was soon found; but not, as the young officer had fancied\n she would be, gathering chestnuts or wild grapes by the brookside, by\n Rattlesnake Brook, where he had first met her five years ago\u2014oh!\n never-to-be-forgotten day, when she was just emerging from girlhood and\n the first down was on his chin. But now Harry found her kneeling upon a\n mossy rock, praying. And when at the sound of footsteps Martha rose up\n and flew into his arms, although transported with delight to meet her\n again, and to feel she had yielded him her heart at last\u2014that heart\n which it had taken so long to win\u2014nevertheless a pang shot through him\n when he discovered a tear on her cheek; \u2019twas easy to kiss the tear\n away, but why had she been weeping? He asked the question, but Martha\n only shook her head and said:\n\n \u201cRemember, dear one, the promise you once made me: if Elisha ever falls\n into your hands, you will do him no injury. Remember.\u201d\n\n And now evening has come, and a jovial party is assembled in the Old\n Stone Jug. Uncle Pete bestirred himself as never before to do his\n guests honor; he could scarce remain quiet a moment. The best his house\n afforded he gave without stint, and \u2019twas a free gift. Uncle Pete\n intended that his future son-in-law should long remember the\n hospitality of this autumn evening.\n\n Martha was the only one who did not make merry. She sat close beside\n Harry Valentine, her eyes resting on his manly, sunburnt face; she\n seemed ready to devour him with her eyes, and spoke very little.\n\n But ever and anon she would withdraw her hand from his and go peep out\n of the window. It was when she had done this for the third time, then\n come back and placed her hand within his again, that Harry observed in\n a tone of surprise:\n\n \u201cWhy, my beloved, what is the matter? Your hand is grown suddenly cold\n as ice.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs it?\u201d said Martha nervously. There were other words quivering on her\n lips, but she held them back. In after-years she bitterly lamented her\n silence at this critical moment. It was late, yet not too late\u2014the moon\n was still a quarter of an hour below the horizon\u2014and when Harry noticed\n her agitation, if she had only been frank with him, how different might\n have been the whole current of her after-life\u2014how very different!\n\n And now the sky in the east is growing rapidly brighter, and Martha\u2019s\n heart is throbbing faster and louder\u2014so loud that Harry might almost\n have heard it. But \u2019twas not necessary for him to hear the beating of\n her heart in order to discover her growing distress. Martha was leaning\n back in the chair, her cheeks were become as cold as her hand, and her\n eyes strayed from his eyes to the window in a wild, fearful way; then,\n looking at him again, she seemed about to say something, but did not,\n and Harry was really becoming alarmed at the strange mood she was in,\n when the tavern door was suddenly flung wide open, and, as it swept\n round on its hinges, a small, black hand passed swiftly over the table.\n In an instant the candles were extinguished, and in the pitchy darkness\n which followed Martha found herself borne away in somebody\u2019s arms.\n\n \u201cNow, Martha, you\u2019re mine,\u201d said Elisha Williams exultingly, as he\n bounded like a deer up the road to the spot where he had left his\n horse.\n\n \u201cBe true to me, Martha. Mount! and we\u2019ll hie to the Jerseys together.\u201d\n\n What the girl\u2019s feelings were just at this moment \u2019twere not easy to\n describe. In her ears came deafening uproar from the Old Stone\n Jug\u2014quick commands; the neighing of steeds; a voice cried, \u201cFire!\u201d\n\n Then\u2014well, she must have swooned; for when next she became conscious of\n anything, Martha found herself seated on the saddle-bow, Elisha\u2019s arm\n supporting her, and Dolly Dumplings galloping at terrific speed along\n Cusser\u2019s Lane.\n\n And here let us say that the very first thought to enter Martha\u2019s mind\n was a glad thought. Ay, her dark presentiment in regard to The Flying\n Scout had proved utterly untrue, and she even laughed aloud when\n presently she told Elisha what her fears for him had been. Whereupon he\n cried: \u201cMe dead! Ha! ha! No indeed! Hurrah for Independence and Martha\n Van Alstyne!\u201d\n\n Then, while his voice was echoing through the woods which lined the\n road on either side\u2014frightening an owl and rousing a partridge out of\n its sleep\u2014Elisha went on to tell the great news of Burgoyne\u2019s\n surrender. \u201cI was present, my love,\u201d he said. \u201cI saw the British colors\n lowered. Hurrah for Martha and Independence! Hurrah! hurrah!\u201d\n\n But swift as was Dolly\u2019s pace\u2014her tail, back, and nose formed one\n beeline\u2014it was none too swift, and she needed all the blood of her\n grandsire, the Flying Childers, to save her from being overtaken. On,\n on at a furious rate Harry Valentine was coming. He led the pursuit;\n his friends were close behind him. And now, we may ask, did Martha\n remonstrate with Elisha? Did she urge him to draw rein?\u2014to surrender\n her to the one whom she had consented to wed on the morrow? No, indeed.\n Elisha\u2019s astounding boldness in stealing her away from her home when\n surrounded by a score of armed men drowned every other thought; verily,\n he was the boldest of the bold. The bracing night-air, too, was like\n wine to her throbbing veins, and the moonbeams shimmering through the\n trees lent a weirdness to the scene which prevented Martha from\n thinking calmly about anything. She felt as if bewitched. Dolly\n Dumplings appeared like a ghostly steed; Elisha was a wizard knight\n bearing her off to his enchanted castle; and not for all the world\n would she have slipped off the saddle to go back to the Old Stone Jug.\n\n But great changes often come unawares, and in a few minutes everything\n changed. It happened thus: lying in the middle of the lane, directly in\n front of old Isaac Cusser\u2019s house\u2014from whom the lane takes its name\u2014was\n a cow, and between the cow and the stone wall opposite the farmer had\n piled a load of salt hay. Now, had there been a little more light,\n Dolly Dumplings would have discovered the animal in time and jumped\n over her. But the trees just at this spot threw a broad shadow across\n Dolly\u2019s path, and naught was visible until the mare got within a stride\n of the obstacle. Then she swerved violently to one side, and in another\n moment Martha found herself rolling over and over in the hay.\n\n Needless to observe that Elisha did his utmost to stay the course of\n Dolly Dumplings. But, once past the cow, Dolly had instantly resumed\n her headlong gait, and she went quite a distance ere she was brought to\n a halt.\n\n Poor Elisha! he knew well that Martha was lost to him; yet he did not\n hesitate to return\u2014to approach within easy pistol-shot of where Harry\n Valentine and his friends were assembled round about the young woman.\n The farmer, too, had come out with a lantern, and Elisha, plunged in\n despair, could distinguish the figure of Martha standing upright, and\n he could hear her voice, and even fancied she was laughing! Was this\n possible? No, no! Elisha would not believe his ears; and he called to\n her to be true to him\u2014that he would never love another.\n\n \u201cMartha, Martha, I will always love you,\u201d he cried.\n\n \u201cSave yourself! Do! do! Make haste!\u201d came back the response to his\n words; and Elisha was slowly turning Dolly round when the crack of a\n pistol rang through the forest; \u2019twas followed by a sting in his\n breast; and while the mare continued her flight Elisha\u2019s life-blood\n trickled down upon the saddle and left red marks along the road.\n\n But, although desperately wounded, The Flying Scout was not going to be\n captured, and faithful Dolly, who heard the clatter of hoofs behind\n her, flew on swifter than ever. It was the firm belief of Elisha\u2019s\n pursuers that he would turn to the right after leaving Cusser\u2019s lane\n and take the way to Tuckahoe; for the bridge across the Bronx River, a\n half a mile on his left, had been destroyed. Although aware of this\n fact, Elisha nevertheless had the audacity to turn Dolly\u2019s head toward\n the stream; and down the hill which led to it Dolly plunged, a dozen\n bullets whizzing by her. Would the Scout venture such a leap? From bank\n to bank was farther than any horse had ever been known to spring. But\n blood will tell\u2014Dolly\u2019s grandsire was the Flying Childers\u2014and now like\n a bird she rose into the air, and, lo! to the amazement of the enemy,\n Elisha was landed upon the west side of the Bronx.\n\n Here, as they abandoned the chase, let us go back to Martha Van\n Alstyne.\n\n It is the morrow morning, and we find her once more under her father\u2019s\n roof, making ready to repair with Harry Valentine to St. Paul\u2019s Church;\n for she has promised to become his bride, and she cannot break her\n word. Yet at this the eleventh hour Elisha holds the first place in\n Martha\u2019s heart; she openly rejoices to hear that he escaped, and even\n twits her affianced husband for not having been able to catch Dolly\n Dumplings, whereupon Harry good-naturedly admits that not another steed\n in America could have cleared the Bronx at one leap.\n\n \u201c\u2019Twouldn\u2019t surprise me in the least,\u201d Martha said to herself, as they\n were about to set out for the village, \u201cif Elisha dashed up to the very\n church-door and carried me off a second time. But then,\u201d she added\n after a moment\u2019s reflection, \u201cit is not likely to happen; no, I must\n banish him from my heart as soon as possible and love Harry alone.\u201d\n Here she threw her eyes upon her betrothed and in all the lovely autumn\n landscape nothing was more lovely than those two faces as they met.\n\n But although Martha was struggling hard to conquer her greater love for\n Elisha, \u2019twas a difficult battle she was waging with herself.\n\n There are embers which will live and glow despite the ashes we heap\n over them; so even now, while her eyes were searching into Harry\u2019s\n eyes, while her smile was answering his smile, Martha\u2019s countenance\n fell anew and she recoiled from him. \u2019Twas at this very moment Popgun\u2019s\n voice cried out:\n\n \u201cDolly Dumplings\u2019s in sight!\u201d\n\n This startling announcement was more than Martha could bear without the\n deepest emotion. Quick she looked up the road; the astonished Uncle\n Pete and all the others did the same, while the girl stretched forth\n her hands to welcome the one who was approaching. Her heart was in her\n throat; every limb of her body quivered. On, on galloped the mare.\n\n In less than two minutes Dolly dashed into the midst of the party\n gathered in front of the Old Stone Jug. And what a spectacle did she\n present! She had no rider, and the red marks which stained the empty\n saddle were blood-marks! Oh! surely they were. The wild look, too, and\n the fierce neigh of poor Dolly told plainly enough that something\n horrible had occurred.\n\n It took Martha but an instant to decide what to do, and, breaking loose\n from Harry and her father, who were vainly striving to calm her, she\n sprang upon the saddle; then, turning to Harry Valentine with an\n expression pen cannot describe, \u201cMarry you!\u201d she cried. \u201cNo, not for\n the kingdom of England!\u201d And away she galloped.\n\n In a remote corner of the graveyard at East Chester is a tombstone with\n the following inscription carved upon it: \u201cHere lie the remains of\n Martha Van Alstyne, spinster, who departed this life in the year of\n grace 1838, aged 81.\u201d These few words tell the rest of our story.\n Martha, when she discovered that Elisha Williams had been killed, never\n married; and although no man knows Elisha\u2019s burial-place, his name is\n not forgotten, and the bridge which spans the Bronx River at the point\n where Dolly Dumplings made her wonderful leap is called Williams\n Bridge.\n\n As late as 1840 the ruins of the Old Stone Jug were visible on what is\n now known as Schieffelin\u2019s Lane; Rattlesnake Brook still flows on, but\n the rattlesnakes have long disappeared; and here and there stands an\n aged tree beneath whose shade Martha and Harry and Elisha used to play\n together in the days when George III. was king.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n BROTHER AND SISTER.\n\n\n Happy those turtle-doves that went, my Queen,\n With you to the temple\u2014tho\u2019 to death they went.\n Could they have known, they had been full content\n To give their little lives. And well I ween\n Your pitying hand caressed them; and, between\n The turns you took with Joseph (favored saint!)\n At carrying Jesus, you would soothe their plaint,\n And hold to your heart their bosoms\u2019 silver sheen.\n But cherish more my sister-dove and me:\n Carry _within_ your heart, and all the way,\n Our souls to the true Temple. Offered so,\n They cannot perish\u2014no, nor parted be:\n For He whom you presented on this day\n Whom you present His own must ever know.\n\n\n FEAST OF THE PURIFICATION, 1876.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n CHRISTIANITY AS AN HISTORICAL RELIGION.\n\n II.\n\n\n To know the true genius of Christianity is the same thing as to know\n the true destiny of man, and the actual order of Providence by which he\n is conducted to its fulfilment, through the state of his earthly\n probation. The true destiny of man is supernatural; his end is beyond\n the earth and the present life, which is the place and period of origin\n and transit only, where he has his point of departure, his impulse of\n direction, the beginning of the movement which is to draw a line of\n endless length on the absolute duration and absolute space of eternity\n and infinity. The actual order of Providence, within the infinitesimal\n limits of time and extension which bound man\u2019s earthly existence, is\n exclusively determined, as to its ultimate end, to this eternal and\n infinite sphere of being, where man shares with God, according to the\n mode and measure which is possible to his finite nature, the \u201ctotal,\n simultaneous, and perfect possession of interminable life.\u201d This is\n precisely what is meant by eternal salvation, final beatitude, union\n with God, and all other terms of similar import. Any temporal good, in\n comparison with this, is trivial. It cannot be an ultimate object of\n God\u2019s providence, and ought not to be regarded as an end by a rational\n man. These are the suppositions, the _pr\u00e6cognita_, from which all\n Christian philosophy must take its initial movement. Dr. Fisher\n enunciates, therefore, one of the axioms of Christianity when he says\n that in the design of the divine religion given by God to mankind, \u201cthe\n good offered is not science,\u201d or, as is evidently implied, any other\n temporal good, \u201cbut salvation.\u201d The original right to this salvation\n and to the means of attaining it having been forfeited in the fall and\n restored only through Christ, \u201cthe final cause of revelation is the\n recovery of men to communion with God\u2014that is, to true religion.\u201d As a\n consequence from this, \u201cwhatever knowledge is communicated\u201d\u2014and,\n equally, whatever other good is communicated for human perfection in\n this present state\u2014\u201cis tributary to this end\u201d (p. 3). The whole of\n human history before the Christian epoch, in general, and specifically\n the whole inspired history of patriarchal and Jud\u00e6an religion, being a\n record of events looking towards the coming of the Son of God to the\n earth, the learned professor proceeds logically in making the\n statements which follow:\n\n \u201cChristianity is the perfect form of religion. In other words,\n it is the absolute religion, ... the culminating point in the\n progress of revelation, fulfilling, or filling out to\n perfection, that which preceded.... In Jesus religion is\n actually realized in its perfection.... In Christ the\n revelation of God to and through man reaches its climax.... In\n Christianity the fundamental relations of God to the world are\n completely disclosed.... Through Christ the kingdom of God\n actually attains its universal character.\u201d[166]\n\n Many passages scattered throughout the entire work of Dr. Fisher\n repeat, confirm, or amplify these general statements of his fundamental\n conception of Christianity. Thus, he says that it \u201cproposed the\n unification of mankind through a spiritual bond\u201d (p. 42); that it\n brings God near \u201cto the apprehension, not of a coterie of philosophers\n merely, but of the humble and ignorant\u201d (p. 189); that it \u201cmade human\n brotherhood a reality\u201d (p. 190). \u201cFrom his first public appearance\n Jesus represented himself as the founder and head of a kingdom\u201d (p.\n 443), and this kingdom \u201cwas to be bound together by a moral and\n spiritual bond of union\u201d (p. 444). Moreover, \u201chis kingdom was to act\n upon the world, and to bring the world under its sway\u201d (p. 456); it was\n to \u201cleaven human society with its spirit, until the whole world should\n be created anew by its agency\u201d; \u201ca world-conquering and world-purifying\n influence,\u201d destined \u201cfor the accomplishment of a revolution, the\n grandest which it ever entered into the heart of man to conceive\u2014it\n being nothing less than the moral regeneration of mankind\u201d (_ibid._)\n\n The idea which lies at the foundation of all these statements is\n nothing else than that which St. Ignatius has made the basis of his\n _Spiritual Exercises_, and which is fully developed in the meditations\n on fundamental Christian principles which are placed at the beginning\n of the series for a retreat in books like the _Raccolta_ of Father\n Ciccolini. On these principles is founded the whole system of\n instructions given to ecclesiastics and religious during their\n retreats, by which they are formed for the sacerdotal or religious life\n or renovated in the spirit of their state. The very same form the basis\n of the sermons preached at the beginning of missions given to the\n faithful in churches, \u201cOn the End of Man,\u201d \u201cOn the Value of the Soul,\u201d\n \u201cOn the Necessity of Salvation.\u201d That man is the only being on the\n earth who is an end in himself, and that all other creatures, together\n with all arrangements of divine Providence respecting this world, are\n for him; that the chief and ultimate end of man is his eternal\n salvation, and that everything else is intended as a means for\n attaining this end; is the doctrine inculcated and preached in all\n Catholic spiritual books and in all sermons, in all theological\n treatises, and expositions of Catholic philosophy which profess to\n explain the fundamental relations of the natural to the supernatural\n order. Any other idea of Christianity than this is unworthy of its\n Author. It is a very low and childish view which represents the\n perfection of humanity in respect to the political, social, and\n intellectual spheres of the earthly and temporal order as the direct\n object of the mission and work of Christ in the world. _Pr\u00e6terit figura\n hujus mundi._ That which is transitory cannot be an ultimate end.\n\n There is nothing permanent and having an eternal value on the earth\n except the spiritual perfection of the human soul and whatever\n appertains to it or is inseparably connected with it. The regeneration\n and perfection of men in the spiritual and divine life is necessarily\n the only direct and primary object of the theandric work of Christ as\n the mediator between God and mankind. His kingdom is in the soul, his\n reign and conquests are in the spiritual realm. St. Augustine explains\n that difficult statement of St. Paul, that the Son will finally deliver\n up his kingdom to the Father, by means of this Scriptural conception of\n the nature of his kingdom. This kingdom is the multitude of the saved,\n the complete number of the elect, in whose glorification the special\n work of the Son as creator and redeemer reaches its consummation and\n attains its final end. The kingdom is delivered up when these souls, in\n whom the reign of Christ is perfectly and for ever established by grace\n and divine love, are united with the divine essence in the beatific\n vision. The initial and temporal conditions of the eternal kingdom of\n Christ, the kingdom of heaven, disappear, of course, in the fulfilment;\n as his human childhood, life, death, and resurrection were transient\n states or events, as the whole of human history is transient. In its\n initial state the kingdom of heaven on the earth is a preparation for\n its perfect state, which it contains in germ and principle, and with\n which it must necessarily have a similitude of nature. It is therefore\n only a truism to say that the kingdom of Christ is spiritual and its\n bond of unity spiritual. We may even say that the whole universe is a\n spiritual empire and its bond of unity spiritual. Physical beings, in\n the ontological order are metaphysical, and in the order of cognition\n are logical. All the transcendental predicates, which really express\n only phases of the same idea; being, unity, truth, and good; are, in an\n analogous sense, predicable of God and of everything which has or is\n capable of having existence. God is a spirit, and the ideal of all\n beings is in his intelligence. The [Greek: Logos] [Greek: endiathetos],\n in the bosom of the Father from eternity, and the [Greek: Logos]\n [Greek: prophorichos], uttering the creative word whose effect is in\n time, whose intelligible expression is in all creatures, are one\u2014the\n Word of God. There are material substances and forces, but their origin\n is spiritual; their essence and existence are the expression of\n thought; the space in which they move has its foundation in the essence\n of God; they are an adjunct of the spiritual world, and are\n subordinated to it with a view to the same end. There are temporal and\n contingent things, but their duration has a fixed relation to the\n absolute duration of God, and to his eternal, immutable decree and\n foreknowledge. Though some things are trivial and worthless by\n comparison with others, and every being is infinitely less than God,\n yet nothing is absolutely trivial or worthless, and every finite thing\n has infinite relations. Bodies are infinitely inferior to spirits, yet\n they are infinitely superior to nothing, and not only the grand bodies\n which express in magnitude and number an image of the immensity of God,\n but grains of sand and the minutest molecules, are terms of divine\n Omnipotence, and their being presupposes and imitates the being of God.\n God formed the body of the first man out of the dust of the earth\n before he breathed into him the living soul, and he will awaken all\n human bodies to an everlasting life from the dust of the universal tomb\n of humanity. The Word assumed not only a rational but also a corporeal\n nature into hypostatic union with the divinity in his own person, and\n arose bodily from the sepulchre to glorify matter as well as spirit,\n and make it a gem eternally lustrous and sparkling with divine\n splendor. God came to this small solar system, a mere point in the\n milky way, to this minute planet, to the insignificant country of\n Jud\u00e6a, to the little village of Bethlehem, to the narrow cave of the\n Nativity, to the humble cottage of Joseph and Mary, and was born and\n brought up the son of a humble maiden under the guardianship of an\n obscure artisan. The future and eternal kingdom of heaven with all its\n splendor, which was only made that it may serve as a reflection of the\n glory of the Incarnate Word, has its origin from these mere points in\n time and space. Things which, isolated and in their mere physical\n quantity, are almost nothing receive an infinite value through their\n relations. Nude first matter, apart from form, is, as St. Augustine\n says, \u201c_fere nihil_\u2014a being not-being.\u201d Yet it seems to be rigorously\n demonstrated that the active force of every material element is capable\n of attracting or repelling other elements in an infinite sphere of\n space around its centre. The visible universe, considered as having a\n mere isolated existence and motion in space and time, is not much,\n compared with even one finite spirit\u2014is _fere nihil_. The intellectual\n creation, considered as isolated within the bounds of nature, finite,\n actually existing only in one indivisible now of time, which by its\n gliding from a beginning point on an endless line never actually draws\n more than a line of finite duration, compared with the infinite\n possibility is not much more. All creation, even supposing that God\n continued to extend and multiply it for ever, could never become\n anything which would not be infinitely less than absolute space and\n duration. On the lower surface of things which faces the nothingness\n out of which they came they participate in not-being and resemble\n nothingness. In their negation and privation, they _are not_. On their\n upper surface which faces the being above them they participate with\n all being, even the highest. That which is lower touches by its highest\n point that which is lowest in the higher, and so from the bottom to the\n top. The physical universe has a sufficient reason of being in the\n intellectual universe, the intellectual in the spiritual, and the\n spiritual at its apex touches God by the union of the highest\n nature\u2014the created nature of the Word, with the uncreated, divine\n essence. The universe, notwithstanding its intrinsically finite and\n contingent being, receives thus a mode and order of relation to the\n infinite and eternal being, giving it a species of divinization which\n extends to its least and lowest parts. Therefore we say that the whole\n universe is a spiritual empire and its bond of unity spiritual.\n\n This world is a garden of God, set apart for the planting and growth of\n human souls. The garden of Eden, which God planted and beautified as\n the residence of the first parents of the human race, is a type of the\n ideal earth as it was conceived in the mind of God. The redemption, in\n its ideal form, is a work for the restoration of paradise on earth,\n under a modified condition suited to the fallen state of man, and in\n its actual results is an approximation to this idea. The growth of\n human souls in the regenerated and spiritual life is its end, and the\n only thing of absolute importance in the sight of God. The Creator\n himself came on the earth in human form expressly for the sake of\n fulfilling this divine intention of bringing souls to the completion of\n their growth in a perfect likeness to himself. It is needless to quote\n his own distinct and solemn affirmation of the value of the soul, and\n the worthlessness of the whole world beside, in comparison with its\n highest spiritual good. His great work in humanity may therefore be\n fitly summed up in the terse and succinct formula of \u201cmoral\n regeneration,\u201d provided that these terms are so defined as to give them\n an adequate extension and comprehension. The whole plan of God in\n creating the universe, and elevating it through the microcosmical being\n man by the Incarnation, must be kept in view; and the nature of the\n regeneration to be effected must be so understood as to justify the\n necessity of the stupendous and multiplied means employed by the divine\n wisdom in bringing it to actual accomplishment. The universe, and this\n little epitome of creation which is man\u2019s world, as well, is complex\n and composed of heterogeneous parts. The problem of man\u2019s destiny and\n of the end proposed in the plan of the divine creator and redeemer of\n human nature is, therefore, necessarily complex. If it is expressed in\n a ratio of simple terms, these terms must be virtually equivalent to a\n great number and a great variety, corresponding to the complex reality\n which they denote and signify. A simplification of our ideas which is\n not the result of a combination of all the elements that ought to enter\n into composition, but is produced by the suppression of some, is a work\n of destructive and not of constructive philosophy. If we interpret,\n therefore, that spiritual doctrine which we have laid down in the\n beginning of this argument too literally and exclusively, we make a\n misinterpretation of the sense of Holy Scripture and of the writings of\n the saints, and manufacture for ourselves a false and absurd doctrine.\n\n A philosophy which aims to give the spirit a complete riddance of\n matter, and of the whole world beside spiritual existence in its purest\n and most immediate relation to God, may arrogate the name of spiritual\n philosophy, but it is a counterfeit spiritualism. If God desired that\n we should get rid of matter, and had no other aim except to produce\n purely spiritual being in his own likeness and in participation with\n his own pure essence, he would never have created anything except\n spirit, and he would have made it at once in that state of perfection\n which he willed it to possess. If this perfection were limited to the\n order of pure nature, nothing more was requisite than to create a\n multitude of intellectual beings naturally endowed with the\n intelligence and felicity conformed to their essence. If they were to\n be elevated to supernatural perfection in the beatific vision of God,\n one act of divine power and love would suffice to place them at the\n first instant of their creation in the term of being, the ultimate\n perfection, the everlasting felicity in the possession of the sovereign\n good, to which they were destined. There is no necessity for probation,\n gradual progress, or any sort of conditions precedent, in order that\n created spirits may be made perfect in cognition and volition, either\n natural or supernatural, in any finite degree and grade of existence\n and beatitude which God may choose in his pure goodness to communicate.\n Still less is there any reason, on the hypothesis of such an end in\n creation as we suppose, for the existence of matter and corporeal\n beings. Matter and body cannot help purely intellectual beings to\n attain their proper intelligible object. The light of glory, and the\n direct illumination which gives the spirit an immediate intuitive\n vision of the divine essence, cannot be conjoined with any material,\n corporeal medium or organ. Why, then, did not God create angels only,\n and, if he desired to elevate creation to the hypostatic union with\n himself, assume the angelic nature? The only possible answer to this\n question is derived from the manifestation which God has made, through\n his works and through his word, that his plan of creation included\n something besides the natural and supernatural communication of glory\n and beatitude to created spirits. It was his will to create the\n corporeal, visible universe in connection and harmony with the\n invisible and spiritual world. It was his will to place man in the\n middle-point of all creation, and to give him a complex essence\n composed of rationality and animality, that he might unite in his\n substantial being the highest with the lowest\u2014_ima summis_. Moreover,\n the creating Word assumed this nature as microcosmical, that in\n humanity he might elevate the entire universe and bring it in his own\n person to its acme.\n\n Even this might have been accomplished instantaneously, without\n probation, without the long procession of second causes, without the\n efforts and the pain which the struggle toward the ultimate end has\n cost the creature, and to which the Incarnate Word subjected himself\n when he became _obediens usque ad mortem, mortem autem crucis_.\n\n Why the long process from the chaos at the beginning toward the\n consummation of the end which has not yet been attained? The only\n answer to this question which can possibly be given is that God chose\n to make the creature concur to its own glorification by the way of\n merit, and to bring the utmost possible effect out of created\n causality. This is the reason for the probation of the angels and of\n man; for the full scope given to free-will, notwithstanding the\n incidental evil which through this avenue has rushed in upon the fair\n creation of God; and for the choice of the most difficult and painful\n way of redemption and restoration through ineffable labors and\n sufferings.\n\n The regeneration of humanity must, therefore, take its character from\n the supernatural destiny of man, his complex nature, and the relations\n in which it places him to the complex plan of God which takes in all\n the parts of the universe, from the lowest to the highest, and gives\n the utmost possible play to the action of created causality. Its chief\n end is to prepare human souls, through the grace and fellowship of\n Christ, to share with the other sons of God, the holy angels, in the\n glory and beatitude of the Incarnate Word in the kingdom of heaven.\n Included in this end of beatification in God, which is essentially the\n same for all spiritual beings who attain it, are the distinctive grades\n of glory, gained through grace and personal merit, in an ascending\n scale from the souls of infants to the soul of Jesus Christ, by which\n the celestial firmament is decorated. This beatitude in the vision of\n God certainly does not exclude the secondary and natural beatitude\n arising from the knowledge and enjoyment of the creatures of God, and\n this must therefore be a secondary and subordinate end in the divine\n plan. Intellectual cognition and volition are not organic acts of human\n nature; and, therefore, if we believe in the bodily resurrection of our\n Lord and of the saints to a glorified corporeal life, we must admit the\n existence in the divine plan of some subordinate end, in view of which\n man was created as a composite being, and in view of which, also, the\n Word assumed the composite human nature, which is complete only by the\n union of the spiritual and material substances. The glorified body no\n doubt receives a reflected lustre from the glorification of the soul.\n But its glorified senses cannot be the organs of anything more than an\n elevated and sublimated sensitive cognition and enjoyment. The term of\n their action is the physical, visible creation to which human nature\n partially belongs; and therefore the final end of man is partially\n identified with the final cause for which the vast and everlasting\n visible universe was created. The Incarnate Word touches this visible,\n material realm of his creation by the bodily part of his human nature.\n The what and the wherefore of this almost infinite realm of nature we\n do not pretend to understand. It is certainly not a mere _jeu d\u2019esprit_\n of Omnipotence, a causeless or transitory spectacle to excite the\n babyish wonder of the human race not yet out of its nursery. It belongs\n to the great sphere of the divine plan, a segment of one of whose great\n circles is human history on this earthly planet. As we cannot\n demonstrate the problem of this sphere and its great circles, we cannot\n completely solve the problem of man\u2019s destiny on the earth. It is an\n enigma, a mystery. And, above all, the question _Cur Deus Homo_? the\n what and the wherefore of the Incarnation, is an enigma, a mystery for\n human reason, only obscurely manifested to faith. Christ in history,\n universal history as having its _mot d\u2019enigme_ in Christ, must\n consequently present to the believing and enlightened mind of the\n Christian student an object of investigation and thought which he\n cannot hope to understand and know adequately, much less to comprehend.\n Whatever we can know must be learned by the manifestation which God\n makes of his wise intentions through his word and his works, the\n instruction which he deigns to give us by experience, reason, and\n divine faith.\n\n For what is man being educated on the earth, and what did his Creator\n intend to bring him to when he came down in person, after a long series\n of precursors had prepared the way before him, to teach and to do that\n which could be entrusted to no mere creature, whether man or angel? The\n manifestation of Christ in the history of mankind on the earth will\n make known the answer to this question to all intelligent beings when\n this history is completed. But this will be only at the day of\n universal resurrection and final judgment. Until that day arrives there\n can only be a gradual and incomplete disclosure and justification of\n the ways of God to men, which are unsearchable and past finding out by\n human wisdom. The Eternal Word, who created all things, and directed\n all nations on the earth by his providence before he assumed human\n nature and died on the cross for their salvation, has not ceased, since\n his Incarnation, to carry on his work, or confined his care to a small\n number elected out of the mass of mankind. Nature has not been\n substantially or totally depraved by the fall, or become the property\n of Satan. The Incarnation is not a mere device and contrivance, to\n which God was forced to resort because he could not otherwise pardon\n the elect, and substitute for the eternal punishment which was due to\n them an eternal reward due to Christ, and transferred to them without\n any personal merit of congruity or condignity. The plan of God for\n salvation through Christ is not a mere segregation of a certain number\n of individuals from the world, that they may devote themselves\n exclusively to their sanctification by purely interior, spiritual\n acts\u2014waiting until death shall release their souls from a bodily\n existence which is a mere degradation, and a world which is utterly\n accursed and given over to the dominion of the devil. Such ideas are\n exaggerations and perversions of Christian doctrine. They necessarily\n provoked a reaction and revolt in the minds and hearts of men whenever\n they were taught; and there has been, consequently, a perpetual effort,\n among Protestants who were not willing to abandon Christianity\n altogether, to find some kind of rational religion which can plausibly\n assume to be the pure, original Christianity of Christ. But by\n eliminating or altering and diminishing the mysteries and supernatural\n elements of Christianity, they change its nature and reduce it to\n something so ordinary and commonplace that its divinity is lost. The\n ideal Christianity becomes a sort of peaceable, orderly, moral,\n well-educated society, in which as nearly as possible all men enjoy the\n comfortable and respectable mode of life belonging to the gentry of\n England, and the poorest class are as well off as the ordinary\n inhabitants of a pleasant, old-fashioned New England village. That\n there is something attractive about this picture we will not deny. But\n we cannot think that the production of a state of merely natural\n well-being in society, of commonplace human happiness, even supposing\n it founded upon religion, sanctified by piety, and tending toward a\n more perfect happiness in the future life, was the real, ultimate end\n which our Lord had in view when he founded the church. The old idea of\n a millennium which used to prevail among the Puritans of New England\n had something in it very beautiful; but it was only a beautiful dream,\n never destined to be realized in this world. The philosophical dream of\n a golden age, to be attained by progress in science, civilization,\n political and social reform, is still more futile. The doleful and\n terrible wail of the pessimist philosophers and poets of Germany, which\n begins to find an echo over all the civilized world, would be the\n outcry of a despair justified by the whole history of mankind, were it\n not for the light which faith casts across the gloom, and the solution\n of the dark enigma of life which is given by the cross on which Jesus\n died, exclaiming, \u201cMy God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?\u201d The\n drama of human history is grand and terrible and tragic. It has scenes\n and episodes which have a character of quiet, delightful, and joyous\n comedy, but it is a tragedy; it has been so from the first, and will be\n the same to the end. The Son of God came on the earth in the very\n crisis of human history, and his human life was a tragedy, ending in a\n sublime triumph, but a triumph won by sorrow, conflict, and conquest.\n All that was tragic in previous history culminated in him, and\n subsequent history can be nothing else than the last act of the tragedy\n hastening to the _d\u00e9no\u00fbment_, and preparing the way for the second\n coming of the Son of Man in the clouds of heaven, with great glory, to\n achieve his final triumph. The Apocalypse of St. John, in which all\n things that were to come to pass in the last age of the world passed\n before his entranced spirit in a series of sublime and awful pictures,\n shows that this horoscope is true. What for him was a vaticination is\n for us in great part a retrospect, by which it is historically\n verified, so far as the scroll of time has unrolled itself, and by\n which the similar character of that part which is still in prospect is\n surely foreboded.\n\n Christianity is an historical religion. It is the outcome of all\n previous history, and its inspired documents alone, in which the\n genealogy of its founder is traced back to Adam, and the record of the\n origin of the human race preserved, give us authentic history of the\n most important facts which underlie all the great events and movements\n of the world. This history connects the beginning of human destinies\n with the earlier and higher sphere, where the history of the\n intelligent creation begins\u2014with those great events, the trial of the\n angels, the rebellion of Lucifer, and the commencement of the warfare\n whose seat was transferred to the earth by the successful ruse of the\n serpent in the temptation of Eve. In the expulsion of our weeping\n parents from Eden into the outside world, humanity was led by a counter\n strategic movement upon the new battle-field, where Satan was to be\n vanquished in fair and open war. All the demons, reinforced by all the\n traitors and deserters they could gain from among men, were allowed to\n pit themselves against the sons of God and the holy angels, and against\n the First-begotten Son himself when he came in the infirmity of human\n nature, as the captain of salvation, to become perfect through\n sufferings and to lead his brethren by the same arduous road to glory.\n Redemption and salvation consist essentially in liberation from the\n servitude of Satan; victory in the combat against that mass of false\n maxims, evil principles, and wicked men called the world, those low and\n vicious propensities called the flesh, and the seducing spirits sent\n forth by Satan to draw men into his rebellion against God. Human\n society was organized under the law of redemption, in the family, in\n the social, and in the political community, in religious communion, in\n order to reconstruct fallen humanity; to repair the ruin effected by\n the devil; to oppose a barrier against his further aggressions; to\n consolidate a perpetual force of resistance and warfare against him;\n and to be the instrument of the Son of God, the creator and redeemer of\n mankind, in effecting the final subjugation of the rebellion\n inaugurated and carried on by Lucifer. The division of nations, the\n colonization of the earth, the foundation of states, of industry and\n commerce, of art and science, of culture and civilization, is a divine\n work. Everything good in humanity is from the Word, the predestined Son\n of Man. The Book of Wisdom says that it was the delight of the eternal\n wisdom to be with the sons of men, and the early Fathers dilate on what\n is expressed in the German word _Menschenfreundlichkeit_, better than\n in any equivalent English term, as an attribute of the Logos. That\n admirable sentiment of the Latin poet, _Homo sum, et nihil humani\n alienum a me puto_, may be most appropriately ascribed to the divine\n Person who joined the human nature to his uncreated essence in an\n indissoluble marriage. The devil is the author of nothing on the earth\n which has real being and life, but only of error and sin with their\n logical consequences\u2014that is, of intellectual and moral perversion, of\n ruin, decay, and death. His kingdom is a graveyard and a realm of\n darkness beneath it. The kingdom of the living is the kingdom of\n Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Life-giver, who proceeds\n from the Father through the Son. The power of Satan on the earth is\n gained by the invasion and treasonable surrender of the cities and\n fortresses founded by the rightful King of men, and consists in the\n influence which he usurps in the affairs of men, in the schism and\n heresy by which he breaks the unity of human brotherhood in Christ. The\n apostasy, the false religions, the corrupted ethics, the degenerate\n institutions of the old heathen world were schisms and heresies against\n the primitive revelation and the patriarchal unity of mankind in one\n true doctrine, worship, and discipline. The foundation of Judaism was a\n measure which the Lord adopted to oppose a bulwark against universal\n apostasy, to preserve the treasure of revelation and grace, and to\n prepare the way for a more perfect organization of the universal\n religion. Without abandoning the other nations, he concentrated his\n special providence upon Israel. And even here the history of his own\n special kingdom and peculiar people is altogether different from what\n our human reason and sentiments would expect and wish for, and\n especially so in reference to the epoch when the Messias appeared. We\n cannot understand it, unless we recognize the universal law pervading\n the divine plan, by which almost unlimited play is given to free-will;\n the conflict of the powers of good and evil permitted to run its\n course; victory and salvation are achieved by labor, combat, and\n suffering; the world and humanity are set apart as a battle-field,\n between the Son of God, with his brethren by adoption among angels and\n men, on one side, Lucifer, with his army of apostate angels and men, on\n the other\u2014a battle-field on which the everlasting destinies of the\n universe are decided for eternity.\n\n After this long and circuitous digression we may direct our attention\n now on the specific nature of Christianity as an historical religion,\n and consider what organization Jesus Christ gave redeemed humanity in\n the universal church, how he embodied the absolute, universal religion,\n what means he adopted for achieving the work of the moral regeneration\n and eternal salvation of mankind.\n\n The work undertaken by the Incarnate Word in person is evidently the\n continuation of that which he began through his ministering angels, his\n prophets, and his other human agents, and by far the most difficult and\n important part of the entire plan of God. Passing over his principal\n theandric work of redemption, we must affirm the same with equal\n emphasis and certainty of that which is supplementary to it, and by\n which it is extended to its term. In assuming human nature the Son of\n God assumed all its temporal and eternal relations; he grasped and drew\n into himself universal humanity and the whole creation. His first and\n direct object was the glorification and beatification of human souls in\n God, but his action toward this end drew into its current and impelled\n by its energy all things connected with and subordinate to this highest\n and purely spiritual sphere of his creative wisdom. The action of\n Christ in history after his resurrection is necessarily more complex,\n more far-reaching and universal, more manifest and immediate, more\n obviously dominant and victorious, more evidently bearing on the final\n and eternal consummation of the divine plan in the universe through the\n destinies of man and the earth, than it could have been before that\n glorious and decisive event. Christianity, as an historical religion,\n must have more comprehension in its actual development than in its\n inchoate state before Christ. While it remains true that it is\n characteristic of the pure and perfect religion taught by the mouth of\n its divine Author to lead men to an interior, spiritual life, to the\n contemplation and love of God, to a paramount desire and effort for the\n salvation of the soul, and to bring this way of union with God in\n loving, spiritual brotherhood among men down to the level of the lowly\n and the poor in all natural goods, this idea does not require an\n exclusion of other and different aspects of the same religion. The\n specific good proposed and placed within reach is salvation, and not\n science, art, civilization, political order, social well-being,\n national development, the natural progress of mankind, the production\n of a brilliant series of great men, extraordinary works and events in\n the temporal order. The empires and cities, the grand monuments, the\n intellectual masterpieces, the entire array of results produced by\n human activity, and all the splendor and felicity of the men who in\n outward seeming are the most favored and fortunate, are transient; they\n return to the nothingness from which they came. Nevertheless, they may\n be made tributary to something higher and more durable, and what is\n substantial and indestructible in and under these evanescent forms may\n survive and reappear, like the mortal part of human nature, by a future\n resurrection. There is no reason, therefore, why Christ, the Incarnate\n Word, in effecting the regeneration of the human race by means and\n instruments which are natural and human, yet not purely natural and\n human, or standing alone in their nude and finite essence, should not\n take hold of all human things and relations and subject them to his own\n special service. There is no reason why he should not have secondary\n and subordinate ends indirectly connected with his one principal and\n ultimate object. There is no reason why Christianity, though not\n identified with and merged in human affairs, should not be in intimate\n relations with them all. In fact, there is every kind of reason to the\n contrary, and as an historical religion it cannot be regarded in any\n other light. It must be in continuity with its own past on the same\n lines. The same constructive principles must pervade religion in all\n ages. The same law of curvature must be verified in every segment of\n the circle, and all the diameters must be equal. Unity is essential to\n universality. The superior courses of stone in the building must\n correspond to the inferior, and rest upon them and upon the foundation.\n Christianity as an historical religion must be of equal dimensions and\n similar structure to the substratum furnished by the pre-Christian\n universal history, where, so to speak, its sub-cellar, crypts, and\n basement are covered, and in great measure buried in inexplorable\n obscurity, beneath the walls of its colossal architecture.\n\n When we consider Christianity as a religion in the precise and\n restricted sense, and the church as a strictly religious society, we\n cannot identify the Christian Church and religion so completely with\n Christianity in the wider sense as to confound the central nucleus with\n its environment and atmosphere. We must distinguish, accurately and\n carefully, those things which are really distinct, though not disunited\n and separate from one another. Religion is well defined by Mr.\n Baring-Gould as consisting essentially in dogma, worship, and\n discipline. The church is its organic embodiment. The absolute and\n universal religion must of course throw off what was proper only to a\n state of inchoate and imperfect development, and the church must be\n freed from what was proper only to a partial and national organic\n constitution. This is a doctrinal certitude with an actual verification\n in history. It is needless to prove that our Lord never thought of\n making Christianity a mere extension of Judaism, and of founding a\n universal kingdom which should be an enlargement, co-extensive with the\n world, of David\u2019s monarchy, with the institutes of Moses and the\n religious ceremonial of Solomon\u2019s temple as the model of its civil and\n ecclesiastical polity and its ritual of worship. It is equally\n unnecessary to prove that the divine Master thought as little of going\n back to the more ancient and simple dispensation of patriarchal\n religion. This would have been a regression instead of a progression; a\n dwindling and dwarfing of humanity into a second infancy instead of its\n expansion into adult proportions, similar to the absurd imagination of\n Nicodemus in respect to the process of regeneration. The absolute,\n universal religion, by virtue of the law of continuity in growth, must\n necessarily retain all that which pertained to the essence and\n properties of religion as such\u2014that is, of religion generically and\n specifically considered in respect to human nature in a state of\n probation; a lapsed condition; and in the way of restoration, through\n the redemption with its law of grace, as revealed by God from the\n beginning. All pertaining to its integrity and to its accidents, in so\n far as any such appurtenance is suited to human nature in all ages and\n nations\u2014giving greater perfection, adaptation to its end, and power in\n its operation to religion\u2014must also be considered as permanent for a\n sufficient reason, viz., that its cause and motive are general and\n persistent, though it may undergo modification and be subject to\n variation. Natural religion is preserved in revealed religion, the\n patriarchal in the Mosaic, and all these in the Christian religion.\n Precisely how much has been preserved, how much modified or altered,\n and in what way, how much dropped as obsolete in Christianity\n considered as an historical religion, must be determined historically.\n We know, however, before we examine the historical documents of\n Christianity, that, unless God manifests in his actual providence a\n determination to derogate from constant and general laws by introducing\n an entirely miraculous dispensation, we shall surely find in historical\n Christianity certain features absolutely requisite in a human religion.\n There are such features or characteristics which in their generic ratio\n are known with certainty, prescinding from any information given by the\n actual, objective manifestation which Christianity presents in its\n history. It must be adapted to human nature\u2014that is, it must be a\n religion suitable to a being who is not a pure spirit, or one united to\n a body by accidental, extrinsic, and temporary relations, but who is\n composed of soul and body in his specific and permanent essence. It\n must be adapted to the conditions in which human nature exists in its\n earthly stage of progress toward perfection\u2014that is, suitable to men\n who are in multifarious relations with one another in the family, in\n society, in the state; relations both amicable and hostile, relations\n of similarity and of opposition, relations of great complexity and\n variability. It must be adapted to the character of the divine Person\n from whom it proceeds; as the Son of God and the Son of Man, united\n with the Father in one essence by the Holy Spirit; hypostatically\n united within his proper personality subsisting in two distinct\n natures, by the same Spirit; sanctified in soul and body by this\n life-giving Spirit; and by the same Spirit sanctifying, and uniting in\n himself to the Godhead, redeemed humanity. It must be adapted to the\n temporal and eternal end for which it is intended\u2014that is, suitable for\n the instruction, sanctification, unification, temporal and eternal\n salvation of all mankind, in all nations and ages; for the work of\n regeneration, individual, social, political, intellectual, moral, and\n physical, as an absolute, universal, world-conquering power.\n\n In order to meet these requisitions, its spirit and body must be\n essentially and indissolubly united; it must be organized in a perfect\n and unequal society of universal extension, sovereign independence,\n complex and irresistible forces. It must have both divine and human\n attributes, and be vivified by the divine Spirit. It must be\n inseparably united with its head and throughout its members,\n indefectible, immutable, and endowed with the plenitude of graces,\n gifts, and powers merited by Jesus Christ for mankind and sufficient\n for the production of the highest degrees of human virtue in the\n greatest possible variety. It must be supreme, and have all things\n subordinated to its own end, controlled by its influence, subservient\n to its purposes as instrumentalities of its dynamical action.\n\n As the absolute world-religion, its dogma, worship, and discipline must\n vastly transcend the initial revelation, elementary ritual, and\n prop\u00e6deutic order of Judaism. There is a kind of foreshadowing of all\n these features of the kingdom of Christ in universal history, and there\n are abundant types and prophecies of it in the history and inspired\n documents of the patriarchal and Judaic dispensations. We need only to\n confront the idea of Christianity, derived _\u00e0 priori_ from the\n consideration of the plan of God manifested in his works and word\n before the time of Christ, with the actual, historical Christianity, in\n order to give this idea distinctness, and to add the last complement of\n certitude to our judgment that it truly represents the reality.\n Wherever we find existing as a concrete, historical fact that which\n realizes in the fullest and the highest sense the predictions of the\n prophets; that which fulfils in the most perfect manner the\n anticipations of history; that which is the most worthy of the\n stupendous miracles culminating in the resurrection; that which\n corresponds in magnitude and grandeur to all the great works of God;\n that which gives the most sublime significance to the destiny of man;\n that which magnifies in the most wonderful way the power and love of\n God and the object of the Incarnation\u2014there we behold, with all the\n evidence which moral demonstration can furnish, the genuine, absolute\n religion, manifest before our eyes as historical Christianity. Facts\n interpret prophecy, confirm and consolidate the conclusions of reason,\n determine the sense of much that is ambiguous in the disclosures of\n revelation. The test of history is therefore safe and conclusive in\n respect to the genuine essence and nature of Christianity.\n\n The application of this test shows that Catholic Christianity, which\n alone can claim unbroken, unaltered historical continuity and\n universality from the apostolic age, is the genuine and absolute\n religion of Christ. Any other species is unknown to history as an\n historical religion. The Catholic faith, worship, and discipline\n manifest themselves in the church of apostolic succession at the\n earliest period in which this church is clearly and distinctly visible\n through the medium of historical testimony. There is no resource for\n those who call in question the identity of Nicene Christianity with the\n apostolic religion, except in the obscurity of the century immediately\n following the death of St. John, and in the indistinct, incomplete,\n and, as considered separately from the traditional supplement and\n commentary, partly ambiguous records, allusions, and testimonies, in\n respect to some parts of Christian doctrine, worship, and discipline,\n of the New Testament. The nobler class of modern Protestant writers\n admit in a general sense the historical continuity of the essence of\n Christianity in the Catholic Church, placing their own restrictions on\n the definition of that which is essential as distinguished from the\n non-essential, as well as from abnormal modifications. Those who are\n not of the semi-Catholic school are obliged to seek for some tenable\n ground on which to maintain their claim of fellowship in essentials\n with the universal church, in a theory of transition from apostolical\n to ecclesiastical Christianity during the period lying between the\n close of the first and the end of the second centuries. The hinge of\n the question is the institution of the episcopate, as a distinct and\n superior grade of the Christian presbyterate, with hierarchical\n authority. We do not propose to discuss the proofs from Scripture and\n the most ancient historical records of the apostolic institution of the\n episcopate, and of what is called the apostolic succession of bishops,\n as a principal and immutable part of organic Christianity. This\n controversy has been exhausted by the able writers of the high-church\n school. Professor Fisher presents but little in addition to what has\n been urged by the advocates of parity, and fully answered in several\n works easily accessible to English readers, though his manner of\n presenting his case is such as to make the most of it, and shows both\n critical ability and a candid spirit. A rejoinder ought to be minute\n and critical like the argument itself. As we have not at present time\n and space for this, we prefer to pass it over altogether. Our line of\n argument leads us to consider some deeper and more universal and at the\n same time more obvious and easily apprehended principles of bringing\n the Catholic and Protestant theories of Christianity to an historical\n issue.\n\n The essential nature of Christianity as represented by one of these\n theories is specifically different from what it is as represented by\n the other. According to the latter theory, the essence of the Christian\n religion is something exclusively spiritual and individual. The\n exterior organization is not in vital and substantial unity with it,\n but is an habiliment, an extrinsic instrument, a vehicle, or a separate\n medium. One who considers that faith, the way of salvation, spiritual\n union with God in Christ, are in a separate and independent sphere,\n very naturally and logically considers that questions of ecclesiastical\n organization and government are of inferior moment; that symbols of\n doctrine, forms of worship, and modes of discipline are not matters of\n perpetual and universal obligation as founded on divine right and law.\n Such a question as that of episcopacy must, therefore, appear to him as\n among the non-essentials; and even supposing that he admits the\n certainty or probability that it is the apostolic form, he will see no\n reason why it should be necessary to the being of the church, or even\n to its well-being, or why Christians should be divided in fellowship on\n account of matters merely belonging to exterior order and indifferent\n forms.\n\n According to the former theory, the spiritual and corporeal parts,\n religion and the church, are after the model of human nature and the\n Incarnation, in vital, essential, and perpetual unity. The church is\n the way of salvation, the body of Christ vivified by his Spirit, the\n medium of union with God. Christianity is a sacramental religion. The\n episcopal order has been established and consecrated by Jesus Christ to\n possess and transmit the plenitude of sacerdotal grace and power\n received from him as a gift; to preserve and transmit the faith,\n sacramental grace, the pure oblation of Christian worship, the\n discipline of the New Law in Catholic unity.\n\n A Christianity of the first species, loosely organized in an imperfect\n society, could never have been transmuted into the second species. The\n specific Catholic Christianity, hierarchical, dogmatic, sacramental,\n liturgical, is the historical Christianity of the period of the first\n six \u0153cumenical councils, and appears at the Council of Nice, in the\n person of the great Athanasius, in all parts of the earth, in all the\n saints and doctors, in all writings and all monuments, pointing\n backward to the past, the era of martyrdom, the period of foundation\n and of apostolic labor, as the origin and source of its doctrine,\n discipline, and worship. A transmutation of species in Christianity\n like that which the Protestant theory supposes is rationally\n impossible. There is the additional impossibility to be taken into\n account of such a great and universal change having occurred without\n leaving its records and traces in history. Christianity is an\n historical religion, and the historical Christianity is identical with\n Catholicity. It is the absolute and universal religion which has\n manifested itself as a work which only divine power could have\n produced, in the history of the past; in present history it is showing\n before our eyes its supernatural and divine character; and the\n fulfilment of its end in the final consummation and triumph of the\n kingdom of Christ will finish the last chapter of the Revelation of\n Christ in History.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n \u201cTHERE WAS NO ROOM FOR THEM IN THE INN.\u201d\n\n\n Foot-sore and weary, Mary tried\n Some rest to seek, but was denied.\n \u201cThere is no room,\u201d the blind ones cried.\n\n Meekly the Virgin turned away,\n No voice entreating her to stay;\n There was no room for God that day.\n\n No room for her round whose tired feet\n Angels are bowed in transport sweet,\n The Mother of their God to greet.\n\n No room for Him in whose small hand\n The troubled sea and mighty land\n Lie cradled like a grain of sand.\n\n No room, O Babe divine! for thee\n That Christmas night; and even we\n Dare shut our hearts and turn the key.\n\n In vain thy pleading baby cry\n Strikes our deaf souls; we pass thee by,\n Unsheltered \u2018neath the wintry sky.\n\n No room for God! O Christ! that we\n Should bar our doors, nor ever see\n Our Saviour waiting patiently.\n\n Fling wide the doors! Dear Christ, turn back!\n The ashes on my hearth lie black\u2014\n Of light and warmth a total lack.\n\n How can I bid thee enter here\n Amid the desolation drear\n Of lukewarm love and craven fear?\n\n What bleaker shelter can there be\n Than my cold heart\u2019s tepidity\u2014\n Chill, wind-tossed, as the winter sea?\n\n Dear Lord, I shrink from thy pure eye,\n No home to offer thee have I;\n Yet in thy mercy pass not by.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE HOME-RULE CANDIDATE.\n\n _A STORY OF \u201cNEW IRELAND.\u201d_\n\n BY THE AUTHOR OF \u201cTHE LITTLE CHAPEL AT MONAMULLIN,\u201d \u201cTHE ROMANCE OF A\n PORTMANTEAU,\u201d ETC., ETC.\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\n A NEW IRELANDER.\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019m afraid your shooting party is spoiled,\u201d said my mother, handing me\n a letter across the breakfast-table in the well-known hieroglyphics of\n my Uncle Jimmy.\n\n \u201cI should hope not,\u201d I retorted, as the expedition in question had been\n looked forward to with considerable pleasure, on account of Harry\n Welstone, my old chum at the Catholic University, having announced his\n intention of \u201cturning the head of his dromedary to the desert of\n Kilkenley,\u201d the name of my ancestral seat, in the snug morning-room of\n which my mother and myself were discussing cream, tea, new-laid eggs,\n and crisp rashers.\n\n My Uncle Jimmy\u2019s note, addressed to my mother, his only sister, ran\n thus:\n\n \u201cUNITED SERVICE CLUB,\n \u201cLONDON, Sept. 10.\n\n \u201cMY DEAR SUSEY: My old and valued friend, Mr. Fribscombe\n Hawthorne, the member for Doodleshire, is most anxious to treat\n Ireland fairly on the Home-Rule question. He is well disposed\n towards the Green Isle, and the country cannot afford to lose\n an ally in this crisis. Freddy [myself], although no\n politician, manages his tenants exceedingly well, and I should\n like Hawthorne to learn that at least one Irish landlord can\n live upon his estate without fear of bullet or bludgeon.\n Hawthorne leaves to-night, and will stop at the Shelborne\n Hotel, Dublin. Tell Freddy to drop him a line, asking him to\n put up at Kilkenley, and to give him some of that Sneyd and\n Barton claret which I love, not wisely but too well. My enemy\n is at work on my big toe, but I hope to be with you as usual at\n Christmas. The grouse were capital, fat and large, and I am on\n the look-out for partridge. Your affectionate brother,\n\n \u201cJIMMY L\u2019ESTRANGE.\u201d\n\n \u201cP.S. I forgot to mention that Hawthorne\u2019s daughter accompanies\n him; you had better enclose a note to her.\n\n \u201cJ. L\u2019E.\u201d\n\n \u201c_Con_found it!\u201d I cried, \u201cit\u2019s really too bad of Uncle Jimmy to saddle\n us with some dried-up statistician and his mummy daughter. You must\n write to him, _madre mia_, saying that I am at Derravanagh and beyond\n reach of post and wire.\u201d\n\n \u201cIf your uncle wasn\u2019t very anxious about this he would never write so\n urgently; and don\u2019t you think a little sacrifice is due to him?\u201d\n\n My mother was in the right. A moment\u2019s reflection told me that my\n uncle\u2019s letter was as forcible as an act of Parliament.\n\n \u201cBesides,\u201d added my mother, with a cheery smile like a ray of sunshine,\n \u201cthis Mr. Hawthorne may be a sportsman and enjoy the shooting as keenly\n as Harry Welstone or yourself.\u201d\n\n My uncle was, or I should say is\u2014for while I write he is enjoying a\n pipe in the company of Barney Corcoran, who stands to him in the same\n capacity as did Corporal Trim to \u201cMy Uncle Toby\u201d\u2014as thorough a\n gentleman as ever saw the light of day. Simple, unassuming, loyal,\n generous, brave, he actually refused the recommendation for the\n Victoria Cross, in order that a fair-haired boy, whose very soul was\n set upon its possession, might receive the decoration. Pure-minded and\n good, he is at once, as Bayard, _sans peur et sans reproche_.\n\n Jimmy entered the army in the year 1847, roving about with his regiment\n from clime to clime with a superb indifference as to change of scene,\n but with a fervid determination to remain with the gallant\n Thirty-third; and it was only when the Crimean war-cloud loomed\n overhead that he resolved upon quitting the old corps for one under\n orders for the East. One-half of the fighting Thirty-third volunteered\n with him, and the great redoubt at the Alma is steeped in the blood of\n many a gallant fellow who chose to follow the fortunes of Jimmy\n L\u2019Estrange.\n\n Jimmy was badly hit at Inkerman, and was sent home invalided, to be\n nursed by my mother. In a few months, however, he returned to the seat\n of war, only to be knocked over at the taking of the Redan, which he\n entered side by side with the dashing Tom Esmonde, where, in addition\n to a bayonet thrust in the chest, he was made the depositary of a\n bullet in the right leg. This bullet, clumsily extracted by an\n unskilful surgeon, constitutes the only decoration my uncle deigns to\n wear, and he carries it suspended from the steel chain attached to a\n huge gold watch formerly in possession of his great-grandfather, to\n whom King James presented it ere he rode from the disastrous\n battle-field of the Boyne.\n\n Jimmy has eight thousand pounds lent out at four per cent., and lives\n like a nabob at his London club\u2014reading the _Army and Navy Gazette_ all\n the morning, gossiping with his former companions-in-arms during the\n afternoon, sunning himself in the park until dinner-time, and playing\n shilling whist up to his wonted hour for turning in for the night. He\n spends three months in every year at Kilkenley, during which, by a\n judicious course of open air, early hours, plain food, and \u201834 claret,\n he is enabled to undertake the London campaign with renewed vigor and\n vitality.\n\n Visions of a crabbed, hard-headed, hard-fact, singularly uninteresting\n Englishman crossed my mind as I helplessly gazed at my uncle\u2019s\n epistle\u2014of mornings spent in debating the question of Home Rule\n _versus_ Imperial legislation; of days engaged in quoting acts of\n Parliament and compiling statistics; of evenings behind the horror of a\n white choker, passed in dissecting and arranging these statistics,\n converting figures into facts, and facts into figures\u2014this dreary\n drudgery instead of the delectable society of the bright, happy, and\n joyous Harry Welstone, of mornings on the hillside, of days in the\n turnip-fields looking for the identical partridge of which my uncle had\n made honorable mention in his letter, of evenings whirled through in\n chatting over old times and old associations. What cared I for Mr. Butt\n or Home Rule, the land question, fixity of tenure, tenant right, and\n such bother? If my tenants required time to pay the rent, they got it.\n If they required help toward fencing, draining, top-dressing, or\n thatching, they got it. If they were twelve months in arrear, they came\n to my mother to plead for them; if over that period, they invariably\n waited for the annual visit of my Uncle Jimmy, in order to utilize him\n as ambassador; and my private opinion is, that upon one occasion, in\n order to keep up the credit of a family distantly related to his valet,\n Barney Corcoran, he paid the rent himself. I dare not hint at such a\n thing, but I feel thoroughly assured that the money came out of his own\n pocket. In the end, however, things generally came right, and delay in\n this case did not prove dangerous.\n\n I read my uncle\u2019s epistle twice, confounded him once, and contented\n myself by showering mild maledictions upon the heads of his English\n friends with a fervor that bore witness to my feelings of chagrin and\n disappointment.\n\n The letters were duly written to Mr. and Miss Hawthorne and forwarded\n to the Shelborne.\n\n \u201cAn\u2019 yez are not goin\u2019 to Derravanagh?\u201d asked Ned Clancy, my\n game-keeper, in tones betraying the deepest dejection\u2014\u201cafther all me\n thrubble wud the birds, an\u2019 the dogs blue-mowlded for a set. Begorra, I\n dunno what I\u2019ll do wud the poor bastes. I tould thim we wor aff in the\n mornin\u2019, an\u2019 now be me song it\u2019s at home they\u2019ll have for to stay an\u2019\n set gruel.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m sorry to say I can\u2019t go, Ned, as I expect an English gentleman and\n his daughter to visit us\u201d; and, wishing to impress him with their\n importance, added: \u201cHe is a member of Parliament, and is coming over to\n study the Home-Rule question.\u201d\n\n My _addendum_ failed to produce the desired effect.\n\n \u201cAn\u2019 much he\u2019ll larn here,\u201d observed Clancy with a toss of his head.\n \u201cAv he axes the quollity for information, sorra an information they\n have for to give him; an\u2019 if he axes the poorer soart, they\u2019ll only cod\n him, bad cess to him!\u201d\n\n Ned Clancy was even more fatally \u201csold\u201d than I by the postponement of\n our visit to Derravanagh; for a certain blue-eyed colleen, the daughter\n of a \u201cwarm\u201d farmer living close to the shooting-lodge, had succeeded in\n stirring tender emotions in the region lying beneath Mr. Clancy\u2019s\n waistcoat on the left side, which, while productive of joy, were\n equally productive of pain, since the sunshine of her presence was\n unhappily counterbalanced by the very prolonged shadow of her absence.\n Forty miles lay between him and the object of his admiration; and\n although there are but seventy thousand four hundred yards in forty\n miles, still it is a long road for a gentleman to travel, unless he is\n pretty certain of his welcome, and as yet Ned Clancy had \u201cnever told\n his love.\u201d\n\n \u201cMebbe yer honor wud like for to show this English gintleman the\n counthry; an\u2019 shure, in regard to scenery, there\u2019s no batin\u2019\n Derrynacushla all the ways be Derravanagh. Sorra a finer sight nor the\n view from Ballyknocksheelin hill; it flogs Rooshia, Ashia, an\u2019\n Africa\u2014so Misther Corcoran, yer uncle\u2019s boy, tould me; an\u2019 shure he\n ought for to know, be raisin\u2019 av his havin\u2019 travelled all the world,\n likewise Arabia.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m afraid it\u2019s a little too far, Ned.\u201d\n\n \u201cFar!\u201d he contemptuously ejaculated\u2014\u201ca few dirty mile, an\u2019 the horses\n atin\u2019 their heds aff. Lily av the Valley darted through her stall this\n mornin\u2019, an\u2019 it tuk me an\u2019 a cupple more for to hould Primrose.\u201d\n\n This was special pleading with a vengeance.\n\n \u201cMebbe the gintleman wud take a gun. Give him a lind av Miss Blake,\n sir. She goes aff soft an\u2019 aisy, an\u2019 wudn\u2019t rub the dew aff th\u2019 eyebrow\n av a grasshopper. Blur an\u2019 ages, Masther Fred! for th\u2019 honor av ould\n Ireland give him a shot. The birds is as thick as hayves, an\u2019 he cudn\u2019t\n miss thim no more nor a haystack; an\u2019 shure,\u201d he added, \u201canything _he_\n misses I\u2019ll be on the luk out for, so betune us we\u2019ll make it soft\n anyhow.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s not to be done, Ned; besides, Miss Hawthorne accompanies her\n father, and she possibly would not like to separate from him.\u201d\n\n \u201cBad cess to thim for wimmen!\u201d he muttered, as he tossed the gun across\n his shoulders; \u201cthey spile everything. I wish they wor niver invinted.\u201d\n\n In the course of post two very polite letters reached us, one addressed\n to my mother from Miss Hawthorne, the other to myself from the M.P.,\n accepting the invitation and stating that the writer would leave Dublin\n by the one o\u2019clock train upon the following day, reaching Ballyvoreen\n station at 5.30.\n\n The letters were excellently well written, both as regards style and\n caligraphy, especially that of the lady, whom I now felt assured must\n be a distinguished member of the Social Science or of the British\n Association.\n\n \u201cThey will be here to-morrow, mother. How on earth are we to amuse\n them? We are in for it now, and must do our best to make their visit\n agreeable. I know little, and care less, about Home Rule, so I\u2019ll hand\n Mr. Hawthorne over to Myles Casey, of Loftus Park, who opposed our\n present member. Father O\u2019Dowd, too, will give this base, bloody, and\n brutal Saxon enough to think about for a dozen sessions of Parliament.\n I\u2019ll do _my_ part like a man.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe must give a dinner-party,\u201d said my mother with a weary sigh,\n visions of unpacking the family plate, which had not seen the light of\n day since my poor father\u2019s death, floating across her mind\u2019s eye. \u201cI\n can drive Miss Hawthorne about the country and pay visits.\u201d\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t trouble yourself about her, mother. She\u2019ll be able to amuse\n herself. Show her the old quarry at Rathnamon, and she can geologize\n until she\u2019s black in the face. Or bring her to Carrignageena, and\n she\u2019ll find ferns to bother her; and if she\u2019s a dab at antiquities, the\n old church at Bohernacapple ought to put her on the treadmill for a\n week. There is one tombstone there that has bewildered Sir William\n Wilde and the entire Royal Irish Academy.\u201d\n\n \u201cShe may be interested in the Home-Rule question,\u201d suggested my mother\n with a smile, adding: \u201cAnd perhaps political economy is her _forte_.\u201d\n\n \u201cIn that case I\u2019ll hand her over to Harry Welstone. He can talk Adam\n Smith, Martin Tupper, and Stuart Mill. He can enlighten her on the land\n question as well as A. M. Sullivan or Mitchel Henry; and he _shall_ do\n it as sure as my name is Frederick Fitzgerald Ormonde. Besides, he can\n imitate Gladstone, Bright, Toole, Mathews, and Buckstone. He\u2019s just the\n sort of fellow to encounter this antediluvian female, and, if such a\n thing were within the realms of possibility, metamorphose her.\u201d\n\n Visitors to a country house, should the entertainers be not in the\n habit of receiving company, are about the severest penances that can by\n any possibility be inflicted. Everything requires to be turned\n topsy-turvy for them\u2014beds, bedrooms, furniture, carpets, \u201cfixins\u2019\u201d of\n every description. The cellar must be overhauled and confidential\n conferences held with the cook. The \u201ctrap\u201d used for knocking about the\n roads and attending markets and fairs must be shoved aside, and the\n family coach put into formidable requisition. The horses must be\n clipped, while the harness is found to be defective and a new whip an\n absolute necessity. The very door-mats suggest renovation.\n\n As regards Harry Welstone, his room and his tub were always ready. I\n would have felt no hesitation in quartering him on the house-top, and\n the only preparation I went in for with reference to his visit was a\n scrupulous overhauling of the billiard-table. Having no person to\n practise with except Martin Heaviside of the Grove, or Captain O\u2019Reilly\n of the Connaught Rangers when home on leave, the cushions became more\n like bags of sand than those springy, elastic walls from which the pale\n white or the blushing red ball bounds gaily towards the coquettish\n pocket or the artfully-arranged collision of the carrom. With the aid\n of Ned Clancy\u2014who, in addition to being game-keeper, was a sort of\n Jack-of-all-trades\u2014and the usual _formul\u00e6_, I succeeded in imparting\n the necessary tone to the table, and was satisfied that Harry would\n scarcely fail to appreciate the utility of the preparations.\n\n I felt no anxiety whatever to \u201cshow off\u201d to the English member of\n Parliament, while I honestly confess to a burning desire to appear the\n \u201ccorrect thing\u201d in the eyes of my old college chum; and while I ordered\n a homely vehicle called the shandradan\u2014half pilentum, half brougham,\n very old, very rickety, and very seedy\u2014to meet Mr. and Miss Hawthorne\n upon the following day, I turned out my own dog-cart, built by Bates,\n of Gorey\u2014stained ash, brass-boxed wheels, brass-mounted harness,\n \u2018possum rug, with Lily of the Valley and Primrose tandem\u2014in order to\n bowl Harry Welstone from Ballyvoreen station to the lodge gate, nine\n miles, in the forty minutes.\n\n In accordance with preconcerted arrangement, I met Harry, hugged him,\n whacked him on the back, refreshed him from my flask, rolled him in the\n \u2018possum rug as though the mercury were in the tens below zero, and\n almost yelled with pleasure the entire way back.\n\n Is any meeting equal to the meeting of old school-fellows?\n\n _Ay de mi!_ no.\n\n He had grown much stouter and much handsomer. His eyes were more\n romantically dark, and his black moustache, which I recollected so well\n in its struggling tooth-brush infancy, was now pointed after the\n fashion of the third Napoleon.\n\n After he had received a cordial welcome from my mother I dragged him up\n to his room, and there we sat talking over Jim Cooper, that went to the\n diggings, and Bobby Thyne, now a leader at the Indian bar, and Tom\n O\u2019Brien, who was a Jesuit, and Phil Dempsey, whose last speech on\n circuit had elicited the warm encomiums of Mr. Justice Fitzgerald; of\n the Corbet girls, and the Walshs\u2019 picnic at the Dargle, when Harry fell\n overhead into the river in a chivalrous endeavor to pluck a maiden-hair\n fern for Miss Walsh, and a host of similar delightful _souvenirs_,\n until the dinner-bell rang.\n\n \u201cHarry, my old bird, what will you dip your beak into\u2014claret or the\n ding-dong?\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, I stand by the solid liquor, Fred, but the pace is too heavy.\u201d\n\n Over our punch we resumed the conversation on the olden, golden time.\n Ah! how weary, as we approach the end, to look back at the milestones\n we have passed on our journey. Why did we tarry here, why not have\n rested there, why not have halted for good and aye? With us it was\n _couleur de rose_. We had no shadows to sadden memory. Our gossip was\n of our college days, when life was on the spring and every nerve braced\n for the forthcoming struggle. We talked late into the night,\n disregarding dove-like messages from the ark announcing coffee.\n\n The next day Harry went on a ferreting expedition with Ned Clancy, and\n my mother was too deeply immersed in household affairs to be enabled to\n take my place and go to meet our expected guests; so, with feelings of\n no very amiable description, I threw myself, all untidy and ill-dressed\n as I was, into the shandradan, and jingled the nine miles to\n Ballyvoreen behind as sorry a pair of nags as ever ploughed a nine-acre\n field.\n\n I had to wait at the station, as _of course_ the train was\n five-and-twenty minutes late, and I was seriously hoping that some\n untoward accident had occurred which would retard its progress for\n four-and-twenty hours at the very least, when it came creaking and\n groaning in. Just as I had anticipated, a tall, grim, gaunt, elderly\n gentleman alighted, followed by a tall, grim, gaunt, elderly young\n lady, with a nose as sharp as a shilling razor, wearing her hair in\n wiry curls, and dragging by a long blue ribbon a plunging, howling,\n ill-visaged pug. The sight of the dog was somewhat of a relief to me,\n as I foresaw the miserable existence he was likely to lead with my two\n Skye terriers\u2014a counterpart of the torture I should be compelled to\n endure with his master and mistress.\n\n \u201cMr. Hawthorne, I presume,\u201d bowing and lifting my hat.\n\n He bowed stiffly.\n\n I repeated the question, fearing, perhaps, that he had not heard me.\n\n \u201cYou are mistaken, sir,\u201d in freezing tones. \u201cI am Lord Mulligatawney.\u201d\n\n \u201cI _was_ mistaken.\u201d\n\n Apologizing for the error, I looked up the line and perceived in the\n distance\u2014for the train was a long one\u2014a well-dressed, dapper little man\n engaged in lugging a valise from beneath the seat of a first-class\n carriage. \u201cThis must be my guest,\u201d thought I, advancing, and as I\n reached the carriage the portmanteau came to earth with a chuck that\n nearly precipitated its proprietor into an adjacent hedge. Following\n the \u201cleathern conveniency,\u201d and with a spring graceful as that of a\n gazelle, a young girl alighted from the compartment. She was small but\n exquisitely proportioned. Her hair, pure gold, was wound round the back\n of her head in ponderous plaits. Her eyes were of that blue which in\n certain lights cries \u201ccheck\u201d unto the violet. Her nose was straight and\n delicately shaped, but not in the least classical. Her mouth was large,\n full, and generous, and adorned with flashing white teeth, somewhat\n irregular, it is true, but in their irregularity lay a special charm\n all their own. She was attired in a shepherd\u2019s plaid silk travelling\n dress, a Die Vernon hat with a sweeping blue feather almost caressing\n her left shoulder, and her dainty little hands were encased in black\n kid gauntleted gloves. Struck by her singular grace and beauty, I\n remained staring at her\u2014staring like a schoolboy at a waxen effigy.\n\n \u201cYou are Mr. Ormonde,\u201d she said laughingly, and advancing towards me.\n\n \u201cYou are Miss Hawthorne,\u201d I stammered.\n\n \u201cI am, and papa, as usual, is fussing about our luggage\u2014_impedimenta_\n you scholars call it nowadays. I knew you from your photograph. It is\n _so_ kind of you to come and meet us.\u201d She put out her hand as she said\n this in a winning, confiding way that was fraught with captivation. I\n bowed over the tips of her fingers in respectful reverence, scarcely\n daring to touch her hand.\n\n \u201cMay I ask _where_ you saw my photograph?\u201d I asked, inwardly hoping she\n had come across the one taken for the Rathaldron hunt, in which I\n figured in full field toggery, my right hand caressing the shoulder of\n Galloping Bess, my favorite hunter.\n\n \u201cIn your uncle\u2019s album,\u201d she replied.\n\n Of course it was that photograph, done while at the university, with\n the lackadaisical expression around the eyes and a general limpness\n about the form, while my garments bore the appearance of having been\n constructed for the celebrated Irish giant. If I had had the artist in\n my hands at that particular moment, it is possible that I might have\n taken _his_ photograph with something akin to a vengeance.\n\n \u201cPapa, this is mine host.\u201d And she curtsied towards me after the\n fashion of the ladies at the Court of St. James, when hoops were worn\n at the hips and patches and powder held their parti-colored sway. I\n grasped the little man by the hand, telling him fervently that his\n acquaintance was the greatest favor ever bestowed upon me by my uncle,\n that my house was his home, together with several similar expressions\n of intense good-will and of the liveliest satisfaction. How I inwardly\n anathematized my seedy coat, my unkempt beard, and above all the\n jingling shandradan with its villanous pair of _garrons_ standing at\n the exit gate! I believe I offered Miss Hawthorne my arm to lead her to\n the vehicle in question, calling loudly to Peter O\u2019Brien, who acted in\n the duplicate capacity of coachman and butler. Finding that my servant\n failed to respond to the summons, I flung open the door of the\n carriage, and was about to hand her into it, when, to my utter shame,\n misery, and mortification, I beheld my missing retainer rolled up like\n a ball in the space between the seats, fast asleep, and snoring like a\n fog-horn. In a blaze of indignation I caught him by the coat-collar,\n with the intention of giving him a shake that would rattle him into an\n eel-like liveliness; but while in the act of inserting my fingers\n deftly around the collar, so as to afford me the grip necessary to the\n effectual carrying out of my intention, he suddenly awoke from his\n slumbers, and, upon perceiving the condition of affairs, with the howl\n of a startled wolf, plunged upwards with such overwhelming force as to\n cause me to lose my hold, to lurch against the step of the carriage,\n carrom off the open door, and lastly, O agony! O shame! to measure my\n full length in the dusty roadway, whilst a shout of laughter from\n porters, passengers, and by-standers, in which I could detect the\n silvery notes of Miss Hawthorne, greeted my tingling ears. I sprang to\n my feet, full of the intention of throttling the misguided rascal, but\n was restrained, _bon gr\u00e9 mal gr\u00e9_, on discovering him upon his knees in\n the centre of a sympathizing audience, whom he was addressing with\n astonishing volubility ere I could possibly interpose.\n\n \u201cO mother o\u2019 Moses! I was overkem wud sleep; an\u2019 shure I\u2019m not for to\n blame afther all, for never a sight o\u2019 me bed I seen last night till\n daylight this blessed mornin\u2019. But shure I\u2019d sit up for a month like a\n Banshee for his honor, av it divarted him. Let me aff this wanst,\n Masther Fred, an\u2019 I\u2019ll carry ye up to bed every night in\u2014\u201d\n\n Deeming it advisable to stop this dangerous harangue as speedily as\n possible, as I found myself quietly dropping from out of the frying-pan\n into the fire, and as, in his anxiety to make out a good case for\n himself, the rascal was using me as a scapegoat, I sternly bade him\n look to his horses.\n\n Finding himself once more approaching the sunshine of favor, he hastily\n scrambled to his feet, and, before I could intercept his movement, had\n commenced to rub me down as if I were one of the quadrupeds under his\n especial care, accompanying each vigorous rub with that purring sound\n wherein the groom proper delights to indulge.\n\n \u201cBad cess to it for dirt! it \u2018ill never come out,\u201d he began, as, with a\n slap that brought tears to my eyes, he endeavored to remove the dust\n from the back of my coat.\n\n \u201cSilence, sir! Go to your box!\u201d I shouted, as I handed Miss Hawthorne\n into the shandradan, placing her father beside her, and my miserable,\n humiliated self opposite directly beneath the perilous influence of her\n violet eyes.\n\n \u201cI trust, Miss Hawthorne,\u201d I blurted, as we started for Kilkenley,\n \u201cthat you are not too deeply influenced by first impressions?\u201d\n\n \u201cWill you permit me to be very Irish, and answer your question by\n putting another? Are _you_?\u201d\n\n Despite my late discomfiture, my unkempt hair, my gloveless hands, and\n general seediness, I had sufficient grace within me to gaze for one\n brief second into her lovely eyes until red as a rose was she, and\n reply with a well-toned emphasis: \u201cMost decidedly.\u201d\n\n I then, in a disjointed and desultory way, endeavored to explain why so\n shaky a vehicle had been sent to the station; why Peter O\u2019Brien\u2019s hat\n was so brown and bore such traces of snail-creeping from brim to crown;\n why I had turned out so shabbily; why the horses were so slow\u2014in a\n word, it was the old story of _qui s\u2019excuse s\u2019accuse_, and my\n explanations, such as they were, will ever remain a matter of the\n profoundest mystery to myself, as I never by any possibility could\n recall their tenor to my memory.\n\n I believe that during the drive Mr. Hawthorne spoke a good deal of my\n uncle, of London, Parliament, late hours, divisions, of the Home-Rule\n question, and upon several other equally agreeable and interesting\n topics, all of which seemed to afford the most exquisite delight to\n Peter O\u2019Brien, who sat perched sideways upon the box, with one eye\n approvingly upon the \u201cmimber\u201d and the other skewise upon the road; but\n as for me, I was so lost in contemplating the charms of my _vis-\u00e0-vis_\n that the eloquence of the member for Doodleshire was as completely\n wasted as if he were addressing Mr. Speaker himself.\n\n Miss Hawthorne only spoke upon two occasions\u2014once to comment upon the\n beauty of the foliage at Ballyknockscroggery, the name amusing her\n immensely, and which she endeavored to repeat with a childlike glee;\n and once to ask about my mother\u2014but the sounds were as music, and my\n ears quaffed the delicious, dreamy draught with greedy avidity. How\n those nine miles passed I never knew; they seemed but so many yards.\n\n Peter kept \u201ca trot for the avenue,\u201d and brought us to a standstill with\n a jerk that spoke volumes in favor of the anxiety of the screws for a\n respite from their labors. I handed the young and lovely girl to my\n mother, who stood upon the steps awaiting our approach, and, having\n escorted Mr. Hawthorne to his room, retired to my own in a whirlwind of\n new and pleasing emotion\u2014ay, new and pleasing indeed!\n\n I ate no dinner. What cared I for food? Mabel Hawthorne\u2019s presence\n enthralled me with an undefinable ecstasy. Every gesture, every\n movement seemed fraught with a new-born grace, while her every word\n filled my very being as with melody. I envied my mother that she talked\n so much to her; I envied Harry Welstone for looking so confoundedly\n handsome and because he sat opposite to her; I envied Peter when she\n addressed even a \u201cyes\u201d or \u201cno\u201d to him; I envied her father, who called\n her \u201cMabel\u201d and \u201cdarling.\u201d Heigh-ho! How I hated the approach of that\n fatal moment when the conventionalities demanded the withdrawal of the\n ladies\u2014a cruel and barbarous custom, and I said so. She brushed past me\n as I held the door open, her eyes lifting themselves like violets from\n beneath the leafy lashes; and when she had glided away on my mother\u2019s\n arm, I felt that the light had ceased to live in the apartment. I\n longed for a cigar in the stillness of the autumn night, surrounded by\n the lordly gloom of nature, and yearned for the priceless _abandon_ of\n my own musings. But, as in duty bound, I descended to the realities and\n the \u201834 claret.\n\n \u201cA good wine, sir,\u201d exclaimed Mr. Hawthorne, smacking his lips and\n cunningly holding his glass between the lamp and his left eye; the\n right being carefully closed. \u201cA grand wine, sir. A comet vintage, sir.\n Mr. Speaker has no wine like this; and the Speaker of the House of\n Commons has the best cellar in England, sir.\u201d\n\n Mr. Hawthorne spoke solemnly. His sentences seemed carefully weighed,\n and were delivered with an unctuousness that bespoke considerable\n satisfaction with himself. He addressed me as if I were the Speaker of\n the House of Commons, and as though he were desirous of catching my\n eye. Some persons hold you with their eye. It\u2019s not pleasant. He was\n one of this class.\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s a \u201834, sir; you are quite correct. My poor father was very\n particular about his cellar. I have too much of it; you must permit me\n to send you a dozen at Christmas.\u201d What would I not give _her_ father?\n\n \u201cOn the condition that you will come and help me to drink it, sir.\u201d\n\n Need I say how profuse were my thanks? This was a chance\u2014to see her in\n her own home, too.\n\n \u201cWe live in the Regent\u2019s Park, York Terrace. Our windows command a very\n pleasing prospect. It\u2019s a nice walk for me to the House, and from my\n roof I can tell by the electric light in the clock tower whether the\n House is sitting or not. This is of immense importance, as to lose a\n division very often means to lose a seat\u2014ha! ha! ha!\u201d\n\n I must be forgiven if I joined in this melancholy merriment.\n\n\n \u201cFull well I laughed, with counterfeited glee,\n At all his jokes, for many a joke had he.\u201d\n\n\n I kicked Harry Welstone beneath the table as a signal to join in, but\n he maintained a grim, stolid silence. He told me subsequently that it\n wasn\u2019t to be done at any price.\n\n \u201cYou may not possibly have heard Mr. Disraeli\u2019s last, gentlemen,\u201d said\n Mr. Hawthorne, placing his left hand inside his waistcoat and\n flourishing the right in my direction. \u201cIt\u2019s\u2014ha! ha!\u2014so _very_ like\n Dizzy that\u2014ha! ha!\u2014I cannot help repeating it.\u201d Here he laughed\n \u201cconsumedly\u201d for fully a minute.\n\n The reader is possibly acquainted with some one man who cozens time by\n inward chuckles at his own conceits. It is a melancholy ordeal to have\n to endure this individual, to reflect back his dulness, and to return\n smile for smile. All bores are terrors, but the worst class of bore is\n the political; he is the embodiment, the concentrated essence, the\n amalgam and epitome of bores. He mounts his dreary Rosinante, and jogs\n along, taking acts of Parliament for milestones and the dullest\n utterances in the lives of eminent men as his halting-places, quoting\n long-winded, meaningless speeches as epigrams, and paralyzing his\n auditory with wooden extracts from a blue-book of exploded theories.\n His pertinacity is as inexhaustible as it is undaunted; he is free from\n the faintest suspicion of self-distrust; he is a bore within a bore. Of\n course, as the father of Mabel, Mr. Hawthorne interested _me_, and I\n listened with a reverence that begat the reputation of a shrewd,\n sensible fellow\u2014an encomium never heretofore passed upon me under any\n circumstance whatsoever.\n\n \u201cThe Right Honorable the senior member for the city of Dublin,\u201d\n commenced Mr. Hawthorne, after his merriment had cooled off a little,\n \u201cis\u2014ha! ha!\u2014a Mr. Jonathan Pim, Quaker, and a laborious statistician.\n The House likes a statistician on the budget or in committee, but we\n will not have him in debate\u2014no, gentlemen, we will not tolerate him in\n debate. A question arose in which I had fruitlessly endeavored to catch\n the Speaker\u2019s eye\u2014the Speaker is, by the bye, no particular friend of\n mine, as I once overruled his decision on a point of order;\n consequently, I seldom get an opportunity of speaking, and am compelled\n to write to the _Times_. Well, gentlemen, as I was observing, a\n question came up in which the Right Honorable the senior member for the\n city of Dublin felt himself interested, and he made a very creditable\n speech, bristling with figures\u2014quite a surprise to some of us; but it\n bored us, gentlemen, and the House will not tolerate a bore.\u201d\n\n Harry trod upon my toe; my boots were tight\u2014I involuntarily groaned.\n\n \u201cI perceive that you agree with me,\u201d said the M.P.; \u201cthe affliction\n _is_ terrible.\u201d\n\n \u201cAwful!\u201d said Harry, peeling a plum.\n\n \u201cWell, gentlemen, the Right Honorable gentleman, the senior member for\n the city of Dublin, had\u2014ha! ha!\u2014just concluded his speech, when Mr.\n Disraeli, who sat upon the Opposition benches, said to the honorable\n member for Shrewsbury, who sat behind him, and placing his eyeglass up\n so\u201d\u2014suiting the action to the word\u2014\n\n \u201c\u2018Who is this person?\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Mr. Pim, sir, the senior member for the city of Dublin,\u2019 responded\n the honorable member for Shrewsbury.\n\n \u201c\u2018Oh! indeed. Dublin used to send us a gentleman and a blackguard; this\n creature is neither.\u2019\u201d\n\n This was not quite so bad, and we joined the honorable member for\n Doodleshire in his mirth, which continued long after our responsive\n haw-haws had become things of the past.\n\n Mr. Hawthorne, being thus encouraged, was good enough to enliven us\n with a prolonged description of his original Parliamentary yearnings,\n his first and unsuccessful contest, and his subsequent triumphant\n victory\u2014a victory which we were led to believe was unparalleled in the\n annals of electioneering struggles, and one that caused a thrill of\n dismay all along the entire line of the great conservative party. We\n were solemnly inducted into the forms of the House, from the entrance\n of a newly-fledged member to his maiden speech. We were initiated into\n the mysteries of the \u201cOpposition benches,\u201d the \u201cgangway,\u201d the \u201ctable,\u201d\n the \u201cbar,\u201d the duties of the \u201cwhip\u201d and the \u201ctellers,\u201d the _modus\n operandi_ as regards notices of motion and divisions, the striking of\n committees, and the rules of Parliament generally, until we were\n surfeited _ad nauseam_. These pleasing preliminaries having been\n satisfactorily gone through, Mr. Hawthorne very obligingly proceeded to\n give us brief biographical sketches of Gladstone, Bright, Disraeli,\n Northcote, Hartington, and other leading men of that august assembly,\n dilating upon the peculiarities in their style and the mistakes in\n their several Parliamentary careers, until I wished him\u2014in the\n drawing-room. The windows were open, and across the sensuous night-glow\n came sweet, soothing strains from the piano, now in low, wailing\n cadences soft and sorrow-laden as the cry of the Banshee, now in the\n dashing brilliancy, the _\u00e9lan_ of those chromatic fireworks which none\n but the most skilled pyrotechnist dare handle save _\u00e0 deux mains_.\n\n \u201cMiss Hawthorne is at the piano,\u201d I ventured, in the earnest hope that\n her father, in the pride of parental fondness, might suggest an\n adjournment.\n\n \u201cYes, yes,\u201d coolly and imperturbably.\n\n \u201cShe plays divinely.\u201d\n\n \u201cRubinstein, who gave her lessons at I\u2019m ashamed to say how much per\n lesson, said she was his best amateur pupil. But, as I was observing,\n Mr. Gladstone pronounces some words very strangely; for instance, issue\n he always pronounces \u2018issew,\u2019 and Mr. Bright invariably says \u2018can\u2019t\u2019\n for \u2018cawnt.\u2019\u201d\n\n After a dissertation of about half an hour\u2019s duration upon the Marquis\n of Hartington\u2019s lisp, the unwieldy oratory of Ward Hunt, Mr. Roebuck\u2019s\n \u2018no,\u2019 and Mr. Whalley\u2019s \u2018heaw, heaw,\u2019 I again hinted at an adjournment,\n and on this occasion with a view to a general move, suggested the\n billiard-room.\n\n \u201cAh! no, my dear sir, we overworked members of the legislature value\n too much the delightful tranquillity of our claret to \u2018rush things,\u2019 as\n they say in America. We must make hay while the sun shines. How many\n nights during the coming session shall I not have to snap at my food\n with the ting! ting! of the division-bell ringing in my ear! How often\n have I just raised my soup to my lips, when ting! ting! and away into\n the House or to the division-lobby, and back to find it cold.\n Fish!\u2014ting! ting!\u201d playfully tapping a wine-glass with his\n dessert-knife by way of illustration. \u201cEntr\u00e9e!\u2014ting! ting! And as for\n wine, I have been compelled, ay, six nights out of the seven, to gulp\n it, gentlemen. Fancy gulping claret as a navvy tosses off a quart of\n ale. _Festina lente_, young gentlemen. Make haste slowly with your\n dinner and your post-prandial wine; the pace of the tortoise is the\n winning, and assuredly the most pleasant, one.\u201d\n\n Harry Welstone, who had been sipping his claret in dogged silence,\n suddenly started from his chair, and exclaiming, \u201cBy Jove! she\u2019s\n playing _Les Baisers d\u2019Amour_; excuse me, Fred,\u201d hurriedly quitted the\n apartment, leaving me in a condition of the deepest dejection, and\n writhing under the dreary torture of the Parliamentary _souvenirs_ of\n the member for Doodleshire.\n\n \u201cI\u2014ha! ha!\u2014call to mind another _mot_ of Mr. Disraeli\u2019s; not at all a\n bad one, either,\u201d continued the M.P., deliberately attacking a fresh\n decanter of claret\u2014attacking it in that steady, methodical way which\n indicated a determination to reduce it by slow degrees to the last\n extremity. \u201cDizzy says a thing, sir, in a quaint, dry way peculiarly\n his own\u2014_Multum in parvo_ I call it\u2014and he looks so demure, seated upon\n the Opposition bench in his short black velvet coat, and caressing his\n daintily-booted left foot upon his right knee. One night during the\n last session a very particular friend of mine, Sir Brisbane Bullflier,\n the junior member for Hants, happened to ask him what he thought of Mr.\n Gladstone. Dizzy turned his gaze toward the government benches, and\n coolly surveying the prime minister, who was parrying an adroit\n question, said, as he calmly surveyed him:\n\n \u201c\u2018Mr. Gladstone is a man without a single redeeming vice.\u2019\u201d\n\n My heart was in the drawing-room, where I now imagined Harry Welstone\n leaning with his elbows upon the piano and his chin upon his hands (his\n favorite position when my mother played for him), gazing at Mabel\u2014I had\n commenced to think of her by this gracious and winsome name\u2014uttering\n some of his daring _faceti\u00e6_, and being rewarded by a glance from those\n bewildering violet eyes, while I, bound in the iron fetters of a vile\n conventionalism, was compelled to listen to \u201cI thus addressed the\n Speaker: \u2018Mr. Speaker, sir,\u2019\u201d or, \u201cI called for a division, sir, and\n insisted upon explaining to the House my motives for adopting this\n somewhat daring and untoward course,\u201d and \u201cWould you believe it, sir,\n the _Times_ never noticed my speech upon the church disestablishment;\n it is positively amusing\u2014ha! ha! ha!\u201d; his face bore no traces of the\n amusement in question\u2014\u201cand that contemptible rag, the _Daily\n Telegraph_, merely mentioned that the honorable member for Doodleshire\n said a few words which were inaudible\u2014this, sir, to a speech that cost\n me three weeks in the preparation and three hours in the delivery.\u201d\n This sort of thing under ordinary circumstances, would have been dry\n and prosy enough, but under the special conditions of the case it\n became simply unbearable.\n\n I suggested cigars; he didn\u2019t smoke. A Bras Mouton instead of Ch\u00e2teau\n Lafitte; he preferred the existing vintage. Coffee I dared not venture\n upon, and I relinquished the hopeless struggle with a weary sigh. He\n was there for the evening, and in that spot he would remain until the\n contents of the decanter had disappeared.\n\n \u201cDo you take an active part in politics, Mr. Ormonde?\u201d he asked after a\n prolonged silence, during which I had the dismal satisfaction of\n hearing the strains of a _valse brillante_, accompanied by an\n occasional ripple of laughter, wafted in through the windows.\n\n \u201cNone whatever.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo?\u201d uttered in a tone almost of dismay.\n\n \u201cNo, sir. Our country is in the hands of an Orange _clique_, who will\n not allow a Catholic to hold a position of any consequence whatever.\n The representation is, as a matter of course, in their hands, and the\n family of De Ruthven have supplied the members since the sacking of\n Drogheda under Cromwell, and will continue so to do, although, perhaps,\n under the recent Ballot Act some outsider may get a chance, There are\n but two Catholics in the grand panel. I am one of them, and was never\n even summoned to attend until I threatened to horsewhip the high\n sheriff. My colleague is what we call in this country a\n \u2018Cawtholic\u2019\u2014that is, one who invariably votes with the Orange party,\n and who would drink the great, glorious, pious, and immortal King\n William in preference to the health of Pius the Ninth.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou have done away with that absurd toast,\u201d said Mr. Hawthorne.\n\n \u201cNot at all, sir; it is given at every dinner-party in the country, and\n it was once given in this very room.\u201d\n\n \u201cIn this room? Why, I thought you Ormondes were always out-and-out\n papists.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd so we have been, and so we are. I\u2019ll tell you how it happened. My\n father\u2014God be merciful to him!\u2014was always noted for his hospitality,\n and one evening, after a hard run with the Bohernabreena hounds, he\n invited the hunt, at least as many as were in at the death, home to\n dinner, sending a boy across the bog with the news to my mother.\u201d\n\n \u201c\u2018I haven\u2019t much to offer you to eat, gentlemen,\u2019 he said, \u2018but we\u2019ll\n make it up in the liquor.\u2019\n\n \u201cAbout twenty gentlemen rode over here, and, after having dined in a\n scratch sort of way, they plunged on the claret\u2014this identical wine.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is too good for fox-hunters,\u201d observed my guest. \u201cSuch liquid\n nectar is for brain-workers like _me_.\u201d\n\n \u201cAfter a very joyous carouse one of the party, called \u2018Orange Dick,\u2019 a\n Mr. Templeton, of Ashbrooke Hall, about ten miles from this, a deputy\n lieutenant and J.P., stood up and asked permission to propose a toast.\n The permission was freely accorded by my father, and full bumpers were\n called for. When the glasses were all filled and the company on their\n feet, Mr. Templeton gave the memory of the great, glorious, pious, and\n immortal King William, which was received with three times three, my\n father, to the astonishment of one or two, joining in.\n\n \u201c\u2018Now, gentlemen,\u2019 said my father, \u2018I drank your toast; you\u2019ll drink\n mine. Fill your glasses.\u2019\n\n \u201cThey required but little inducement to do as he bade, and in an\n instant were in readiness.\n\n \u201c\u2018To your feet, gentlemen.\u2019\n\n \u201cThis order having been complied with\u2014for it was given as such, and not\n as a request\u2014my father shouted in a voice of thunder:\n\n \u201c\u2018Here\u2019s to the sorrel nag that broke King William\u2019s neck.\u2019\u201d\n\n Mr. Hawthorne was about to enter into the question of the Hanoverian\n succession, and had already briefly sketched the career of the Prince\n of Orange, when Peter entered, and, approaching me as though he were\n treading upon eggs, whispered in a voice which betrayed a vigorous\n _razzia_ upon the decanter, and sufficiently loud to make itself\n distinctly overheard:\n\n \u201cThe sooner the punch is riz the betther, sir; the kittle\u2019s gettin\u2019\n cowld an\u2019 the mould fours is runnin\u2019 low.\u201d\n\n Inwardly cursing the fellow\u2019s garrulity, I proposed to my guest that we\n should join the ladies.\n\n \u201cBegorra, yez may save yourselves the thrubble, gintlemin, for it\u2019s in\n their beds th\u2019 are\u201d; here he lowered his voice into a whisper solely\n addressed to my ear: \u201cThe young leddy axed me confidintial: \u2018When will\n he be comin\u2019 to the dhrawin\u2019-room?\u2019 sez she.\n\n \u201c\u2018Not till he\u2019s had his five,\u2019 sez I.\n\n \u201c\u2018What five?\u2019 sez she.\n\n \u201c\u2018Tumblers av punch, miss!\u2019 sez I. \u201cAn\u2019 didn\u2019t I do well, Masther Fred,\n for to keep up the credit av\u2019 the family?\u201d\n\n My hands clenched involuntarily, preparatory to making themselves\n acquainted with the body of my blundering retainer, when Mr. Hawthorne,\n upon whom the fatigue of the journey, and perhaps his Parliamentary\n reminiscences, had produced a somniferous effect, suggested following\n the good example of the ladies\u2014a proposition which I joyfully acceded\n to. I assisted him to his bed-chamber, where, after listening to a very\n lengthened and no doubt excessively profound disquisition upon a\n proposed amendment in the Irish Poor-Law Act, I left him to \u201cnature\u2019s\n sweet restorer,\u201d and, gruffly refusing to partake of a night-cap with\n Harry Welstone, lighted a cigar and went out into the night.\n\n What a revolution had taken place in my existence within a few hours!\n Behind yonder lighted casement a young girl was preparing for rest, the\n very thoughts of whom, but a short while back, were a source of\n mortification and chagrin, and now\u2014love and light and joy beckoned me\n towards her, drawing me to her by a chain of roses.\n\n TO BE CONTINUED.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A CHILD-BEGGAR.\n\n\n Soul, from thy casement look, and thou shalt see\n How he persists to knock and wait for thee!\n \u2014LOPE DE VEGA, _Longfellow\u2019s Translation_.\n\n\n There knocketh at thy door to-night\n A tender little hand.\n Without the portal, waiting thee,\n Two feet, way-weary, stand.\n So oft to-night that hand hath knocked,\n So often been denied;\n O wavering soul! ope thou thy house,\n Bid this child-beggar bide.\n\n Without the bitter moonlight casts\n Cold glitter on the snow;\n With icy fingers \u2018mid the boughs\n The wind wakes sounds of woe;\n Unclouded is the light of stars\n Filling the frosty blue;\n Yet, heedless of the winter chill,\n A childish voice doth sue:\n\n \u201cOpen, dear love, and let me in,\n The world without is cold;\n In the warm shelter of thy heart\n I pray thee me enfold.\n Weary I wander forth to-night,\n I knock at many a door,\n I call, but seems my voice too weak\n To rise the bleak wind o\u2019er.\n\n \u201cA little exile here I stand,\n Begging an easy grace\u2014\n Beside thy hearth this biting night\n A little resting-place.\u201d\n O patient voice! O weary feet!\n O soul! be thou beguiled,\n Thy bolts undo, thy bars let fly,\n Keep Love no more exiled.\n\n \u2019Tis Love that knocks and begs for love\n In that soft, childish tone,\n Who pleads a beggar at thy gate,\n Whose right is thy heart\u2019s throne.\n Open, dear heart, and do not fear;\n With him can enter in\n Not any ill\u2014nay, from his hand\n Thou shalt all blessing win.\n\n Though heaped thy house with treasure rare\n Ah! do not Love deny;\n He may not seek thee any more,\n Scorning to-night his cry.\n And do not fear that thou shalt find\n A little rosy elf\n With laughing eyes that look through tears\n That pity but himself.\n\n No fretful, pouting lips are his\n Who waiteth at thy gate;\n No querulous tone shall dim his voice\n Who knocks so long and late;\n His are no folded rainbow wings\n Wherewith he may ensure\n His safe retreat when his weak faith\n No longer shall endure.\n\n He bears no burden of barbed shafts;\n A cross his quiver is,\n And of a crown of thorns his brow\n Beareth the cruelties;\n His feet are pierced with wounds whose stain\n Lies on the moonlit snow,\n And in his tender baby hands\n Twin blood-red roses blow.\n\n Beneath the cross and crowning thorn\n Infinite peace doth shine.\n Ah! open quick. O doubting heart!\n Let in this Love Divine.\n Have thou no fear of heavy cross\u2014\n His shoulders bear its weight;\n The thorny wreath with sharp, strong touch\n Shall joy undreamed create.\n\n These infant lips shall bless thy tears,\n This tender voice give peace;\n The hand that begs thy grace to-night\n Shall sign thy woe\u2019s release.\n He asks so little, gives so much,\n And sigheth to give more\n Who, patient in the wintry world,\n Stands knocking at thy door.\n\n Hasten, my soul, let Him not wait;\n Fling thy heart\u2019s portal wide;\n Bid thou this weary little Child\n Fore\u2019er with thee abide.\n Kneel thou a beggar at his feet\n Who begs to-night of thee;\n No alteration knows this Love\n Born of eternity.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE ISLES OF L\u00c9RINS.\n\n\n There like a jewel in the Midland Sea\n Far off discerned, the isle of L\u00e9rins hangs\n Upon the coast of Provence, no fit haunt,\n As from its beauty might at first appear,\n For summer revel or a moonlit masque,\n But where in studious cloister Vincent lived\n And taught, and, in the simple panoply\n Of Catholic tradition armed, struck down\n The heretics.\n \u2014FABER.\n\n\n The town of Cannes, to which so many English and Americans resort on\n account of its delicious climate, its healing air, and the lovely\n shores where grow the olive and the vine, has, too, its balmy\n atmosphere for the soul. All the neighboring heights are clothed with\n the mystic lore of medi\u00e6val saint and chapel, the waves of the azure\n sea still seem to move to the holy impulses that once swept the air,\n and across the beautiful bay are two fair isles at the entrance\u2014St.\n Marguerite, associated in most persons\u2019 minds with the prison in which\n was confined the mysterious Man of the Iron Mask, but once was more\n happily peopled with\n\n\n \u201cVirgins good\n Who gave their days to heaven\u201d;\n\n\n and St. Honorat, the Happy Isle (_beata illa insula_), as it was once\n called, famous for its ancient monastery, that played so glorious a\n _r\u00f4le_ in the religious history of Gaul. These are the isles of L\u00e9rins,\n two gems of that collar of pearls thrown by God around the\n Mediterranean Sea, to quote St. Ambrose, where once those who would\n escape from the perilous charms of the world found refuge.\n\n The island of St. Honorat is now occupied by the Cistercians, and early\n one morning, soon after our arrival at Cannes, we went in search of the\n boat they send to the mainland every day for their necessary supplies.\n We were so fortunate as to find on board a young monk of great\n intelligence, who was well versed in all the traditions of L\u00e9rins and\n the surrounding region. He kindly volunteered to become our guide, and\n proved an invaluable one. The islands are between two and three miles\n distant, and we were about an hour in crossing. A sail on those blue\n waters, in sight of their shores of radiant beauty, is always a\n delight, but especially so on a lovely day such as we had chosen, in\n the middle of October, with just air enough\u2014and what soft air it\n was!\u2014to ripple the sea and make it give out a thousand flashes from the\n tiny waves. We first came to St. Marguerite, which is the largest of\n the islands. It is seven kilometres in circumference, oval in shape,\n and almost entirely covered with maritime pines. It looks indeed like a\n gem, this emerald isle rising out of the sea of dazzling gold. It is\n said to have once borne the name of L\u00e9ro, from some person of ancient\n times whose prowess excited the admiration of his contemporaries, and\n the sister isle took the diminutive of this name\u2014L\u00e9rina. St. Honorat is\n said to have overthrown the temple of the deified L\u00e9ro, and perhaps\n built the church early erected here in honor of the illustrious virgin\n martyr of Antioch. An old legend says when he retired to the\n neighboring isle his sister Margaret came here to live, and gathered\n around her a community of pious maidens, to whom the sea, as it were,\n offered its mystic veil. As L\u00e9rina was interdicted to women, she begged\n St. Honorat to visit her frequently, and complained that her wish was\n so seldom gratified. On the other hand, the saint feared that he held\n converse with his sister too often, and thought such visits disturbed\n his recollection in prayer. At length he told her he should restrict\n his visits to a periodical one, and selected the time when the\n cherry-trees should be in bloom\u2014meaning, of course, once a year.\n Margaret wept and entreated, but nothing could change his resolution.\n Then she declared God would be less inflexible, and, in answer to the\n prayers she addressed to him, a cherry-tree planted on the shore put\n forth its snowy blossoms every month. Honorat no longer felt disposed\n to resist, and whenever he saw their white banner on St. Marguerite\u2019s\n Isle he crossed the water, which became solid under his feet.\n\n This island is also said to have afforded a secret asylum to the monks\n called to the contemplative life, or who wished to pass some time in\n utter solitude. Little is known of these lofty contemplatives, but it\n is believed that it was here St. Vincent of L\u00e9rins wrote his immortal\n work, the _Commonitorium_. St. Eucher also dwelt here for a time, and\n here received letters from St. Paulinus of Nola, who, like him, had\n abandoned the world.\n\n It is melancholy that an isle, once consecrated to virginal purity and\n holy contemplation, should become a place of expiation for criminals,\n and that the most noted of its prisoners should almost efface the\n memory of St. Vincent and St. Margaret.\n\n St. Honorat is just beyond the island of St. Marguerite. It is a low,\n flat island, also oval in form, only about a mile in length, and three\n kilometres in circumference.\n\n\n \u201cParva, sed felix meritis L\u00e9rina,\n Quam Paraclito, Genito, Patrique\n Rit\u00e9 quingenti roseo dic\u00e2runt\n Sanguine testes\u201d\n\n\n \u2014L\u00e9rins is small in extent, but illustrious by its glory; five hundred\n martyrs have worthily consecrated it to the Father, the Son, and the\n Holy Ghost by shedding their noble blood, says Gregorius Cortesius.\n Along the edge is a line of low, craggy rocks, called monks or\n brothers, which protect the shore from the encroachment of the waves.\n At the east are some little islets, the largest of which bears the name\n of St. F\u00e9r\u00e9ol, who, according to tradition, was here martyred by the\n Saracens and received burial.\n\n The numerous trees that formerly grew on St. Honorat gave it the poetic\n title of the _aigrette de la mer_, but they are all gone except a few\n olives in the centre, and a girdle of pines along the shore which\n protect the interior from the winds injurious to vegetation, and serve\n as an agreeable promenade. But no, there is one more tree\u2014it is rather\n a monument\u2014the ancient palm of St. Honorat, which stands before the\n door of the conventual church. \u201cHonor thy paternal aunt, the\n palm-tree,\u201d says the prophet of Islam, \u201cfor she was created in Paradise\n and of the same earth from which Adam was made!\u201d Let us especially\n honor this legendary palm; for if we understood, as the rabbis say\n Abraham did, the language of its leaves, that never cease their\n mysterious murmuring, even on a windless day, what a page in the\n history of the church we should learn!\n\n A legend tells us that the island in ancient times was infested with\n venomous serpents, of which a frightful picture was drawn by the\n inhabitants of the mainland to retain St. Honorat at Cap Roux, whither\n he at first went on retiring from the world. When the saint arrived at\n L\u00e9rina, and beheld their number and size, he prostrated himself on the\n ground and cried to the Lord to exterminate them, and they all died at\n once. Their bodies infecting the air, the saint climbed a palm-tree and\n prayed to Him who had led him into this solitude, and the waves of the\n sea immediately rose and swept over the isle, carrying off the serpents\n that covered it.\n\n This miracle of the palm, as it is called, is attested by St. Hilaire,\n who passed several years as a monk at L\u00e9rins, and speaks of the numbers\n of serpents that still infested the neighboring shores. At all events,\n this isle, like Ireland, is free from them to this day, though they are\n to be found on St. Marguerite, which is not saying much for the\n gallantry of St. Honorat. This palm-tree has always been regarded with\n great veneration, and the legend was represented on the old shrine of\n St. Honorat\u2014the saint in the palm-tree, and the waves sweeping the\n serpents into the sea. And on the arms of L\u00e9rins the abbatial crosier\n is placed between two palms.\n\n Under the care of St. Honorat and his disciples the aspect of the\n island was before long so changed that St. Eucher, one of the first to\n inhabit it, says: \u201cWatered by gushing fountains, rich with verdure,\n brilliant with flowers, odorous with sweet perfumes, and with\n delightful views on every side, it seems to those who inhabit it the\n very image of heaven toward which tend all their desires.\u201d And Isidore,\n the monk, speaking of its eternal verdure, exclaims: \u201c_Pulchrior in\n toto non est locus orbe Lerina_\u201d\u2014No, the universe presents not a more\n beautiful spot than L\u00e9rins.\n\n But it appears that the holy cenobites suffered greatly at first from\n the want of pure water, and at length they came one day and prostrated\n themselves at St. Honorat\u2019s feet, beseeching him to obtain by his\n prayers what nature had refused to the island. \u201cGo, brethren,\u201d he\n replied, \u201cand dig perseveringly in the centre of the isle between the\n two palms. [It appears there were two then, as on the arms.] God, who\n has created the living springs of the earth, is sufficiently powerful\n to grant what you ask with faith.\u201d The monks set to work with ardor,\n and dug till they came to a solid rock, without finding water or the\n least sign of humidity. Discouraged, they returned to St. Honorat, who\n ordered them to attack the live rock and confide in the Lord. They\n returned obediently to the task, and succeeded in excavating a few feet\n deeper, but still without any result, and they finally requested\n permission to try another spot; but St. Honorat went with unshaken\n faith to the place and descended into the pit. After praying to the\n Lord he smote the rock thrice in the name of the Holy Trinity, and an\n abundant stream gushed forth. Such is the tradition of L\u00e9rins, founded\n on the testimony of SS. Eucher and Hilaire, who both lived with St.\n Honorat. St. Eucher says the waters rose to the surface and spread over\n the land around. There is nothing miraculous in the present appearance\n of the well, but an old farmer of this region, who has been down\n several times to clean it out, says the water issues from four\n different points, as from the extremities of a cross. It is now covered\n with a little rotunda, and over the entrance is an inscription in Latin\n to this purpose:\n\n \u201cThe leader of the hosts of Israel made sweet the bitter waters; his\n rod brought forth a stream from the rock. Behold here the fountain that\n sprang up from the hard rock, the sweet water that welled from the\n bosom of the sea. Honorat smote the rock, and abundant waters gushed\n forth, thus renewing at once the prodigies Moses wrought with the tree\n and the rod.\u201d\n\n Everywhere on the island are _d\u00e9bris_ of all kinds\u2014hewn stones, old\n cement, bricks of Roman type, fragments of inscriptions, etc. The soil\n is red and stony. The centre is partly cultivated, and bears a few\n grapes, olives, and vegetables. The Cistercians, who have been here\n eight years, have built a new convent near one end, which includes part\n of the old abbey and St. Honorat\u2019s palm. This is enclosed by a high\n wall, as if they were not girt about by the great deep, and beyond this\n wall no woman is permitted to go. Even the Duchess of Vallombrosa, the\n great benefactress of the house, has been allowed to enter but once,\n and then as part of a suite of a princess to whom the pope had given a\n special permission. But there are some low buildings without the walls\n where pilgrims can find shelter, even those of the obnoxious sex, and\n be provided with refreshments. There are about fifty monks in the\n community, one of them a novice of sixteen, who looked like an\n anachronism in his Cistercian robes. Near the monastery is an orphan\n asylum containing about thirty boys under the care of Brother Boniface.\n They are taught trades, and for this purpose there are joiner\u2019s shops,\n a printing establishment, etc., on the island.\n\n While the monks were attending some rite we made the entire circuit of\n the island, following the path among the odorous pines on the shore,\n calm, peaceful, and embowered as the arcades of a cloister. These tall\n pines are aslant, as if bent by the winds, and the foliage, high up in\n the air, shelters from the sun, without excluding the sea breeze or\n obstructing the view. Everywhere was the flash of the waves, and the\n mysterious sound of the waters that gently broke upon the shore of this\n happy isle, mingled, as in the olden time, with the solemn measure of\n holy psalmody. It was delightful to wander in this lone aisle of\n nature, and drink in the beauty of sea and land, and give one\u2019s self up\n to the memories that embalm the place.\n\n It was early in the fifth century when St. Honorat established himself\n here. He belonged to a patrician race, and his father, to divert his\n mind from religious things, sent him at an early age to the East with\n his brother Venance, who was of a livelier turn. Venance, however, soon\n yielded to Honorat\u2019s moral ascendency, but died at Messenia, and the\n latter returned sorrowfully to Gaul with St. Caprais, his spiritual\n guide, who had accompanied them. For some time he lived as a hermit in\n a cave at Cap Roux. Then he came to L\u00e9rins, where numerous disciples\n gathered around him who are now numbered among the most eminent\n churchmen of Gaul. Maxime, Bishop of Riez, Hilary of Arles, Jacques of\n Tarentaise, Vincent of Saintes, Fauste of Riez, Ausile of Fr\u00e9jus, were\n all formed in his school of Christian philosophy. St. Eucher, whom\n Bossuet calls \u201cthe great Eucher,\u201d here forgot his noble birth and\n attained the sanctity which raised him to the see of Lyons. Salvian,\n surnamed \u201cthe Master of Bishops,\u201d and styled \u201cthe Jeremias of his age,\u201d\n on account of his lamentations over the woes and corruptions of the\n world, here wrote his treatise on the government of God. Cassian, after\n long journeys and great sorrows, spent a year at L\u00e9rins before he\n founded the abbey of St. Victor at Marseilles. St. Patrick, according\n to the tradition of the island, passed long years here in prayer and\n frightful austerities. St. Vincent of L\u00e9rins here wrote those works\n which have made him an authority in the church. St. C\u00e6sarius also, who\n became one of the most influential bishops of southern Gaul, and St.\n Loup of Troyes, who inspired so much deference in Attila, the Scourge\n of God, were among the first disciples of St. Honorat, and many more,\n some of whom have left no name on earth, but whose names are written in\n the Lamb\u2019s Book of Life. \u201cHow many assemblies of saints have I seen in\n this isle!\u201d cries St. Eucher\u2014\u201cprecious vases, which spread abroad the\n sweet perfume of their virtues.\u201d And St. Sidonius Apollinaris, with a\n bolder figure, says:\n\n\n \u201cQuanto illa insula plana\n Miserit ad c\u0153lum montes!\u201d\n\n\n \u2014How many lofty mountains rise toward heaven from this low isle! And\n St. C\u00e6sarius of Arles: \u201cHappy, blessed isle of L\u00e9rins, thou art small\n and level, but from thee have risen innumerable mountains!\u201d Over forty\n saints are mentioned by name in the Litany of L\u00e9rins, besides the\n hundreds of martyrs who are invoked.\n\n Salvian thus alludes to the paternal rule of St. Honorat: \u201cAs the sun\n changes the aspect of the firmament by its splendor or obscurity, so\n joy and sadness are diffused among those who, under his paternal\n guidance, aim at heaven and devote themselves to the angelic functions.\n If Honorat suffers, all suffer; restored to health, all return to new\n life.\u201d\n\n L\u00e9rins became so renowned as a school of theology that, in the seventh\n century, there were three thousand and seven hundred monks, and the\n Christian world sent here to obtain its bishops and the directors for\n its monasteries. It was in this century that St. Aygulph established\n here the rule of St. Benedict. In the eighth century, when the Saracens\n invaded the island, more than five hundred monks fell victims to their\n hatred of Christianity. Eleuth\u00e8re, by the aid of King Pepin, restored\n the ruined buildings, but the enemy returned again, committing fresh\n ravages, and, indeed, devastating the island. These attacks at length\n became so frequent that the pope granted indulgences to all who would\n aid in defending it against the infidel. Whosoever devoted himself to\n this good work for the space of three months acquired the same\n indulgences as a pilgrim to the Holy Places at Jerusalem, and minor\n ones were accorded to those who sent substitutes. In 1088 was erected\n the lofty citadel, which is still the most prominent object on the\n island, as a retreat for the monks in time of danger. It was connected\n with the abbey by a subterranean passage. This is now a picturesque\n ruin. It is on the eastern shore of the island, and rises directly out\n of the water. The massive walls of hewn stone have acquired a soft,\n mellow tint that contrasts admirably with the sky and sea. They are\n scarred with many a cannon-ball that tells of more than one rude\n assault.\n\n Here and there are narrow loop-holes, and high up in the air is a line\n of battlements that still seem to defy both the sea and the Moor. There\n was formerly a drawbridge, and nothing was lacking necessary to sustain\n a siege. This stronghold formed part of a line of signals along the\n sea-coast. It was four or five stories high, and contained four\n kitchens, several chapels, thirty-six cells for the monks and five for\n strangers, with cisterns, and everything to render it a complete\n monastery as well as castle. The P\u00e8re Antonin was our guide around this\n interesting ruin. It is entered by a spiral staircase, which brought us\n into a small court or cloister with several galleries around it, one\n above the other, communicating with the different stories, sustained by\n pillars of marble, porphyry, and granite. Old fragments of carved\n capitals, and inscriptions, some Roman, some Christian, were scattered\n here and there. In the centre is an immense cistern, paved with marble,\n which contains a never-failing supply of water. This was constructed by\n Gastolius de Grasse, who, having lost his wife and children, retired to\n the island to console himself with the thought of heaven and eternal\n reunion, devoting his whole fortune to the poor and the improvement of\n the monastery. The old chapter-room is utterly ruined. Its arches were\n blown up by some Scotchman in his attempts to find the supposed\n treasure of St. Honorat, and the rank grass is growing from the\n accumulated soil. There is the old refectory with its crumbling pulpit,\n and, in the next room, the lavatory of calcareous stone, like an\n ancient sarcophagus, where the monks washed their hands before entering\n the refectory. On it is graven in Latin: \u201cO Christ! by thy right hand,\n which can cleanse us within and without, purify our souls, which this\n water cannot cleanse.\u201d Then there is the chapel which once contained\n the relics of SS. Honorat,[167] Caprais, Venance, Aygulph, etc., and\n the three sacred altars to which indulgences were attached at the\n request of the Emperor Charles V. The chapel of Notre Dame de Piti\u00e9, or\n of the dead, was used for domestic purposes by some layman who held the\n island after the Revolution, and the place where once rose the solemn\n requiem and the odor of incense was now filled with the fumes of a\n kitchen. We went up, still by the spiral staircase, to the battlements.\n Here we looked down on the whole island. Before us was stretched the\n neighboring shore with fair towns and villages from Cannes to Nice,\n with the purple mountains in the background. On the other hand, in the\n distance, rose the mountains of Corsica. And all around was the sea\n that bathes the shores of so many storied lands.\n\n With increased means of defence the prosperity of the abbey revived. It\n had the exclusive right, conferred by the counts of Provence, of\n fishing in the surrounding waters. It owned numerous priories all along\n the coast from Genoa to Barcelona, as well as in the interior. And it\n continued to be a centre from which radiated light, and many a person\n escaped from the _Mare Magnum_ of the profane world to this haven of\n spiritual rest. We read that Bertrand, Bishop of Fr\u00e9jus in the eleventh\n century, retired to St. Honorat (as the bishop of Valence has recently\n done) and died here in the odor of sanctity. For those who wished to\n lead the eremitical life there were formerly many cells around the\n island. How dear this holy retreat was to its inmates may be seen by a\n letter from Denis Faucher, whose duties retained him from the isle, to\n his superior: \u201cMy thoughts turn eagerly towards L\u00e9rins. Sad, I bewail\n my long exile. In spite of my oft-renewed entreaties, you defer my\n deliverance. A cruel grief torments my desolate soul. I love not these\n magnificent palaces. Let kings inhabit them. For them, they gleam with\n marble; for me, the desert and the lonely shore. That little isle\n suffices for my happiness.\u201d\n\n Around the island were seven small chapels, or oratories, mostly on the\n shore, to which, like the seven stations at Rome, great indulgences\n were attached. These were successively visited by the pilgrims as a\n preparation for receiving the Holy Eucharist.\n\n The tombs of the saints, the holy chapels, the soil impregnated with\n the blood of the martyrs, and the wondrous history of the island, gave\n it a glorious prestige that made it not only a resort for pilgrims, but\n even the dead were brought across the waters, with crucifix and\n lanterns held aloft in the boats, and chants mingling with the sad\n murmur of the waves, to be laid in this consecrated isle. Many remains\n of their marble tombs are still to be found.\n\n We, too, made the stations of the seven holy chapels, though they are\n mostly in ruins. That of the Holy Trinity, in the eastern part of the\n island, is the most ancient. Its walls of massive stones are still\n erect. It is a Romanesque chapel, with three bays, the remains of an\n ancient porch, and vaults beneath for recluses or the dead. But the\n windows are gone, and rank weeds grow in the interior.\n\n Only a few traces remain of St. Cyprian\u2019s chapel; not St. Cyprian who\n shed his blood at Carthage, but St. Cyprian of L\u00e9rins, surnamed the\n Magician, who is honored September 26.\n\n Further on, among the rocks on the shore, is the legendary cave known\n as the _Baoumo de l\u2019Abbat_, only accessible by going down into the\n water and wading through a narrow crevice between two tall rocks. It\n was here, when St. Porcaire and his five hundred companions were\n martyred by the Saracens, that two of the monks, Colomb and Eleuth\u00e8re,\n fled in terror to conceal themselves. But they could still hear the\n vociferations of the infidel, and, their eyes being opened, could see\n the souls of their brethren ascending to heaven, conducted by the\n angels. Ravished by this spectacle, Colomb cried out with holy\n enthusiasm: \u201cLet us go forth to be crowned like them. Let us fly to the\n Lord!\u201d Eleuth\u00e8re still shrank with fear, but Colomb went boldly out to\n share the glory of his brethren. Eleuth\u00e8re afterwards gathered together\n the monks who had escaped, and became abbot of L\u00e9rins. Hence the name\n of the Abbot\u2019s Cave, given to the place of his concealment.\n\n Nearly opposite, in the centre of the island, is the octagon chapel of\n the Transfiguration, or St. Sauveur, with a star-shaped vault. It is\n twenty feet in diameter and twelve high. It has been rudely restored by\n the bishop of Fr\u00e9jus, and has an ancient stone altar pierced with\n holes, as if for the passage of liquids. Some consider this chapel the\n ancient baptistery. The sailors call a neighboring inlet the _Caranquo\n d\u00e9 Sant Saouvadou_, or Crique de St. Sauveur.\n\n Several of these chapels were used in the construction of batteries by\n the Spaniards in the seventeenth century, as that of St. Pierre on the\n southern shore, near the remains of which is an old votive altar to\n Neptune with the inscription: _Neptvno Veratia Montana_.\n\n The walls of St. Caprais are partly standing. This saint is still\n invoked in our day for rheumatism. A portion of his relics, hidden at\n the Revolution, is religiously preserved at Chart\u00e8ves, in the diocese\n of Soissons, and is the object of pilgrimages on the 20th of October.\n \u201c_Qu\u00e6 sancta Caprasi vita senis!_\u201d says St. Sidonius Apollinaris\u2014What\n an admirable life is that of the aged Caprais!\n\n The chapel of St. Porcaire and the Five Hundred Martyrs, on the place\n where they were buried, has recently been repaired, and Father Boniface\n says Mass there every morning. Over the altar is a painting of St.\n Porcaire pointing to heaven and encouraging his brethren. The seventh\n chapel, St. Michael\u2019s, is within the walls of the Cistercian convent.\n\n The isles of L\u00e9rins have been a place of pilgrimage for more than a\n thousand years. They were already frequented when Pope Eugenius II.\n came here early in the ninth century to venerate the traces of the\n saints and martyrs. When he landed on the shore of St. Honorat, he put\n off his shoes and made the tour of the island in his bare feet. He\n consecrated the church, blessed the whole isle, and granted those who\n visited it with the proper dispositions between the eve of the\n Ascension and Whit Monday all the indulgences to be gained by a\n pilgrimage to Jerusalem, as well as smaller ones to those who came here\n at other seasons, with the exception of those who had been guilty of\n striking their parents or violating their marriage vows. In accordance\n with his wish, all who had gained the indulgence used to receive a palm\n in testimony thereof. These pilgrimages were called, in the language of\n the country, _Romipet\u00e6_. All the towns on the neighboring coast were\n numerously represented here at the Grand Pardon. Twenty-seven nobles\n are mentioned as coming once from Arles. Pilgrims even came from Italy.\n The old records tell how fifty-three came from Pisa to offer thanks for\n their miraculous escape after being taken by the corsairs. But the\n annual pilgrimage from Rians was the most famous, and has been\n celebrated in a quaint old Proven\u00e7al ballad that is delightfully\n redolent of the age. It consisted of the greater part of the villagers,\n and to sanctify the journey, they used to halt at all the places of\n devotion along the road. Every one of these places had its holy legend\n that, like a fragrant flower, embalmed the way. At Cotignac they paused\n to drink at the miraculous fountain of St. Joseph\u2014\n\n\n Foou ana boiro \u00e0 la sour\u00e7o\n Doou benhurux Sant Jaous\u00e9\u2014\n\n\n which, say the people, sprang up to quench the extreme thirst of a poor\n simple country laborer, named Gaspar, to whom the compassionate St.\n Joseph appeared under the form of an aged man, and pointed out the spot\n where water could be found\u2014a spot since widely known as a place of\n miraculous cures and abundant spiritual favors.\n\n Then the pilgrims ascended the hill of Verdale, near Cotignac, to pray\n at the altar of Nouastro Damo d\u00e9 Graci. This is quite a noted chapel.\n It was visited in 1600 by Louis XIV. and his mother, Anne of Austria,\n for whom a new road was expressly constructed, still known as the\n _Chemin de Louis Quartorze_. He hung his _cordon bleu_ on the Virgin\u2019s\n breast, and Anne of Austria founded six Masses in the chapel. The king\n afterwards sent here copies of his marriage contract and the treaty of\n the Pyrenees in a magnificently-bound volume, by way of placing these\n important transactions under the protection of our great Lady; and when\n his mother died he founded Masses here for her soul, and set up a\n marble tablet with a commemorative inscription. Pope Leo X. conferred\n indulgences on this chapel.\n\n At the village of Arcs, or near it, the pilgrims turned aside to\n venerate the remains of the beautiful St. Rossoline, who sprang from\n the barons of Villeneuve and Sabran. Her cradle in infancy was\n surrounded by a supernatural light. The miracle of the roses was\n renewed in her favor to avert the anger of her father, who was weary of\n the importunity of beggars at his castle. At the age of seventeen she\n buried her youth and beauty in the Chartreuse of Celle Roubaud, and was\n consecrated deaconess by the bishop of Fr\u00e9jus in 1288, which gave her,\n by an exceptional privilege to the nuns of this house, the right of\n reading the Gospel in church. Hence she is represented in art, not only\n with the crown of roses wherewith she was crowned on the day of her\n sacred espousals, but wearing a stole. She spent the remainder of her\n life in transcribing the sacred books, in order, as she said, to be\n always holding intercourse with God, and, as she could not preach in\n public, aid in propagating the Gospel. She held the office of prioress\n for a time, but, at her own request, ended her days as a recluse. While\n she was breathing her last St. Hugh of Lincoln and St. Hugo of Grenoble\n appeared and incensed her cell, and she died with _Deo gratias_ on her\n lips.\n\n An old ballad tells how, after her death, St. Rossoline delivered her\n brother, Helion de Villeneuve, a crusader, who had been taken prisoner\n by the Saracens. She appeared to him in his dungeon, loosed his heavy\n chains, opened the doors, and conducted him to the sea-coast, where,\n spreading her veil on the waters, they both placed themselves thereon,\n and so came safely to Provence. Helion now happened to fall asleep, and\n when he awoke his sister was missing. He thought she had gone home to\n announce his arrival, but, when he came to the manor-house, learned she\n had for some time been dead. Her tomb became noted in Provence, and was\n one of the stations where pilgrims loved to pay their vows.\n\n Our villagers next came to Fr\u00e9jus to see the image of the Holy Child\n Jesus venerated in the cathedral. At Esterel the prior gave them\n refreshments under the great chestnut-trees near the inn. Cannes\n welcomed them with the ringing of bells, and went out to meet them in\n procession:\n\n\n \u201cCanno, villo maritimo\u2014\n Remplido d\u00e9 z\u00e8lo \u00e8 d\u2019estimo\n Per leis p\u00e9l\u00e9rins d\u00e9 Rians\u2014\n Seis campanos souanoun toutos\n Per faire la proucession.\u201d\n\n\n Then they came with\n\n\n \u201c_Allegresso\n Dins leis ilos d\u00e9 L\u00e9rins_.\u201d\n\n\n It seemed to them like entering Paradise. They went to shrift, visited\n the seven chapels, and finally came to the church of the _glourious\n Sant Hounourat_, where they received the Holy Eucharist and their\n palms. Besides the latter, they also carried away, as the custom was,\n some sprigs of a marine plant still known as the _herbo doou par\n doun_\u2014the herb of the Pardon or Indulgence. This is the _cineraire\n maritime_, common on the shores of the isle, which has hoary,\n pinnatifid leaves and a flower that grows in panicles.\n\n On their way home the pilgrims went to pray at the tomb of Sant\n Armentari, a great miracle-worker at Draguignan, specially invoked for\n those who have lost their reason. But we shall speak of him further on.\n Arriving home, they were met by their fellow-townsmen and led in\n triumph to the church, when Benediction was given, thus ending the\n pilgrimage.\n\n The expense of the journey, or the gradual lukewarmness of the people,\n at length diminished the number from Rians, and finally the pilgrimage\n ceased altogether, till a failure of the crops induced the town to\n revive it partially by sending a yearly deputation as its\n representative.\n\n There is a na\u00efve legend of one Boniface who lived at Oraison\u2014a simple,\n upright man whom lack of worldly wisdom had reduced to such want as to\n force him to become the swineherd of a wicked usurer, named Garinus,\n who was blind. For six successive years he had visited L\u00e9rins at the\n time of the Grand Pardon, and, when the seventh arrived, he humbly\n begged permission of Garinus to go and gain the indulgence. Garinus\n refused, and, lest the swineherd should secretly join the other\n pilgrims, he carefully fastened him up. Boniface\u2019s grief increased as\n the feast of Pentecost drew near. The eve arrived, but he was prevented\n from keeping even a lonely vigil by an overpowering drowsiness.\n\n Suddenly the sound of music awoke him, and, opening his eyes, he found\n himself before the altar of the church of L\u00e9rins. When the stations\n were made and the divine offices were over, the monks, as usual,\n distributed the palms among the _Romin\u00e6_. Boniface also approached with\n the others to receive his, and then retired to an obscure corner of the\n church, where he soon fell sound asleep. When he awoke he found himself\n once more in the prison where he had been confined by his master. The\n rest of the pilgrims from Oraison arrived three days after, and, not\n knowing the state of affairs, complimented the usurer on his kindness\n to his servant. He denied having given Boniface permission to go, and\n summoned him to his presence. The swineherd related with great\n simplicity what had happened to him. Garinus was at once astonished and\n affected by the account, and besought Boniface to give him the palm he\n had brought from the holy isle. Taking it reverently in his hands, he\n applied it to his eyes, and at once not only recovered his sight, but\n the eyes of his soul were likewise opened.\n\n But to return to the history of the island. The abbey was secularized\n in 1788\u2014some say on account of the luxuries and excesses of the monks.\n But the inventory shows how few luxuries they really had\u2014not more than\n the simplest villagers now possess. The monks withdrew to their\n families. Not one was left to guard the graves of the martyrs and\n continue the prayers of so many ages. The last prior of L\u00e9rins, Dom\n Th\u00e9odule Bon, died at his sister\u2019s residence in Vallauris. The people\n of Cannes used to say of him: _Moussu lou Priour es Bouan d\u00e9 noum et d\u00e9\n fach_\u2014M. le Prieur is good by name and good by nature.\n\n In 1791 the island was sold at public auction, and the purchaser\u2019s\n daughter, who had been an actress, came here to reside. O isle of\n saints!... In 1856 Mr. Sims, an Anglican minister, bought it. He showed\n some respect for the ancient monuments, and had begun to restore the\n citadel when he died. The bishop of Fr\u00e9jus bought it in 1859. Two\n bishops, several dignitaries of the church, and a number of priests\n came over to take possession of the island. A great crowd awaited them.\n The clergy (those of Cannes bearing the relics of St. Honorat) advanced\n toward the old church, chanting the mournful psalm, _Deus, venerunt\n gentes_, many verses of which were so particularly applicable. The\n walls so long profaned were blessed, and the crowd prostrated\n themselves while the Litany of L\u00e9rins was solemnly sung. Some\n agricultural brothers of the Order of St. Francis were established here\n for a time. On the eve of the feast of St. Caprais (St. Honorat\u2019s\n spiritual guide) the bishop blessed the chapel of St. Porcaire and the\n Five Hundred Martyrs, which had been restored, and Mass was said amid\n the ruins of the old church of St. Honorat.\n\n * * * * *\n\n There are several places of great interest on the mainland, associated\n with the saints of L\u00e9rins, all of which we devoutly visited as a part\n of our pilgrimage. One is Cap Roux, at the western termination of the\n Bay of Cannes, always dear to the monks of the isle on account of the\n _baume_, or cave, on the western side of the cliff, inhabited for some\n time by St. Honorat after his return from the East, and still called by\n his name. The ascent to this grotto is rather dangerous, and at the\n foot was once an oratory where pilgrims stopped to pray before\n undertaking the ascent. They used to cry: \u201cSancte Maguncti!\u201d perhaps\n because they associated the name of this saint of L\u00e9rins with the\n Proven\u00e7al word _m\u2019aganti_, as if they would say, _Saint I-cling-to_, as\n they seized hold of the sides of the cliff.\n\n Denis Faucher, the monk, graved an inscription in Latin verse over the\n entrance to the Baume de St. Honorat, which may thus be rendered:\n \u201cReader, in Honorat, our father, thou wilt find an example of lofty\n virtue and reason to admire the wonderful gifts of God. Others visit\n the holy places and seek afar off the noble models they have not at\n home. The renown of Honorat renders sacred every place he approached,\n though now devoid of his presence. Behold this retreat, once almost\n inaccessible to the wild beasts, now rendered so famous by the holy\n bishop as to attract innumerable visitors from every land.\u201d In the cave\n there has been for centuries an altar for celebrating the Christian\n mysteries. At the left is a well that rarely fails, even in the\n greatest drought. At the right is a hollow in the rock like the impress\n of the human form, called by the people the _Couche de St. Honorat_.\n Over it is also an inscription by the same monk: \u201cIllustrious pontiff,\n from the height of heaven reveal thy august presence to him who seeks\n thy traces upon earth.\u201d\n\n Another cave in the side of the mount near the sea was inhabited for a\n time by St. Eucher, to whom his wife, Galla, came to bring food while\n he gave himself up to contemplation. An angel revealed to the people of\n Lyons where he lived concealed, and they sent messengers to ask him to\n be their bishop.\n\n St. Armentaire, who was bishop of Embrun in the middle of the fifth\n century, being deposed by the council of Riez, retired to Cap Roux. It\n was he who slew the dragon that infested the neighborhood of\n Draguignan. The fame of his sanctity led to his being chosen bishop of\n Antibes, but his body was, after his death, brought back to Draguignan\n and placed in a church he himself had erected in honor of St. Peter.\n The concourse to his tomb was formerly very great, as we have seen in\n the case of the pilgrimage from Rians.\n\n There were hermits at Cap Roux as late as the eighteenth century, and\n pilgrims used to go there in procession, chanting the litany of L\u00e9rins,\n to implore the cessation of some scourge. Now it is only visited from\n time to time by a solitary devotee, or some naturalist to study the\n flora and the formation of the rocks, who pauses awhile at the cave and\n drinks at the fountain.\n\n About a league west of Cannes, above Cap Roux, is Mt. Arluc, which\n rises out of the plain of Laval. It belongs to the tertiary formation,\n and looks so artificial that it has often been regarded as a tumulus\n made by the Romans, who, according to tradition, had an intrenched camp\n here to protect the Aurelian road[168] that ran through the plain, as\n well as the galleys on the coast. After the submission of the province\n to the Roman domination a temple was built here in honor of Venus, who\n could not have desired a fairer shore, in sight of the very sea from\n which she sprang. Her altar was surrounded by trees to veil her unholy\n rites, and the mount took the name of _Ara-luci_\u2014altar of the sacred\n wood\u2014whence the name of Arluc. This consecrated grove was cut down by\n St. Nazaire, abbot of L\u00e9rins, who knew the importance of destroying\n these high places of the Gentiles. To him, too, the waves beneath were\n always whispering of love, but not profane love. They spoke of \u201clove\n eternal and illimitable, not bounded by the confines of the world or by\n the end of time, but ranging beyond the sea, beyond the sky, to the\n invisible country far away.\u201d And he set up an altar to the Infinite\n One, and beside the church built a monastery, which he peopled with\n holy maidens under the direction of H\u00e9l\u00e8ne, a princess of Riez. One of\n the first abbesses bore the name of Oratorie. It was to her St. C\u00e9saire\n of Arles addressed two of his essays: one on the qualities that should\n be possessed by those who have the direction of souls; the other on the\n text, \u201cO the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge\n of God!\u201d\n\n About the year 677 St. Aygulph, abbot of L\u00e9rins, rebuilt or enlarged\n this monastery at the request of several noble ladies of the region,\n and, the house having perhaps been depopulated by the Saracens, a\n colony of nuns came here from Blois under the care of St. Angarisma.\n When the holy abbot was martyred, Angarisma, learning the fate of her\n spiritual father, went with the sisterhood to venerate his remains. The\n monks who had escaped described the sufferings and constancy of the\n martyrs, and showed their mangled remains. One of the nuns, named\n Glauconia, who was blind, applied the right arm of St. Aygulph to her\n eyes and at once recovered her sight. Whereupon the abbess begged for\n his body, but in vain. The arm which had restored Glauconia\u2019s sight was\n given to her, however, and they carried it with them to Arluc. St.\n Aygulph is invoked in this region still, under the name of St. A\u00efgou,\n for diseases of the eye, and a statue of him is to be seen at\n Ch\u00e2teauneuf in the chapel of Notre Dame de Brusc.\n\n The nuns of Arluc fled several times before the Saracens, but we read\n of the monastery in the tenth century, when St. Maxime, of the\n illustrious family of De Grasse, came here in search of Christian\n perfection. She was afterwards sent to found a house at Callian, where\n part of her remains are still preserved.\n\n In the life of St. Honorat there is an interesting legend of one of the\n nuns of Arluc, named Cibeline, the daughter of Reybaud, a lord of\n Antibes. She had been married in early life, but lost her husband soon\n after, and was still renowned for her beauty when she became infected\n with leprosy. St. Honorat appeared to Reybaud in a dream and said to\n him: \u201cGive me thy daughter as a bride.\u201d He had the same vision three\n times, which at last so impressed him that he took Cibeline with him\n and went to L\u00e9rins to relate it to the holy abbot Porcaire. The latter\n at once comprehended its spiritual significance and said to Cibeline:\n \u201cWilt thou, out of love to God and devotion to St. Honorat, lead\n henceforth a pure life and take the sacred veil in the monastery of\n Arluc?\u201d Cibeline then confessed this had been the earliest desire of\n her heart, and that she regarded her disease as the judgment of God for\n having violated the vow she had made in yielding to worldly persuasions\n and wedding the husband she had lost. St. Porcaire then took pure\n water, in which he plunged holy relics, and ordered her to bathe\n therein. She was instantly cured of her leprosy, and her father led her\n to Arluc and consecrated her to God.\n\n Arluc probably took the name of St. Cassian, by which it is now more\n generally known, in the fourteenth century, when it fell under the\n jurisdiction of the abbey of St. Victor at Marseilles, which Cassian\n had founded. Nor is the name inappropriate for this mount that stands\n in sight of the places rendered sacred by St. Honorat and St. Eucher,\n for whom Cassian had so great an admiration as to cry in one of his\n books on the ascetic life dedicated to them: \u201cO holy brothers! your\n virtues shine upon the world like great beacon-lights. Many saints will\n be formed by your example, but will scarcely be able to imitate your\n perfection.\u201d\n\n Cassian has been regarded as a saint in Provence, and the people of\n Cannes used to make a _rom\u00e9rage_, or pilgrimage, to the chapel that\n took his name at Arluc, on the 23d of July, the festival of St.\n Cassian.\n\n When the Revolution arrived the republicans wished to sell the mount,\n and two hundred soldiers were sent to strip the chapel. The number was\n none too large, for at the news the people of Cannes sounded the tocsin\n and went in crowds to the rescue. The very women were armed. One in\n particular aimed her reaping-hook at the neck of the leader. They bore\n triumphantly away the relics and ornaments, but the chapel and land\n were sold some time after to nine men belonging to Cannes. St. Cassian,\n or Arluc, is still crowned with oaks, as in the time when Venus held\n sway there, though Bonaparte, when in the vicinity, had many of them\n cut down.\n\n The monastery of Arluc gave its name to a village on the sea-shore at\n the mouth of the Siagne. This stream, in which the monks of L\u00e9rins once\n had the sole right to fish, derives its name from the Proven\u00e7al word\n _saignos_ or _siagnos_, given to the cat-tails that grow so abundantly\n on its banks. On the Siagne is the hamlet of Mandelieu, on land which\n once belonged to St. Consortia, the daughter of St. Eucher. She gave\n her fortune to works of charity, and founded here a hospital under the\n invocation of St. Stephen. And there is a cape on the coast, near La\n Napoule, called Theoule, from another daughter of St. Eucher, named\n Tullia. When St. Eucher abandoned the world and retired to L\u00e9rins he\n took with him his two sons, V\u00e9ran and Salonius, leaving his wife,\n Galla, and her two daughters on his domains near La Napoule, where\n Tullia, who died young, was buried.\n\n Such are the memories associated with the isles of L\u00e9rins, for many of\n which we are indebted to the interesting work by M. l\u2019Abb\u00e9 Alliez. We\n made a second visit to St. Honorat before leaving Cannes, to take a\n farewell look at the old donjon on the shore, the holy palm in the\n cloister, and the ruined chapels. When we left the isle several of the\n white-robed monks accompanied us to the shore, and, on looking back\n from our swiftly-receding boat, we saw two of them still standing at\n the foot of a huge cross among the sad pines....\n\n\n \u201cO satis nunquam celebrata tellus!\n Dulce solamen, requiesque cordis!\n C\u0153litum sedes procul a profani\n Turbine vulgi!\u201d\n\n\n \u2014O land that can never be sufficiently praised! Sweet consolation,\n repose of the heart! Haven sheltered from the tempests of a profane\n world!\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n IN RETREAT.\n\n\n \u201cBreak, my heart, and let me die!\n Burst with sorrow, drown with love!...\n Lord, if Thou the boon deny,\n Thou wilt not the wish reprove.\u201d ...\n\n Whence that piercing, burning ray,\n Seem\u2019d to reach me from the light\n Where, behind the Veil, \u2019tis day\u2014\n Where the Bless\u00e8d walk by sight?\n\n Thine, \u2019twas thine, O Sacred Heart!\n Mercy-sent\u2014that I might see\n Something of the all Thou art,\n Something of the naught in me.\n\n Ah! I saw Thy patient love\n Watching o\u2019er me year on year;\n Guarding, guiding, move for move\u2014\n Always faithful, always near:\n\n Saw Thy pardon\u2019s ceaseless flow\n Evermore my soul bedew;\n Washing scarlet white as snow,[169]\n Sere and blight to morning-new:\n\n Saw this self\u2014how weak, how base!\u2014\n Still go sinning, blundering, on;\n Thankless with its waste of grace,\n Wearied with the little done.\n\n Then I murmur\u2019d: \u201cO my King!\n What are all my acts of will?\n Each best effort can but bring\n Failure and confusion still!\n\n \u201cThis poor heart, which ought to burn,\n Smoulders feebly; yet may dare\n Offer Thine one last return\u2014\n One fond, fierce, atoning prayer?\n\n \u201cLet it break, this very hour\u2014\n Burst with sorrow, drown with love!\n For if Thou withhold thy power,\n Thou wilt not the wish reprove.\u201d ...\n\n Pass\u2019d that moment: but, as fall\n Lovers\u2019 whispers, answer\u2019d He;\n \u201c_Daily_ die[170]\u2014with thy Saint Paul.\n Die to self\u2014and live to Me.\u201d\n\n SEPTEMBER, 1877.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n PREACHERS ON THE RAMPAGE.[171]\n\n Men who are by no means optimists are apt unconsciously to allow\n themselves to get a dim impression that the world is becoming better,\n more kindly, more charitable, and that we are approximating a time\n when, by the pure influences of increased material appliances and\n \u201cwell-regulated human nature,\u201d the hatreds and strifes both of nations\n and sects will have measurably ceased. The delusion is a pleasant one,\n but it is none the less a delusion, and will not endure the slightest\n contact with the sharp edge of fact. In this nineteenth century,\n notwithstanding the peace society, more human beings have lost their\n lives by war than in any other since the advent of our Lord. In this,\n the freest, the most prosperous, and, so far as the masses are\n concerned, the best-instructed of all Christian countries, we have but\n had breathing time since one of the bloodiest civil wars on record. In\n the lull (protracted by war and its results) many Catholics seem to\n have become in like manner possessed with an undefined notion that the\n people who made the Penal Laws and executed them have become imbued\n with a milder spirit toward the church; that Know-nothingism is a thing\n of the past, the virtue of the cry of \u201cNo Popery\u201d dissipated, and the\n fell spirit of the Native American party utterly extinct.\n\n Those who think thus will see cause to awake from their dream on\n examining the volume whose title heads this article. In October, 1876,\n a Joint Special Committee of three senators and three members of the\n Lower House sat in San Francisco for the purpose of procuring testimony\n in regard to the advisability of restricting or abolishing the\n immigration of Mongolians to this country\u2014a question which has been for\n some time exciting at least a considerable section of the inhabitants\n of our Pacific coast. Whether truly or falsely we cannot say, but the\n impression is produced that the Catholic, and more particularly the\n Irish Catholic, population of California has ranged itself in hostility\n to the Chinese. If this be true we should be very sorry for it, knowing\n full well that by any such action foreigners of all sorts, more\n especially Catholics, are simply supplying whips of scorpions with\n which they will be lashed on the outburst of the next campaign (under\n whatsoever name it may be known) conducted on principles of hostility\n to them. On its face it looks altogether likely that so plausible a\n movement as this opposition to the Chinese should take with a laboring\n class not very well posted in the principles of political economy, and\n we know that the large majority of white laboring people are in San\n Francisco Catholic, while certainly a great many of them are Irishmen.\n Their priests are too few and have too much to do to give them lectures\n on Say, Smith, and Ricardo; and it is no part of their duty, still less\n would it be a pleasure, to instruct them how they shall view purely\n political issues, whether local or national. Repeating, then, that we\n cannot but deem it a terrible blunder for their own sakes, and utterly\n against their own real interests, that these people should so range\n themselves against the influx of the Chinese, we have certainly no\n right to dictate to them how they shall vote or on what side they shall\n exert any influence they may have; and we must add that they seem to\n err (if error there be) in very good company, and plenty of it, since\n both political parties have in their national platforms endorsed the\n views said to be held by the Irish Catholics of California, as did also\n both Republicans and Democrats in the last campaign of the Golden\n State.\n\n This report contains the sworn testimony on the subject at issue of one\n hundred and thirty witnesses; but we only call attention to the\n evidence of some of the preachers, and that, too, not on the general\n merits of their testimony or concerning Chinese immigration at all, but\n on account of the Vatinian hatred which they have gone out of the way\n to display towards Catholics, and the deadly venom they exhibit towards\n Irishmen especially. For just as women are sometimes most bloodthirsty\n during a war, far outdoing in rancor the combatants themselves, so\n would preachers seem to be the least charitable of the human species\u2014to\n have, as Dean Swift well remarked, \u201cjust enough religion to make them\n hate, and not enough to make them love, one another.\u201d The first of\n these worthy representatives of Christian charity and disseminators of\n the truth is a certain Rev. O. W. Loomis, in the employ of the\n Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions, who takes occasion to say:\n \u201c_Unlike some others who come to America, as we have been told (and who\n manage to get to the ballot-boxes very soon), they [the Chinese] are\n not sworn to support any foreign hierarchy and foreign ecclesiastical\n magnate who claims the whole earth as his dominion_\u201d (p. 417). While\n the English of this sentence is very far from clear, yet the animus of\n the whole is so patent that he must needs be a very stupid fellow\n indeed who does not perceive that Catholics are aimed at. Whether Mr.\n Loomis \u201c_has been informed_\u201d that Catholics come to America, or that\n they reach the ballot-boxes early, or that they are sworn to support a\n foreign hierarchy, or that the Chinese are not under such obligations,\n is far from being as limpid as \u201cbog-water,\u201d and it is to be hoped that,\n in his instructions to his neophytes, he seldom degenerates into such\n want of perspicuity; still more would it be desirable that he should\n confine himself more strictly in his usual ministrations to the truth\n and to matters within his own knowledge than he does when before the\n committee and on oath.\n\n It is distinctly _false_ that Catholic foreigners, in coming to this\n country, make a business of getting to the ballot-boxes any sooner than\n the law allows them to do. It is equally mendacious, if he means to\n assert the same thing of any one set of Catholics as a specific\n nationality. If the statement were as true as it is false, scurrilous,\n and malicious, that \u201cman of God\u201d could not possibly know more than a\n few individual instances, and could not predicate the fact as true of a\n whole nationality, any more than the writer (who happens to have known\n in his life four instances in which young Americans voted without\n having attained their majority) would be justified in slanderously\n describing the young men of the United States as in the habit of\n perjuring themselves in order to anticipate the right of elective\n franchise. But our friend, though on oath, never blinks\u2014in fact, he\n has, while on oath, gone out of his way to drag in the above statement,\n and is only prevented from taking the bit in his teeth and careering\n madly over the whole plain of anti-Catholic bigotry by being checked\n peremptorily with the information furnished him by Representative\n Piper: \u201c_That is entirely foreign to the matter at issue._\u201d\n\n As to the assertion that Catholics swear allegiance to the Pope in any\n sense that would interfere with their fealty to any temporal rule or\n government, its absurdity has been so often, so ably, and so clearly\n demonstrated that it is only persons of the third sex who at this day\n pretend to believe it. We will give even Mr. Loomis credit for\n appreciating the distinction between the loyalty which his people owe\n to the confession of faith, their synods and presbyteries, and that\n which they owe to the government of the land. We wish we could in\n conscience credit him with as much candor as ability and knowledge in\n the premises; for a great deal of his testimony proves him to be by no\n means one of those persons whom we pass by as being entitled to a\n \u201cfool\u2019s pardon.\u201d Did it never occur to this man, and to others of his\n way of thought or expression, that this oath or obligation of two\n hundred million Catholics must be of very little avail\u2014might, in short,\n quite as well not have been taken\u2014if its only result is to land the\n Pope here in the fag end of the nineteenth century, in the Vatican,\n without an acre of land over which he can exercise temporal\n jurisdiction, while Catholics all over the world, with the numbers, the\n power, and the means to restore him, if they had but the will, lie\n supinely by, not making a move, either as governments or as\n individuals, in his behalf? That bugbear is too transparent for use;\n people can no longer be scared by it; it is high time to excogitate\n another and a more plausible one, if you are still bent on war with the\n Pope. For our own part, we would recommend the propriety of a change;\n but that change should be to the culture of Christian charity, the\n practice of the golden rule, not forgetting the commandment which\n people of Mr. Loomis\u2019 persuasion call the _ninth_. Ah! Mr. Loomis,\n hatred springs apace fast enough among men without any necessity for\n its culture on the part of professing religious teachers.\n\n Again, the same professor of the doctrine that \u201cthe earth is the\n Lord\u2019s,\u201d that \u201cwe are all his children,\u201d and that \u201cwe are all one in\n Christ,\u201d announces: \u201c_I was a Native American on principle, and I\n believe that America should belong to Americans_\u201d (p. 464). This is\n bad, in our opinion, but it is English, it is intelligible, and it is\n no doubt true as an utterance of his individual sentiment. The set of\n principles referred to have twice been adjudged by the voice of the\n American people, and condemned on both occasions as anti-American,\n opposed to the genius and traditions of our people, and subversive of\n the aims which made us one of the foremost nations of the earth. Mr.\n Loomis, or any other man, has an inherent right to believe in them, if\n he so list; but we question much his discretion in dragging his\n enunciation of political principles into his sworn evidence on the\n Chinese question, and we doubt much whether a knowledge that such is\n his belief would be calculated to enhance the regard of the Chinese,\n among whom he states that he is an evangelist, for either the\n philanthropy or the hard sense of their coryph\u00e6us.\n\n That there may be no doubt about the intensity of his virulence\n against the church, he returns to the charge; and, strangely enough,\n it is the same committeeman that now goads him on who, on the\n previously-mentioned reference to foreign hierarchs, stopped his\n mouth by stating that his opinions on that subject were not at issue\n in the examination.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ You spoke about these Irish as people coming here who\n have sworn allegiance to some foreign potentate. To whom have\n you reference?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ I refer to the Roman Catholics.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Do you, then, think Chinese immigration less dangerous\n to our institutions than that of Roman Catholics?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ I think so; decidedly less. The Chinese do not purpose\n to intermeddle with our religious rights. They have no\n hierarchy. They are not sworn to support any religious system.\n They are mixed up at home. They have no one religion. They may\n be Mahometans.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ You think they are less dangerous than European\n Christians of a certain persuasion?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ I think they are less dangerous than Roman Catholics.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Are they less dangerous than Europeans?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ Whether they be Europeans or of any other nationality,\n providing they are Romanists.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Suppose the Chinese should become Catholics; then they\n would become dangerous?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ I think so.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ The Roman Catholics are not Christians, then?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ They are Christians, but not Protestant Christians.\n They are Roman Catholic Christians. I make a wide distinction\n between Protestants and Romanists\u201d (p. 469).\n\n Thus this man, professing himself an ambassador of Christ, deliberately\n puts himself on record as holding that pagans who know nothing of\n Christ\u2019s atonement, and who, in his phrase, worship idols, are\n preferable to those who have had invoked upon them the name of God in\n baptism, who believe in the Divinity, bow at the name and hope to be\n saved by the merits of Jesus. Could the spirit of the most malevolent\n _odium theologicum_ go further? Would such an assertion be believed of\n any ignorant communist, much less of one who claims to be a minister of\n Christ, were it not contained in print in the report of a Congressional\n committee? If the man believes so little in the influence of the\n religion of the Saviour whom he preaches as his statement would\n indicate, it is his duty at once to resign, and relieve the society\n which supports him of the burden of a salary which he cannot\n conscientiously earn. \u201cBelieve,\u201d said the apostle, \u201cin the Lord Jesus\n Christ, and thou shalt be saved!\u201d \u201cNot enough,\u201d says Rev. Loomis; \u201cyou\n must be additionally a Protestant, or a belief in the Saviour will\n profit you no whit.\u201d Has any man yet ever had a clear definition of\n that term, \u201c_Protestant_\u201d? Thomas \u00e0 Kempis and St. Vincent of Paul, St.\n Augustine and St. Charles Borromeo, the glorious cohort of martyrs and\n confessors, would be dangerous citizens of the United States compared\n with Ah Sin and Fan Chow! This is certainly information of an\n unlooked-for kind, and the man competent to impart it does not usually\n hide his light in the dreary pages of a Congressional committee\u2019s\n report. He says himself that he has been a missionary since 1844. By\n consequence he must have attained to a good age, and the great wonder\n to us is that a man of such astoundingly original views has not\n heretofore made his mark upon an age always anxious \u201cto see or hear\n some new thing.\u201d\n\n The assertion that Catholics purpose to interfere with the rights of\n Protestants or other unbelievers, implied in the statement that the\n Chinese have no such intention, is both too indefinite and too futile\n for discussion. Catholics in all countries, but more especially in\n English-speaking countries, have for the past two hundred years had all\n they could manage to be allowed to follow the dictates of their own\n faith, free of legal pains and penalties, to have any time to spare for\n concocting plans against the civil or religious rights of others. In\n the only English-speaking state that they founded they established\n liberty of conscience, which statute was abolished by the friends of\n Mr. Loomis just as soon as they had the power.\n\n But Mr. Loomis assigns reasons in favor of the superior desirability of\n pagan over Christian immigration, and the prominent ones seem to be\n that they have essentially no religion\u2014or rather, that they have fifty;\n that they have no hierarchy; that, in fact, they do not support any\n religious system\u2014to sum it up, that they are _mixed up at home_! How\n ill does not the adversary of mankind brook the distinctive unity of\n the church of God! Like Pharao\u2019s magicians, everything else he can\n counterfeit or imitate; but the unity of the church is too much for\n him. Common sense teaches the most ignorant, that if our Saviour\n founded any church at all he founded _one_, and not four hundred\n jarring and jangling conventicles. Probably this is the gravamen. The\n Catholic, strong in the oneness of his church, and stanch in the\n conviction that everything not of it must be a sham emanating from the\n father of lies, will not be perverted by Mr. Loomis, charm he never so\n wisely; while, on the other hand, a lot of pagans, especially of pagans\n who were \u201cconsiderably mixed up at home,\u201d might furnish grist for Mr.\n Loomis\u2019 peculiar gospel mill, with due toll for the miller. As with the\n apostle before, so this preacher now differs with the Saviour, who said\n and thought that there should be \u201c_one fold and one Shepherd_.\u201d _Absit\n blasphemia!_ but the sects all differ widely both from the Master, his\n apostles, and the church, with which he promised to abide for ever.\n\n Lest, however, any Catholic should lay to his soul the flattering\n unction that his American birth might eliminate him from the general\n unfitness of Catholics for citizenship in the United States or from an\n entire appreciation of the institutions of his native country, Mr.\n Loomis is very careful to inform us that it does not matter whether\n they be Europeans or _of any other nationality; if they are Catholics_,\n they are not so fit for immigration to this country, still less for the\n exercise of citizenship, as if they were \u201c_heathen Chinese_.\u201d Here is a\n man who declaims against Catholics and denounces them for purposing to\n interfere with the rights of those who disagree with them in religious\n views, and in the same breath argues the unfitness of a population of\n possibly nine millions for citizenship in his own country, they being\n at the time all residents, mostly citizens and largely natives, merely\n because they belong to the old religion\u2014the religion of Charles Carroll\n of Carrollton. \u201cResolved,\u201d said the meeting, \u201cthat the earth belongs to\n the saints.\u201d \u201cResolved,\u201d added the same body, \u201cthat we are the saints.\u201d\n Did it ever by chance occur to our friend of decidedly original, if\n limited, intellect that Senator Casserly lives in his own town, and is\n looked upon, with some reason, as a representative man, very well\n posted upon American institutions, and that it would be very hard to\n persuade the people of the United States of any latent disability on\n the part of that senator to appreciate or support them? Mr. Loomis\n makes a great distinction between a Catholic and a Protestant, and no\n doubt the difference is considerable; but the chasm is by no means as\n great as that which separates the Christian from the bigot, and it is\n hard for us to put Mr. Loomis in the ranks of the former. _Abeat_\n Loomis.\n\n Rev. W. W. Brier, after describing himself as \u201ca Presbyterian minister\n by profession, who makes his living by raising fruit,\u201d proceeds thus:\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Would a reasonable restriction of Chinamen be an\n advantage or not?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ If a restriction is to be made in respect to China, it\n ought to be made upon people who are far worse for us than\n Chinese. I would trade a certain nationality off for Chinamen\n until there was not one of the stock left in trade\u201d (p. 575).\n\n Other portions of his evidence show that he herein refers to the Irish\n as inferior to the Chinese. How he regards the latter is shown by his\n response to the suggestion of a possible danger resulting from the\n presence of sixty thousand Chinamen in the State, without any women of\n their kind, viz.:\n\n \u201c_Ans._ The fact is, they are laborers, and I regard them very\n much in the light I do any other thing we want to use\u2014horses,\n mules, or machinery\u201d (p. 577).\n\n When asked if he would be willing to give the Chinese a chance to\n overrun California, he says:\n\n \u201c_Ans._ Why not? As well as to give the Irish a chance! My real\n opinion is that we would be better off without any more\n foreigners (p. 580).\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Are you quite willing there shall be no laws to\n prevent this State from becoming a Chinese province?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ My opinion is that there is a great deal worse class of\n foreigners in our land, who have all the rights of citizenship\n and everything else\u201d (p. 581).\n\n That a man saturated to the heart\u2019s core with such bitter prejudices\n against any portion of God\u2019s children should have, under any\n circumstances, engaged in the work of saving souls may seem strange,\n and we shall not here go into the explication, which would detain us\n from our subject; but it is by no means surprising that such a person\n should fail of success as an evangelist and devote his time and\n prejudices to fruit-raising. He describes himself as a successful\n fruit-grower, and we have good authority for believing that \u201cno man can\n serve two masters.\u201d Not that he has given up preaching by any means;\n for he tells of his ministering in the vineyard, which means with\n people of his stamp delivering on Sunday an essay or so something after\n the fashion of a screed from the _Spectator_, and taking leave of all\n practical religion till the next Sunday. Of the ministrations of the\n Catholic priest\u2014going in and out daily among his parishioners,\n preparing this one for death, comforting that one bereaved, advising\n and warning the vicious, alleviating want and encouraging all\u2014he knows\n as little as his own mules. It appears by his evidence that he hires at\n times as many as sixty-five or seventy Chinamen, and, as he confessedly\n regards them in the same light as so much machinery, it is by no means\n to be wondered at that he should prefer men who will submit to be so\n regarded. The Chinaman possibly may, certainly the Irishman will not;\n and, upon the whole, we should think very much less of an Irishman if\n he had proved a favorite with such a specimen fossil as Rev. Brier. The\n Irishman is quick, full of life, strong, prone to resent an insult,\n courageous, and of all men least likely to allow himself to be trampled\n upon, ignored, or regarded in the same light as the mules and horses\n about the place. Further, it is more than likely that, in an encounter\n of wit with an Irishman, Rev. Mr. Brier would not come out first; and\n it is a dead certainty that Brier\u2019s view of religion would appeal as\n little to the Irishman\u2019s sympathies as it probably does to those of the\n reader. Taking, then, everything into account, we are not surprised\n that this person should not like Irishmen, but we do wonder that he\n should not have the grace to conceal the hypocrisy involved between his\n own ostensible profession on the one side, and his utter disregard of\n the dignity of humanity, of the value of the human soul, on the other.\n Under such shepherds it is no wonder that the flock becomes scattered,\n and, while we do not wish well to Protestantism at any time (for\n individual Protestants we entertain the most kindly feelings), it would\n be impossible for us to wish the system worse than that the watchmen\n upon the walls of the fortress founded by Luther and Calvin may all\n have the osseous heart, the hypocritical profession, and the eocene\n brain of Rev. Mr. Brier. Calvinism is disintegrating very rapidly, in\n all conscience; it needs but a few more years of the ministrations of\n such reverend gentlemen as this to give it the final _quietus_.\n\n Why, even Chinamen have in this century been touched by the progressive\n spirit of the age. They emigrate, are found in California, the Sandwich\n Islands, Australia, Singapore, etc. They have opened their ports to\n foreigners, and are sending their young men to be educated both in the\n United States and in Europe. And here we have the Rev. Mr. Brier\u2014who\n would build up in these United States a Chinese wall of exclusion, who\n would have Japan and China return to their ancient policy of\n non-intercourse, and who, if he had his way, would cause this great\n country to join them\u2014who says deliberately that the United States would\n be \u201cbetter off without any more foreigners.\u201d He is a credit to the\n college that educated him, the State that bred him, and the religion he\n professes! _Exeat_ Brier.\n\n Rev. S. V. Blakeslee is an orthodox Congregational minister, acting now\n as editor of the _Pacific_, which he describes as \u201cthe oldest religious\n newspaper on the coast.\u201d Contrary to the former two ministers, he is\n bitterly opposed to Chinamen, and is only less rancorous against them\n than he is against the hated Irish Catholics. We give parts of his\n examination, omitting much that would but lead us over ground already\n trodden:\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Is there any other class of foreign labor that you\n think has a tendency to render labor disreputable?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ Yes, I mean all whom we regard as inferior; to whom we\n consign the work\u2014all who are really inferior.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ What race would you put in that category?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ If I were to mention names, I believe the Americans\n generally regard the Irish as very much inferior; yet I believe\n if the priests were out of the way, if Romanism were out of the\n way, the Irish would be equal to any people on earth. As it is,\n they are inferior in intelligence, inferior in morality\u201d (p.\n 1035).\n\n In another portion of his testimony he complains that the people of his\n town (Oakland), with forty thousand inhabitants, have by no means the\n supply of Congregational and other Protestant churches which in the\n East would be considered necessary, and is asked:\n\n \u201c_Ques._ There are many Catholics, are there not?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ Oh! Catholics can hardly be said to go to church. They\n do not go to listen to a sermon; they do not go to get\n instructed (p. 1037).\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Do the Irish assimilate with the American people?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ They do, if they are Protestant; but the priests mean\n to keep them separate, and mean to keep them as a power in\n America under their control\u201d (p. 1041).\n\n As to his knowledge of Catholic practice and belief, the following will\n suffice, viz.:\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Have you as much prejudice against an American or\n German Catholic as against an Irish Roman Catholic?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ If you ask, is my judgment more in approval of an\n American or German than of an Irish Catholic, I should say it\n was, because I do not find that the priest can control the\n German as he can the Irish Catholic.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Does the priest control them for evil or for good?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ I think that a great many priests teach them that the\n end justifies the means, and that to tell a lie for mother\n church is honest.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Did you ever hear one preach that?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ Well, they were so near it\u2014it\u2019s all the same, probably;\n but they did not use those words.\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Have you heard them preach?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ No, sir; they don\u2019t preach much. They will stand a long\n time, going through a performance, and ring a little bell for a\n man to rise and kneel down, and then they will rise up again,\n but they don\u2019t preach much!\u201d\n\n The reader will observe the marked contempt with which those to whom\n _we consign the work_ are regarded as being _really inferior_. Why, in\n the eyes of this exponent of Christian doctrine and republican\n practice, labor, and those who do it, are quite as disreputable as used\n to be, in their own region, a class known as _poor white trash_. Now,\n from the conditions of this world in which we are placed, there can\n never, by any possibility, come a time (as there never has hitherto\n been one) in which it will not be incumbent on two-thirds of earth\u2019s\n inhabitants to earn their _bread in the sweat of their brow_. It is\n God\u2019s decree, man\u2019s destiny, and a large proportion of the one-third\n who in any age of the world have managed to exempt themselves from the\n consequence of the _fiat_ of the Omnipotent in respect to labor, have\n done so by taking advantage of the honesty or simplicity of their\n fellow-men. They or their ancestors must have converted to their own\n use more than their share of the soil, the common heritage of the human\n race and the source of all wealth. There are not wanting at this day\n those who consider the laws which perpetuated the right to such\n original seizures unjust, and it is just such despisers of the laborer\n and appropriators of his work as this reverend gentleman who\n unwittingly give the greatest occasion for discontent to those who\n fancy themselves aggrieved by the existing condition of things. We are\n neither communists nor agrarians, but we see that, even in this happy\n country, it will be very possible to convert the laboring class into\n such by subjecting them to the scorn of such men as this witness,\n causing them to feel that they are regarded as really inferior, and\n incidentally exciting the envy which the sight of ranches of\n seventy-six thousand acres of land in the hands of one individual is\n calculated to produce. Such contempt of the laborer is un-American, to\n say nothing of its entire lack of Christianity, and to us it seems that\n no men of any nationality or religion could be so injurious to the real\n interests of any country as those entertaining it. We do not say that\n we would _trade_ the Rev. Mr. Blakeslee _for a Chinaman_, but we hope\n and believe that there are few Americans of his way of thinking in\n regard to labor, and trust that soon there will be none of _that stock_\n left. The preamble to the Declaration of Independence must have long\n ceased to be remembered, and Christianity will be in her last throes,\n ere such views shall obtain; and we have confidence in the permanence\n of this republic, with an abiding faith that God will be with his\n church.\n\n We will not bandy words with Mr. Blakeslee as to his opinion that\n Americans generally regard the Irish as _inferior in intelligence and\n morality_. It is one of those lump statements which impulsive or\n prejudiced men sometimes make about a whole nation in the heat of\n conversation, but which seldom find their way into sworn testimony. We\n are American to the manner born, and we not only do not believe the\n fact, but, so far as both reading and intercourse with our countrymen\n have enabled us to form an opinion, we should assert the direct\n contrary. There is, we well know, about all our large cities a class\n corresponding to the \u201choodlums\u201d of San Francisco (and we are sorry to\n add that they are nearly all Americans) who fancy that their mere\n accidental birth upon this soil has not only elevated them above all\n other nationalities, but raised them above the necessity of work. We\n can lay no stress on the opinions of this class. By all other Americans\n not influenced by hatred of the church, and, indeed, by many who do not\n regard her favorably, we have always heard remarked (and statistics\n will prove) the almost entire immunity of the Irish from the crime of\n f\u0153ticide; their large generosity to their friends and relatives, as\n proved by the proportionately larger amounts of money yearly\n transmitted by them to the old country; their unconquerable industry;\n the chastity of their women, though, by their condition in life, more\n exposed to temptation than perhaps any other body of females in the\n world. It is denied by nobody that where a soldier is wanted the\n Irishman is always on hand, and that he compares very favorably with\n the soldier of any other nation. As to intelligence, Mr. Blakeslee must\n surely be poking some mild fun at us under the sanctity of his oath. If\n he had ever tried to get the advantage of the most illiterate Irishman\n in conversation, if he had ever heard or read a true account of the\n result to any one who did so, he would not, for shame\u2019s sake, appear\n making the wild assertion that the Irishman is deficient in\n intelligence. The common experience of any local community in the\n United States will at once brand the statement with its proper stamp,\n for which three letters are quite sufficient.\n\n But here comes the real gist of Mr. Blakeslee\u2019s charge of immorality\n and stupidity against the countrymen of Swift and Burke, of Wolfe Tone\n and O\u2019Connell, of Moore and John of Tuam. \u201cIf,\u201d says he, \u201cit were not\n for Romanism, they would be in course of time a very excellent people.\u201d\n In other words, if they would cease to be what they are, if they would\n sit under the ministrations of Rev. Blakeslee and his like, if they\n would now give up the religion from which centuries of persecution and\n penal laws have failed to dissever them, they might finally come to\n have as thorough-paced a contempt for labor and as strong a belief in\n the inferiority of the laborer as this reverend gentleman himself.\n \u201cPaddy,\u201d says Mr. Blakeslee, \u201cyou are a Papist, you are an idolater,\n you are very immoral, and you have very little sense. Will you be good\n enough now to become a Congregationalist?\u201d The Irishman\u2019s blood boils,\n fire flashes from his eye, the church militant is roused in him, and\n away runs Rev. Blakeslee, more than ever convinced of the inferiority\n of the mean Irish and their imperviousness to the charms of\n Protestantism!\n\n Among the ephemeral sects of the day, depending, as they do, on the\n temporary whims or idiosyncrasies of the individuals who \u201crun them,\u201d\n there is apt to arise a fashion in morality, so that it is something\n not unlike fashion in ladies\u2019 dress\u2014very different this season from\n what it was the last. Now, these sects are loud and noisy, making up in\n vehemence for what they lack in numbers, logic, and authority. Just\n now, and for some years past, the sin which it is the fashion to decry\n to the neglect of all others is that of drunkenness, which the church\n has always held to be a great scandal amongst men and a sin against the\n Almighty. But, while the church has received no new light on the\n subject, the various sectaries have erected \u201cdrinking\u201d into the one\n typical, the sole crying vice, the incorporation of all the other sins.\n A man is now practically \u201ca moral man,\u201d provided he does not use\n liquor; and no other crime, short of murder, is, in the eyes of the\n Protestant community, so damning as is addictedness to drink. There is\n no doubt but that, in the early part of this century, liquor was drunk\n by the Irish to too great an extent. There is just as little doubt that\n a great change for the better has come over the Irish in this regard,\n and that the good work is still going on. But the Irish at no time\n exceeded the Scotch in their consumption of liquor, nor did they ever\n equal either the Danes or Swedes, both thoroughly Protestant nations.\n But if you give a man a bad name you may as well hang him; and the same\n holds good of a nation. It suited the sectarian temperance orators to\n select the Irish as the \u201cshocking example\u201d among nations, and falsely\n to attribute the exaggerated drunkenness which they represented as then\n existing to the influence of the church. Such a cry, once well set\n going from Exeter Hall and the various Ebenezer chapels, is not easily\n quelled; and as it is much easier for most men to take their opinions\n ready made than to frame them for themselves, there does remain on the\n minds of a large number of people a lurking distrust of the sobriety of\n the individual Irishman, and a general belief that drunkenness is his\n peculiar and besetting national vice. The statistics of the quantity of\n ardent spirits consumed in Ireland since the year 1870, as compared\n with the quantities used in England, Scotland, or Wales, will convince\n any one who desires to know the truth; and we are not writing for those\n who are content to defame a people by the dishonest repetition of a\n false cry. These tables prove that, man for man, the consumption\n referred to is in Ireland not so much as in Scotland by over three\n gallons, in England by nearly two gallons, and in Wales by a little\n less than in England. So long, however, as Sweden overtops the\n consumption of the highest of them by the annual amount of two and a\n half gallons per man, and Catholic Ireland holds the lowest rank as a\n consumer of ardent spirits, we have no hope that it will \u201csuit the\n books\u201d of sectarian temperance agitators to call attention to the\n facts. It is much easier to defame than to do justice, and by this\n craft many people nowadays are making a livelihood. Yet this false\n charge of a vice which betrays by no means the blackheartedness\n involved in many others\u2014which, bad as it is, is by no means so heinous\n as defrauding the laborer of his hire, swindling the poor of their\n savings, watering stocks, accepting bribes, etc., etc., and which is\n not even mentioned in the decalogue\u2014is the only one that could at any\n time have been charged with a decent show of plausibility against the\n Irish as a nation, or against the individual Irishmen whom we have in\n this country. We ourselves must admit that we thought there was some\n truth in it, till we searched the statistical tables to find out the\n facts, and we here make to the Irish people the _amende honorable_ for\n having misjudged them on the strength of the cry of sectarian\n demagogues.\n\n Going to church can, in the mind of Mr. Blakeslee, mean only one\n thing\u2014_i.e._, going to hear a sermon\u2014and so he says that \u201c_Catholics\n can hardly be said to go to church_.\u201d Certainly the prime object of a\n Catholic in going to church is not _to listen to a sermon_, nor should\n it be so. It is hardly worth while to attempt to enlighten a man like\n Mr. Blakeslee, who himself habitually sheds light from both pulpit and\n press; but if we are to take the knowledge he seems to possess of the\n Catholic Church as a specimen of the information he diffuses on other\n points, what rare ideas must not his hearers and readers attain of\n matters and things in general! Yet he is a man who professes to have\n made a theological course, which should involve not only the study of\n the doctrines and practises of his own sect, but also, to some slight\n extent, of the remaining sects of Protestantism, to say nothing of the\n church on which two hundred million Christians rest their hopes of\n salvation. He knows no more of the celebration of the Blessed Eucharist\n in the Church of Rome than to describe it as \u201c_going through a\n performance and ringing a little bell for a man to rise and kneel\n down_\u201d; and yet the fellow does not hesitate to announce what is the\n doctrine and what the practice of the church\u2014nay, to hold himself forth\n as a champion against her tenets, as though he were divinely\n commissioned to instruct thereon. To see ignorance is at all times\n unpleasant; blatant ignorance combined with assumption of knowledge is\n doubly nauseous; but the supereminent degree of loathing is only\n excited when ignorance or conceit of knowledge elevates itself into the\n chair of the spiritual guide and denounces what it in no whit\n understands. _Be these thy gods, O Israel?_ Surely it is not to hear\n the lucubrations of men of this stamp that any sane people would go to\n church. We can only wish to the sheep of such a pastor increase of\n knowledge, decrease of prejudice, and an enlarged ability to tell truth\n on the part of their shepherd! We repeat that Catholics do not go to\n church primarily or solely to hear a sermon. But they do go there to\n join in spirit at the celebration of the divine Sacrifice, to pray to\n God for grace to assist them through life, to make and strengthen good\n resolutions, and to obey the command of the church. We all believe that\n the devout hearing of one Mass is far more valuable than the hearing of\n all the sermons ever delivered or printed since the sermon on the\n Mountain of Beatitudes; and we lay no stress whatever on the best\n formul\u00e6 of words ever strung together by the ingenuity even of the most\n pious and learned of mere men, when compared with the expiatory\n sacrifice of Christ\u2019s body and blood, instituted by him and celebrated,\n not merely commemorated, by the priest to whom he has given the power.\n Should it ever happen\u2014and as the mercy of God is infinite, and his ways\n past finding out, it is not impossible\u2014that this poor deluded man\n should be brought to a knowledge of the truth, with what shame and\n confusion of face would he not read his ignorant and impudent travesty\n of the worship of God in his church!\n\n If there be, as there doubtless are, other Protestants who get their\n instruction about Catholics from Mr. Blakeslee and his like, and who\n believe with this witness that the _priests mean to keep them_ (the\n Catholics) _as a power in America_ under their (the priests\u2019) control,\n it would not be, and is not, worth our while to attempt to argue the\n point with such. They will so believe, like the relatives of Dives,\n though one rose from the dead to confute them. Ephraim is joined to his\n idols; let him alone! But we appeal to the Catholic voters of this\n country, of American or foreign birth, to answer: Has your bishop or\n parish priest ever undertaken to dictate to you how you should vote?\n Has your vote, on whatever side given, interfered in the slightest\n degree with your status in the church? Do you know of a single instance\n in which one or the other of these things has taken place? We cannot\n lay down a fairer gauge. If these things take place they cannot occur\n without the knowledge of those among whom they are done and upon whom\n they are practised. They are Americans, and it is a free country. Long\n ere this would the country have rung with the proof, had any such been\n forthcoming. Mr. Blakeslee\u2019s lying charge meant, if it meant anything,\n that Catholics were to be kept apart as a political power; for neither\n we nor any other Catholic desires or hopes otherwise than that the\n church, _as a religious body_, shall, till the end of time, be kept\n separate and apart from all the sects of Protestantism, which we\n believe to be heresy and schism.\n\n One would naturally always rather give an adversary the credit of\n having honestly mistaken the facts than be obliged to consider him a\n wilful slanderer and falsifier. But there are circumstances in which\n the assertion made is so patently false, or has been so often\n thoroughly refuted, that, though the heart would fain take refuge in\n the former course, the brain refuses to accept any but the latter. Such\n a case occurs where Mr. Blakeslee says that \u201c_a great many priests\n teach them that the end justifies the means, ... that to tell a lie for\n mother church is honest_.\u201d Every Catholic who has learned his catechism\n knows that this is not so. We believe that _he_ knew it was not so when\n he said it, but that his own innate malevolence against the church, and\n the spirit of the father of lies speaking through him, compelled him to\n the utterance of this vile slander. For which great sin may God forgive\n him: he stands in sore need of it.\n\n But after all, if Satan is so easily caught on a cross-examination as\n he on this occasion allowed his servant to be, we need not stand in\n much dread of his lies. The same man whose lips are not yet dry from\n saying _on oath_ that the priests teach their people to tell lies, when\n asked if he ever heard any single priest so teach, shuffles out of it\n thus\u2014his own words need no comment from us:\n\n \u201c_Ans._ Well, they were so near it; it\u2019s all the same,\n _probably_! They didn\u2019t use those words!\n\n \u201c_Ques._ Have you ever heard them preach?\n\n \u201c_Ans._ _No, sir!_\n\n We, on the contrary, think that it was not all the same \u201c_probably_,\u201d\n and heartily thank his satanic majesty for his negligence in failing to\n inspirit his servant with the knowledge that, in order to be believed,\n in swearing as to what priests preach in their sermons, it is necessary\n to be able also to swear that the witness has heard at least one such\n sermon. _Valeat_ Blakeslee.\n\n Other preachers testified; and when the question arose as to Catholic\n foreigners, more especially Irish Catholic, all betrayed the cloven\n hoof, though some veiled their hatred in much more seemly words than\n did others. It had been our intention to examine their testimony, in so\n far as it touched the church, _seriatim_; but further reflection\n induces us to believe that from these few pages the reader can learn\n sufficiently the depth of the ignorance and the extent of the hatred of\n these blind leaders of the blind. If the reward in heaven be exceeding\n great to those whom all men shall hate, revile, and despitefully use,\n surely the glory of Catholics, and of Catholic Irishmen especially,\n will be great in the next world; for certainly they are not loved of\n men in this.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n A LITTLE SERMON.\n\n FROM \u201cTHE LITTLE FLOWERS OF ST. FRANCIS.\u201d\n\n\n The Poor One of Assisi trod one day\n Bevagna\u2019s road, and, praying by the way\u2014\n\n His heart seraphic, like the choirs above,\n Filled with the sweetness born of heavenly love\u2014\n\n Lifting his eyes, that loved the earth\u2019s fair face,\n He saw, thick gathered in a bosky place,\n\n A host of birds that flitted to and fro,\n Filling the boughs with twittering murmur low.\n\n \u201cWait here, my brothers,\u201d fell in gentle speech;\n \u201cUnto this multitude needs must I preach:\n\n \u201cHere by the wayside, good Masseo, bide\n Till I these little birds have satisfied.\u201d\n\n Into the field he passed, the flowers among,\n Where, on the bending stems, the songsters swung.\n\n Gathered the wing\u00e8d things about his feet,\n Dropped from the boughs amid the grasses sweet:\n\n Reverent dropt down to listen to God\u2019s word,\n Silenced their song that his Poor One be heard.\n\n Touching with his gray robe their eager wings,\n St. Francis softly stilled their flutterings.\n\n Sedate they sat with crested heads alert,\n The near ones nestling in their brother\u2019s skirt.\n\n \u201cMy little birds, ye owe deep gratitude\n To God, who has your forms with life imbued,\n\n \u201cAnd ever in all places should ye praise\n Your Maker, who in love keeps you always,\n\n \u201cSince by His hand to you is freedom given\n To fly where\u2019er ye will, on earth, in heaven:\n\n \u201cSince from his strong and loving hand ye hold\n Your double garments guarding you from cold:\n\n \u201cSince, that no evil blight fall on your race,\n He gave in Noe\u2019s ark your sires a place.\n\n \u201cAnd unto him deep gratitude ye owe\n For this pure air whence life itself doth flow.\n\n \u201cAnd then ye sow not, neither do ye reap,\n Yet God for you doth plenteous harvest keep;\n\n \u201cThe streams He gives you, and the limpid spring\n Where ye may drink of waters freshening;\n\n \u201cHe gives the hills and valleys for your rest,\n The great-armed trees where each may make his nest.\n\n \u201cAnd, since ye cannot spin nor sew, his care\n Weaves the soft robes ye and your fledglings wear.\n\n \u201cHow much he loves that doth so richly give!\n Praise him, my little birds, all days ye live!\n\n \u201cSo keep ye well from sin of thanklessness,\n And God keep you, whom let all creatures bless!\u201d\n\n Bowed all the little birds their heads to earth,\n Oped wide their bills, and sang with holy mirth\n\n Their _Deo gratias_ when St. Francis ceased,\n Yet rose not till his hand their wings released\n\n With Christian cross signed in the happy air,\n Giving the songsters leave to scatter there.\n\n Softly, so blessed, the grateful birds up-soared\n And marvellous music in their flight outpoured:\n\n Looked not at earth, nor him they left behind,\n Parting in ways the holy cross had signed.\n\n Singing they cleft the quarters of the sky\u2014\n Type of St. Francis\u2019 mission wide and high:\n\n Type of his little ones who nothing own,\n Whose humble trust is in their Lord alone\u2014\n\n So nourished as their brother birds are fed,\n Whose great Creator doth their table spread.\n\n Listening the lessening chant, St. Francis smiled,\n Praising his Lord for joy so undefiled.\n \u2014_From the French of F. A. Ozanam_.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n NEW PUBLICATIONS.\n\n\n THE KNOWLEDGE OF MARY. By the Rev. J. De Concilio, Pastor of St.\n Michael\u2019s Church, Jersey City, author of _Catholicity and\n Pantheism_. New York: The Catholic Publication Society Co., 9\n Barclay Street. 1878.\n\n We must apologize to Father De Concilio for being late with our notice\n of his book. Our excuse is, simply, lack of time for its\n perusal\u2014anything but lack of desire; for, on learning that the author\n of _Catholicity and Pantheism_\u2014a work that has won unstinted and\n generous praise from all competent critics, and established the fame of\n its author as a profound philosophical thinker\u2014was engaged upon a work\n about the Blessed Virgin, we hailed the promised boon as a feast, both\n intellectual and devotional, of the rarest kind. And are we\n disappointed? On the contrary, our most sanguine expectations are\n surpassed.\n\n Father De Concilio tells us in his preface that this new book is \u201ca\n necessary part\u201d of his former work on _Catholicity and Pantheism_,\n \u201cthough it may seem to have very little to do with it.\u201d \u201cFor Mary,\u201d he\n says, \u201cis the best refutation of pantheism, the universal error of our\n time. The substance of this error is to absorb the finite in the\n infinite, and, consequently, to abolish, to do away with, all created\n agency. Now, Mary, as we shall prove, represents created agency in its\n grandest, sublimest, and most magnificent expression. She represents\n created agency in all the mysteries of God relating to the creature.\n She is, therefore, the best and most convincing refutation of\n pantheism, the rock against which the mighty waves of this universal\n error must exhaust their force.\u201d Again: \u201cPantheism, in pretending to\n exalt humanity, degrades it and deprives it of everything that causes\n its glory. Mary, the grandest specimen of human nature, exhibits human\n personality in its most colossal proportions, and is the glory, the\n pride, the magnificence of our race.\u201d\n\n We quote these passages from the author\u2019s preface, because they furnish\n the key-note to the whole work.\n\n The volume opens with an admirable \u201cIntroduction,\u201d showing how\n Christianity was needed to bring fallen man to the knowledge and love\n of God, and how \u201cthe world owes Christianity, along with its results,\n to Mary\u201d; also, how the same instrument must bring back the knowledge\n and love of God to-day, lost again as they have been in great part;\n whence \u201cthe necessity of true, accurate, solid knowledge of Mary.\u201d Then\n follow the five books into which the essay is divided, the chapters of\n each book being subdivided into articles. This arrangement at once\n gives conciseness to the argument, and much relieves the strain upon\n the reader\u2019s thought.\n\n The first, second, and fourth books are the most important: the first\n dealing with \u201cMary\u2019s place in the divine plan of the universe\u201d; the\n second with \u201cthe grandeur of Mary\u2019s destiny\u201d; and the fourth with \u201cthe\n consequences of Mary\u2019s dignity relatively to God, to the human race,\n and to herself.\u201d The third book treats of \u201cthe perfections of Mary in\n general,\u201d and its arguments will be readily admitted by the reader who\n has accepted those of the preceding books; the fifth, again, elucidates\n \u201cMary\u2019s merit and glory,\u201d which no one will question who agrees with\n the fourth book.\n\n Father De Concilio shows himself a master by the easy strength with\n which he expounds the divine plan of the universe, and the place which\n the Incarnation holds therein. The eight articles of his first chapter\n are thus recapitulated:\n\n \u201cEnd: The greatest possible manifestation and communication of divine\n goodness.\n\n \u201cPreliminary means: Creation of substances, spiritual, material, and\n composite\u2014angels, matter, and men.\n\n \u201cBest means to the object: The hypostatic union of the Word with human\n nature.\n\n \u201cEffects of the Incarnation with regard to God: Infinite glory and\n honor.\n\n \u201cWith regard to created nature: Universal deification.\n\n \u201cWith regard to personalities: Deification of their nature in Christ,\n and beatific union with the Trinity through their union with Christ by\n sanctification.\n\n \u201cGod foresees the fall, and permits it in order to enhance these\n effects by redemption.\u201d\n\n We do not at all wonder at a reviewer in the Chicago _Interior_\n complimenting our author on \u201cprofound scholarship in Catholic\n theology.\u201d \u201cThe book,\u201d he says, \u201cis bold to familiarity in describing\n with scientific particularity and clearness of outline the constitution\n of the Holy Trinity as defined by Catholic theologians.\u201d We do,\n however, wonder that this writer, if a believer in revelation, should\n go on to compare Father De Concilio to a chemist analyzing \u201ca pyrite of\n iron,\u201d and still more that he should declare his \u201cideas as grossly\n _anthropomorphic_ as it is possible to be\u201d(!) Would this critic call\n the Bible anthropomorphic? He says nothing about our author\u2019s theology\n of the Incarnation\u2014unless he means to hit at _that_ as\n \u201canthropomorphic.\u201d It is precisely about the Incarnation that\n Protestants are utterly at sea. When the reviewer adds: \u201cWe can\n understand, after examining this book, the character of Catholic\n devotion to Mary as we never understood it before,\u201d we are compelled to\n reply: \u201cThen your understanding of it is a greater mistake than ever\n before, unless you have first come to realize the Catholic doctrine of\n the Incarnation with its bearings; and if that were the case you would\n avow it, for you could not remain a Protestant another hour.\u201d\n\n Let any Protestant of sufficient education read the first of these five\n books earnestly and prayerfully, and he will have to acknowledge that\n his hitherto Christianity, be it what it may, is divided _toto c\u0153lo_\n from Catholic Christianity\u2014the _totum c\u0153lum_ being precisely his lack\n of that \u201cknowledge of Mary\u201d which is inseparable from an intelligent\n belief in the Incarnation.\n\n The Catholic student will be specially interested by the way in which\n Father De Concilio treats of Mary\u2019s \u201cco-operation.\u201d She is set\n forth\u2014and in a clearer light than ever before by any book in the\n English language\u2014as the great \u201crepresentative _personality_\u201d of our\n race. It is in this capacity that she consents to the Incarnation and\n Redemption. \u201cA God-Man was necessary to expiate for the sins of\n mankind. But that was not sufficient. According to the law of wisdom,\n mentioned in our last argument, God was ready to help human nature to\n that extent as to effect the Incarnation and produce the God-Man; but\n God required, also, that mankind should do all it could towards its own\n redemption. It could not give the God who was to divinize the acts of\n human nature; it could not actually effect the union between human\n nature and the divine person of the Word; but it could freely and\n deliberately offer the nature to be united for the express purpose and\n intent of suffering; and this offering could only be made by means of a\n _representative human person_ fully conscious of the necessity of\n expiation, of the conditions required by it, and of the consequences\n resulting therefrom\u201d (pp. 77, 78).\n\n Again (pp. 78, 79): \u201cThe consent of Mary was required in the plan of\n God in order to elevate created _personality_ to the highest possible\n dignity, and thus to fulfil the end which God had proposed to himself\n in exterior work.\u201d This purpose, he goes on to say, was not completed\n by God \u201ctaking human _nature_ to be his own nature, and to be God with\n him.\u201d ... \u201cHuman _personality_ does not exist in Christ, and receives\n no honor from him. There is one person in him, and that is divine.\u201d ...\n \u201cMary, therefore (p. 80), fulfils the office of creation, and\n especially of created personality, in its most sovereign act\u2014the act\n which this personality would have elicited in Jesus Christ, if it had\n been in him. Human nature, such as it was in Christ, could not give\n itself, because to give is a personal act, and God wished to carry to\n its utmost extremity the communication of goodness, that human nature\n should give itself in order to be made partaker of the responsibility\n and attribution of the effects of that mysterious union.\u201d\n\n Having thus shown the inestimable importance of Mary\u2019s consent to the\n Incarnation, our author proceeds to point out \u201cthe extent or\n comprehensiveness\u201d of that consent\u2014to wit, that \u201cin giving her consent\n to the Incarnation and redemption\u201d she \u201cnot only agreed to become the\n Mother of Jesus Christ the _Redeemer_, ... but also to become a\n _co-sufferer_ with him; so that Mary\u2019s Compassion was to accompany, to\n go hand in hand with, Christ\u2019s Passion, _both_ being _necessary_ for\n the redemption of mankind, according to the plan selected by God\u2019s\n wisdom.\u201d\n\n Here is something new to us, but very delightful to discover, since it\n glorifies Our Blessed Lady so much more than the ordinary view of her\n Dolors. We knew that \u201cshe consented to undergo all the anguish and\n sorrow and martyrdom consequent upon her from the sacrifice and\n immolation of her divine Son,\u201d and thus \u201cjoin her _Compassion_ to his\n Passion, in order to redeem mankind\u201d; that, in this sense, she\n \u201cconsented to become the _corredemptrix_ of the human race.\u201d But it had\n not occurred to us that \u201call this, implied in her consent, was\n _necessary_ as that consent itself.\u201d\n\n Our author here quotes Father Faber\u2019s theory about Mary\u2019s privilege of\n being \u201ccorredemptrix\u201d\u2014the term by which saints and doctors call her\u2014and\n shows that the gifted Oratorian, in his exquisite book on Mary\u2019s\n sorrows (_The Foot of the Cross_), \u201chas not done justice to the\n subject.\u201d He even quarrels with Faber\u2019s \u201cco-redemptress\u201d as a\n \u201c_substitution_\u201d for the ancient \u201ccorredemptrix,\u201d whereas it would\n appear but a translation\u2014that is, as Faber uses it. We feel sure, too,\n that the English word _may_ mean the full equivalent of the Latin. But,\n at all events, Father Faber\u2019s theory is that Mary\u2019s dolors were among\n the _unnecessary_ sufferings of the Passion. \u201cIndeed,\u201d he says, \u201cthey\n were literally our Lord\u2019s unnecessary sufferings.... Her co-operation\n with the Passion by means of her dolors is wanting, certainly, in that\n indispensable necessity which characterizes the co-operation of her\n maternity.\u201d To this Father De Concilio remarks that Father Faber \u201chad\n an incomplete idea of the office of Mary as to redemption,\u201d and objects\n to the doctrine of \u201cunnecessary sufferings\u201d as \u201ctheologically\n inaccurate, to say the least.\u201d \u201cThe Passion of Christ,\u201d he says, \u201cmust\n be considered as a _variety_ of sorrows _co-ordained_ by the _unity_ of\n the sacrifice\u2014the beginning of which was the maternal womb, in which\n the Incarnate Word placed himself in the state of a victim, and the\n termination Calvary, where the grand holocaust was consummated.\u201d And,\n after establishing this point, he proceeds to prove that Mary\u2019s\n Compassion was \u201camong the necessary elements of the redemption.\u201d He\n brings to light, both from the Fathers and from reason, \u201ca principle in\n the economy of our redemption,\u201d whereby God had to supply, indeed, a\n means of infinite merit (through the Incarnation), but, equally, had to\n exact from humanity all that itself could do towards atonement. From\n this principle he deduces three consequences:\n\n _First_. That \u201cour Lord\u2019s humanity was to suffer as much as ... would\n bear a kind of proportion to the offence and realize the principle that\n human nature was to do as much as possible towards its own redemption.\u201d\n Whence, obviously, \u201cthe distinction of necessary and unnecessary\n sufferings in the life of our Lord\u201d is untenable.\n\n _Second_. That \u201chuman nature was required to do more than suffer in\n Christ. It was required to deliberately and willingly offer up that\n human nature to be united to the Word of God for the purpose of\n redemption, by means of a representative of the whole human race.\u201d\n Whence \u201cthe necessity of Mary\u2019s consent to the Incarnation and\n redemption.\u201d\n\n _Third_. That \u201cit was necessary that the highest representative of\n human personality, the human head of the race, _should be subject also\n to the highest possible martyrdom which a human person may be subject\n to_, as a reparation coming from a human personality, and unite it with\n the sufferings of the humanity of the Word, and thus bring its own meed\n of suffering required by God\u2019s wisdom for our ransom.\u201d \u201cThis was\n necessary,\u201d he adds, \u201cbecause in our Lord _humanity suffered as a\n nature, not as a personality_.\u201d\n\n From these deductions, then, the author concludes that \u201cMary\u2019s\n Compassion is a necessary element of the redemption, and Mary is really\n and truly the corredemptrix of the human race.\u201d But, of course, he is\n careful to add that \u201cChrist alone redeemed us truly, really, and\n efficaciously, because he alone could give infinite value to those\n sufferings, and, therefore, he is the only Redeemer. Mary is the\n corredemptrix, but only in the sense just explained.\u201d \u201cThose,\u201d he says,\n \u201cwho are afraid to think Mary\u2019s sufferings necessary for our redemption\n are thinking only of the infinite value required for our sacrifice.\n Mary has nothing to do with that. In speaking of her co-operation we\n limit ourselves to speaking of what was required from human nature and\n human personality as their mite towards redemption, independent of the\n infinite worth to be given only by Christ\u2019s infinite personality.\u201d\n\n To us, we must joyfully avow, this elaborate argument for Mary\u2019s\n greater glory appears irrefragable.\n\n What specially delights us in the fourth book, again, is to see our\n heavenly Mother proved the \u201cchannel\u201d and \u201cdispenser\u201d of all grace.\n This, also, is an unspeakable gain to us. And we need not say that if,\n on the one hand, our learned theologian has invested his Queen with a\n sublimity and an awe that makes us feel how unworthy of her notice is\n our best of love and service, he has inspired us, on the other hand,\n with more confidence than ever in her tenderness and power.\n\n Those, too, of our readers who have a turn for contemplation and have\n thought much on Our Lady will meet in these pages with many an idea\n which has come into their minds before, and which, perhaps, they have\n been afraid to disclose, or even harbor. Such will join with us in\n revelling over the logic which makes blessed certainties of these\n exquisite guesses.\n\n In conclusion, we are quite unable to express our thanks to Father De\n Concilio for his magnificent book. But he does not need our gratitude.\n She whose champion he is will not fail to fulfil in his regard the\n promise which to him must be so precious: _Qui elucidant me vitam\n \u00e6ternam habebunt_\u2014\u201cThey who make me shine forth shall have life\n everlasting.\u201d\n\n\n WHY A CATHOLIC IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY? By William Giles Dix. New\n York: The Catholic Publication Society Co., 9 Barclay Street. 1878.\n\n The author of this essay once contributed to THE CATHOLIC WORLD a\n thoughtful article called \u201cThe Roman Gathering.\u201d (See CATHOLIC WORLD,\n May, 1868.) He was then a Protestant. It is consoling to find him no\n longer among those who, while forced to envy the Catholic Church,\n remain outside her communion on the strength of some hazy theory or\n from a superstitious dread of using their reason. Having come, by God\u2019s\n grace, to see the truth himself, he aims at making others see it\n equally clearly. He shows very forcibly, and in simple language, \u201cthat\n the New Testament, and the Protestant version of that, proves these\n propositions:\n\n \u201cI. Christ founded a church.\n\n \u201cII. Christ founded _one_ church, one only: _not a corporation of\n national churches, not a federal union of churches_, but literally one\n church.\n\n \u201cIII. That one church of Christ was intended to be the only spiritual\n guide, on earth, of Christians.\n\n \u201cIV. That [this] church had the promise of endurance and of guidance\n until the end of the world.\n\n \u201cV. That [this] church was the beginning of the church known\n historically as the Catholic Church.\u201d\n\n Of course this is very old ground; but Mr. Dix goes over it in a way\n that ought to induce earnest Protestants of any denomination to follow\n him.\n\n Here is an excellent hit:\n\n \u201cA word is in many mouths\u2014_Ultramontane_\u2014intended to represent extreme\n views of papal rights. Now, I care not whom you select among the\n defenders of the powers of St. Peter and his successors, you will find\n the attributes ascribed by any such writer to the successors of St.\n Peter not so strong as the single commission of our Lord to his\n apostles recorded in the New Testament. _The most ultramontane writers\n that I know of are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John._ The only difficulty\n which any one finds in the interpretation of the words of our Lord\n referring to his church is because those words are so plain and direct.\n They so clearly set forth the amplest prerogatives ever claimed for the\n Church of Christ that many people seem to believe that they cannot mean\n what they seem to mean, and, therefore, must be explained away.\u201d\n\n We hope this short essay will meet with the success its ability\n deserves. We regret, however, to say that while the plainness of its\n language is a great point in its favor, its style is open to\n improvement.\n\n\n THE MIRROR OF TRUE WOMANHOOD. A Book of Instruction for Women in the\n World. By Rev. Bernard O\u2019Reilly. New York: Peter F. Collier. 1878.\n\n Dr. O\u2019Reilly continues to lay Catholics under obligation to his fluent\n and versatile pen. He has a keen instinct for what is wanting in\n Catholic popular literature, and this large and handsome volume fills a\n niche in the Catholic household that was too long left empty. Women in\n the world are apt to be overlooked by spiritual writers, or the works\n intended for them are of a character not well adapted to attract the\n average woman of the world, however good she may be. They need\n something to take hold of their homes and their hearts, and to enter\n into their ordinary daily life. This Dr. O\u2019Reilly\u2019s excellent volume\n aims at doing, and, we trust, will succeed in doing. It is a work of\n practical suggestion, illustrated and annotated, so to say, by examples\n from the lives of women in all ages and in every station of life. A\n tender heart, a practical mind, and a pious soul speak in every line.\n It is the mother first of all who is chiefly instrumental in shaping\n the life of man. If she is good and pure and high-minded, a constant\n example of the height and greatness of those noblest of estates,\n wifehood and motherhood, the chances are altogether in favor of her\n children following her example. She is their great safeguard, their\n earthly guardian-angel until they are properly launched upon the sea of\n life, and even after that period her heart follows them and her virtues\n live in their memory and their lives. It is because so many women\n neglect this high office that so many children go astray. Virtue\n belongs to no class; it is common to all Christians. The truest\n nobility is a Christian life, which is open to all. The object of his\n book is well described by Dr. O\u2019Reilly in the \u201cIntroductory\u201d: \u201cIt is\n precisely because women are, by the noble instincts which God has given\n to their nature, prone to all that is most heroic that this book has\n been written for them. It aims at setting before their eyes such\n admirable examples of every virtue most suited to their sex, in every\n age and condition of life, that they have only to open its pages in\n order to learn at a glance what graces and excellences render girlhood\n as bright and fragrant as the garden of God in its unfading bloom, and\n ripe womanhood as glorious and peerless in its loveliness and power as\n the May moon in its perfect fulness when she reigns alone over the\n starry heavens.\u201d We cannot too earnestly recommend _The Mirror of True\n Womanhood_ to women of every class, station, and time of life.\n\n\n SHAKSPEARE\u2019S HOME: Visited and Described by Washington Irving and F. W.\n Fairholt. With a letter from Stratford. By J. F. Sabin. With\n etchings by J. F. and W. W. Sabin. New York: J. Sabin & Sons. 1877.\n\n This is an interesting little volume. A fair idea of its contents may\n be gathered from the title. The etchings are carefully executed, and\n are full of promise.\n\n\n WHAT CATHOLICS DO NOT BELIEVE. A Lecture delivered in Mercantile\n Library Hall, on Sunday evening. Dec. 16, 1877. By Right Rev. P. J.\n Ryan, Bishop of Triconia, and Coadjutor to the Archbishop of St.\n Louis. St. Louis: P. Fox. 1878.\n\n It was a happy thought to publish this lecture in pamphlet form; for\n the matter which it contains is worthy of wide dissemination and close\n study. Bishop Ryan has here presented some admirable points in an\n admirable manner to the consideration of fair-minded men who are\n interested in the doings and the faith of the Catholic Church. He has\n taken up a few of the chief current objections against the church, set\n them strongly forward, and then disposed of them in a manner that wins\n admiration as much for its honesty and calmness as for its completeness\n and skill. We understand that it has provoked much discussion in St.\n Louis, in the public press and elsewhere. Such discussion can only do\n good. We strongly recommend the pamphlet to Catholic and Protestant\n alike. It is interesting for its own sake; it will be of great use to\n the Catholic who is thrown into non-Catholic society; it will relieve\n the fairly-disposed Protestant mind of some inherited darkness and much\n foolish misconception.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.\n\n\n THE WRITTEN WORD; or, Considerations on the Sacred Scriptures. By\n William Humphrey, Priest of the Society of Jesus.\n\n THE CHRISTIAN REFORMED IN MIND AND MANNERS. By Benedict Rogacci, of the\n Society of Jesus. Translation edited by Henry James Coleridge, of\n the same Society.\n\n THE ART OF KNOWING OURSELVES; or, The Looking-Glass which does not\n Deceive. By Fr. John Peter Pinamonti, S.J. With Twelve\n Considerations on Death, by Fr. Luigi La Nuza, S.J., and Four on\n Eternity, by Fr. John Baptist Manni, S.J.\n\n LIFE OF HENRI PLANCHAT, Priest of the Congregation of the Brothers of\n St. Vincent de Paul, etc., etc., One of the Hostages Massacred by\n the Commune at Belleville, May 36, 1871. By Maurice Maignen, Member\n of the Congregation of Brothers of St. Vincent de Paul. Translated\n from the French, with an Introductory Preface, by Rev. W. H.\n Anderdon, S.J.\n\n A VISIT TO THE ROMAN CATACOMBS. By Rev. J. Spencer Northcote, D.D.\n\n MEDITATIONS. From the Spanish of Rev. Fr. Alonso de Andrade, S.J.\n\n ERLESTON GLEN. A Lancashire Story of the Sixteenth Century. By Alice\n O\u2019Hanlon.\n\n [All the above are published by Burns & Oates, London, and are for sale\n by The Catholic Publication Society Co.\n\n PENITENTIARY SERMONS. By Rev. Theodore Noethen, Catholic Chaplain.\n Albany: Van Benthuysen Printing-House. 1877.\n\n THE TOWER OF PERCEMONT. A Novel. From the French of George Sand. New\n York: D. Appleton & Co. 1877.\n\n THE SCHOLASTIC ALMANAC for the year of our Lord 1878. Compiled by J. A.\n Lyons. Notre Dame, Ind.: The Scholastic Printing-Office.\n\n TO THE SUN. A Journey through Planetary Space. From the French of Jules\n Verne. By Edward Roth. Illustrated. Philadelphia: Claxton, Remsen &\n Haffelfinger. 1878.\n\n IRELAND: As She Is, As She Has Been, and As She Ought To Be. By James\n J. Clancy. New York: Thomas Kelly. 1877.\n\n NEW IRELAND. By A. M. Sullivan, Member of Parliament for Louth.\n Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1878.\n\n LIVES AND TIMES OF ILLUSTRIOUS AND REPRESENTATIVE IRISHMEN. By Thomas\n Clarke Luby, A.B., T.C.D. Part II. New York: Thomas Kelly.\n\n HOLY CHURCH, THE CENTRE OF UNITY; or, Ritualism Compared with\n Catholicism: Reasons for Returning to the True Fold. By T. H. Shaw.\n London: R. Washbourne. 1877.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n THE\n\n CATHOLIC WORLD.\n\n\n\n\n VOL. XXVI., No. 156.\u2014MARCH, 1878.\n\n\n IRELAND IN 1878.\n\n I.\n\n A history of Ireland still remains to be written; nor has there been\n even an attempt to collect some of the chief materials for such a work.\n Ten centuries of almost continuous conflict since the Danish\n incursions, or seven since the Anglo-Norman settlement and the\n destruction or dispersion of the national archives, are sufficient to\n account for the absence of any full, authentic, or valuable Irish\n history. From Giraldus Cambrensis in the twelfth century to Froude in\n our day, there have never been wanting subsidized, and even able,\n writers to defame and revile the native population and laud the English\n rule in Ireland. Nor, on the other hand, has there been any lack of\n enthusiasts whose patriotism, more ardent than their erudition is\n profound or exact, is ever ready to excuse or defend the natives and\n execrate the Anglo-Norman and Saxon tyrants and despoilers. Even in\n Ireland it is difficult to obtain reliable information regarding the\n country; while outside of it such aim is impossible of attainment. The\n dispersion of the Irish race during the last thirty years has been\n greater in extent and over a larger area of the globe than any exodus\n of humanity known to history. These millions have carried the\n traditions of their country\u2019s wrongs, and the dismal tales of the\n misgovernment of Ireland, to the uttermost ends of the earth,\n exaggerating, perhaps, the oppression of their persecutors, and\n depicting in touching sympathy the glowing virtues of the victims. The\n largest contingent of this Irish emigration has enriched the United\n States of America, where partiality has culminated in alternate praise\n and censure of the Irish race. The circumstances under which most of\n these people reached the American shores were truly tragic and\n appalling, and are well-nigh forgotten by the older portion of the\n generation now passing away.\n\n The estimated population of Ireland in 1845 was 8,295,061, which made\n it then one of the most densely peopled countries in Europe. In the\n autumn of that year the potato crop, one of the chief products of the\n country and the staple food of three-fifths of the people, failed,\n involving a loss estimated by Mr. Labouchere, the British minister, of\n eighty million dollars, or sixteen millions sterling. This failure in\n 1845 was followed by successive blights of the potato-crop in 1846 and\n subsequent years, causing what is called the Irish famine, and with it\n the great emigration, which brought an increase of millions of citizens\n to the United States. There had been an Irish immigration in America\n from the earliest days of the colony\u2014to Maryland, for example, in the\n seventeenth century; but the Irish famine of 1845\u201349 marks the opening\n of the great influx of Irish into the United States and Canada.\n\n We propose to consider the social and industrial condition and the\n political and religious prospects of Ireland in 1878, making the eve of\n the famine, in 1845, the basis of comparison. We write from Ireland,\n with the amplest knowledge of our subject, and, as we hope, having no\n object in view save a full and clear statement of the main facts\n necessary for its elucidation. We have travelled over every province,\n every county, every parish, every locality of its soil; are intimate\n with every phase of its history and every section of its population,\n and feel every throb of its national life. Yet we invite the fullest\n criticism of our attempt to discuss the present condition of Ireland\n from a scientific, a truthful, and an impartial stand-point. Nowhere\n out of Ireland is such discussion more desirable or more difficult than\n in the United States. The republic contains about the same number of\n Irish, by birth or by descent, that remain in the old country. The\n emigrants of the famine period left under dire pressure, the origin of\n which is not fully understood abroad. In the forty-four years 1801\u20131845\n the population of Ireland increased from 5,216,329 to 8,295,061, or by\n 3,078,732 persons\u2014an increase of fifty-nine per cent. Emigration was\n throughout that period inconsiderable; in the decade 1831\u201341 it was\n only 403,459, or about 40,000 a year; in the next four years it fell to\n little over half that average; while in the year 1843, when O\u2019Connell\n led the great agitation for repeal of the Union, only 13,026 persons\n left the country, being the lowest on record. Although the potato\n blight appeared in 1845, it was not until 1847 that the horrors of the\n famine and of emigration assumed their most awful aspect. In the single\n year 1847, that of O\u2019Connell\u2019s death, there was a loss of population of\n 262,574, or three per cent., by the conjoint action of emigration and\n the excess of deaths over births; while in the next four years the\n aggregate decrease reached 1,510,801 persons\u2014little short of nineteen\n per cent. of the whole population. The following table exhibits the\n estimated population at the middle of the year relating to our inquiry:\n\n\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n \u2502 \u2502 DECREASE\n YEAR\u2502 POPULATION\u2502 PERSONS \u2502 PER CENT.\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n 1845\u2502 8,295,061\u2502 \u2014\u2014\u2502 \u2014\u2014\n 1846\u2502 8,287,848\u2502 7,213\u2502 0.09\n 1847\u2502 8,025,274\u2502 262,574\u2502 3.1\n 1848\u2502 7,639,800\u2502 385,474\u2502 4.3\n 1849\u2502 7,256,314\u2502 383,486\u2502 5.0\n 1850\u2502 6,877,549\u2502 378,765\u2502 5.1\n 1851\u2502 6,514,473\u2502 363,076\u2502 5.1\n 1861\u2502 5,778,415\u2502 736,058\u2502 11.3\n 1871\u2502 5,395,007\u2502 383,408\u2502 6.6\n 1875\u2502 5,309,494\u2502 65,513\u2502 1.0\n 1876\u2502 5,321,618\u2502 \u2014\u2014\u2502 \u2014\u2014\n 1877\u2502 5,338,906\u2502 \u2014\u2014\u2502 \u2014\u2014\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n\n\n Over the whole period from 1845 to 1875 population decreased, but the\n rate of decline diminished after 1851. In the thirty years there was a\n loss of 2,973,443\u2014nearly 100,000 annually, or thirty-six per cent. of\n the inhabitants. The year 1876 is memorable as the starting-point of\n reactionary improvement. For the first time during a generation\n emigration has so diminished that the natural increase of births over\n deaths added 10,352 to the population in 1876, and 17,288 in 1877.\n Increase must henceforth be the normal law of population, but it is\n never again likely to reach the rate it attained in the thirty years\n 1801\u201331, when it expanded about fourteen per cent. each decade, or an\n increase of nearly one in seven every ten years.\n\n We are now to inquire into the main causes of these terrible\n calamities, strange and conflicting explanations of which are advanced\n by public writers in the United States and other countries. One\n flippant, fertile, and accepted theory is the peculiar proneness of the\n Irish to contention and disunion\u2014a theory generally credited as sound\n by those ignorant of history or those prejudiced against the Irish\n race. We shall adduce a few broad and suggestive facts in disproof of\n this theory. Can any nation exhibit a nobler proof of unity than the\n Brehon laws, or _Seanchus Mor_, which prevailed universally in Ireland\n for centuries before the Christian era, until revised by St. Patrick\n and the Christian kings, and which continued in force throughout the\n country, save the small patch called the Pale, until the seventeenth\n century, while the traditions and principles of that code yet influence\n the people after a lapse of twenty to five-and-twenty centuries? And so\n as regards the tenacity with which, for ages, the people have adhered\n to the use of the Gaelic or native tongue, still spoken by little short\n of a million of the inhabitants, after the Greeks, the Romans, the\n French, the Spaniards, the Britons, and the Scotch have mainly\n abandoned the primitive tongues of their ancestors. All pagan Ireland\n was converted to Christianity by one man\u2014an example of unity and\n docility without parallel in the history of the human race. Ireland,\n like France, England, and other countries, was ravaged by the Danish\n and Norse invaders, yet the Irish defeated and expelled them in 1014,\n long before the Gauls or the Saxons had banished or crushed them in\n Normandy or in England. Towards the close of the twelfth century the\n Anglo-Normans found partial footing in Ireland, yet for seven hundred\n years the native race have opposed their rule, and oppose it to-day\u2014an\n example of unity and persistency unsurpassed in the world. The English,\n the Scotch, and most of the nations in the north and northwest of\n Europe abandoned their ancient faith and accepted the Protestant\n Reformation, at the bidding of their sovereigns, in the sixteenth\n century; while Catholic Ireland, in defiance of penal laws that\n plundered property, denied education, reduced the people almost to\n barbarism, and sent them to the scaffold for adherence to their church,\n has remained, through centuries of suffering, loyal to conscience, and\n by unity, fidelity, and perseverance has effected the overthrow of the\n Protestant Church Establishment of the Tudors. Proud and great memories\n these for the Irish nation\u2014memories sufficient to disprove the shallow\n and unfounded charge that to disunion, peculiar to their race, must be\n attributed the sad and chequered history of the country. While if we\n turn to all other kingdoms at corresponding periods, even to the\n present time, we find analogous internal strife and domestic political\n factions as numerous and as intense as any in Ireland. England,\n Scotland, the several British colonies, France, Germany, Italy, Spain,\n Holland, and the United States were quite as much torn by internal\n dissension as Ireland, and are so at the present day; so that this\n hypothesis is wholly unfounded and quite inadequate to account for the\n disastrous decadence, or at least want of progress, of Ireland,\n compared in many respects with other countries.\n\n The causes of Irish discontent and comparative social backwardness are\n remote, chronic, and cumulative. From the arrival of the Anglo-Normans\n in 1169 to the defeat of the Irish in the Williamite war, near the\n close of the seventeenth century, one clear purpose was kept in view by\n the aliens\u2014the extirpation of the natives from ownership and even\n occupancy of the soil. Attainders, escheatments, plantations,\n transplantations, and settlements\u2014all had the same purpose. Penal Laws,\n the Court of Wards, and dire persecution had driven the Catholic\n natives from proprietorship, and almost from occupancy, of the soil.\n Cupidity led many Cromwellian and planter landlords to baffle the Penal\n Laws and pocket the higher rents offered by popish recusants.\n Protestants of the humbler classes complained that the protection\n promised and due to them as of right in the English interest was denied\n and defeated by the planter and palatine landlords in preferring popish\n tenants whose lower standard of living and degraded social caste\n enabled them to pay a higher rent than Protestant tenants, who claimed,\n by right of class, a better mode of living. Thus robbed and deprived of\n their estates, denied leases, and rackrented by middlemen and others,\n the mass of the Irish people before the famine were mere squatters on\n the soil, neither owners nor, in any true sense, occupiers.\n\n Catholics were emancipated in 1829 and rendered admissible to almost\n all the offices in the state; they obtained an instalment of\n educational concession in 1831, and a modification of the grinding\n oppression of the tithe system and the Protestant Church Establishment\n a few years afterwards; a Poor Law, directed by a London board, was\n passed in 1838, and corporate reform was granted in 1840; but these and\n other remedial measures, in operation for a few years, could effect\n little towards the elevation of a people impoverished and degraded by\n centuries of foreign and crushing legislation.\n\n From an economic and industrial stand-point the condition of Catholics,\n in relation to land, was the chief cause of the wretchedness of the\n country. The agricultural laborers were in the lowest social state in\n Europe, scarcely excepting the Russian serfs. Employment was precarious\n and rarely secured a higher average wages than sixpence to eightpence a\n day, or scarcely a dollar a week. From Connaught a large number went to\n England for some weeks at the hay, corn, and potato harvests, where\n they earned what paid the rent of the cabin and the potato-plot; while\n many of the cotters and small farmers were little better in position. A\n few facts from the census of 1841 and 1851 will suffice to illustrate\n the large number and the terrible fate of these classes, as indicated\n by the grades of house accommodation before and after the famine:\n\n\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n \u2502 1841. \u2502 1851.\n HOUSE ACCOMMODATION.\u2502 \u2502 PER\u2502 \u2502 PER\n \u2502 HOUSES\u2502 CENT.\u2502 HOUSES\u2502 CENT.\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n First class \u2502 31,333\u2502 2.1\u2502 39,370\u2502 3.3\n Second class \u2502 241,664\u2502 16.4\u2502 292,280\u2502 24.3\n Third class \u2502 574,386\u2502 39.0\u2502 588,440\u2502 48.9\n Fourth (cabin) class\u2502 625,356\u2502 42.5\u2502 284,229\u2502 23.5\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n Total\u2502 1,472,739\u2502 100.0\u2502 1,204,319\u2502 100.0\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n\n\n Here we see that, seemingly in ten but really in five years, no less\n than 341,127 fourth-class houses\u2014mud, sod, or stone, thatched cabins\n with only a single apartment\u2014were swept away, inhabited by that number\n of families, which included about 1,800,000 persons; while the table of\n population above given shows that in these years the estimated decrease\n was 1,780,588\u2014a striking concurrence between both. Another proof as\n regards the class swept away is found in the following table of\n agricultural holdings, grouped by extent, in 1841 and 1851:\n\n\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u252c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n HOLDINGS. \u2502 1841. \u2502 1851.\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n Not exceeding one \u2502Not known.\u2502 37,728\n acre \u2502 \u2502\n One to five acres \u2502 310,436\u2502 88,083\n Five to fifteen \u2502 252,799\u2502 191,854\n acres \u2502 \u2502\n Fifteen to thirty \u2502 79,342\u2502 141,311\n acres \u2502 \u2502\n Above thirty acres\u2502 48,625\u2502 149,090\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u253c\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n Total\u2502 691,202\u2502 608,066\n \u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2534\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\u2500\n\n\n Excluding the very large number of holdings under an acre not\n ascertained in 1841, we find the disappearance in that decade, or\n rather in half of it, of 222,353 tenements between one and five acres,\n which represents a diminished population of 1,200,000 persons. The\n decrease of 60,945, in the tenements from five to fifteen acres,\n representing about 320,000 people, is portion of this same subject. If\n we now turn to another head of evidence we find that the population was\n thinned from the least educated classes. The census of 1841 returned\n fifty-three per cent. of the whole population, aged five years and\n upwards, as illiterate, being unable to read or write, while the return\n for 1851 showed a decrease to forty-seven per cent.; and turning to the\n great decrease in the percentage of the Irish-speaking population\n between 1841 and 1851, we find similar results. Lastly, the creed\n census demands attention.\n\n The first taken in Ireland was that by the Royal Commission of Public\n Instruction in 1834, when, of a population of 7,954,100, it was found\n there were 6,436,000, or 80.9 per cent., Catholics; while the followers\n of the intruded Anglican Church, established for three centuries,\n numbered only 853,160, or 10.7 per cent. The adherents of the Scotch\n Presbyterian Church, endowed by the state, though not established,\n 643,058, or 8.1 per cent.; and all other Protestant dissenters mustered\n only 21,822 or 0.3 per cent. Between 1834 and 1845, when the potato\n blight first appeared, the population had increased from 7,954,100 to\n 8,295,061, during which period of eleven years there are ample\n evidences to prove that the Catholic element underwent a larger\n increase than the Protestant, so that we may fairly assume the whole\n population in 1845 to have been thus composed:\n\n\n PER\n CENT.\n\n Catholics 6,760,475 81.5\n\n Protestants 1,534,586 18.5\n\n \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014 \u2014\u2014\n\n Total 8,295,061 100.\n\n\n These millions of Catholics, emancipated only sixteen years, were the\n descendants of the natives who for over six centuries had battled\n against English domination; whose estates and lands had been wrested\n from them and given to soldiers and adventurers from England and\n Scotland\u2014\u201cthe scum of both nations\u201d; whose ancient church had been\n despoiled of her property; to whom education was denied and the\n profession of their faith made penal; whose manufacturing industries\n were suppressed by English laws; who were excluded from all offices,\n civil and military, and from all social rank and distinction, and\n denied not alone a seat in Parliament for 137 years, 1692 to 1829, but\n from 1727 to 1793, a period of 66 years, the right to vote.\n\n Such is a broad outline of the main facts concerning the population of\n Ireland in 1845, as to quantity and quality. We must, however,\n supplement these by a few particulars.\n\n From one-third to one-half the rental of the kingdom went to absentee\n and alien landlords, who spent it in England or on the Continent. The\n imperial taxes borne by Ireland were in excess of her capacity and in\n violation of the articles of the Act of Union. All the state\n departments had their headquarters in London, while Ireland had slender\n share either in the appropriating or the enjoyment of those taxes. The\n local taxation, through grand jury and other cess, was enormous, but\n levied and appropriated by the country gentry, all predominantly\n Protestant. The county officers, the grand jury, the jail, the lunatic\n asylum, infirmary, and poor-law union boards were almost exclusively\n Protestant. The corporations, reformed by statute in 1840, were still\n Protestant. One or two Catholic judges had reached the bench, as\n O\u2019Loghlen, and many Catholics were pressing to the front at the bar and\n in medicine, while in all the professions, in trade, and in commerce\n Catholic influence was beginning to be felt. Catholics had, it is true,\n only trifling share in the administration of the government and the\n laws. They had little representation in the magistracy or on the grand\n juries; while jury-packing was the normal condition of the\n administration of justice. The Orange system, stimulated by the triumph\n of Catholic emancipation, was rampant and aggressive at the prospect of\n social equality.\n\n Yet, amidst such disadvantages, Ireland, in the two or three years\n before the famine, presented a moral and political spectacle such as\n the modern world had never witnessed. O\u2019Connell, the greatest political\n leader of this century, led the millions of Irish people in their\n demand for justice to Ireland. He claimed the restoration of the\n legislative independence of Ireland as it existed from 1782 to 1801, or\n a repeal of the Act of Union. His efforts towards that object, the\n millions who rose to support him, and the moral, intellectual, and\n national sympathy that his demand elicited, are perfectly well known.\n The famine appeared in 1845 and blasted the whole agitation, while\n O\u2019Connell died at Genoa, May 15, 1847, when the country that he wildly,\n passionately loved was in the throes of the famine, the horrors of\n which O\u2019Connell vainly endeavored to avert by appeals for substantial\n relief to the British government. The present prime minister of\n England, the Earl of Beaconsfield, declared in the House of Commons, in\n reference to Ireland, on the opening of the famine, that for a country\n with an absentee proprietary, an alien established church, and a\n population starving or fleeing the country, most Englishmen can see but\n one remedy, and that _revolution_.\n\n The great Irish famine, contrary to popular opinion, was exceeded by\n many visitations of the kind in India and elsewhere, and perhaps\n equalled by some that had occurred even in Ireland, so far as extent of\n mortality is concerned; but, measured by the aggregate of its social\n and economic effects, no such disaster is recorded in history. The\n mortality was considerably less than was supposed\u2014that is, of deaths\n caused directly by starvation, suffering, and sickness arising out of\n the famine. Dysentery, diarrh\u0153a, fever, cholera\u2014all supervened.\n Workhouse accommodation failed, notwithstanding the utilization, as\n auxiliary houses, of nearly all the idle and abandoned stores in cities\n and towns, and of large numbers of rural mansions deserted by the\n country gentry. All the habits, feelings, and traditions of the Irish\n nation were opposed to a poor-law. Passed in 1838, although a poor-law\n had been in operation in England from 1601, it was only in 1847, the\n third year of the famine, that the last of the 131 Irish workhouses was\n opened, in Clifden, Connemara, and then by _mandamus_ of the Queen\u2019s\n Bench. In 1844, the year before the appearance of the potato blight,\n there were only 113 workhouses open, with an aggregate of 105,358\n paupers relieved that year at an expense of $1,085,336. In 1847 the\n number relieved in the workhouses, auxiliaries included, was 417,139,\n or nearly fourfold, while the expenditure was $3,214,744, or threefold.\n The entire Poor-Law Act and the workhouse system utterly broke down\n under pressure of the mass of destitution. That act was administered\n from Somerset House, London, under an English commission, from 1838 to\n 1847. All the leading officers, assistant commissioners, and others\n were sent from England to carry out a law amongst a people of whose\n feelings and social circumstances they were thoroughly ignorant, and to\n their race and faith were totally opposed. That act expressly denied\n out-door relief, in any form or towards any destitution, how acute\n soever, in Ireland; while out-door relief was the general and normal\n form of poor relief in England for centuries, and continues so at\n present. The law was framed so as to throw the whole influence of its\n administration into the hands of the landlords and magistracy, or their\n agents, the vast majority of whom were planters and Cromwellians,\n hostile in faith and feeling to the destitute classes. A temporary Poor\n Relief Extension Act, passed June 8, 1847, was necessitated, or the\n destitute classes must have seized in self-defence the cattle, corn,\n and other edibles abounding in the country to prevent starvation.\n Out-door relief was permitted, but should be administered solely in\n food; while the able-bodied recipients were subjected to severe tests\n of stone-breaking or other unproductive labor. The tenth section of\n this act was the infamous quarter-acre clause, which declared that,\n\n \u201cIf any person so occupying more than the _quarter of a statute\n acre_ (less than thirty-five yards square) shall apply for\n relief, or if any person on his behalf shall apply for relief,\n _it shall not be lawful for any Board of Guardians to grant\n such relief, within or without the workhouse_, to any such\n person.\u201d\n\n This horrible clause gave the alternative of death or the surrender of\n their cabins, cottages, and small farms to the tens, the hundreds of\n thousands who occupied the humbler allotments and homesteads in\n Ireland. If they refused to surrender possession to the landlord, they\n perished, relief being denied them; while if they yielded, the crowded\n workhouse, with a weekly mortality of twenty-five in every one thousand\n inmates, precipitated them from the trap-coffin, often unshrived and\n always unshrouded, into the common fosse without a semblance of\n Christian burial. As an adjunct to the quarter-acre clause, and further\n to effect the clearance of the mass of the laboring and industrious\n classes, urban as well as rural, occupiers rated at under twenty-five\n dollars who surrendered their holdings, whether held on lease or\n otherwise, to their landlords, were, with their families, assisted to\n emigrate, two-thirds of the expenses of the same to be borne on the\n rates of the electoral division, the other third by the landlord. And\n to complete and give effect to these provisions for the death or the\n extermination of the population, the landlords were secured, by a\n radical change in the act of 1838, a monopoly in the whole\n administration of relief. Under that act each Board of Guardians\n consisted of three-fourths elected members and one-fourth _ex-officio_\n members, being magistrates resident in the union; whereas, by an\n amendment introduced into the act of 1847 the proportion of\n _ex-officio_ members is doubled, being increased from one-fourth to\n one-half the whole strength of the board. With a full moiety of the\n members of the landlord class, the territorial influence through the\n _multiple_ vote, which gives rated property from one to six votes, and\n also voting by proxy, the land magnates are always able to command, if\n not a majority, at least a large number, of seats amongst the elected\n guardians, and thus secure dominance in the administration of the whole\n poor-law.\n\n Under the original act of 1838 the incidence of the poor\u2019s rate was\n divided equally between the occupier and the owner, while occupiers\n whose tenements were below twenty-five dollars annual valuation were\n exempt, the rate being charged to the landlord; and, moreover, a clause\n declared that any contract made between owner and occupier which would\n release the former from liability to a moiety of the poor\u2019s rate was\n null and void. The landlord added, of course, the rates to the rent,\n save in the case of the small number of tenants holding under lease, so\n that the whole cost of relief fell on the occupier; while a clause in\n the Poor-Law Amendment Act passed in 1849 repealed the annulling\n provision of the act of 1838, and legalized the enabling power of the\n tenant to contract himself, under compulsion, out of the protection\n secured to him that property should bear a moiety of the cost of poor\n relief. We may mention that the savage quarter-acre clause continued in\n operation from 1847 until partially repealed in 1862, a period of\n fifteen years, during which it quenched many a hearth, dismantled\n thousands of roof-trees, and sent more than a million of the Irish race\n to the grave or as scattered exiles over the face of the globe. In\n 1862, its fell purpose fulfilled, it was partially repealed, to the\n extent that destitute persons, although occupiers of a quarter of an\n acre of land, may be relieved, _but in the workhouse only_; so that\n still a cotter with forty perches of a garden, or a small farmer,\n suffering under temporary distress from failure of crop, sickness, or\n accident, must either surrender his little holding and enter the\n workhouse, _or starve_ under the scheme of legal charity devised to\n extirpate the Irish from the soil of which their ancestors had been\n robbed through ages.\n\n We write fact and law, and repudiate all but sober statement in our\n attempt to illustrate the present position of the Irish people. In the\n most acute throes of the famine, July 22, 1847, an act was passed for\n the punishment of vagrants and persons offending against the laws in\n force for the relief of the poor in Ireland\u2014an act worthy of the worst\n days of Nero or Diocletian. Let us inquire what was the condition of\n the country when this act was passed. At the end of February that year\n there were 116,321 inmates in receipt of relief in the workhouses, and\n in July there were 10,000 cases of fever, apart from other terrible\n diseases, in those institutions, the mortality being enormous. Under\n the Temporary Relief Act there were issued, July 3, rations equal to\n the support of 3,020,712 persons. Yet the Vagrant Act inflicted\n imprisonment in a common jail and hard labor for a month upon any\n person \u201cplacing himself in any public place, street, highway, court, or\n passage to beg or gather alms,\u201d with the same punishment for removing\n from one poor-law union, or even one electoral division, to another for\n the purpose of relief. More than half the population were then in\n receipt of relief, a vast portion of them being engaged upon relief\n works, which necessitated the migration to considerable distances of\n the male heads of families. Yet a clause in this act imposed\n imprisonment for three months, with hard labor, for desertion or wilful\n neglect of a family by its head\u2014desertion that might have arisen from\n removal for some miles to another union or electoral division, in order\n to provide food for them.\n\n Ireland was one uncovered lazar-house in 1847. We write from vivid and\n painful remembrance of personal travel of 5,000 to 10,000 miles yearly,\n in an official capacity, over the most afflicted of the famine-stricken\n districts, from Waterford round to Sligo, during that and subsequent\n years up to 1858. We visited every workhouse, every auxiliary, every\n fever hospital, every relief depot, every soup-kitchen, every centre of\n public works, by way of relief, every missionary station for\n proselytizing purposes, every ragged-school, every jail, and made a\n minute personal survey of the most distressed localities in the south\n and west of Ireland in 1847 and throughout the famine. Holding an\n important commission from the government, we had access to and command\n of sources of reliable information open to few, while we had personal\n communication with the chief officers of several public departments\n that enabled us to understand thoroughly the precise condition of the\n suffering classes throughout the whole period of acute distress in\n Ireland. Charged, unsolicited, by the government with a special inquiry\n connected with the condition of the destitute and criminal classes\n which embraced the whole kingdom, owing to experience acquired during\n the famine period, we visited officially every county, every diocese,\n every poor-law union, every parish in Ireland, and willingly place the\n results of that experience before the readers of THE CATHOLIC WORLD.\n The history of the famine is yet to be written, and, if not soon\n prepared, the records of personal experience will be lost, and a\n reliable account of it rendered impossible. When political factions in\n the United States traduce the Irish race, and when factions in the\n several British colonies do likewise, as regards Irish immigrants, they\n do so ignorant, it is to be hoped, of the precise circumstances under\n which these immigrants reached those countries during pressure of the\n famine. We have treated the amount of decline of population in Ireland,\n and the social quality of that decline, in this article. The decrease\n of population directly through the famine is, as we have said,\n exaggerated. The census commissioners of 1851 set down the deaths from\n _extraordinary_ causes, between 1841 and 1851, or rather from 1845, as\n follows:\n\n\n Deaths from fever 222,029\n\n Deaths from dissentery 134,355\n and diarrh\u0153a\n\n Deaths from cholera 35,989\n\n Deaths from starvation 21,770\n\n \u2014\u2014\u2014\n\n Total 414,143\n\n\n These figures, sad and enormous as they are, we are prepared to show\n are an entire understatement of the true facts of the case. The whole\n condition of society below the middle classes was disorganized and\n demoralized. Panic and paralysis seized the entire population. The\n dependent perished at home or in the workhouses, while those with means\n to emigrate fled the country. Flying from famine, fever, and\n pestilence, these reluctant emigrants, numbers of whom perished before\n settlement, have helped to lay the foundation of the prosperity of the\n United States and of the British colonies. The author of the _Record of\n the O\u2019Connell Centenary_, describing the character of the early Irish\n emigrants, says, with great truth and force:\n\n \u201cSnatched from rough rural labor, little skilled in handicraft,\n a very large number wholly illiterate, and many unable to speak\n any tongue save the native Gaelic; nearly half of them females,\n without that cultured training in domestic service required by\n other countries; a heavy, helpless juvenile element hanging on\n them; intensely clannish, yet removed from those tribal and\n religious standards of morality and social life which\n powerfully influence the Irish at home; memory saddened with\n the recollection of the roofless cabin and the loved little\n ancestral farm lost for ever, the dead who had been starved at\n home or fell in fever, the dear relatives who sought the\n shelter of the workhouse, but through whose trap-coffin they\n were precipitated into the famine fosse without shroud or\n requiem; and the uncertainty of despair as to the living\n remnant of the family left behind\u2014agonized by such feelings,\n the millions were hastily deported on the shores of America,\n Australia, and New Zealand, objects of sympathy and affection\n to the generous, of pity to the benevolent, of alarm and horror\n to the timid, of contempt to the misanthropic, and of scorn and\n hatred to the enemies of the race and faith of the Irish\n nation. Never before was spectacle so sad, so gigantic, so\n appalling submitted to the contemplation of humanity; the\n history of Ireland was dramatized throughout Christendom, and\n its tragic story personated on every hospitable shore on both\n hemispheres, when Moore\u2019s prediction was literally and amply\n fulfilled:\n\n\n \u201c\u2018The stranger shall hear thy lament on his plain;\n The sigh of thy harp shall be sent o\u2019er the deep.\u2019\u201d\n\n\n We have given an outline sketch of the condition of Ireland just before\n and in the early stages of the famine; in our next we shall endeavor to\n trace what progress she has made from that sad period to her present\n improved position in 1878.\n\n\n Copyright: Rev. I. T. HECKER. 1878.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE BLESSED VIRGIN.\n\n\n Like chants which fade yet linger still to bless,\n While float their formless notes of joy or dole,\n So thought doth grieve for words beyond control,\n That to itself it may thy charms confess,\n And tell each grace with joyous eagerness,\n As did the morning stars their anthems roll,\n Or as the angels greet a ransom\u2019d soul.\n Such tongues alone could paint the loveliness\n Which o\u2019er thy face in sad, sweet beauty smiled;\n As though in unseen wingings, ever near,\n The Dove had coo\u2019d a legend in thine ear\n Of some rare tenderness to grief beguiled\u2014\n Perchance of love which bought redemption dear,\n With all its cost of sorrow to thy Child.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n AMONG THE TRANSLATORS.\n\n VIRGIL AND HORACE\u2014III.\n\n\n The work of translation seems in an odd way to enlist that mimetic\n impulse which is so strong an element of human nature, and which is\n really at the bottom of so much of human rivalry. To wish to do as much\n as others in any given line of effort is but an after-thought, a\n secondary motion of the mind; the initial instinct is to do _the same_\n as they. That men do not rest at this; that they are not content with\n merely duplicating what they see done about them, like the late\n lamented Mr. Pongo; that they are for ever seeking \u201cto better their\n instruction,\u201d is due to that further instinctive yearning for\n perfection which helps to differentiate them from Mr. Pongo, and\n interferes so sadly with many most ingenious and scientific schemes for\n recreating the universe without a Creator. All literatures, it may be\n said, all poets, begin with translation\u2014that is, with imitation of some\n other literature or poet. Alc\u00e6us and Sophron, no doubt, are but Horace\n and Theocritus to the unknown who went before them; Homer is first,\n doubtless, only because we know not the greater than Homer\u2014rapt from us\n by the irrevocable years\u2014whom Homer may have copied, as Virgil copied\n Homer.\n\n This, however, is a law of literature which was known as long ago as\n the days of Solomon, at least. What is not so obvious, and even more\n curious as well as more to the present point, is why translators under\n certain conditions should be so fond of repeating one another in regard\n to any particular bit of work.\n\n For a generation or so some one of the poets who are the favorite\n objects of the translator\u2019s zeal will be neglected and seemingly\n forgotten. Then some day appears a version which attracts attention and\n gets talked of, and, _presto_! a dozen pens are in eager chase to rival\n or surpass it. Now it is Homer which is thus brought into notice, and\n we have Professor Newman, Lord Derby, Mr. Wright, Mr. Worsley, Mr.\n Dart, Professor Blackie, Mr. Bryant\u2014what muse shall catalogue the\n host?\u2014giving us in quick succession and in every kind of metre their\n versions of the _Iliad_ or _Odyssey_, or both? Again it is Virgil, and\n within a brief interval Professor Conington, Mr. Morris, and Mr. Cranch\n have done the _\u00c6neid_ into English. Or once more Horace sways the hour,\n and in a twinkling or thereabouts a dozen translations of the _Odes_\n are smoking hot from the press on the critic\u2019s table, and bewildering\n him to choose among their various merits. Within the last half-century,\n nay, within the last twenty-five years, we have seen just this\n revolution. Is it because our own is so peculiarly one of those\n transitional periods in the history of a literature which are most\n favorable to translation\u2014indeed, most provocative of it; one of those\n intervals when the national imagination is, as it were, lying fallow\n after the exhaustion of some great creative epoch, and intellectual\n effort takes chiefly the form of criticism, which in one sense\n translation is? Well, such generalizations are as perilous as they are\n fascinating and we must not yield to them too rashly. In this case, if\n we did yield, we should be told, no doubt, that translation was no more\n a peculiarity of a transitional period than of a creative one; that the\n notion of such divisions in the history of a literature is preposterous\n and but another invention of the arch-enemy, like comparative philology\n and the Eastern question, to set the mildest and wisest of sages\u2014even\n ourselves, beloved reader\u2014thirsting for each other\u2019s blood; or that,\n finally, an epoch which has produced Tennyson and Browning, De Vere and\n Arnold, Swinburne, Morris, and Rossetti, and\u2014let nothing tempt us back\n to our own side of the Atlantic, where poets grow like pumpkins, big\n and little, in every garden patch; yet surely, if originality goes for\n anything, we may add\u2014Tupper\u2014that a time so prolific of poetic genius is\n not to be counted a transitional period at all.\n\n This, or something like it, we should no doubt hear, if we ventured\n upon putting forth as our own the enticing proposition we have but\n modestly thrown out as a suggestion to the reader. And if we were not\n withheld by that providential want of time and opportunity which so\n often saves us from our rasher selves, we should no doubt go on to make\n the venture even now: to assert that, in spite of Tennyson and\n Browning, in spite even of Matthew Arnold\u2014in one sense a truer voice of\n his time than either of them\u2014in spite of the pagan and medi\u00e6val\n renaissance piloted by that wonderfully clever coterie of the\n Rossettis, the present can in no sense be called a creative epoch in\n our literature, as we call creative the two epochs of which Shakspeare\n and Wordsworth are, broadly speaking, the representative\n names\u2014representative, however, in different ways and in widely\n different degrees; that it is, on the contrary, a true transitional\n period, as the period of Pope and Dryden was transitional, and for\n analogous reasons; and that, because it is so, the art of translation\n flourishes now as then. Nor should we forget, in saying this, the\n numerous translations which marked the Elizabethan era. But it is to be\n noted that while all, or nearly all, the then extant classics were\n turned into English before the close of the Elizabethan era,\n translations of any one of them were not repeated, and precisely for\n this reason: that the age, being a creative epoch, made its main effort\n in the direction of knowledge, and not of criticism\u2014sought to acquire\n ideas, and not to arrange them, as was the case with the translating\n periods which came after it. Then, too, it was the virtual beginning of\n our literature, when translation, as we have said, came natural to it.\n Chaucer two hundred years before was a creative poet, if the term may\n be used, in a time that was not creative, a time that was not his, a\n time whose sluggishness not even his pregnant genius could inform;\n Chaucer was the glad premature swallow of a lingering, long-delaying\n spring, whose settled sunshine came to us only with Spenser\u2019s later\n bird-song,\n\n\n \u201cPreluding those melodious bursts that fill\n The spacious times of great Elizabeth\n With sounds that echo still.\u201d\n\n\n Milton may be said to have concluded, as Spenser preluded, that mighty\n time, without fairly belonging to it. They belonged rather to each\n other. \u201cMilton has owned to me,\u201d says Dryden, \u201cthat his original was\n Spenser.\u201d They were the epilogue and the prologue of that mighty\n opening chorus of our literature, in which the translators, too, had\n their parts, but only as prompters to the great singers, to help them\n to add to their native melody here and there some sweetness of a\n foreign note.\n\n The time of critical translation, of translation for its own sake, as\n an art, came in only with Dryden\u2014perhaps, on the whole, the greatest of\n the transition poets. Then, too, translators began first to repeat each\n other\u2019s work. Before the year 1580 most of the classic poets had been\n translated into English verse. They were not duplicated, because, as we\n have said, the time wanted first of all the knowledge of them, and it\n was not fastidious as to the shape in which it came. For a hundred\n years after its appearance Phaer\u2019s version of the _\u00c6neid_ had no rival.\n Then came Vicars\u2019, only to disappear almost as quickly. Doubly lapped\n in lead, it sank at once in that Stygian pool where Dulness tries the\n weight of her favorites, and there it has since remained, like\n Prospero\u2019s book and staff, drowned\n\n\n \u201cDeeper than did ever plummet sound.\u201d\n\n\n Undeterred by this untoward fate, John Ogilby brought out his\n translation soon after, first at Cambridge and again in London,\n \u201cadorned with sculptures and illustrated with annotations\u201d\u2014\u201cthe fairest\n edition,\u201d grave Anthony \u00e0 Wood assures us, \u201cthat till then the English\n press ever produced.\u201d This gorgeous work, pronounced by Pope to be\n below criticism, nevertheless went through four editions before\n descending to the congenial fellowship of Vicars under the forgetful\n wave\u2014a proof how much a good English version of the _\u00c6neid_ was\n desired. Ogilby had been a dancing-master, and perhaps learned in his\n profession to rival Lucilius, who\n\n\n \u201cIn hora s\u00e6pe ducentos\n Ut magnum versus dictabat stans pede in uno.\u201d[172]\n\n\n At all events, although he took to literature late in life\u2014he was past\n forty before he learned Latin or Greek\u2014he was a prodigious author, as\n we learn from the _Dunciad_:\n\n\n \u201cHere groans the shelf with Ogilby the great.\u201d\n\n\n Besides translating remorselessly everything he could lay hands on,\n from Homer to \u00c6sop, he found time to write various heroic poems, and\n had even completed an epic in twelve books on Charles I., when fate\n took pity on his fellows and sent the great fire of London to the\n rescue. Phillips, in the _Theatrum Poetarum_, styles Ogilby a prodigy,\n and avers that his \u201cParaphrase on \u00c6sop\u2019s Fables\u201d \u201cis generally\n confessed to have exceeded whatever hath been done before in that\n kind.\u201d[173] As Milton\u2019s nephew can scarcely be suspected of a joke, we\n must conclude that this is not one of the critical judgments which\n Milton inspired. Nevertheless, Ogilby\u2019s translations and paraphrases\n procured him a \u201cgenteel livelihood\u201d which many better poems have failed\n to do for their authors.\n\n Neither Vicars nor Ogilby, however, was of sufficient note, nor had\n their labors sufficient vitality, to set the current of translation\n fairly going. That was reserved for Dryden, whose famous work came out\n in 1697. Dryden had all the qualifications necessary to ensure him a\n full harvest of imitation and rivalry at once. He was the most famous\n poet and critic of his day, and in either capacity had found means to\n excite abundance of jealousies and resentments. Moreover, his change of\n religion, and the vigor with which he had espoused the Catholic cause\n in his _Hind and Panther_, made him many additional enemies. So it is\n not to be wondered at that when, as Pope puts it,\n\n\n \u201cPride, malice, folly, against Dryden rose\n In various shapes of parsons, critics, beaux,\u201d\n\n\n the parsons led the onslaught. First came Parson Milbourn, \u201cthe fairest\n of critics,\u201d who printed his own version side by side with the one he\n found fault with, and whom Dulness also promptly claimed for her own.\n Then Dr. Brady, giving over to his worthy coadjutor, Tate, for the\n nonce the herculean task of promoting Sternhold and Hopkins to be next\n to the worst poets in the world, devoted himself to the equally\n gigantic labor of proving that there was a work he could translate more\n abominably than the Psalms. His version in blank-verse, \u201cwhen dragged\n into the light,\u201d says Dr. Johnson, \u201cdid not live long enough to cry.\u201d\n Then Dr. Trapp, the Oxford professor of poetry\u2014_majora viribus\n audens_\u2014rushed to the attack and did the _\u00c6neid_ into, if possible,\n still blanker verse than his predecessor\u2019s. It was he who said of\n Dryden\u2019s version \u201cthat where Dryden shines most we often see the least\n of Virgil.\u201d This was true enough; and it was, no doubt, to avoid the\n like reproach that the good doctor forbore to shine at all. On him was\n made the well-known epigram apropos of a certain poem said to be better\n than Virgil:\n\n\n \u201cBetter than Virgil? Yes, perhaps;\n But then, by Jove, \u2019tis Dr. Trapp\u2019s!\u201d\n\n\n This is only another form of Bentley\u2019s famous judgment: \u201cA very pretty\n poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it Homer.\u201d The doctor has had no\n better luck than his fellows.\n\n\n \u201cOlli dura quies oculos et ferreus urguet\n Somnus; in \u00e6ternam clauduntur lumina noctem.\u201d[174]\n\n\n These efforts of the parsons, however, were no doubt inspired at least\n as much by _odium theologicum_ as by the genuine impulse of emulation.\n The first true exemplification of this came about 1729 with the version\n of Pitt,[175] whose choice of Dryden\u2019s couplet was a direct challenge.\n Johnson\u2019s estimate of the success of this rivalry is not, on the whole,\n unfair\u2014or, at least, as fair as such comparisons often are. \u201cDryden,\u201d\n he says, \u201cleads the reader forward by his general vigor and\n sprightliness, and Pitt often stops him to contemplate the excellence\n of a single couplet; Dryden\u2019s faults are forgotten in the hurry of\n delight, and Pitt\u2019s beauties neglected in the languor of a cold and\n listless perusal; Pitt pleases the critics and Dryden the people; Pitt\n is quoted and Dryden read.\u201d Dryden, however, is probably oftener read\n nowadays than Pitt is quoted. It is something to be a poet after all,\n and in the exchange of translation we allow for the purity of his metal\n and the beauty of his coinage. Most of us would rather have the gold of\n Dryden, though it fall a piece or two short in the reckoning, than the\n small change of Pitt, though every silver sixpence and copper farthing\n be accounted for.\n\n Other translations of the _\u00c6neid_ there were during the eighteenth\n century, among them one by another Oxford professor of poetry, Hawkins,\n but none have survived. Pope\u2019s translation of Homer, which was\n published soon after Pitt\u2019s _\u00c6neid_, diverted attention to the Greek\n poet, and gave him with translators a pre-eminence over his Latin rival\n which only within a few years he can be said to have lost. Pope had no\n imitators, however, till long after. Even more absolutely than Dryden\n he swayed the sceptre of poetry in his time; and the presumptuous wight\n who had ventured to challenge his sovereignty or to measure strength\n with \u201cthat poetical wonder, the translation of the _Iliad_, a\n performance which no age or nation can pretend to rival,\u201d gods\u2014critical\n gods\u2014and men and booksellers would have laughed to scorn. It is true,\n Addison, that most uneasy \u201cbrother near the throne,\u201d was shrewdly\n suspected of meditating such a design under the cloak of his friend and\n follower, Tickell, and even went so far as to publish\u2014so ran the\n current gossip of the coffee-houses\u2014a version of the first book of the\n _Iliad_ in Tickell\u2019s name. But the scheme stopped there; Pope\u2019s triumph\n was too splendid and overwhelming, and his great work calmly defied\n competition, until the spell of his honeyed couplet was broken, and\n Cowper could find a hearing for his ponderous Miltonic periods, a full\n half-century after Pope\u2019s death. The battle which soon thereafter came\n to be joined between the partisans of the Popian and Cowperian\n methods\u2014both of them, as Mr. Arnold assures us, really on a complete\n equality of error\u2014had the effect of keeping Homer in the foreground and\n Virgil in the shade, despite the praiseworthy versions of the latter by\n Simmons in rhymed couplets about 1817, and Kennedy in blank-verse some\n thirty years later, until the critical _furore_ created by the\n appearance of Prof. Conington\u2019s _\u00c6neid_ about ten years since once more\n turned the tide and brought our Mantuan to the front.\n\n Conington\u2019s translation, by the novelty of its metre, the freshness of\n its treatment, the spirit of its movement, its union of fidelity and\n grace, took the public ear and at once won a popularity which, if we\n may judge from the fact that a new edition has been lately advertised,\n it has not yet lost nor is destined speedily to lose. Moreover, its\n peculiar metre gave rise to a discussion among the critics, which has\n no doubt had its share in bringing out the two additional versions by\n Mr. Cranch and Mr. Morris at brief intervals after Professor\n Conington\u2019s, the former at Boston, the latter in England and reprinted\n here. Each of these three versions has that \u201cproper reason for\n existing\u201d in novelty of method and manner which Mr. Arnold demands, and\n without which, indeed, multiplied translations are but cumberers of the\n book-stall and a weariness to the flesh. Of Mr. Cranch this assertion\n may sound a trifle odd, since his work upon its face presents little\n that is new. In place of the galloping octosyllabics of Prof. Conington\n or the resurrected Alexandrines of Mr. Morris, he offers us only the\n familiar blank-verse which Kennedy and Trapp and Brady used, or\n misused, before him; he has no theories to illustrate, but translates\n his author as faithfully as he knows how, and his rendering is neither\n so exceedingly good nor so excessively bad as to give it any claim to\n originality upon that score. But then it is the first American\n translation of Virgil, and that is surely novelty enough.\n\n For as each age, so every country, looks at a classic author through\n spectacles of its own. \u201cEach age,\u201d as Conington well says in his\n preface, \u201cwill naturally think that it understands an author whom it\n studies better than the ages which have gone before it\u201d; and it is for\n this reason, he adds, \u201cthat the great works of antiquity require to be\n translated afresh from time to time to preserve their interest as part\n of modern literary culture.\u201d But it is not alone that each age will\n understand an author better than preceding ages; it will understand him\n differently; it will see him in another light, from far other points of\n view, modified and interpreted by its own spirit. What Heyne says of\n the poet is in a measure true of the translator\u2014that he has the genius\n of his era, which must necessarily qualify his work. We have sometimes\n fancied even that this business of translation was a kind of\n metempsychosis through which the poet\u2019s soul shall speak to many\n different times and lands through forms and in voices changing to suit\n the moods of each. This, of course, is only one of those fantastic\n notions which a writer must sometimes be indulged in, if he is to be\n kept in reasonable good-humor. But we think we may venture to say that\n two nations translating for themselves what antiquity has to say to\n them will insensibly find its utterances modified for each of them by\n their natural modes of thought. Nay, may we not go further and say that\n no two human minds will find precisely the same message in Homer or\n Virgil or Horace\u2014so infinite are the gradations of thought, so\n innumerable the shades of meaning and suggestion in a word. Of Virgil\n this is especially true; for he has, says Prof. Conington, \u201cthat\n peculiar habit, ... common to him and Sophocles, of hinting at two or\n three modes of expression while actually employing one.\u201d\n\n It is just for this reason that repeated translations of a great author\n are not only useful but desirable; that, to quote Conington again, \u201cit\n is well that we should know how our ancestors of the Revolution period\n conceived of Virgil; it is well that we should be obliged consciously\n to realize how we conceive of him ourselves.\u201d How true this is no one\n can fail to perceive who contrasts Dryden\u2019s method in any given passage\n with Conington\u2019s. The sense of Virgil may be given with equal exactness\n by each\u2014we say _may_ be, which is rather stretching a point, for, in\n respect of verbal fidelity, the two versions are not to be compared\u2014the\n interpretation may be equally poetical, but there will remain a subtle\n something which stamps each, and which we can only say is the flavor of\n the time. Or, again, compare the Abb\u00e9 Delille\u2019s French version with\n Dryden\u2019s English\u2014perhaps a fairer comparison; for both are equally\n free, though by no means equally acquainted with their author, and both\n to a certain extent belonged to the same school of composition. Nor are\n they so very far apart as they seem in point of time; the century or so\n which divides them was a very much longer period in England than in\n France. Charles II. was nearer to Louis XV. than to George III. in\n point of taste. Yet how different from Dryden\u2019s Virgil, or from any\n Englishman\u2019s, is Delille\u2019s, even though he does not find in his text\n such enchanting gallicisms as Jean Regnault de Segrais could twist out\n of the lines,\n\n\n \u201cUbi templum illi centumque Sab\u00e6o\n Thure calent ar\u00e6, sertisque recentibus halant\u201d:[176]\n\n \u201cDans le temple o\u00f9 toujours quelque Amant irrit\u00e9\n Accuse dans ses v\u0153ux quelque jeune Beaut\u00e9.\u201d\n\n\n This is an extreme case, no doubt, and there are Frenchmen even who\n would not be beyond laughing at it. We are not to forget, as we laugh\n at it ourselves, that Segrais was not unknown in the H\u00f4tel Rambouillet,\n and that although his own poetry was not all of this order, not even\n his _\u00c6neid_\u2014Saint-Evremond liked it\u2014he also wrote novels which not even\n the H\u00f4tel Rambouillet could read. But when that really able man and\n accomplished scholar, Cardinal Du Perron, turns Horace\u2019s lines in the\n charming farewell to Virgil (_Carm._ i. 3):\n\n\n \u201cVentorumque regat Pater\n Obstrictis aliis pr\u00e6ter Iapygia,\u201d\n\n\n into this sort of thing:\n\n\n \u201cAinsi des vents l\u2019humide P\u00e8re\n Ton cours heureusement tempere,\n Tenant ses enfants emplumez\n Si bien sous la clef enfermez\n Except\u00e9 l\u2019opportun Zephyr,\u201d\n\n\n we have a version which no doubt seems correct and poetical enough to a\n Frenchman, but to an English mind suggests nothing so much as a damp\n and aged poultry-fancier locking up his chickens in the hen-house out\n of the rain. And a countryman of the cardinal can make nothing more of\n the \u201claughing eyes\u201d of Dante\u2019s Piccarda:\n\n\n \u201cOnd\u2019 ella pronta e con _occhi ridenti_,\u201d[177]\n\n\n than\n\n\n \u201cL\u2019ombre me repondit _d\u2019un air satisfait_!\u201d\n\n\n as though the celestial phantom had been a small girl bribed with a\n tart to answer. To the post-academic Gaul, shivering in the chaste but\n chilly shadow of that awful Pantheon of the verbal proprieties, the\n \u201cMarguerite aux yeulx rians et verds\u201d whom his forebears loved to sing\n would be but a green-eyed monster indeed. Ronsard\u2019s parodies of Pindar\n were no worse than Ambrose Philips\u2019 travesties of the deep-mouthed\n Theban\u2014the sparrow-hawk aping the eagle\u2014and not much worse, indeed,\n than West\u2019s or even Wheelwright\u2019s, or any other imitation of the\n inimitable that we have seen. But the badness of the one is thoroughly\n French and of his time, even to his bragging that it was his noble\n birth which enabled him to reproduce Pindar, wherein Horace, for lack\n of that virtue, had failed; the badness of the other as thoroughly\n English and of his age. And what more salient instance could be given\n of this natural difference in mental constitution, in \u201cthe way of\n looking at things,\u201d than Voltaire\u2019s treatment of the scene in _Hamlet_\n where the sentinel answers the question, \u201cHave you had quiet guard?\u201d by\n the familiar household idiom, \u201cNot a mouse stirring\u201d? \u201c_Pas un souris\n qui trotte_\u201d the author of _Zaire_ makes it, and proceeds to inform his\n countrymen that this Shakspeare was a drunken savage.\n\n Now, while there is no such radical difference between English and\n American ways of thought as between English and French ways, there is\n still difference enough to justify us in giving place to Mr. Cranch\u2019s\n blank-verse _\u00c6neid_, as being _\u00e0 priori_ another thing from the English\n blank-verse _\u00c6neids_ of forty or one hundred and forty years ago. So,\n without more ado, let us repeat that these three versions of the last\n decade are sufficiently unlike one another or any that have gone before\n to warrant attentive notice.\n\n In choosing for the vehicle of his attempt the octosyllabic line\u2014the\n well-known metre of Scott\u2019s _Marmion_\u2014Prof. Conington turned his back\n intrepidly on all the traditions. Scarcely any rhythm we have would\n seem at first blush worse fitted to give the unlearned reader an\n adequate idea of the sonorous march of the Latin hexameter or of the\n stately melody of Virgil\u2019s verse, of the dignity of his sentiments, or\n the noble gravity of his style. For him who uses such a metre to render\n the _\u00c6neid_ one half anticipates the need of some such frank confession\n as that Ronsard, in a fit of remorse, or perhaps a verbal indigestion\n over his own inconceivable pedantry, puts at the end\u2014at the _end_, mark\n you\u2014of one of his never-ending series of odes:\n\n\n \u201cLes Fran\u00e7ois qui mes vers liront,\n S\u2019ils ne sont et Grecs et Romains,\n En lieu de ce livre, ils n\u2019auront\n Qu\u2019un pesant faix entre les mains\u201d\u2014\n\n\n which for our present purpose we may paraphrase: My excellent reader,\n if you don\u2019t know Virgil as well as I do, you will find very little of\n him here, and if you do you will find still less. But Professor\n Conington soon puts away from us all such forebodings. He gives us, in\n spite of his metre, for the most part, in rare instances, by the help\n of it, a great deal of Virgil\u2014more, on the whole, than almost any other\n of the poet\u2019s translators. He has put the story of the _\u00c6neid_ into\n bright and animated English verse which may be read with pleasure as a\n poem for itself, and is yet strictly faithful to the sense and spirit\n of its original, as close as need be\u2014wonderfully close in many parts\u2014to\n its language, often skilfully suggestive of some of the most salient\n peculiarities of its form, and only failing conspicuously, where all\n translations most conspicuously fail, in rendering the poet\u2019s manner,\n because the manner of any poet\u2014and we mean by manner that union of\n thought and form of the poet\u2019s way of seeing with his way of saying\n things which is the full manifestation of his genius\u2014only failing here\n because this part of any poet it is next to impossible to reproduce in\n a foreign tongue, and because the vehicle chosen by Prof. Conington, so\n opposite in every way to Virgil\u2019s vehicle, increased that difficulty\n tenfold. But a translation of a long narrative poem is not like the\n translation of a brief lyric. Is the former to be written for those who\n understand the original and care for no translation, or for those who,\n not understanding the original, ask first of the translator that he\n shall not put them to sleep, and, second, that he shall give them all\n that his author gives as nearly as possible in the same manner? Two of\n these demands Prof. Conington\u2019s version fully meets, and it comes as\n near to the third as was consistent with a metre which gave him the\n best chance of combining the other two. If any translation of Virgil\n can hope to be popular it is his; and we hold to the belief that it\n will share with Dryden\u2019s, which, if only for its author\u2019s sake, will\n live, the affections of the _unlatined_ English reader for long to\n come.\n\n As might be expected, it is in battle-pieces and in scenes of swift and\n animated action, to which Scott\u2019s metre naturally lends itself, and\n with which it is as naturally associated, that this version chiefly\n excels. Take, for example, the onset in the eleventh book:\n\n\n \u201cMeantime the Trojans near the wall,\n The Tuscans and the horsemen all,\n In separate troops arrayed;\n Their mettled steeds the champaign spurn,\n And, chafing, this and that way turn;\n Spears bristle o\u2019er the fields, that burn\n With arms on high displayed.\n Messapus and the Latian force,\n And Coras and Camilla\u2019s horse,\n An adverse front array;\n With hands drawn back they couch the spear,\n And aim the dart in full career;\n The tramp of heroes strikes the ear,\n Mixed with the charger\u2019s neigh.\n Arrived within a javelin\u2019s throw,\n The armies halt a space; when, lo!\n Sudden they let their good steeds go\n And meet with deafening cry;\n Their volleyed darts fly thick as snow,\n Dark-shadowing all the sky.\u201d\n\n\n The Latin could scarcely be given with more spirit or closeness; though\n in neither respect does Morris fall short of his predecessor, from whom\n in manner, however, he differs _toto c\u0153lo_:\n\n\n \u201cBut in meanwhile the Trojan folk the city draw anigh,\n The Tuscan dukes and all their horse in many a company\n Well ordered; over all the plain, neighing, the steed doth fare,\n Prancing and champing on the bit that turns him here and here.\n And far and wide the lea is rough with iron harvest now,\n And with the weapons tost aloft the level meadows glow.\n Messapus and the Latins swift, lo! on the other hand,\n And Coras with his brother-lord, and maid Camilla\u2019s band,\n Against them in the field; and, lo! far back their arms they fling\n In couching of the level spears, and shot-spears brandishing.\n All is afire with neigh of steeds and onfall of the men.\n And now, within a spear-shot come, short up they rein, and then\n They break out with a mighty cry and spur the maddened steeds;\n And all at once from every side the storm of spear-shot speeds,\n As thick as very snowing is, and darkens down the sun.\u201d\n\n\n It would be hard to say which version is closer to the original.\n Conington leaves out the epithet _celeres_ which Virgil bestows on the\n Latins, and also\u2014a graver omission\u2014that brother whom Virgil makes\n attend him like his shadow (_et cum fratre Coras_) in every\n battle-field of the _\u00c6neid_. This fraternal warrior Morris gives us,\n indeed, but not very intelligibly, as Coras\u2019 \u201cbrother-lord.\u201d On the\n other hand, although Morris renders the Latin line for line, he is not\n so concise as Conington, who puts Virgil\u2019s fifteen hexameters into\n twenty of his short lines as opposed to fifteen of Morris\u2019 long ones.\n Virgil has nothing of Morris\u2019 \u201ciron harvest\u201d; here\u2014\n\n\n \u201cTum late ferreus hastis\n Horret ager, campique armis sublimibus ardent\u201d\u2014\n\n\n we should give Conington the preference, while Morris excels in\n rendering the verse:\n\n\n \u201cAdventusque virum fremitusque ardescit equorum.\u201d\n\n\n In Morris\u2019 version four words are to be specially noted: _folk_,\n _dukes_, _maid_, and _very_. They contain the key to his method, and we\n shall recur to them again.\n\n Our American\u2019s blank-verse here helps him to no greater degree of\n fidelity than either of his rivals, while even patriotism must own his\n version, as compared with theirs, a trifle tame:\n\n\n \u201cMeanwhile, the Trojan troops, the Etruscan chiefs,\n And all the cavalry approach the walls,\n In order ranged. The coursers leap and neigh\n Along the fields, and fight against the curb,\n And wheel about. An iron field of spears\n Bristles afar, and lifted weapons blaze.\n Upon the other side the Latins swift,\n Messapus, Coras, and his brother come,\n Also Camilla\u2019s wing; in hostile ranks\n They threaten with their lances backward drawn,\n And shake their javelins. On the warriors press,\n And fierce and fiercer neigh the battle steeds.\n Advancing now within a javelin\u2019s throw,\n Each army halted; then, with sudden shouts,\n They cheer and spur their fiery horses on.\n From all sides now the spears fly thick and fast\n As showers of sleet, and darken all the sky.\u201d\n\n\n The word \u201ccavalry\u201d here is too modern in its associations to suit us\n entirely, nor strikes us as highly poetical.\n\n\n \u201cWave, Munich, all thy banners wave,\n And charge with all thy _chivalry_,\u201d\n\n\n is the way Campbell put it. Again, the rendering of the line\n _Adventusque virum fremitusque ardescit equorum_ is less exact than\n Morris\u2019, if not than Conington\u2019s, and much less poetical than either;\n and were it not for the printer\u2019s aid, we should be unable to tell such\n blank-verse as \u201cMessapus, Coras, and his brother come, also Camilla\u2019s\n wing,\u201d from the very prosiest of prose. Mr. Cranch, like Prof.\n Conington, omits Camilla\u2019s attribute of _virginis_\u2014though that is,\n perhaps, better than to call her, as Dryden does, a \u201cvirago\u201d\u2014and turns\n Virgil\u2019s snow into sleet, no doubt having in mind Gray\u2019s\n\n\n \u201cIron sleet of arrowy shower\n Hurtles in the darkened air,\u201d\n\n\n or the \u201csharp sleet of arrowy shower\u201d in _Paradise Regained_.\n\n It may be of interest to set side by side with these English\n translations the French version of Delille. It will show us, at least,\n where Mr. Morris went, perhaps, for his \u201ciron harvest\u201d:\n\n\n \u201cMais d\u00e9j\u00e0 les Troyens, d\u00e9j\u00e0 les fiers Toscans\n Pour attaquer vers Lausente ont d\u00e9ploy\u00e9 leurs rangs;\n Ils marchent; le coursier de sa t\u00eate hautaine\n Bat l\u2019air, ronge le frein, et bondit dans la plaine;\n Les champs sont h\u00e9riss\u00e9s d\u2019une moisson de fer,\n Et chaque javelot fait partir un \u00e9clair.\n Et Messape, et Coras et son valeureux fr\u00e8re,\n Et la chaste Camille et sa troupe l\u00e9g\u00e8re,\n Se pr\u00e9sentent ensemble. On voit de toutes parts\n Et s\u2019alonger la lance et s\u2019agiter les dards.\n Sous les pas des guerriers les champs poudreux g\u00e9missent;\n Et soldats et coursiers de col\u00e8re fr\u00e9missent.\n Enfin, \u00e0 la distance o\u00f9 le trait peut porter,\n Les partis ennemis viennent de s\u2019arr\u00eater:\n On s\u2019\u00e9crie, on s\u2019\u00e9lance, et d\u2019un essor rapide.\n Chacun pousse en avant son coursier intr\u00e9pide.\n Plus press\u00e9s que la neige au retour des hivers\n Des nuages de traits en obscurci les airs.\u201d\n\n\n In a future number we purpose concluding our present examination and\n taking a final leave of the translators.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE HOME-RULE CANDIDATE.\n\n _A STORY OF \u201cNEW IRELAND.\u201d_\n\n BY THE AUTHOR OF \u201cTHE LITTLE CHAPEL AT MONAMULLIN,\u201d \u201cTHE ROMANCE OF A\n PORTMANTEAU,\u201d ETC., ETC.\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n NEW IRELAND AND YOUNG ENGLAND.\n\n How glad I felt when morning came, as it brought me nearer to seeing\n our fair guest! I gathered a bouquet for her, wet with the kisses of\n the lingering night-dew. I flatter myself that my bouquets are\n constructed with a tender regard for tone. I have sat for hours in\n Paris, upon an upturned empty basket in the March\u00e9 aux Fleurs, watching\n the _fleuristes_ deftly composing those exquisite poems in color which\n serve to render flowers a charming necessity. Upon this occasion I\n selected blood-red geraniums as the outer edge, with narrowing circlets\n of stefanotis and mignonette, the whole enshrined in a bower of\n maiden-hair fern. How lovely she looked when I presented them to her at\n breakfast; how enchanting her transparent complexion, that flushed as\n she spoke, and crimsoned when she was spoken to! Alphonse Karr speaks\n of a similar indefinable charm in his own delightful way: \u201c_Elle avait\n ce charme po\u00e9tiquement virginal, qui est la plus grande beaut\u00e9 de la\n femme._\u201d Alas! my bouquet had been forestalled by the gift of a\n veritable last rose of summer which Harry Welstone had culled while I\n was engaged in imparting some finishing touches to my rather bristly\n hair. The words \u201ctoo late\u201d to meet me on the very threshold of my new\n career! It was truly disheartening.\n\n She was attired in a tightly-fitting dress of pure white, adorned by a\n series of coquettish blue ribbons, the edgings being of the same color.\n Her cavalier collar and gauntlet cuffs finished a toilette which almost\n recalled my Virgil, as I could hardly refrain from exclaiming \u201c_O Dea\n certe!_\u201d\n\n \u201cMight I ask, if it is not an unparliamentary question, Mr. Ormonde, at\n what hour you allowed poor papa to retire to his bed? Was it late last\n night or early this morning?\u201d she asked with a droll archness.\n\n \u201cWell, it _was_ rather late, Miss Hawthorne; but as your father was\n good enough to favor me with some exceedingly interesting passages in\n his senatorial career, the time galloped by at a break-neck pace and we\n took no note of it.\u201d\n\n I had already learned to play the hypocrite. O Master Cupid! and this\n was thy first lesson.\n\n \u201cIs my memory mocking me, or did I hear awful mention of Irish whisky?\u201d\n she laughed.\n\n This enabled me to explain the blunder of my retainer in his desire to\n uphold the honor of the family, and to exonerate myself from the\n _soup\u00e7on_ of having neglected her society for that of the bottle.\n Peter\u2019s ideas upon the family _status_ seemed to afford her the\n liveliest merriment, and she laughed the silvery laugh with which, old\n playgoers tell me, Mme. Vestris used to bring down the house.\n\n \u201cPeter is a character, then?\u201d\n\n \u201cYou will find that out before very long, Miss Hawthorne.\u201d\n\n \u201cI do _so_ love characters!\u201d\n\n I ran over my characteristics like a flash, and found them of the\n baldest and mildest nature. Not a single strong point came to the\n rescue, not a liking or a disliking. Pah! what a dull, drowsy weed;\n what a prosy, colorless nobody.\n\n \u201cPeter is a great admirer of the fair sex,\u201d said my mother. \u201cYou must\n see him on Sunday standing at the chapel gate \u2018discoorsin\u2019\u2019 the pretty\n girls as they pass in to last Mass.\u201d\n\n \u201cIs he a bachelor?\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! yes. I have often asked him why he doesn\u2019t marry, and his\n invariable reply is, \u2018I\u2019d rayther keep looking at them.\u2019\u201d\n\n \u201cPerhaps I might have a chance,\u201d said Miss Hawthorne, with a delicious\n coquetry in her manner.\n\n \u201cNot a bit of it, my dear; he would not ally himself to a Saxon for a\n crock of gold.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe is a hard-hearted wretch, then,\u201d laughed our guest, \u201cand I shall\n not endeavor to make a conquest.\u201d\n\n Little did she imagine that she might have uttered _Veni, vidi, vici_\n at that particular moment. A poor triumph, though\u2014a paltry victory. I\n did not feel myself worthy of powder and shot.\n\n Harry Welstone kept gazing at Miss Hawthorne from out his supremely\n handsome eyes. How I envied him those deep, dark, corsair-like organs\n of vision, inwardly railing against my own heavy blues! He chatted\n with her upon every conceivable topic, planning excursions, arranging\n her boating, riding, walking, and even the songs she was to sing,\n disposing of her time to his own especial advantage, and leaving me\n helplessly out in the cold with the prosy member for Doodleshire. I\n could not find a solitary topic to speak upon; at least, just as I\n had summoned up courage to \u201ccut in,\u201d as they say at whist, the wind\n had shifted and the current of the conversation had taken another\n turn, leaving my disabled argosy high and dry. I had spent my most\n recent years in the secluded valley of Kilkenley with my mother, my\n horses, and my dogs. I had seen little or nothing of the whirl of the\n world, and was so purely, so essentially local as to be almost\n ignorant of what was going on in the outer circle of life. Of course\n I read the _Freeman\u2019s Journal_\u2014generally two days old when it reached\n us\u2014and then I merely glanced at the hunting fixtures or the sales of\n thoroughbreds at Farrell\u2019s or Sewell\u2019s. Of course I had done some\n reading; and of a lighter kind the Waverley Novels and Dickens, the\n Titanic Thackeray and a few unwholesome French effusions; but of late\n I had read nothing, and, as a consequence, was local to a\n contemptuous degree. In what did Peter, my own servant, differ from\n me? Merely in the perusal of a few books. He was a better judge of a\n horse and\u2014but why proceed? My reflections were all of this melancholy\n cast as I listened to dissertations upon Chopin, Schubert, and\n Wagner, upon the novelists and poets of the period, upon Gainsborough\n hats and Pompadour flounces, upon the relative merits of R\u00e8ve d\u2019Amour\n and Ess\u2019 bouquet. Harry and our fair young guest kept the shuttlecock\n going between them, and I was forced to bear the burden of my own\n ignorance in a stolid, stupid silence. One chance was offered me\n which I took as I would a six-foot wall\u2014flying. The question of\n horses came upon the _tapis_, and I vaulted into the saddle. I rode\n down Harry and scarcely spared Miss Hawthorne; nor did I draw rein\n until I had described _the_ run of last season, from meet to death,\n winding a \u201cView-halloo!\u201d that actually caused the teacups to ring\n upon their saucers. This blew off my compressed excitement, and,\n although very much ashamed, I felt all the better for it. My foot was\n on my native heath, and I showed _her_ that my name was McGregor.\n\n \u201cWhat are you going to do with Mr. Hawthorne to-day?\u201d asked my mother.\n\n \u201cWhat are _you_ going to do with Miss Hawthorne, mother?\u201d I retorted.\n\n \u201cOh! Harry Welstone and I have arranged all that. _You_ are not in the\n baby-house.\u201d\n\n This was gratifying intelligence with a vengeance. I was told off as\n bear-leader to the prosy Parliament man, while Harry was to revel in\n the radiance of Miss Hawthorne\u2019s presence. This was grilling. And yet\n what could I do or say? My hands were tied behind my back. I was host,\n and should pay deference to the respected rites of bread and salt, the\n sacred laws of hospitality. A sacrifice was demanded, and in me was\n found the victim.\n\n \u201cCould we not manage to unite our forces?\u201d I suggested, in the faint,\n flickering hope that a compromise might be effected.\n\n \u201cImpossible!\u201d said Harry.\n\n I could have flung my teacup at his head.\n\n \u201cAnd why not, pray?\u201d I asked in a short, testy way.\n\n \u201cBecause you are to take Mr. Hawthorne over to Clonacooney, and to talk\n tenant-right and landlord-wrong with old Mr. Cassidy; then, when\n exhausted there, you are bound for the model farm at Rouserstown, and\n any amount of steam-ploughing and top-dressing; then you can pay a\n flying visit to Phil Dempsey\u2019s hundred-acre field, and show the Saxon\n the richness of the land he has invaded; then you are to call for\n Father O\u2019Dowd, where you can coal and do Home Rule; and then you may\n come home to dinner, where _we_ shall be very happy to receive you.\u201d\n And Harry laughed loudly and long at my utter discomfiture\u2014a\n discomfiture written in my rueful countenance in lines as heavy as\n those laid on the grim visage of Don Quixote by Gustave Dor\u00e9.\n\n \u201cYou are very kind, Welstone\u2014a most considerate fellow. Why not have\n arranged for Knobber, or the other side of the Shannon\u2014say Ballybawn,\n or Curlagh Island?\u201d\n\n The iron had entered my soul.\n\n \u201cIs not this arrangement a very heavy tax upon Mr. Ormonde\u2019s\n good-nature?\u201d exclaimed our fair guest, graciously coming to the\n rescue, addressing my mother, who, _par parenth\u00e8se_, expressed herself\n perfectly charmed with Miss Hawthorne.\n\n \u201cTax! my dear child? On the contrary, it is just the sort of day my son\n will thoroughly enjoy: going about the country, talking second crops,\n turnips, and the price of hay and oats. He is devoted to all that sort\n of thing, and I doubt if even his duties of gallantry to you, Mabel,\n would get the better of his devotion to Mme. Ceres.\u201d\n\n I was about to blurt out something that might possibly have compromised\n me on all sides, when, as luck would have it, the M.P. entered.\n\n He stalked into the room as if the division-bell were ringing, and took\n his seat as though below the gangway, bowing gravely to the assembled\n House. He lifted his cup as he would a blue-book, and handled his knife\n as an act of Parliament.\n\n \u201cYou will\u2014ahem!\u2014I\u2019m sure excuse my being a little late\u201d\u2014with a\n preparatory cough\u2014\u201cbut the late sittings of last session have totally\n unfitted me for bed until the wee sma\u2019 hours.\u201d\n\n \u201cSurely, papa, you are not going to carry the House of Commons hours\n into the romantic glens of Kilkenly?\u201d\n\n \u201cI admit that I ought not to do so, my dear, but, as a great statesman\n once observed\u2014I, ahem! quite forget his name at this particular\n moment\u2014habit is second nature; and were I to retire early, it would\u2014ha!\n ha!\u2014be only for the purpose of quarrelling with one of my best friends,\n my _best_ friend\u2014Morpheus.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou must find the fatigues of Parliament very great,\u201d said my mother.\n\n \u201cHerculean, madam. My correspondence, before I go down to the House at\n all, is a herculean task, and one in which I am very considerably aided\n by my daughter.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! yes,\u201d she laughed; \u201cI can write such diplomatic letters as \u2018I beg\n to acknowledge receipt of your communication of the blank instant,\n which shall have my very best attention.\u2019 Papa\u2019s constituents\n invariably hear from me in that exact phraseology by return of post. I\n have a whole lot of such letters, as the Americans say, \u2018on hand.\u2019\u201d\n\n \u201cIf it were not for the off-nights, madam,\u201d continued the member for\n Doodleshire, \u201cWednesdays and Saturdays, I should seriously think of\n accepting the Chiltern Hundreds, which is a gentlemanlike way of\n resigning a seat in the House.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd on the off-nights poor papa devotes himself to _me_,\u201d exclaimed\n Mabel; \u201cand I always accept invitations for those nights, so the only\n chance he has for sleep is during the recess.\u201d\n\n I wondered who her friends might be, what they were like, where they\n resided, and if the men were all in love with her. She had upon three\n distinct occasions referred to a Mr. Melton, and somehow the mention of\n this man filled me with a grim foreboding.\n\n \u201cWe take too much sleep. We should do with as little as possible, and\n divide that by three. Sleep is waste of time. Sleep is a sad nuisance,\n a bore. It is born in a yawn and dies in imbecility,\u201d cried Harry,\n suddenly bursting into vitality.\n\n \u201cIs it thus you would designate Nature\u2019s soft nurse, sir?\u201d demanded Mr.\n Hawthorne in a severe tone.\n\n \u201cThis comes very badly from Mr. Welstone,\u201d said my mother, \u201cwho\n requires to be called about ten times before he will deign to leave off\n sleeping.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou should see the panels of his door\u2014actually worn away with\n knuckle-knocking,\u201d I added.\n\n \u201cIn the country I sleep because there\u2019s nothing else to do. I get up\n early! What for? To see the same mist on the same mountains, and the\n same cows in the same field, and the same birds in the same trees;\n though, _mot d\u2019honneur_, I was up and out this morning at eight\n o\u2019clock, and played Romeo to Miss Hawthorne\u2019s Juliet\u2014at least, so far\n as a garden and a balcony could do it.\u201d\n\n \u201cWho ever heard of a Romeo by daylight?\u201d I exclaimed sarcastically.\n\n \u201cLet\u2019s see what that love-stricken wretch does \u2018neath the sun\u2019s rays.\n We all know what he says and does in the pale moonlight.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe kills Tybalt,\u201d I interposed, not utterly displeased in being able\n to show Mabel that I was on intimate terms with the Bard of Avon.\n\n \u201cAnd buys a penn\u2019orth of strychnine,\u201d added Harry with a grin.\n\n \u201cWe know a gentleman who plays Romeo to perfection,\u201d observed Mabel.\n \u201cSuch a handsome fellow! And the dress suits him charmingly.\u201d\n\n How I hated this Romeo!\n\n \u201cA Mr. Wynwood Melton.\u201d\n\n I knew it before she had uttered the words.\n\n \u201cAn actor?\u201d I drawled in a careless sort of way.\n\n \u201cOh! dear, no; he\u2019s in the Foreign Office, and a swell. He is nephew or\n cousin\u2014I don\u2019t know which\u2014to Mr. Gladstone or some other great chief.\u201d\n This with an animation that sent a thrill of despairing jealousy to my\n very soul.\n\n \u201cHe is\u2014ahem!\u2014a very promising young man, a great favorite of ours, and\n will make his mark. He is destined for the House. You\u2019ll meet him, Mr.\n Ormonde, when you come over. He is\u2014ha! ha! ha!\u2014rather a constant\n visitor,\u201d with a significant glance in the direction of his daughter.\n\n She flushed crimson. The deep scarlet glowed all over her like a rosy\n veil. That blush tolled the death-knell of my hopes. Our eyes met; she\n withdrew her glance, as I haughtily outstared her.\n\n \u201cHe is a great favorite of papa\u2019s,\u201d she murmured, almost\n apologetically.\n\n \u201cAnd how about papa\u2019s only daughter?\u201d laughed my mother.\n\n \u201cPapa\u2019s only daughter admires him very much\u2014thinks him very handsome,\n very nice, very cultivated, very clever, _et voil\u00e0 tout_.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat more would papa\u2019s only daughter have?\u201d\n\n A quaint little shrug, and a dainty laugh.\n\n \u201cA thousand things,\u201d she said. From that moment I marked down Melton as\n my foe\u2014as the man who had dared to cross my path. Not that I hoped for\n success, or could ever hope for it; yet to him she had evidently\n surrendered her heart, and _he_ must reckon with _me_. Meet him!\n Rather! I would now accept the invitation to London for the sole\n purpose of falling foul of Melton. It would be such exquisite torture\n to see them together; such racking bliss to behold them pressing hands\n and looking into each other\u2019s eyes. What pleasurable agony to look\n calmly on while those nameless frivolities and gentle dalliances by\n which lovers bridge the conventionalities were being performed beneath\n my very nose! Ha! ha! I would close with Mr. Hawthorne\u2019s offer and make\n arrangements for proceeding to \u2018town,\u2019 as he would persist in calling\n the English metropolis, at the earliest possible opportunity consistent\n with his, and Melton\u2019s, convenience.\n\n \u201cMiss Hawthorne,\u201d suddenly exclaimed Harry, \u201c_do_ tell us something\n more about this Romeo. You have only given us enough to make us wish\n for more. What is he like?\u201d\n\n \u201cWill you have his portrait in oil or a twopenny photo?\u201d she laughed.\n\n \u201cLet us strike \u2018ile\u2019 by all means.\u201d\n\n \u201c_Imprimis_\u2014that\u2019s a good word to begin with\u2014he is tall.\u201d\n\n \u201cGood!\u201d\n\n \u201cGraceful.\u201d\n\n \u201cGood again!\u201d\n\n \u201cDignified-looking.\u201d\n\n \u201c_Bravissimo!_\u201d\n\n \u201cParts his hair in the centre.\u201d\n\n \u201cI don\u2019t care for that,\u201d said Harry.\n\n \u201cIt becomes _him_.\u201d\n\n \u201cPossibly. Pray proceed. His eyes?\u201d\n\n \u201cGray.\u201d\n\n \u201cNose?\u201d\n\n \u201cAquiline.\u201d\n\n \u201cBeard?\u2014men parting their hair in the centre wear beards.\u201d\n\n \u201cHenri Quatre.\u201d\n\n \u201cHands?\u201d\n\n \u201cSmall and white.\u201d\n\n I threw a hasty glance at mine; they were of the same hue as the leg of\n the mahogany breakfast-table at which we were seated. Sun and saddle\n had done their work effectually.\n\n \u201cDoes he smile?\u201d\n\n \u201cWhy, _of course_ he does.\u201d\n\n \u201cNow,\u201d said Harry, \u201cupon your description of his smile a good deal may\n depend.\u201d\n\n \u201cI object to this line of cross-examination,\u201d said my mother.\n\n \u201cI consider the subject has been sufficiently thrashed already,\u201d I\n added. Truly, I was sick of it.\n\n \u201cI shall throw up my brief, if I do not get an answer to my question.\u201d\n\n \u201cI shall tell you by and by, Mr. Welstone.\u201d\n\n \u201cBy and by will not do.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, then, Mr. Melton\u2019s smile is like a sunbeam. Are you satisfied\n _now_?\u201d\n\n \u201cMr. Hawthorne,\u201d said Harry, turning to the M.P., \u201cthis is a very bad\n case.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m afraid\u2014ha! ha! ha!\u2014that it looks somewhat suspicious,\u201d was the\n significant reply.\n\n \u201cIf you mean\u2014\u201d Mabel began.\n\n \u201cI don\u2019t mean what _you_ mean,\u201d laughed Harry.\n\n \u201cWhat _do_ you mean?\u201d she asked.\n\n \u201cWhat do _you_ mean?\u201d he playfully retorted.\n\n At this juncture Peter O\u2019Brien\u2019s shock head appeared at the open\n window, through which he unceremoniously thrust it, announcing, in no\n very delicate accents:\n\n \u201cThe yokes is _con_vaynient.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s a fine morning, Peter,\u201d exclaimed Miss Hawthorne, rising and\n approaching the window.\n\n \u201cTroth, it\u2019s that same, miss, glory be to God! It\u2019s iligant weather\n intirely for the craps.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe\u2019ve cut all our corn in England, Peter.\u201d\n\n \u201cSee that, now,\u201d gloomily; but, brightening up, he added: \u201cSorra a\n haporth to hindher _us_ from cuttin\u2019 it long ago, av it was only ripe\n enough.\u201d\n\n \u201cAn Irish peasant will never admit Saxon superiority in anything,\u201d said\n my mother, placing her arm about Mabel\u2019s waist. \u201cWhat \u2018yokes\u2019 have you\n out to-day, Peter?\u201d\n\n \u201cThe shay for you, ma\u2019am, and the young leddy there; though I\u2019m afeared\n it\u2019s not as nate as it ought for to be, be raisin av a rogue av a hin\u2014a\n red wan, full av consait an\u2019 impidence\u2014makin\u2019 her nest right\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cHere, Peter,\u201d I cried, to put a stop to these hideous revelations,\n \u201cget my car round at once.\u201d I could have strangled him.\n\n As all English visitors to Ireland are possessed of a frantic desire to\n experience the jolting of an Irish jaunting-car, I ordered my own\n special conveyance round, also from the workshop of Bates\u2014a low,\n rakish-looking craft, with a very deep well for the dogs when going out\n shooting, and bright yellow corduroy cushions; an idea of my own, and\n upon which I rather piqued myself. Harry Welstone and the ladies came\n to the doorsteps to see us off, and while he explained the beauties of\n the chariot to Miss Hawthorne I endeavored to initiate her father into\n the mysteries of clinging on, advising him not to clutch the front and\n back rail so convulsively, but rather to allow his body to swing with\n every motion of the vehicle, and above all things to trust to luck.\n\n \u201cLave yourself as if ye wor a sack o\u2019 male, sir,\u201d suggested Peter, who\n was charioteer, \u201cor as if ye had a sup in. Sorra a man that was full\n ever dhropped off av a car, barrin\u2019 Murty Flinn; an\u2019 shure that was not\n his fault aither, for it was intirely be raisin av a bargain he med wud\n a lump av a mare he was dhrivin\u2019 at that time.\u201d\n\n \u201cWho was Murty Flinn, Peter?\u201d asked Miss Hawthorne.\n\n \u201cA dacent boy, miss, that lives beyant at the crass-roads\u2014a rale hayro\n for sperits,\u201d was the prompt response, accompanied by a semi-military\n salute.\n\n \u201cAnd how did he fall off the car?\u201d\n\n \u201cTroth, thin, _mavourneen_, it wasn\u2019t Murty that fell aff av the car,\n so much as that the car fell aff av Murty; an\u2019 this is how it happened:\n Murty was comin\u2019 from the fair av Bohernacopple, where he wint for to\n sell a little slip av a calf, an\u2019 afore he left the fair he tuk several\n gollioges av sperits, an\u2019 had a cupple uv haits wud Phil Clancy, the\n red-hedded wan\u2014not Phil av Tubbermory\u2014an\u2019 he was bet up intirely betune\n the whiskey an\u2019 the rounds wud red Clancy, so that whin he cum for to\n make for home he was hard set for to yoke the mare, an\u2019 harder set agin\n for to mount to his sate on the car. But Murty is the persevarionist\n man ye ever laid yer two purty eyes on, miss, an\u2019 he ruz himself into\n the sate afther a tremendjus battle; and th\u2019 ould mare, whin she seen\n that he was comfortable, tuk the road like a Christian mare. Well,\n Murty rowled backwards an\u2019 forwards, an\u2019 every joult av the car ye\u2019d\n think wud sind him on the crown av his _caubeen_; but, be me song, he\n was as secure as a prisner in Botany Bay, an\u2019 it\u2019s a sailor he thought\n he was, up in a hammock no less. Well, miss, the night was a little\n dark an\u2019 the road was shaded wud threes, an\u2019 whin they cum to th\u2019 ould\n graveyard at Killencanick never a fut the mare \u2018ud go farther.\n\n \u201c\u2018What\u2019s the matther wud ye?\u2019 axed Murty; but sorra an answer she med\n him.\n\n \u201c\u2018Are ye bet,\u2019 sez he, \u2018an\u2019 you so far from home?\u2019 She riz a cupple av\n kicks, as much as to say, \u2018Ye hit it off that time, anyhow, Misther\n Flinn!\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Did ye get a dhrink at the fair beyant, Moria?\u2019\u2014the little mare\u2019s\n name, miss. She shuk her hed in a way that tould him that she was as\n dhry as a cuckoo.\n\n \u201c\u2018Musha, musha, but that was cruel thratemint,\u2019 sez he. \u2018What\u2019s to be\n done at all, at all?\u2019\n\n \u201cWell, miss, he thought for a minit, an\u2019 he sez: \u2018Moria, we\u2019re only two\n mile from the Cock an\u2019 Blackberry, an\u2019 I\u2019ll tell ye what I\u2019ll do wud\n ye: you carry me wan mile, sez he, \u2018an\u2019 I\u2019ll carry you th\u2019 other.\u2019\u201d\n\n This proposition on the part of Murty Flinn was received with a peal of\n ringing laughter from Miss Hawthorne, who, with flashing eyes and an\n eager expression of delighted curiosity, begged of Peter to proceed.\n\n \u201cAv coorse, miss,\u201d replied the gratified Jehu. \u201cWell, ye see the words\n was hardly acrass his mouth whin, cockin\u2019 her ears an\u2019 her tail, th\u2019\n ould mare darted aff as if she was runnin\u2019 for the Cunningham Coop at\n Punchestown, an\u2019 Murty swingin\u2019 like a log round a dog\u2019s neck all the\n voyage; an\u2019 the minnit she come to the milestone undher Headford\n demesne she stopped like a dead rabbit.\n\n \u201c\u2018Where are we now?\u2019 axed Murty.\n\n \u201cShe sed nothin\u2019, but rouled the car up to the milestone an\u2019 grazed it\n wud the step.\n\n \u201c\u2018Well, yer the cutest little crayture,\u2019 sez Murty, \u2018that ever wore\n shoes,\u2019 sez he; \u2018an\u2019, be the powers, as ye kept yer word wud me, I\u2019ll\n keep me word wud you.\u2019 And he rouled aff av the car into the middle o\u2019\n the road, while th\u2019 ould mare unyoked herself as aisy as if it was\n aitin\u2019 hay she was insted av undoin\u2019 buckles that riz many a blisther\n on Murty\u2019s fingers; for the harness was _con_trairy, and more betoken\n as rusty as a Hessian\u2019s baggonet. When Murty seen the mare stannin\u2019\n naked in the road, he med an offer for to get up, but he was bet\n intirely be raisin av the sup he tuk, an\u2019 he cudn\u2019t stir more nor his\n arms; but the ould mare wasn\u2019t goin\u2019 for to be done out av her jaunt in\n that way, so she cum over, an\u2019 sazin\u2019 him\u2014savin\u2019 yer presence, miss\u2014be\n the sate av his small-clothes, riz him to his feet, an\u2019, wud a cupple\n av twists, dhruv him betune the shafts av the car, an\u2019 in a brace av\n shakes had him harnessed like a racer.\n\n \u201c\u2018I\u2019m reddy now, ma\u2019am,\u2019 sez Murty, mighty polite, for he seen the whip\n in one av her forepaws\u2014\u2018I\u2019m reddy now, ma\u2019am; so up wud ye, an\u2019 I\u2019ll go\n bail we\u2019ll not be long coverin\u2019 the road betune this an\u2019 the Cock an\u2019\n Blackberry.\u2019\n\n \u201cWell, miss, th\u2019 ould mare mounted the car, an\u2019 Murty started aff as\n well as he cud; but he was bet up afther runnin\u2019 a few yards, an\u2019 he\n dhropped into a walk, but no sooner he done it than he got a welt av\n the whip that med him hop.\n\n \u201c\u2018What are ye doin?\u2019 sez he, an\u2019 down cums the lash agin be way av an\n answer.\n\n \u201c\u2018How dare ye raise yer hand to a Christian?\u2019 sez he. A cupple av welts\n follied this.\n\n \u201c\u2018I\u2019ll not stan\u2019 it!\u2019 he bawled; but the more he roared an\u2019 bawled the\n heavier th\u2019 ould mare welted, an\u2019 he might as well be spakin\u2019 to the\n Rock o\u2019 Cashel.\n\n \u201c\u2018Hould yer hand!\u2019 he roared, thryin to soothe her\u2014\u2018hould yer hand, an\u2019\n ye\u2019ll have a bellyful av the finest oats in the barony\u2014ould Tim\n Collins\u2019 best crap. Dhrop the whip, an\u2019 sorra a taste av work ye\u2019ll do\n till next Michaelmas. I can\u2019t thravel faster, Moria, be raisin av a\n corn,\u2019 and the like; but the mare had him, an\u2019 she ped off ould scores,\n an\u2019 be the time they kem to the Cock an\u2019 Blackberry poor Murty was bet\n like an ould carpet, an\u2019 he wasn\u2019t fit for to frighten the crows out av\n an oat-field. An\u2019 that\u2019s how it all happened, miss.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd did he give Moria the drink?\u201d asked Miss Hawthorne.\n\n \u201cHe sez he did,\u201d replied Peter, with a peculiar grin; \u201cbut the people\n that owns the public-house sez that he niver darkened their doore, an\u2019\n that he was found lying undher the yoke near the crass-roads, wud th\u2019\n ould mare grazin\u2019 about a half a mile down the road. But it\u2019s a thrue\n story,\u201d he added with somewhat of solemn emphasis.\n\n \u201c_Si non e vero e ben trovato_,\u201d laughed our guest, as she waved us a\n graceful adieu.\n\n It was one of those lovely mornings nowhere to be found but in Ireland:\n the dim, half-gray light, the heavily-perfumed air, the stillness that\n imparted a sort of sad solemnity to the scene, the glorious tints of\n green on hill and hollow that mellowed themselves with the sombre sky,\n a something that inspires a silence that is at once a resource and a\n regret. I became wrapped up in my own thoughts\u2014so much so that,\n although I held the \u201cribbons\u201d I was scarcely aware of the fact, and it\n was only the exclamation from Peter: \u201cBlur an\u2019 ages! Masther Fred, luk\n out for the brudge\u201d\u2014a narrow structure, across which it was possible to\n pass without grazing the parapet walls, and nothing more\u2014that brought\n me to my senses. My guest, in spite of the earnest instructions of\n Peter, was clinging frantically to the rails at either end of the seat,\n and, instead of allowing his body to swing with the motion of the\n vehicle, was endeavoring to sit bolt upright, as though he were in the\n House of Commons and in anxious expectation of catching the Speaker\u2019s\n eye. Upon arriving at the foot of Ballymacrow hill Peter sprang to the\n ground\u2014an example followed by myself; but Mr. Hawthorne retained his\n seat, as there was plenty of walking in store for him, and my horse\n could well endure the weight of one, when the weight of three would\n make a very essential difference in so steep a climb.\n\n Peter, reins in hand, walked beside the \u201cmimber,\u201d and in a few minutes\n was engaged in \u201cdiscoorsin\u2019\u201d him.\n\n \u201cHome Rule? Sorra a wan o\u2019 me cares a thraneen for it, thin.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat is a thraneen?\u201d asked Mr. Hawthorne, eager for information all\n along the line.\n\n \u201cA thraneen is what the boys reddies their dhudeens wud,\u201d was the\n response to the query.\n\n \u201cI am still in ignorance.\u201d\n\n \u201cWisha, wisha! an\u2019 this is a mimber av Parliamint,\u201d muttered Peter,\n \u201can\u2019 he doesn\u2019t know what a thraneen manes, an\u2019 the littlest gossoon\n out av Father Finnerty\u2019s school beyant cud tell him\u201d; adding aloud: \u201cA\n thraneen is a blade av grass that sheeps nor cows won\u2019t ait, an\u2019 it\n sticks up in a field; there\u2019s wan,\u201d suiting the action to the word,\n plucking it from a bank on the side of the road, and presenting it to\n the member for Doodleshire.\n\n \u201cAnd so you are not a Home-Ruler, my man?\u201d\n\n \u201cSorra a bit, sir.\u201d\n\n \u201cThen what are you?\u201d\n\n \u201cI am a repayler. I\u2019m for teetotal separation; that\u2019s what Dan\n O\u2019Connell sed to Drizzlyeye.\u201d\n\n \u201cWhat did Mr. O\u2019Connell say to Mr. Disraeli?\u201d asked my guest in very\n Parliamentary phraseology.\n\n \u201cI\u2019ll tell ye. \u2018What is it yez want at all, at all, over beyant in\n Hibernium?\u2019 sez Drizzlyeye. \u2018Yez are always wantin\u2019 somethin,\u2019 sez he,\n \u2018an\u2019 what the dickens do yez want now?\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018I\u2019ll tell ye what we want,\u2019 says Dan, as bould as a ram.\n\n \u201c\u2018What is it, Dan?\u2019 sez Drizzlyeye.\n\n \u201c\u2018We want teetotal separation,\u2019 sez Dan.\n\n \u201c\u2018Arrah, ge lang ou\u2019 a that,\u2019 sez Drizzlyeye. \u2018Yez cudn\u2019t get along\n wudout us,\u2019 sez he.\n\n \u201c\u2018Cudn\u2019t we?\u2019 sez Dan. \u2018Thry us, Drizzlyeye,\u2019 sez he. \u2018How did we get\n on afore?\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Bad enuff,\u2019 sez Drizzlyeye\u2014\u2018bad enuff, Dan. Yez were always batin\u2019\n aich other and divartin\u2019 yerselves, and, barrin\u2019 the weltin\u2019 Brian Boru\n gev the Danes at Clontarf, bad cess to the haporth yez ever done, Dan.\n England is yer best frind. We always play fair,\u2019 sez he.\n\n \u201c\u2018How dar ye say that to me?\u2019 sez Dan, takin\u2019 the Traity av Limerick\n out av his pocketbuke. \u2018Luk at that documint,\u2019 sez he, firin\u2019 up;\n \u2018there\u2019s some av yer dirty work; an\u2019 I ax ye square an\u2019 fair,\u2019 sez Dan,\n in a hait, for he was riz, \u2018if the brakin\u2019 av that wasn\u2019t as bad as\n anything yer notorious ancesthor ever done?\u2019 alludin\u2019 to Drizzlyeye\u2019s\n ancesthor, the impenitint thief.\n\n \u201c\u2018That\u2019s none of my doin\u2019, Dan,\u2019 sez Drizzlyeye, turnin\u2019 white as a\n banshee.\n\n \u201c\u2018I know it\u2019s not,\u2019 sez Dan; \u2018but ye\u2019d do it to-morrow mornin\u2019,\u2019 sez\n he, \u2018an\u2019 that\u2019s why I demand the repale an\u2019 a teetotal separation.\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Begorra, but I think yer right, Dan,\u2019 sez Drizzlyeye.\u201d\n\n \u201cSuch an interview could not possibly have occurred,\u201d observed the\n practical Englishman.\n\n \u201cCudn\u2019t it?\u201d with an indignant toss of the head. \u201cI had it from\n Lanty Finnegan, who heerd it from the bishop\u2019s own body-man.\u201d And\n Peter, giving the horse a lash of the whip, dashed into the\n laurestine-bordered avenue leading up to the cosey cottage wherein\n resided the \u201cdarlintest priest outside av Room,\u201d Father Myles\n O\u2019Dowd.\n\n Father O\u2019Dowd\u2019s residence was a long, single-storied house, whitewashed\n to a dazzling whiteness, and thatched with straw the color of the amber\n wept by the sorrowing seabird. A border of blood-red geraniums ran\n along the entire _fa\u00e7ade_, and the gable ends were embowered in\n honeysuckle and clematis. A rustic porch entwined with Virginia creeper\n jealously guarded the entrance, boldly backed up by the \u201ciligantest\n ratter in the barony\u201d in the shape of a bandy-legged terrier, who\n winked a sort of facetious welcome at Peter and bestowed a cough-like\n bark of recognition upon me. The parlor was a genuine snuggery,\n \u201cpapered with books,\u201d all of which, from St. Thomas of Aquinas to\n Father Perrone, were of the rarest and choicest theological reading.\n Nor were the secular authors left out in the cold, to which the\n well-thumbed volumes of the Waverley Novels and the immortal _faceti\u00e6_\n of Dickens bore ample testimony. A charming copy of Raphael\u2019s\n masterpiece stood opposite the door, the glorious eyes of the Virgin\n Mother lighting the apartment with a soft and holy radiance, while the\n fresh and rosy flesh-tints of the divine Infant bespoke the workmanship\n as being that of a _maestro_. A portrait of Henry Grattan hung over the\n chimney-piece, and facing it, between the windows, a print of the\n review of the volunteers in College Green, while some dozen valuable\n engravings, all of a sacred character, adorned the walls in graceful\n profusion. A statuette of the Holy Father occupied a niche specially\n prepared for it, and an old brass-bound rosewood bureau, black as ebony\n from age, sternly asserted itself in defiance of a hustling crowd of\n horse-hair-seated chairs; a shining sofa a little the worse for the\n wear, and presenting a series of comfortless ridges to the unwary\n sitter, and a genuine Domingo mahogany table bearing an honest corned\n beef and cabbage and \u201cboiled leg with\u201d completed a picture that was at\n once refreshing and invigorating to behold.\n\n \u201cShure he\u2019s only acrass the bog, Masther Fred,\u201d exclaimed Biddy\n Finnegan, the housekeeper, with a joyous smile illuminating the very\n frills of her old-world white cap, \u201can\u2019 I\u2019ll send wan av the boys for\n him. He\u2019d be sore an\u2019 sorry for to miss ye, sir. An\u2019 how\u2019s the\n misthress\u2014God be good to her!\u2014an\u2019 the major, whin ye heerd av him? It\u2019s\n himself that\u2019s kindly and dhroll.\u201d And Biddy, dusting the sofa,\n requested the member for Doodleshire to take a \u201csate.\u201d\n\n \u201cWon\u2019t ye have a sup o\u2019 somethin\u2019 afther yer jaunt, Masther Fred, or\n this gintleman? Och! but here\u2019s himself now.\u201d\n\n Father O\u2019Dowd had been attached to Imogeela since his ordination\u2014a\n period of thirty years, during twenty-five of which he was its devoted\n parish priest. Respectfully declining the promotion in the church which\n his piety, erudition, and talents claimed for him as their natural\n heritage, he clung with paternal fondness to his little parish,\n ministering to the spiritual wants of his flock with an earnest and\n holy watchfulness that was repaid to the uttermost by a childlike and\n truthful obedience. To his parishioners he was all, everything\u2014guide,\n philosopher, friend. He shared their joys and their sorrows, their\n hopes and their fears. He whispered hope when the sky was overcast,\n urging moderation when the sun was at its brightest. He had christened\n every child and married every adult in the parish; and those, alas! so\n many, lying beneath the green grass in the churchyard of Imogeela had\n been soothed to their long, long rest by the words of heavenly\n consolation from his pious lips. Ever at his post, the cold, bleak\n nights of winter would find him wending his way through rugged\n mountain-passes, fording swollen streams, or wading treacherous bogs to\n attend to the wants of the sick and dying, while a granite boulder or\n the stump of a felled tree, the blue canopy of heaven overhead, has\n upon many memorable occasions constituted his confessional. A profound\n scholar, a finished gentleman, and, despite his surroundings, a good\n deal a man of the world, I was proud, exceedingly proud, to be enabled\n to present to Mr. Hawthorne so true a specimen of that order which Lord\n John Russell had been pleased to describe as \u201csurpliced ruffians.\u201d\n\n The priest entered, a smile illuminating his expressive face like a ray\n of sunlight. Stretching forth both hands, he bade me welcome,\n exclaiming: \u201cAh! you have made your pilgrimage at last; you come, as\n old Horace hath it, _inter silvas Academi qu\u00e6rere verum_. How is your\n excellent mother? I received your joint epistle, and I hope you got my\n promissory note, due almost at sight.\u201d\n\n Father O\u2019Dowd was about fifty-five or fifty-six; hale, handsome, and\n muscular; his silken, snow-white hair and ruddy complexion, with his\n lustrous, dark blue eyes and glittering teeth, giving him an air of\n genial cordiality pronounceable at a single glance. Tall, sunburnt, and\n powerfully built, he carried that solidity of gesture and firmness of\n tread sometimes so marked in muscular Christianity. I saw with feelings\n of intense pleasure that my guest was both pleased and impressed\u2014an\n impression strengthened by the cordial greeting which the worthy priest\n extended to him.\n\n \u201cWelcome to Ireland, Mr. Hawthorne. It\u2019s about the best thing Strongbow\n ever did for me\u2014the pleasure of seeing a friend of my dear young\n friend\u2019s here. Collectively you Saxons hate us; individually you find\n us not quite the lawless savages the _Pall Mall Gazette_ and\n _Spectator_ would make us.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe want to know you better,\u201d said the M.P.\n\n \u201cAh! that\u2019s the rub. You don\u2019t know us, and never will know us; but\n _we_ know _you_. Englishmen come over to Ireland, believing that a real\n knowledge of the country is not to be acquired from newspapers, but\n that a man must see Ireland for himself. They come; they go; and all\n they pick up is a little of our brogue. We never can hope for much more\n than what Lucan calls _concordia discors_.\u201d\n\n \u201cI believe if Ireland were to take the same stand as Scotland\u2014\u201d\n\n \u201cScotland me no Scotland,\u201d laughed Father O\u2019Dowd.\n\n \u201cScotland is contented and thrifty.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd Ireland is poor and proud. I tell you, Mr. Hawthorne, that we have\n a big bill of indictment against you that I fear may never be settled\n in _my_ day. Why should not Scotland be contented? Is she not fed on\n sugar-plums? Is there not a sandy-haired Scotchman in every position\n worth having, from the cabinet to the custom-house? Do you not develop\n all her industries, and pat her on the back like a spoiled child? Are\n not your royal family _ipsis Hibernicis Hiberniores_, or, if I freely\n translate myself, more Scotch than the Scotch themselves? Why should\n she not be contented and prosperous when she gets everything she asks\n for?\u201d\n\n \u201cBut you ask too much, reverend sir.\u201d\n\n \u201cIt is scarcely asking too much to ask for one\u2019s own.\u201d\n\n \u201cSurely yours are at best but\u2014ahem!\u2014sentimental grievances, and the\n House makes every\u2014ahem!\u2014effort at conciliation.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe can stand hard knocks and square fighting, and possibly feel all\n the better for it; but when you speak of conciliation and all that sort\n of thing we get on our edge at once, as we know that we are going to be\n bamboozled.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut surely you will admit that we have done a good deal for the\n country. See the Church Disestablishment Act and the Land Act.\u201d\n\n \u201cOnly two patches on our ragged coats, my dear sir. We want\n independence, and that you won\u2019t give us; nor will you offer us a _quid\n pro quo_, as you did with Scotland, because you know we would not\n accept it. No, Mr. Hawthorne, we\u2019ll have to fight you for this, and our\n Irish members must do the Mrs. Caudle for John Bull, and give him\n sleepless and wretched nights in the big house at St. Stephen\u2019s.\u201d\n\n \u201cHave you any fault to find with the administration of the laws?\u201d\n\n \u201cFault! When we find ourselves gagged and fettered by a miserably weak\n administration, and hedged in by a set of uncertain and floating laws,\n we begin to think about righting ourselves. You send us a\n lord-lieutenant who knows as much about Ireland as he does of\n Bungaroo\u2014who comes over with a hazy idea that there\u2019s some one to be\n conciliated and some one to be hanged; a chief-secretary who knows\n less; an attorney-general who, if active, means a necessity for\n strengthening the garrison; and a commander of the forces who pants for\n a chance of man\u0153uvring his flying columns over our prostrate bodies.\n But here comes Biddy Finnegan with a cutlet of mountain mutton, and I\n can give you a drop of the real mountain dew that never paid the Saxon\n gauger a farthing duty\u2014or, at least, if we had our rights, ought not,\n according to Peter O\u2019Brien.\u201d And he laughed. \u201cThese subjects are much\n better worth discussing than English misrule. _Quantum est in rebus\n inane._\u201d And ushering Mr. Hawthorne to a seat upon his right hand, he\n proceeded to do the honors with a courtly grace blended with a\n fascinating hospitality.\n\n \u201cThat _poteen_ has its story. As I have already told you, it never paid\n duty. A friend of mine was anxious that I should keep it on tap, as he\n constantly comes this way. It is somewhat difficult to obtain it now,\n as the excise officers are, like you members of Parliament,\n particularly wide awake.\u201d The M.P. bowed solemnly in recognition of the\n compliment. \u201cAt last, however, he managed to drop on a man, who knew\n another man, who knew another man, in whose cabin this particular\n crayture was to be found. My friend ferreted him out, and, upon asking\n the price per gallon, was informed by the manufacturer that he would\n only charge _him_ eighteen shillings.\n\n \u201c\u2018Eighteen shillings!\u2019 exclaimed my friend. \u2018Why, that\u2019s an enormous\n price.\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Och! shure,\u2019 replied the other, with a droll look perfectly\n indescribable, \u2018I cudn\u2019t part it for less, _as the duty\u2019s riz_.\u2019\u201d\n\n It took a considerable time to drive the point of Father O\u2019Dowd\u2019s\n fictitious narrative and the illicit distiller\u2019s rejoinder into the\n head of the member for Doodleshire; and when he did manage to grapple\n it, wishing to lay it by in order to retail it in the House, it was\n found impossible to get him completely round it, as the word \u201criz\u201d\n invariably balked him, and it is scarcely necessary to observe that his\n Anglican substitution failed in every way to improve the story. The\n cutlets were deliciously tender, and the potatoes in their jackets so\n mealy and inviting that the Saxon fell to with a vigor that fairly\n astonished me. As dish after dish of the diminutive shies disappeared,\n and potato after potato left its jacket in shreds behind it, I\n congratulated myself upon the signal success of this visit.\n\n \u201cMy drive gave me an appetite, father,\u201d he said. \u201cI haven\u2019t eaten\n luncheon for many months. In the House I generally pair off with some\n friend to a biscuit and a glass of sherry; but here I have\u2014ahem!\u2014eaten\n like a navvy.\u201d\n\n \u201cI\u2019m delighted to hear you mention the drive as the cause of the\n appetite; for I must endeavor to induce you to repeat it and help me to\n eat a saddle of mutton that will be fit for Lucullus on Thursday.\u201d\n\n \u201cI am in Mr. Ormonde\u2019s hands.\u201d\n\n I was in an agony\u2014another day from Mabel!\n\n \u201cOh! Ormonde will do as I direct him; and I\u2019ll tell you what we must\n conspire about to-night\u2014to induce the ladies to drive over. I should be\n very pleased to show Miss Hawthorne a little this side of the county.\u201d\n\n I breathed again.\n\n \u201cYou shall have my vote,\u201d said the M.P.; \u201cand, if I might dare suggest\n an amendment to the saddle, it would be in \u2018chops.\u2019\u201d\n\n \u201cWe might do the swell thing,\u201d laughed the _padre_, \u201cand have two\n dishes\u2014an _entr\u00e9e_; how magnificently that sounds! In any case I can\n say with Horace:\n\n\n \u201cHinc tibi copia\n Manabit ad plenum, benigno\n Ruris bonorum opulenta cornu.\u201d\n\n\n \u201cI have\u2014ahem!\u2014almost forgotten my Horace,\u201d sighed our guest.\n\n \u201cOne might say to you, as was said to the non-whist-player, What an\n unhappy old age you are laying up for yourself, Mr. Hawthorne!\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, reverend sir, so long as a man has the _Times_ he can defy\n _ennui_; every leader is an essay.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou cannot commit the _Times_ to memory.\u201d\n\n \u201cI read it every day, sir,\u201d was the pompous reply.\n\n \u201cApropos of the _Times_, they tell a story of Chief-Baron Pigott which\n is eminently characteristic. He is one of the most scrupulous,\n painstaking men the world ever saw, who, sooner than do a criminal\n injustice, would go over evidence _ad nauseam_ and weigh the _pros_ and\n _cons_, driving the bar nearly to distraction. One day a friend found\n him upon the steps of his house superintending the removal of a huge\n pile of newspapers.\n\n \u201c\u2018What papers are those, Chief-Baron?\u2019 he asked.\n\n \u201c\u2018The London _Times_.\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Do you read the _Times_ regularly?\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Oh! dear, yes.\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Did you read that slashing leader on Bright\u2019s speech?\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018No; when did it appear?\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Last Thursday.\u2019\n\n \u201c\u2018Oh! my dear friend, I shall come to it by and by; but at present I am\n _a year in arrear_.\u2019\u201d\n\n \u201cAm I to understand that he intended to read up to that speech?\u201d\n\n \u201cCertainly. This will illustrate the man. At his house in Leeson\n Street, Dublin, the hall-door was divided into two, and a knocker\n attached to each door. The chief-baron has been known to stand for\n hours, pausing to consider which knocker he would rap with, fearing to\n act unjustly by the unutilized one.\u201d\n\n \u201cI can scarcely credit this,\u201d exclaimed the member.\n\n \u201cOh! you\u2019ll hear of stranger things than that before you leave\n Ireland.\u201d And the merry twinkle in the priest\u2019s eye dissipated any\n doubts still lingering in the ponderous mind of the learned member for\n Doodleshire.\n\n \u201cThat story is worthy of our\u2014ahem!\u2014charioteer.\u201d\n\n \u201cWho? Peter O\u2019Brien? What good company the rascal is! Of him one can\n safely say with Publius, _Comes jucundus in via pro vehiculo est_.\n Peter would lighten any journey. What was the subject of the debate\n to-day?\u201d\n\n \u201cWell\u2014ahem!\u2014he gave us a new and original version of _A Strange\n Adventure with a Phaeton_.\u201d And the little man chuckled at his wit.\n\n \u201cI know the story,\u201d said Father O\u2019Dowd. \u201cIt is one of Peter\u2019s\n favorites, and it takes Peter to tell it.\u201d\n\n \u201cFrom the phaeton he plunged into Home Rule.\u201d\n\n \u201cFreddy,\u201d addressing me, \u201cyou must get Peter to tell our English friend\n here the story of how \u2018ould Casey done Dochther Huttle out av a\n guinea\u2019; it\u2019s racy of the soil.\u201d\n\n \u201cThere are\u2014ahem!\u2014some words of his that I cannot exactly follow. They\n are Irish, but they have quite a Saxon ring about them, which evidently\n shows the affinity in the languages.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd a further reason for uniting us. You English will never rest\n content until a causeway is built between Kingstown and Holyhead,\n garrisoned for the whole sixty miles by a Yorkshire or Shropshire\n regiment\u2014one that can be depended upon.\u201d\n\n \u201cThat idea has been mooted in the House before now; I mean\n the\u2014ahem!\u2014connection of the two countries by a tunnel.\u201d\n\n \u201cSo you would bind us in the dark, Mr. Hawthorne?\u201d\n\n \u201cHa! ha! ha! Father O\u2019Dowd, that is so good that I must book it here,\u201d\n tapping his forehead in a ghastly way. \u201cDon\u2019t be surprised if it is\n heard in the House. We are very witty there.\u201d\n\n \u201cIf there is any wit in the House of Commons we send it to you. But I\n doubt if there is a sparkle of repartee among all the Irish members\n even. I\u2019ve seen a French _mot_ rehashed, with the epigram left out in\n the cold, and an Irish story with the point striking somewhere in\n Tipperary.\u201d\n\n \u201cTipperary is very Irish, is it not? They speak the Irish language\n there, and run their vowels into each other.\u201d\n\n \u201cYou are right, sir; that is the place where you\u2019d get your two _i_\u2019s\n knocked into one.\u201d\n\n Mr. Hawthorne saw this, and, although the laugh was against him,\n enjoyed it amazingly. Father O\u2019Dowd could hit from the shoulder, but\n could also pick up his prostrate foe with the delicacy of a woman. When\n creed or country came up, one found a stalwart champion in the worthy\n priest, who could meet his adversary with shillelah or polished steel,\n as the requirements of the case demanded.\n\n \u201cFinish that glass of wine, and let me show you a set of the finest\n boneens in the county.\u201d\n\n \u201cBoneens? What are boneens?\u201d\n\n \u201cThis is more of your Saxon ignorance,\u201d laughed Father O\u2019Dowd, as,\n followed by Mr. Hawthorne and myself, he led the way in the direction\n of the stable-yard.\n\n\n TO BE CONTINUED.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n OUTSIDE ST. PETER\u2019S.\n\n\n How grand the approach! The dome\u2019s Olympian disc\n Albeit has sunk behind the huge fa\u00e7ade.\n Lo! with its cross the sentinel obelisk\n Salutes as on parade.\n\n \u201cHewn from the red heart of primeval granite,\u201d\n It says, \u201camong the monuments which man\n Reared to outmass the mountains of his planet,\n I was, ere Rome began.\n\n \u201cBy no dark hieroglyphs my sides are storied;\n My titular god, in Heliopolis,\n In the world\u2019s morning burned into my forehead\n The signet of his kiss.\n\n \u201cConverted like an ancient scroll rewritten,\n What heeds the Sun of Righteousness my date?\n I lift his symbol on my brow, dawn-smitten,\n And at his portal wait!\u201d\n\n And the twin fountains leap in joy, and twist\n Their silvery shafts in foaming strength amain,\n Whose loosening coil is whirled into a mist\n Of sun-illumined rain.\n\n Therein the bow of promise tenderly,\n A Heart in glory, palpitates and glows;\n And musically, in words of melody,\n The crystal cadence flows:\n\n \u201cHo! fallen ones, Eve\u2019s sorrowing sons and daughters!\n In our lustration nothing is accurst;\n Ho! come ye, come ye to the living waters,\n Whoever is athirst.\u201d\n\n The colonnaded, stately double-porch\n For world-wide wanderers stretches arms of grace;\n The bosom of the universal church\n Draws us to her embrace.\n\n In their white silence the apostles look\n Benignantly upon us. Waving hands\n Of welcome\u2014if our tears such vision brook\u2014\n In midst the Master stands.\n\n \u201cHumanity,\u201d he pleadeth, \u201cheavy laden,\n Come unto me, and I will give you rest!\n Through this, my portal, to the nobler Eden\n Enter, and be possessed!\u201d\n\n \u2019Tis Easter; and they sing the risen Christ\u2014\n How jubilant St. Peter\u2019s wondrous choir!\n But now no vision of the Evangelist,\n Preceding throne and tiar,\n\n Is borne amid the mystic candlesticks;\n No waving feathers flash with starry eyes;\n In the gold chalice and the gold-rayed pyx,\n For paschal sacrifice,\n\n No pontiff consecrates the elements;\n And dost remember, in the olden time,\n How heaven was stormed with silver violence\u2014\n That trumpet-burst sublime,\n\n Like cherubim in battle? Or, all sound\n Tranced for the elevation of the Host,\n How tingling silence thrilled through worlds profound,\n Where moved the Holy Ghost,\n\n And then Rome rocked with bells? If such things were,\n They are not now. But we are strangely wrought\n And vibrant, answering like a harp in air\n The impalpable wind of thought.\n\n O\u2019er the Campagna\u2019s wastes of feverous blight\n I\u2019ve watched St. Peter\u2019s mighty dome expand\n In soaring cycloids to the infinite,\n When heaven was blue and bland.\n\n When storm was on the mountains and the sea,\n Have seen its whole empyreal glory tost\n Like shipwreck on a wild immensity,\n That heaved without a coast.\n\n But it was grand through all. From far or near,\n It seemed too vast for heresies or schisms;\n No colored glass, within its hemisphere,\n Breaks white light as with prisms.\n\n I have dreamed dreams therein: of charity\n Wide as the world, impartial as the sun;\n That on such Sion, in fraternity,\n Might all men meet as one.\n\n Dreams! Yet one cross, one hope\u2014we scarce can err\u2014\n May, must all wanderers to one fold recall:\n The Apostles\u2019 Creed, the bunch of precious myrrh,\n Can purify us all.\n\n \u201cI have builded on a rock!\u201d His word symbolic\n He will make plain\u2014the Eternal cannot fail:\n \u201cEarth shall not shake my One Church Apostolic,\n Nor gates of hell prevail!\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n FRENCH HOME LIFE.[178]\n\n Philosophers, theologians, and political economists alike are agreed\n that the family is the basis of society and the type of government.\n Home life and teaching, therefore, is the most important thing in\n youth, and of whatsoever kind it is, so will be the behavior in riper\n years of the generation brought up in its precepts. If parents did\n their duty, the state would need fewer prisons; or, as a Chinese\n proverb more tersely puts it, \u201cIf parents would buy rods, the hangman\n would sell his implements.\u201d Individual effort, however heroically it\n may make head against the stream, has but a hard and uncertain task in\n an atmosphere the very reverse of Christian and Scriptural, and in the\n teeth of laws becoming every day more and more antagonistic to the Ten\n Commandments. Still, since the spirit of the age has almost put on one\n side, as obsolete, the ideal of reverence for age and experience, and\n the respect due to parents, husbands, masters, and superiors, the\n preservation of the worthy traditions of Christian home-life falls\n necessarily to the hands of families themselves. We have to live not up\n to or within the laws, but beyond them, and to train our children not\n only as good and obedient citizens but as earnest and practical\n Christians. Not only in one country is this the case, nor even among\n the countries of one race, but everywhere, from modernized Japan to\n Spain, from Russia to the reservations of friendly Indians.\n\n There is one country, however, whose modern literature and practice for\n a century and a half has been a synonym for looseness of teaching, for\n disregard of family ties, honor, authority, and restraint, for every\n element brilliantly and fatally disintegrating, for every moral and\n philosophical novelty. France is perhaps the nation most misrepresented\n and maligned by her public literature\u2014at least the France whose\n delinquencies have been so shamelessly and with seeming enjoyment\n dissected before our eyes by her novelists and satirists. The sound\n body on whose surface these sores break out is ignored; the old\n tradition, rigid and artificial in many points, but made so by the very\n license of court and city which for ever assaulted its simplicity, is\n overlooked, and the decent, quiet, and strong substratum of manliness,\n truth, and purity underlying the froth of vice in the capital and the\n large towns is forgotten.\n\n The first French Revolution was prepared by atheistical epicures, the\n airy and refined unbelievers of the court of Louis XIV. and XV.; and\n though turbulent masses here and there caught the infection, and with\n cruel precision put in practice against the court nobility the theories\n about which the latter so complacently wrote essays and epigrams, yet\n the rural populations still believed in God and virtue\u2014the evil had not\n struck root among the body of the nation. The infidelity of the present\n century has completed the task left unfinished by Voltaire and\n Rousseau; newspapers have carried doubt and arrogance among the simple\n people of the country; the laws of partition have destroyed many\n homesteads once centres of families, and driven people into crowded and\n unhealthy cities; the example of a noisily prominent class of\n self-styled leaders has carried away the senses of otherwise sober and\n decent men; the increase of drunkenness has further loosened family and\n home ties; politics have become a mere profession, instead of the\n portion allotted by duty to the collective body of fathers of families,\n and so the old ideal is vanishing fast. Frenchmen of the right sort\n look despairingly into the far past of their own country, and into the\n history of foreign nations\u2014English, American, Dutch, Hanoverian\u2014for\n models of pure living, respect for authority, law-abidingness, and\n attachment to home. Some have set themselves to study Hindoo, Chinese,\n and Egyptian models, and to put together from the Proverbs and\n Ecclesiastes of Solomon, and the exhortations of Plato and Cicero, an\n ideal code of home-life; some have gathered together and published with\n loving regret the memorials of French life at its purest, of the\n patriarchal ideal which survived even till the seventeenth century\u2014the\n age, pre-eminently, of great Frenchmen and women, and of which some\n shadows lingered into our own century. From the _na\u00eff_ advice of Louis\n IX., the saintly king of France, to his son and daughter, Philip and\n Isabel, to the family registers of small yeomen of Proven\u00e7al valleys\n and the grave admonitions of a judge to his newly-married daughter just\n before the French Revolution, the same spirit breathes through the\n dying addresses of Christian fathers of families in what we only know\n as infidel and immoral France. \u201cThe seven thousand who bowed not the\n knee to Baal\u201d were always represented, though the licentious courts of\n the Valois and the Bourbons threw a veil over the virtues of the\n country; not one class alone, but all, from the titled proprietor to\n the small tradesman and struggling _m\u00e9nager_, or yeoman, contributed\n its quota of redeeming virtue. But it is noticeable that the majority\n of these upright men were poor. They could not afford to be idle; they\n had large families to support; they had their patrimony to keep in the\n family, and, if possible, to increase. All the customs that we are\n going to see unrolled before us, the sentiments expressed, the simple,\n dull, serious life led, are utterly alien from anything we call\n technically French. We shall be surprised at every page, but less so if\n we remember that this patriarchal life was generally spent in the\n country, and often in mountainous regions and severe climates. While\n reading of these scenes some may be reminded of a story placed in a\n singular region in the south of France,\u2014the Camargue, not far from\n Aigues-Mortes\u2014in which Miss Bowles has embodied the characteristic\n traits of a magnificent, healthy, hardy, and upright race. One of these\n Proven\u00e7al farms had much in common with some described in that book.\n\n The reason which makes the author of _La Vie Domestique_ choose the\n Courtois family register as the first subject of his two volumes is\n that it is the latest that has come to his knowledge; and reproducing,\n almost in our own generation, the traits of a vanished society, it is\n of more interest and of greater weight as a possible model. The author\n of it, descended from a family of lawyers and judges at least two\n hundred years old, died in 1828, and his descendants still live in the\n valley of Sault\u2014one of those natural republics not uncommon in\n mountainous districts\u2014retired from the outer world, faithful to\n ancestral tradition, and governing themselves patriarchally according\n to their old and never-interrupted communal liberties. There is a vast\n field for research, and more for meditation, in the liberties of the\n old medi\u00e6val states north and south of the Pyrenees; it is startling to\n see what bold claims the parliaments of Aragon and Navarre could\n enforce, and their Spartan disregard of the kingly office unless joined\n to almost perfect virtue. But centralization, the genius of our time,\n has ruthlessly declared that sort of liberty antiquated, and, after the\n decay of the despotism which the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries\n began, the liberty of the individual was insisted on rather than that\n of the commonwealth.\n\n The valley of Sault was originally independent of any feudal duties,\n and though later on its lords, the D\u2019Agoults, paid homage and fealty to\n the counts of Provence and then to the counts D\u2019Anjou, they still\n retained the sovereign rights of coinage and independent legislation.\n The country is rocky and woody; for, though reckless wood-cutting\n decreased the forests round this commune, Sault itself remained a\n forest oasis, which the provident inhabitants have tried to perpetuate\n by planting young oaks on the barren slopes of their hills. The\n Courtois were assiduous planters of trees, and a grove of fairly-grown\n oaks formed a background to their farm buildings. Quantities of\n aromatic herbs grow in this neighborhood, and their distillation into\n essences forms an industry of the country. But the beauty that Sault\n chiefly lacks is that of water; for, though not far from the famous\n fountain of Vaucluse, there is no local stream of any importance. This\n is Alpine scenery without Alpine torrents. But, on the other hand,\n Sault has a sulphur spring, as yet only locally famous, and the meadows\n are green and moist. The principal natural curiosity of the valley is\n the _Avens_, a kind of rifts in the earth, like craters, which, at the\n rainy season, gape open and absorb floods of rain, leaving only a small\n portion to feed the Nesque, a tiny tributary of the Rhone. Beech,\n birch, and maple abound, and pasturage forms a surer road to fortune\n than agriculture. Yet the small freeholds are pretty equally divided,\n and the more advanced among the inhabitants have very clear and\n approved notions of practical farming. The custom of selling or\n exchanging the paternal acres was, till the last quarter of a century,\n unknown, or at least abhorred; and a local tradition dating hundreds of\n years back had established a modified right of primogeniture\u2014one of the\n sons, generally but not necessarily the eldest, devoting himself to the\n care of his aged parents, the settlement of his sisters, the management\n of the farm, and the accumulation of a reserve fund from his income for\n the unforeseen necessities of the younger branches of the family. His\n portion in money was sometimes double, according to the Mosaic\n precedent, but it was understood that the Support of the House (such\n was the phrase) should use his advantages only for the general benefit\n of the family, and also that his wife\u2019s dowry should nearly cover the\n deficit caused by the marriage and dowries of his sisters.\n\n Those simple people knew nothing of laws, such as shameful excesses\n have made necessary in Anglo-Saxon countries, for the protection,\n against the husband and father, of the wife\u2019s fortune and children\u2019s\n inheritance. Antoine de Courtois, one of these model yeomen of southern\n France, looked upon any alienation of ancestral property, or even any\n use of capital, as sheer robbery of his descendants, and says in his\n family register: \u201cTo sell our forefathers\u2019 land is to renounce our name\n and disinherit our children. Never believe that it can be replaced by\n other property, and remember that all those who have been ready to\n exchange their ancestors\u2019 for other land have ruined themselves.... If\n our farm is well managed, it will always bring in more than six per\n cent. Any other land you could buy would not bring in three per cent.,\n and would ruin you to improve it. You would have a decreased capital\n and no income, and it would break your heart.\u201d\n\n The description of the homestead is interesting. The buildings included\n the master\u2019s house, with ten rooms on the ground-floor, eight others on\n the first floor, three granaries above, with a dovecote, and three\n cellars below; a farmer\u2019s house, a shepherd\u2019s, hay-barns and stables, a\n courtyard and fountain, a garden and orchard with over a hundred\n fruit-trees, a fish-pond, fifty bee-hives, and two hundred sheep. He\n had rebuilt much of this himself, and spent ten thousand francs on the\n work; and in laying some new foundations he had put his wife\u2019s and\n children\u2019s names below the corner-stone. As to farm management, he\n emphatically preferred and advised self-work with hired help, instead\n of renting the place on shares or otherwise to a farmer with a useless\n family. He gave very judicious rules for sowing, hoeing, harvesting,\n etc., and impressed upon his son the profit to be derived from bees,\n and the increased value of land of a certain kind, if planted with\n young oaks. Work he considered the only condition of happiness, as well\n as the road to comfort, and he said he would sooner see his sons\n shoemakers than idlers. The family profession was the law, though he\n himself in his youth studied medicine, successfully enough in theory,\n but not in practice, since, after losing his first patient, his\n scruples and disgust ended by forcing him to leave his calling. The\n business of a notary public was the one he recommended to his son in\n the choice of a profession; his family tradition led him in this\n groove, where, indeed, he had been preceded by some of the greatest men\n in France.\n\n This choice of a state is so much a matter of custom or of personal\n inclination that we must carefully discern between things in the\n Courtois family which were models and things of indifference. Their\n moral qualities alone are universal types; their local customs, worthy\n in their own circumstances, would probably be utterly unfit for a\n country and race so different as ours. But Courtois\u2019 native town, of\n which he was mayor for nearly twenty years, gives an example less rare\n in foreign countries than in either England or the United States\u2014that\n of supporting an institution containing an arch\u00e6ological museum, a\n botanical collection, and a collection of local zo\u00f6logy and mineralogy,\n besides a library which occupies a separate building, the whole under\n the care of a member of the French Arch\u00e6ological Society, M. Henri\n Chrestian\u2014an example which it would be well if our own towns of three\n thousand inhabitants (Sault has no more) would be public-spirited\n enough to follow. It is not the lack of money that debars small rural\n towns of such advantages; they generally contrive to keep three or four\n barrooms going, a dancing-hall, a Masonic hall, an annual ball and\n supper, half a dozen discreditable places for summer picnics, and other\n things either useless and showy or downright disreputable. Instead of\n paying money year by year for the gratification of folly and temptation\n to vice, and putting money in the pockets of men who deliberately trade\n on their fellow-men\u2019s weakness or wickedness, why not pay a\n subscription the full benefits of which they reap themselves not for\n one day or night only in a year, but every day? Where there _is_ a\n library in a small town, what books are most numerous? Trashy novels\n vilely illustrated, and Saturday newspapers with their ignoble,\n misleading, immoral tales and cuts. What a contrast to many a French,\n Italian, German village of three to five thousand inhabitants, or even\n to some of the island-villages of North Holland, remote and unvisited\n as they are!\n\n Antoine de Courtois was the natural outcome of the secluded domestic\n atmosphere in which his family had grown up. The doctrines that led to\n the excesses of the Reign of Terror\u2014for we must not confound the legal\n and rightful reforms of 1789 with the bloody fury of 1793\u2014and the\n abuses that hurried on the great dislocation of society, had not\n reached his valley. In all lands where the local land-owners had\n remained at home and identified themselves with their neighbors,\n keeping only as a badge of their superiority a higher standard of honor\n and bravery, there was no revolt against the gentlemen. If any village\n followed the example of the large cities, it was sure to be owing to\n some scapegrace who had left home and learnt a more successful\n rascality among the tavern politicians of some seething city, and then\n come back to play Robespierre on his own small stage. Courtois married\n in the midst of the Revolution, in 1798, and quietly took up the task\n of his brother Philip, who had died suddenly without leaving any\n children, and whose wife, though only a bride of a few months, devoted\n herself all her life to the family interests. Antoine, always humane\n and charitable, had given shelter to two of the revolutionary\n commissioners, pursued by enemies of an opposite faction then\n uppermost, for which he was speedily denounced by an informer and\n imprisoned. His widowed sister-in-law travelled to Nice and besought\n the interference of the man he had formerly saved\u2014the young\n Robespierre. A respite, then a pardon, was granted, and Antoine retired\n for a short time to Nice, sheltering himself behind his nominal\n profession of medicine, until one night the informer who had betrayed\n him came trembling to his door, begging him to save his life. He fed\n and clothed him, and gave him money to set him on his way, as well as a\n promise to turn his pursuers from his track should he be examined.\n\n Such a man acted as he believed, and might say the Lord\u2019s Prayer with a\n clear conscience. His equable temperament, and his firm reliance on\n reason as the corner-stone of morality, are very unlike what we\n attribute to the typical Frenchman\u2014emotional, unreliable, fantastic, or\n affected; the Parisian has blotted out all worthier types from our\n sight. His advice to his children on their duty of consulting reason\n and moderation in all things, and sternly repressing mere inclination\n or passion, goes so far as to seem exaggerated and to banish from life\n even its most legitimate pleasures. But he knew the corruption pressing\n upon his retreat, besieging it and luring it, and to extreme evils he\n opposed extreme remedies. Besides, ancient custom sanctioned, or at\n least colored, his advice as to marriage, in which matter not only his\n daughters but also his son were not to choose for themselves, but let\n their mother choose and decide for them. He required his children to be\n wise beyond their years, and would fain have put \u201cold heads on young\n shoulders\u201d; but the frightful license he saw around him made the recoil\n only natural. Men had need to be Solomons in early youth, when hoary\n heads degraded themselves to play at Satyrs. Among other precepts\u2014and\n there is not one that could not be matched out of Proverbs and\n Ecclesiastes\u2014he insisted on the duty of neither borrowing nor lending;\n his teaching was inflexible on this point. \u201cBetter go shirtless than\n borrow money\u201d was his maxim. In these days of lax and indiscriminate\n pity for all misfortune such advice sounds selfish and harsh; it\n belongs to the conscience of each man to interpret it and make\n exceptions. As to the borrowing we might be inclined to say, \u201cNever\n under any circumstances\u201d; but as to the lending there may be\n exceptions. In the first you fetter yourself, than which nothing is\n less wise; in the second you incur no obligation, and, if you can\n afford to lose the sum lent, there is an additional excuse. Courtois\u2019\n objection was founded on the principle he set forth elsewhere, that\n your property is not your own but your posterity\u2019s, and that you have\n no right to diminish it. If he had had any other and absolutely\n personal property, the objection would have been no doubt qualified. In\n many cases he showed by his own example that he had no objection to\n _give_, and to be helpful to his neighbor according to his ability. He\n was rigidly opposed to the reading of novels, to games of chance, to\n balls and theatre-going; one could almost fancy one\u2019s self listening to\n an old Puritan on this subject. But in this respect who is more of a\n Puritan than St. Jerome in his instructions to Paula for the education\n of her daughter? Reading consisted, with Antoine de Courtois, chiefly\n of the Scriptures and of the _Following of Christ_, that universal book\n of devotion, with Ch\u00e2teaubriand\u2019s then recently-published _G\u00e9nie du\n Christianisme_. The later development of Christian literature, less\n florid than Ch\u00e2teaubriand, might have added other books in his own\n language to his restricted library, but they hardly existed in his day.\n For instance, he would have sympathized with Joubert, who wrote:\n \u201cWhenever the words altars, graves, inheritance, native country, old\n customs, nurse, masters, piety, are heard or said with indifference,\n all is lost.\u201d\n\n The practical and physical advantages of virtue were always before his\n eyes, and he never ceased showing his children how sensible and\n rational are the laws of God. They preserved health and gave success;\n they ensured happiness and kept peace. Honesty is not only the first\n duty of man to his fellow, but is the safest road for one\u2019s self, and\n brings with it the confidence, the respect, and the love of one\u2019s\n neighbors. On the subject of drunkenness it is worth while to note what\n a Frenchman, one of a nation of wine-drinkers\u2014who, it is said, are so\n sober as opposed to a nation of ale and spirit drinkers\u2014and of a\n generation long preceding any agitation on the temperance question,\n says in his solemn advice to his children:\n\n \u201cNothing is more contemptible than drunkenness, and, in order\n that it may be impossible for you to fall into this sin, I\n advise you never to drink wine. Water-drinkers live longer and\n are stronger and healthier. Be sure of this: it is easy to\n accustom yourself to drink no wine, but, once the habit of\n drinking wine is formed, it costs a good deal to satisfy it,\n and often painful efforts to restrain it within the bounds of\n moderation. I never drank wine till I was five-and-thirty, and\n I should have done better never to drink any. Wine strengthens\n nothing but our passions; it wears out the body and disturbs\n the mind.\u201d\n\n He recommended work, not only as a duty but as the essential condition\n of happiness, and no one knows how true this is but those who have\n tried to do without regular employment. One often hears people wonder\n why so-and-so, being so rich, continues in business, and slaves at the\n desk instead of enjoying the fruits of his wealth. Nothing is more\n natural, unless a man has a taste strong enough to form an occupation,\n such as Schliemann had from his boyhood, and was able to indulge after\n he earned money enough by business to prosecute researches in the East.\n The leisure that some people recommend is only idleness under a veil of\n refinement, and no man or woman can be rationally happy unless through\n some special occupation which towers above all others. Doing a score of\n things, and giving an hour or so to each, never brings any result worth\n mentioning; devoting all your spare time to one pursuit strengthens the\n mind even where it is not needed to support the body. \u201cIf you have no\n profession,\u201d says Antoine de Courtois, \u201cyou will never be anything but\n useless men, a burden to yourselves and a weariness to others.\u201d\n\n Domestic economy is another cardinal virtue of this thrifty French\n farmer, and the rule he prescribes\u2014that of laying by one-sixth of one\u2019s\n income to form a reserve fund, so as not to encroach on one\u2019s capital\n for repairs or other unexpected expenses\u2014is worthy of notice. Going to\n law, especially among relations, he utterly abhors, and advises his\n son, in cases of dispute, to have recourse to the arbitration of some\n mutual friend. On one occasion, when he was compelled to go to law\n against a neighbor, he mentions the suit as that of \u201cour mill against\n \u2014\u2014\u2019s meadow,\u201d and takes the first opportunity to do his adversary a\n personal favor, carefully distinguishing between the individual and the\n cause. In a word, all the elements of discord and dissolution most\n familiar to ourselves, and too unhappily common to cause any surprise,\n or even to elicit more than languid blame, are, in this family\n register, studiously held up to execration.\n\n Family affection, again, was not restricted to the brothers and\n sisters; it included all relations, and was supposed, whenever\n necessary, to show itself in practical help. Uncles and aunts were\n second fathers and mothers; god-parents were more than nominal\n connections; cousins were only another set of brothers and sisters. A\n maiden aunt, Mlle. Girard, called in the affectionate _patois_ of\n Provence \u201cour good _tata_,\u201d helped to bring up Antoine\u2019s children, and\n her brothers, far from wishing her to follow her first impulse, and, on\n account of her feeble health, take the veil in some neighboring\n convent, argued with her in favor of home life and duties. She died at\n the age of fifty-two, a holy death, as her life had been useful,\n humble, and charitable. Courtois himself considered marriage the\n natural state of man, and said that, for his part, he thought \u201cthere\n was no true happiness, and perhaps no salvation, outside of the married\n state.\u201d But he looked upon it as so much a means to an end that he\n deprecated the interference of personal inclination against such\n practical considerations as health, virtue, becoming circumstances of\n fortune and station. He wisely said that one was only the steward of\n one\u2019s own property, and was bound to hand it on unimpaired to one\u2019s\n posterity; yet it is possible that he had too little confidence in the\n probably wise choice his children would make for themselves. It is true\n that the choice of mates by the parents provides in each generation a\n balance to the inability of the parents to choose for themselves in\n their own case\u2014a sort of poetic retribution; and it is true also that\n men and women at the age of parents with marriageable children have\n just come to that maturity and perfection of judgment which enables\n them to be good guides to their sons and daughters while the latter are\n still in that chrysalis state when obedience is the wisest course. But\n such an education as he had given them should have made them more\n capable of discernment than others, and in his precepts there is\n perhaps as much of old tradition as of reaction against the subversive\n theories which were rending French society in pieces. How else\n interpret such a sweeping assertion as this: \u201cA father is the only man\n a young girl need not fear\u201d?\u2014a withering comment, indeed, on the\n general state of society. On the important subject of marriage and its\n duties Mme. de Lamartine, the mother of the poet, has a beautiful\n passage in her journal, written at Milly, near M\u00e2con, at a small\n country house, whose orchards, meadows, and vineyards brought in the\n small income of six hundred dollars a year. On this she had a large\n family of sons to bring up and workmen to pay, yet the family life was\n as dignified and as calm as Abraham\u2019s with his vast possessions. Her\n husband she calls a peerless man, \u201ca man after God\u2019s own heart,\u201d and,\n as is often the case with the fathers of brilliant men, his character\n stands contrasted with that of the poet, as the oak by the side of the\n willow. The father of Macaulay was infinitely superior in his moral\n character to his amiable, genial, and gifted son\u2014a man of iron,\n austerely upright, and a rock on which to depend, \u201cthrough thick and\n thin,\u201d but not what the world calls charming. Here is Mme. de\n Lamartine\u2019s judgment, worthy to be graven in the heart of every bride\n as she leaves the altar:\n\n \u201cI was present to-day, 5th Feb., 1805, at a taking of the veil\n of a Sister of Mercy in the hospital at M\u00e2con. There was a\n sermon, in which the candidate was told that she had chosen a\n state of penance and mortification, and, as an emblem of this,\n a crown of thorns was put upon her head. I admired her\n self-sacrifice, but could not help remembering also that the\n state of the mother of a family, if she fulfils her duties, can\n match the cloistered state. Women do not think enough of it\n when they marry, but they really make a vow of poverty, since\n they entrust their fortune to their husbands, and can no longer\n use any of it except what he allows them to spend. We also take\n a vow of chastity and obedience to our husbands, since we are\n hereafter forbidden to seek to please or lure any other man.\n Over and above this we take a vow of charity towards our\n husbands, our children, our servants, including the duty of\n nursing them in sickness, of teaching them as far as we are\n able, and of giving them sound and Christian advice. I need\n not, therefore, envy the Sisters of Mercy; I have only\n faithfully to fulfil my duties, which are fully as arduous as\n theirs, and perhaps more so, since we are not surrounded by\n good examples, as they are, but rather by everything which\n would tend to distract us. These thoughts did my soul much\n good; I renewed my vows before God, and I trust to him to keep\n me always faithful to them.\u201d[179]\n\n Her life was serious and busy:\n\n \u201cI go to Mass every morning with my children at seven. Then we\n breakfast, and I attend to some housekeeping cares; then study,\n first the Bible, then grammar and French history\u2014I sewing all\n the while.... My chief object is to make my children very pious\n and keep them constantly in full occupation.\u201d\n\n They had family prayer, too, and she says in her journal:\n\n \u201cIt is a beautiful custom and most useful, if one would have\n one\u2019s house, as Scripture recommends, a house of brethren.\n Nothing is so good for the mind of servants as this daily\n partaking with their masters in prayer and humiliation before\n God, who recognizes neither superiors nor inferiors. It is good\n for the masters to be thus reminded of Christian equality with\n those who are their inferiors in the world\u2019s eyes, and the\n children are thus early taught to think of their true and\n invisible Father, whom they see their elders beseech with awe\n and confidence.\u201d\n\n The Courtois family were cousins of the Girards, one of whom, Philip de\n Girard, invented a flax-spinning machine in 1810, and many other\n mechanical improvements. In 1823 his father\u2019s property was in danger of\n being sold at auction, and, having no capital but his genius, he made a\n contract with the Russian government, binding himself to become\n chief-engineer of the Polish mines for ten years. He thus saved his\n patrimony. A new town grew up around one of the factories established\n in Poland on his system, and took his name, Girardow; the present\n emperor has given the town a block of porphyry as a pedestal for the\n founder\u2019s statue. He, too, was of the old French stock, a dutiful son\n and sincere Christian, schooled in tribulation in his own country, but,\n notwithstanding his many disappointments as an inventor, happy enough\n to have been buried in his own old home.\n\n A better-known name is that of the D\u2019Aguesseau family, a remarkable\n house, both for inherited piety and genius. The great chancellor of\n this name was a model son to a model father, and all his own children\n were worthy of him. Perhaps the La Ferronnays are equally fortunate; as\n far as their family life is revealed in _A Sister\u2019s Story_, it seems\n cast in the same mould. Few, however, so prominent, and therefore so\n open to temptation, as the D\u2019Aguesseaus have given such a sustained\n example of high virtue. The chancellor, whose family, always connected\n with the law, dated authentically from the end of the fifteenth\n century, was dangerously fortunate in his public career. At twenty-two\n he was advocate-general to the Parliament of Paris, and\n procurator-general at thirty-two, an orator famous all over France, a\n historian, a judge, a philosopher, and a writer. His name was\n synonymous with several important laws. He held the seals of the\n chancellorship for thirty-two years, and died in 1751, over eighty. His\n linguistic studies embraced Hebrew and Arabic\u2014rare acquirements at that\n time\u2014and he was also a good mathematician. His own saying, which he\n applied to his father, is no less true of himself: \u201cThe way of the\n righteous is at first but an imperceptible spot of light, which grows\n steadily by degrees till it becomes a perfect day.\u201d Another of his\n maxims was that \u201cpublic reform begins in home and self-reform.\u201d His\n children\u2019s education was his greatest solicitude, even among his public\n duties, and one gets an interesting glimpse of him in Mme.\n d\u2019Aguesseau\u2019s letters describing the business journeys of inspection on\n which he had to go, and which he made with his family in a big coach.\n The mother would open the day by prayer, and the sons then studied the\n classics and philosophy with their father, while even the hours of\n leisure were mostly filled up by reading; for the chancellor wisely\n taught his boys to choose subjects of interest out of school-hours,\n that they might not identify reading with compulsory tasks. School\n teaching he considered only as a basis for continued education by one\u2019s\n self, and his ideal of his daughter\u2019s education was the union of\n domestic deftness with scientific study. This daughter, in her turn,\n left to her sons advice such as truly proved her to be a mother in\n Israel. His wife he enthroned as a queen in his heart and his home, and\n would smile when others rallied him on his domestic obedience. He\n trusted to her for all home matters and expenses; and such women as she\n and those she represented were fit to be trusted.\n\n The seventeenth century was essentially the age of great women in\n France, and the early part of the eighteenth still kept the tradition.\n Mme. de Chantal had a manly soul in a woman\u2019s body, and yet proved\n herself as good a housekeeper as an administrator of her son\u2019s estate\n while a minor. Prayer, work, and study went hand in hand in these\n women, and the D\u2019Aguesseaus were only shining representatives of whole\n families and classes of noble wives and mothers. They remind one of\n some Scotch mothers and homes, in districts where old customs still\n abide; where servants are part of the family, yet never, in all their\n loving and rude familiarity, approach to a thought of disrespect or\n disobedience; where there is intense love but no demonstration; where\n honor and truth are loved better than life, and simplicity becomes in\n reality the most delicate and grave courtesy. D\u2019Aguesseau loved farming\n as his chosen recreation, and vehemently denounced the rising prejudice\n of the young who were ashamed of their father\u2019s simple homestead and\n refused to live such rustic lives. The Hebrew ideal\u2014than which no finer\n has ever been invented\u2014was his absolute standard of home-life, and how\n his father\u2019s character answered to it we shall presently see. The\n publication of this manuscript biography and other domestic writings of\n the chancellor was due only to long-continued pressure, and his sons\n consented only with the hope of doing good to a perverse generation. In\n these days, when people are rather flattered than otherwise to see\n their names in print, even if it be only in a local sheet, many may\n wonder at this reticence which denoted the delicacy of this exceptional\n family. Whether the publication did good we can hardly judge; it must\n have helped to stop some on a downward career, or at least strengthened\n the weak resolves of some few struggling against the current.\n\n The elder D\u2019Aguesseau had singular natural advantages such as the\n majority lack, but much of this happy temperament was probably the\n result of generations of clean, temperate, and orderly living, such as\n his forefathers had been famous for. His son traces a portrait of him\n which seems to unite the primitive Christian with the ancient Roman:\n\n \u201cExempt from all passion, one could hardly tell if he had ever\n had any to fight against, so calmly and sovereignly did virtue\n rule over his soul. I believe the love of pleasure never made\n him lose a single instant of his life. It even seemed as if he\n needed no relaxation to balance the exhaustion of his mind,\n and, if he allowed himself any at rare intervals, a little\n historical or literary reading, a short conversation with a\n friend, or a chat with my mother was enough to strengthen his\n mind for more work; but these relaxations were so few and far\n between that one would have thought he grudged them to himself.\n Ambition never disturbed his heart; for himself, he had never\n had any, and in his children\u2019s careers he looked only for\n opportunities for them to serve their country and avoid\n idleness and luxury, which he considered a perpetual temptation\n to evil. How could avarice come near a soul so generous?...\n Twenty years\u2019 labor on public works and thirty-one in the\n council never suggested to him the idea of asking for\n anything.[180] ... He died at the age of eighty-one, never\n having received any extraordinary gratuity, pension, or grant.\n Even his salary, in spite of his share in the distribution of\n the public treasury, was always the last to be paid. Mr.\n Desmarets, finance minister, said to me one day as we were\n walking in his garden: \u2018I must say your father is an\n extraordinary man. I found out by chance that his salary has\n not been paid for some time, though he needs it. Why did he not\n tell me? He sees me every day, and he knows there is no one I\n would oblige sooner than him.\u2019 I answered with a laugh that the\n salary never would be paid, if he waited for my father to ask\n for it, for he well knew that the word _ask_ was the hardest in\n the world for my father to utter.... What defects could a man\n have who was so insensible to pleasure, ambition, even\n legitimate self-interest? Nearly all human weaknesses are the\n results of these three passions, ... and Despr\u00e9aux was only\n literally in the right when he said of your grandfather: \u2018Such\n a man makes humanity despair.\u2019 He did not know justice only\n through the discernment of his mind; he felt it as the natural\n instinct and impulse of his heart, spite of all prejudices and\n predilections. Diffident of his own judgment, he feared the\n illusions of a first impulse and the snares of a hasty\n conclusion. Wisely lavish of his time in listening to causes\n and reading the memoranda of his clients, he was never\n contented till he had got to the smallest details of the truth,\n for to judge aright was the only anxiety or disturbance of mind\n he ever experienced. Mindful only of things in the abstract, he\n wholly lost sight of names and persons; and if in the exercise\n of his functions he was ever known to give way to emotion, it\n was only on behalf of endangered justice, never of individuals\n as such. In this there was no obstinacy or arrogance. Zeal for\n justice and love of truth would often so move him that he was\n unable to contain his thoughts, and would admonish others of\n the danger of trusting too much to what is erroneously called\n common sense, though it be so rare a gift; of the duty of\n learning accurately the principles of justice, and of forming\n one\u2019s judgment on the experience of the wisest men.\u201d\n\n His gentleness and patience, his prudence and discretion, were no less\n conspicuous; his son says further: \u201cNo one knew men better, and no one\n spoke less of them.\u201d His gentleness was a companion virtue of his\n courage. Apparently timid, he was yet impassible; neither moral nor\n physical danger awed him.\n\n \u201cFrom this mixture of justice, prudence, and bravery resulted a\n perfect equipoise as little in danger from variations of temper\n as from tempests of passion.... He was always the same, always\n himself, always lord of his thoughts and feelings. Hence that\n groundwork of moderation that kept him in an atmosphere so\n serene that pride never puffed him up, nor weakness degraded\n him, nor extreme joy upset him, nor immoderate sorrow depressed\n him. Duty, ever present to his mind, kept him within the bounds\n of the most solid wisdom, and one might epitomize his character\n thus: he was a living reason, quickening a body obedient to its\n lessons and early accustomed to bear willingly the yoke of\n virtue.\u201d\n\n Of lesser qualities, having these greater ones, he could not be\n destitute, and in his daily life, his eating and drinking, his\n recreations, his domestic relations, he was equally steady and perfect.\n He disliked dinner-parties especially, as involving a loss of time,\n though, if obliged to be at them, he never went beyond the frugal\n portion equivalent to his home meals; he drank so little wine that it\n scarcely colored the water with which he mixed it; and as to display,\n he was such an enemy to it that he would use only a pair of horses\n where his colleagues and subordinates ostentatiously used two pair. He\n was sickly of body, but retained his gentle and equable temperament\n throughout his life; his servants found him too easy to serve, so\n careless was he of his personal comfort; his friends, few but sincere,\n found in him another self, so forgetful was he of his interests in\n theirs. In conversation he repressed his natural turn for pleasantry,\n because he despised such frivolous talents; but his _esprit_ pierced\n his gravity at times, and he was always a hearty laugher. Piety was\n inborn in him, and his faith was as childlike as his morals were pure.\n Scripture was his favorite reading, the Gospels especially, and his\n grave devotion in church was a rebuke to younger and more thoughtless\n men. He laid aside a tenth of his income for the use of the poor, whom\n he looked upon collectively as an additional child of his own; and a\n famine, or local distress of any kind, always found him with a reserve\n fund ready to help the needy. On the other hand, he practised the\n strictest domestic economy, and on principle shunned all display beyond\n what was necessary for simple comfort and the respect due to his\n official position. We might go further in this eulogium, but, having\n pointed out the steadiness of character which was peculiar to him, we\n need not enlarge on qualities which he shared with many weaker but\n still well-meaning men. All real saints are first true men; wherever an\n element of weakness crosses the life of a servant of God there is a\n corresponding flaw in his perfection. The death of Henri d\u2019Aguesseau\n was worthy of his life; the consideration for others, the solicitude\n for some poor clients whose interests he feared would suffer through\n the time lost in formalities after his death, the strong reliance on\n God, the frequent repetition of the Psalms, \u201cthe possessing his soul in\n patience,\u201d which distinguished his dying hours, all pointed to the\n \u201cpreciousness\u201d which it must have worn in God\u2019s sight.\n\n The Chancellor d\u2019Aguesseau walked in his father\u2019s footsteps. Among his\n teachings to his son, who at nineteen was leaving home, he insists\n especially on the study of Holy Scripture, supplemented by a practice\n of marking and bringing together in writing all such passages as relate\n to the duties of a Christian and a public life, to serve as a body of\n moral precepts for his own guidance. Others, he says, have commented\n upon Scripture in this direction, but he does not advise his son to\n follow them in their methods, for \u201cthe true usefulness and value of\n this sort of work is only for the person himself, who thereby profits\n at his leisure, and imbues himself with the truths he gathers.\u201d In his\n book, _Reflections on Christ_, he says: \u201cThe characteristic of Gospel\n doctrine is that it is as sublime, while it is also as simple, as\n _one_, as God himself. There is but one thing needful: to serve God, to\n imitate him, to be one with him. This truth includes all man\u2019s duties.\u201d\n Simplicity and uprightness, singleness of purpose and love of truth,\n were for him the practical synonym of religion. His father\u2019s death he\n calls \u201csimple and great\u201d; Job\u2019s eulogium he emphatically points out as\n having been that of \u201ca man simple and upright, fearing God and\n eschewing evil.\u201d Other moralists, public and private, have harped, not\n unnecessarily, on the same string. The Proven\u00e7al poet, Frederick\n Mistral, adds another element to the definition of goodness\u2014work.\n Brought up on a farm, among all the interests and details of\n agriculture and the vintage, in a household whose head was his father\n and teacher, and where daily family prayer and reading in common ended\n a day of hard work, he was a strong and rustic boy. All old customs\n were in vogue: the father solemnly blessed the huge Yule-log at\n Christmas, and then told his children of the worthy doings of their\n ancestors. He never complained of the weather, rebuking those who did\n in these words: \u201cMy friends, God above knows what he is about, and also\n what is best for us.\u201d His table was open to all comers, and he had a\n welcome for all but idlers. He would ask if such and such a one was a\n good worker, and, if answered in the affirmative, he would say: \u201cThen\n he is an honest man, and I am his friend.\u201d The men and women on the\n farm were busy, healthy, strong, and pious. The old man had been a\n soldier under Napoleon, and had harbored proscribed and hunted\n fugitives in the Reign of Terror. His adventures were a never-ending\n source of interest to his family, his hired men, and to strangers. We\n are perhaps wrong in saying so, but there is always a tendency, when we\n see or hear of such men, to say: \u201cThere are none such now.\u201d Certainly\n there are fewer, but in every age the same lament has been raised. The\n \u201cgood old times,\u201d if you pursue them closely, vanish into the age of\n fable; yet in hidden corners one may always find some of their\n representatives, and goodness, alas! has always been exceptional. M.\n Taine, in his _Sources of Contemporary France_, wisely says: \u201cIn order\n to become practical, to lord it over the soul, to become an\n acknowledged mainspring of action, a doctrine must sink into the mind\n as an accepted, indisputable thing, a habit, an established\n institution, a home tradition, and must filter through reason into the\n foundations of the will; then only can it become a social force and\n part of a national character.\u201d Unfortunately, it takes centuries, or at\n least generations, to produce such results; but the continual and\n unchanging teaching of religion, running parallel to, and yet distinct\n from, all local changes of circumstance, may often supply much of this\n natural tradition. In the sixteenth century Olivier de Serres, in a\n manual of agriculture, touches on the duties of a landholder, and the\n old principles of the Bible are revived in his archaic French. He bids\n masters, \u201caccording to their gifts, exhort their servants and laborers\n to fly sin and follow virtue.\u201d\n\n \u201cHe (the master) shall show them how industry profits every\n business, specially farming, by means of which many poor men\n have built houses; and, on the other hand, how by neglect many\n rich families have been ruined. On this subject he shall quote\n the sayings of the wise man, \u2018that the hand of the diligent\n gathers riches,\u2019 and that the idler who will not work in winter\n will beg his bread in summer. Such and like discourses shall be\n the ordinary stock of the wise and prudent father of a family\n concerning his men, whence also he will learn to be the first\n to follow diligence and virtue, and to let no word of\n blasphemy, of lasciviousness, of foolishness, or of backbiting\n ever pass his lips, in order that he may be a mirror of all\n modesty.\u201d\n\n Gerebtzoff\u2019s _History of Ancient Russian Civilization_ gives curious\n details of the patriarchal rules of life in that country, the respect\n lavished on parents and elders, the early-imbibed love of truth, and\n the familiar use of proverbs embodying these doctrines. Why do these\n things seem new to us, or at least why is their repetition so\n necessary? St. Marc Girardin, lecturing at the Sorbonne thirty years\n ago on the fifth chapter of Proverbs, distrusted the effect on his\n audience of youths \u201cof the period.\u201d He handled the subject manfully,\n but so well that his audience caught his own enthusiasm and rained down\n applause on those noble, ancient Hebrew maxims, so dignified in theory,\n so beautiful in practice. But if the world would not listen to such\n teaching, the same precepts would meet it unawares in the books of\n classic writers\u2014in the _Republic_ of Plato, in the speeches of Cicero,\n the _Politics_ of Aristotle, in the laws of Solon. The ancients\n constantly startle us with their maxims of more than human virtue; much\n of their heathen teaching puts to shame the practice of their\n pseudo-Christian successors. Those among them who do not uphold piety,\n filial respect, obedience, and faith belong to a time when literature\n as well as morals was degenerating; but it would have required a\n Sardanapalus in literature to teach unblushingly what Rousseau taught\n to the most polished society of Europe. All law is contained in the Ten\n Commandments, and in China, relates one of the missionaries whose\n \u201cletters,\u201d unpretentious as they are, are the greatest help to science,\n a committee of learned men, on being ordered to report flaws in\n Christian doctrine, said they had considered well, but dared not do it,\n for all the essential doctrine was already contained in their own\n sacred books, the _King_. Again, Christian practice in old times\n revived the precept of Deuteronomy to bear the commandments \u201con the\n wrist, and engrave them on the threshold of the house and the lintel of\n the door\u201d (Deut. _vi_. 6\u20139). In Luneburg, Hanover, a farm-house built\n in 1000, and which for six hundred years has been in the family of its\n present owner, a small yeoman, Peter Heinrich Rabe, has this text over\n the door: \u201cThe blessing of God shall be thy wealth, If, mindful of\n naught else, thou art Faithful and busy in the state God has given\n thee, And seekest to fulfil all thy duties. Amen.\u201d English and Dutch,\n German and French, houses have more or less such decorations and\n reminders on their walls; churches abounded with them, and men and\n women wore illuminated texts as jewels. The immutable law of which\n Cicero, in his _Republic_, gives a definition worthy of the Bible, and\n to deny which, he says, is to fly from one\u2019s self, deny one\u2019s own\n nature, and be therefore most grievously tormented, even if one escapes\n human punishment; the law of conscience, of which a Chinese family\n register says: \u201cNothing in the world should turn your heart away from\n truth one hair\u2019s breadth,\u201d and \u201cIf you set yourself above your\n conscience, it will avenge itself by remorse; heaven and earth and all\n the spirits will be against you\u201d; the law which P\u00e8re Gratry resumed in\n three passages of Scripture: \u201cIncrease and multiply, and possess the\n earth,\u201d \u201cMan is put on earth to set order and justice in the world,\u201d\n and \u201cSeek first the kingdom of God and his justice, and all things else\n shall be added unto you\u201d; the law which Garron de la B\u00e9vi\u00e8re, a victim\n of the Revolution, though himself a sincere advocate of liberty,\n translates thus: \u201cHe who knows not how to suffer knows not how to\n live\u201d; that law which does not deal only in magnificent generalities,\n but carries its dignity into the smallest details of practical life, so\n that P\u00e8re de Ravignan could apply it from the pulpit of Notre Dame to\n the sore point of a fashionable audience whom he startled by asking if\n they paid their debts\u2014that law was the shield and the groundwork of the\n heroic old family life of French provinces. Simple tradesmen and\n untaught peasants lived under it as blamelessly as gentlemen and\n statesmen, and taught their sons the same traditions, the same honesty,\n the same truth, the same deference to their conscience, the same fear\n of evil for evil\u2019s sake, and not for the punishments it involves or the\n misfortunes it often brings on. The custom of keeping family registers\n is a very old one; even before St. Louis\u2019 famous instructions to his\n children it was common: Bayard\u2019s mother left him a similar manual, and\n people of all conditions made a practice of it. From these documents,\n and the sentiments written in them from time to time by fathers for the\n guidance of their children, M. de Ribbe has collected many memorials of\n domestic life in France\u2014chiefly in remote and happy neighborhoods, but\n also in more populous and disturbed ones; and the sameness of the\n precepts in all is less strange than the likeness they bear to those of\n the Chinese family books, which date back often more than 2,000 years.\n He has found in the recently-discovered papyri in Egyptian tombs the\n same eternal rules, set forth in language almost equal to the simple\n grandeur of the Bible, while the Hindoo hymns and books of morals teach\n in many instances the same truths in nearly the same words.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n DR. DRAPER AND EVOLUTION.\n\n At a meeting of Unitarian ministers held at Springfield, Massachusetts,\n on the 11th of October, 1877, Dr. J. W. Draper delivered a lecture on\n \u201cEvolution: its Origin, Progress, and Consequences.\u201d Prof. Youmans\n publishes it in the _Popular Science Monthly_, with the remark that\n \u201csome passages omitted in the lecture for want of time are here\n introduced\u201d; which means, so far as we can understand, that Dr. Draper,\n before allowing the publication of his lecture, retouched it, and\n introduced into it some items, views, or considerations which the\n lecture delivered to the Unitarian meeting did not contain, but which\n he considered necessary as giving the last finish to his composition.\n It seems, in fact, that the doctor must have felt a little embarrassed\n in the performance of the task which he had accepted; for he well knew\n that in speaking to a body of sectarian ministers he could not make the\n best use of the ordinary resources of free-thought without breaking\n through the barriers of conventional propriety; and he himself candidly\n informs his hearers that, when he received the request to deliver this\n lecture before them, he was at first disposed to excuse himself, giving\n the following reason for his hesitation: \u201cHolding religious views which\n perhaps in many respects are not in accordance with those that have\n recommended themselves to you, I was reluctant to present to your\n consideration a topic which, though it is in truth purely scientific,\n is yet connected with some of the most important and imposing\n theological dogmas.\u201d This was, perhaps, one of the motives (besides the\n want of time) why in the delivery of the lecture some passages were\n omitted which have subsequently found their way into the pages of the\n scientific monthly.\n\n It would be interesting to know what \u201cimposing theological dogmas\u201d Dr.\n Draper considered it to be his duty to respect while lecturing before a\n Unitarian audience. Unitarians do not generally overload their liberal\n minds with dogmas. Their creed is very short. They simply admit, as\n even the good Mahometans do, that there is one God. This is all. What\n that one God is they are not required to know; their denial of the Holy\n Trinity leaves them free to conceive their God as an impersonal being,\n a universal soul, or a sum total of the forces of nature. On the other\n hand, their denial of ecclesiastical authority and of the inspiration\n of the Scriptures leaves them absolutely free to disbelieve every other\n dogma and mystery of Christianity. It seems to us, therefore, that Dr.\n Draper, who had no need, and certainly no inclination, to descant on\n Trinitarian views or to defend the inspiration of the Bible, ought not\n to have feared to scandalize the good souls to whom he was requested to\n break the bread of modern science. It is clear that only an unequivocal\n profession of scientific atheism could have been construed into an\n offence; and even this, we fancy, would have been pardoned, for the\n sake of science, by the easy and accommodating gentlemen whose\n \u201cliberality of sentiment\u201d triumphed at last over Dr. Draper\u2019s\n hesitation.\n\n Whether or not the assembled Unitarian ministers were satisfied with\n the lecture, and converted to the scientific views maintained by the\n lecturer, we do not know; this, however, we do know: that Dr. Draper\u2019s\n reasoning and assertions about the origin, progress, and consequences\n of evolution, even apart from all consideration of religious dogmas,\n are not calculated to command the assent of cultivated intellects.\n\n The lecture begins with the statement that two explanations have been\n introduced to account for the origin of the organic beings that\n surround us; the one, according to the lecturer, \u201cis conveniently\n designated as the hypothesis of creation,\u201d the other as \u201cthe hypothesis\n of evolution.\u201d This statement, to begin with, is incorrect. It may,\n indeed, be very \u201cconvenient\u201d for Dr. Draper to speak of creation as a\n mere hypothesis; but the device is too transparent. The creation or\n original formation of organic beings by God is not a hypothesis, but an\n historical fact perfectly established, and even scientifically and\n philosophically demonstrated. Evolution, on the contrary, as understood\n by the modern school, is only an empty word and a dream, unworthy of\n the name of scientific hypothesis, under which sciolists attempt to\n conceal its absurdity. In fact, even the little we ourselves have said\n on this subject in some of our past numbers would amply suffice to\n convince a moderately intelligent man that the theory of evolution has\n no real scientific character, is irreconcilable with the conclusions of\n natural history, and has no ground to stand upon except the worn-out\n fallacies of a perverted logic. To call it \u201chypothesis\u201d is therefore to\n do it an honor which it does not deserve. A pile of rubbish is not a\n palace, and a heap of blunders is not a hypothesis.\n\n \u201cCreation,\u201d says Dr. Draper, \u201creposes on the arbitrary act of God;\n evolution on the universal reign of law.\u201d This statement, too, is\n entirely groundless. Creation is a _free_ act of God; but a free act\n needs not to be _arbitrary_. We usually call that arbitrary which is\n done rashly or without reason. But an act which forms part of an\n intellectual plan for an appointed end we call an act of wisdom; to\n call it \u201carbitrary\u201d is to falsify its nature. If Dr. Draper admits that\n there is a God, he ought to speak of him with greater respect. But,\n omitting this, is it true that evolution \u201creposes on the universal\n reign of law\u201d? By no means. We defy Dr. Draper and all the modern\n evolutionists to substantiate this bold assertion. Not only is there no\n universal law on which the evolution of species can repose, but there\n is, on the contrary, a well-known universal law which sets at naught\n the speculations and stultifies the pretensions of the Darwinian\n school. The law we refer to is the following: In the generation of\n organic beings there is no transition from one species to another. This\n is the universal law which rules the department of organic life; and it\n is almost inconceivable how a man who is not resolved to injure his\n scientific reputation could so far forget himself and his science as to\n pretend a blissful ignorance of this known truth, in order to propagate\n a silly imposture exploded by philosophy and contradicted by the\n constant, unequivocal testimony of nature itself.\n\n Had we been present in the Unitarian audience when the doctor uttered\n the assertion in question, we doubt if it would have been possible for\n us to let him proceed further without interruption; for the\n recklessness of his doctrine called for an immediate challenge. When a\n man, in laying down the foundations of a theory, takes his stand upon\n the most evident false premises, he simply insults his hearers. Why\n should an intelligent man accept in silence such a glaring absurdity as\n that \u201cevolution reposes on the universal reign of law\u201d? Why should he\n not rise and say: \u201cI beg permission, in the name of science, to\n contradict the statement just made, and to express my astonishment at\n the want of consideration shown to this learned assembly by the\n lecturer\u201d? However contrary to the received usages, such an\n interruption would have been highly proper and meritorious in the eyes\n of a lover of truth. But, unfortunately, the assembled ministers had no\n right to remonstrate. They had requested the doctor to lecture, and to\n lecture on that very subject; they knew beforehand the doctor\u2019s views\n concerning evolution; and they were not ignorant that his manner of\n reasoning was likely to exhibit that disregard of truth of which so\n many striking instances had been discovered in his history of the\n conflict between religion and science. The assembled ministers were\n simply anxious to hear a bit of genuine modern thought; hence, whatever\n the lecturer might think good to say, they were bound to listen to with\n calm resignation, if not with thankful submission.\n\n Dr. Draper told them, also, that the hypothesis of evolution derives\n all the organisms which we see in the world \u201cfrom one or a few original\n organisms\u201d by a process of development, and \u201cit will not admit that\n there has been any intervention of the divine power.\u201d But when asked,\n Whence did the original organisms spring? he replies: \u201cAs to the origin\n of organisms, it (the hypothesis) withholds, for the present, any\n definite expression. There are, however, many naturalists who incline\n to believe in spontaneous generation.\u201d Here we must admire, if not the\n consistency, at least the sincerity, of the lecturer. He candidly\n acknowledges that, as to the origin of organisms, the theory of\n evolution \u201cwithholds, for the present, any definite expression.\u201d This\n phrase, stripped of its pretentious modesty, means that the advocates\n of evolution, though often called upon to account by their theory for\n the origin of organic life, and though obliged by the nature of the\n case to show how life could have originated in matter alone \u201cwith no\n intervention of the divine power,\u201d have always failed to extricate\n themselves from the difficulties of their position, and have never\n offered an explanation deserving the sanction of science, or even the\n attention of thoughtful men. The axiom _Omne vivum ex ovo_ still stares\n them in the face. They cannot shut their eyes so as to lose sight of\n it. At the same time they cannot explain the origin of the _ovum_\n without abandoning their principles; for if the first _ovum_, or vital\n organism, is not the product of evolution, then its existence cannot be\n accounted for except by the intervention of the divine power, which\n they are determined to reject; and if the first vital organism be\n assumed to have been the product of evolution, then they cannot escape\n the conclusion that it must have sprung from lifeless, inorganic\n matter\u2014a conclusion which few of them dare to maintain, as they clearly\n see that it is absurd to expect from matter alone anything so cunningly\n devised as is the least seed, egg, or cell of a living organism. To\n confess, therefore, that the evolution theory cannot account for the\n origin of the primitive organisms is to confess that the efforts of the\n evolutionists towards banishing the intervention of the divine power\n and suppressing creation have been, are, and will ever be ineffectual.\n\n But this legitimate inference was carefully kept out of view by the\n lecturer, who, not to spoil his argument, hastened to add that \u201cmany\n naturalists incline to believe in spontaneous generation.\u201d This,\n however, far from making things better, will only make them worse. It\n is only when a cause is nearly despaired of that the most irrational\n fictions are resorted to in its defence. Now, spontaneous generation is\n an irrational fiction. Even in our own time, when the world is full of\n organic matter, and when the working of nature has been subjected to\n the most searching investigations, the spontaneous formation of a\n living organism without a parent of the same species is deemed to be\n against reason; for reason cannot give the lie to the principle of\n causality, by virtue of which nothing can be found in the effect which\n is not contained in its cause. Hence very few naturalists (though Dr.\n Draper calls them _many_) are so reckless as to support, or countenance\n by their example, a belief in spontaneous generation. Nothing would be\n easier to them than to imitate Dr. Draper by assuming without proof\n what is not susceptible of proof; but, although some scientists have\n adopted this convenient course, few have dared to follow them, because\n the inadmissibility of spontaneous generation has been confirmed by the\n best experimental methods of modern science itself. Now, if this is the\n case in the present condition of the world, and with such an abundance\n of organic matter, how can any one, with any show of reason, maintain\n that in the remote ages of the world, and before any organic compound\n had made its appearance on earth, cells and seeds and eggs burst forth\n spontaneously from inorganic matter without the intervention of the\n divine power?\n\n At any rate, if it would be preposterous to assume that inert,\n lifeless, unintelligent matter has the power of planning and making a\n time-piece, a sewing-machine, a velocipede, or a wheelbarrow, how can a\n man in his senses assume that the same inert, lifeless, and\n unintelligent matter has the power to plan, form, and put together in\n perfect harmony, due proportion, and providential order the organic\n elements and rudiments of that immensely more complicated structure\n which we call an _ovum_ or a seed, with its potentiality of life and\n growth, and its indefinite power of reproduction? And who can believe\n that the same inert, lifeless, and unintelligent matter has been so\n inventive, so crafty, and so provident as to devise two sexes for each\n animal species, and to make them so fit for one another, with so\n powerful an instinct to unite with one another, as to ensure the\n propagation of their kind for an indefinite series of centuries?\n\n We need not develop this argument further. Books of natural history are\n full of the beauties and marvels concealed in millions of minute\n organisms, which proclaim to the world the wisdom of their contriver,\n and denounce the folly of a science which bestows on dead matter the\n honor due to the living God. Evolution of life under the hand of God\n would have a meaning; but evolution of life \u201cwithout the intervention\n of the divine power\u201d means nothing at all, as it is, in fact,\n inconceivable.\n\n Dr. Draper quotes Aristotle in favor of spontaneous generation. The\n Greek philosopher, in the eighth book of his history of animals, when\n speaking of the chain of living things remarks: \u201cNature passes so\n gradually from inanimate to animate things that from their continuity\n the boundary between them is indistinct. The race of plants succeeds\n immediately that of inanimate objects, and these differ from each other\n in the proportion of life in which they participate; for, compared with\n minerals, plants appear to possess life, though when compared with\n animals they appear inanimate. The change from plants to animals is\n gradual; a person might question to which of these classes some marine\n objects belong.\u201d This doctrine is unobjectionable; but we fail to see\n its bearing on spontaneous generation. Aristotle does not speak here of\n a chain of beings genetically connected, nor does he derive the plant\n from the mineral, or the animal from the plant. On the other hand, even\n if we granted that Aristotle \u201creferred the primitive organisms to\n spontaneous generation,\u201d we might easily explain the blunder by\n reflecting that a pagan philosopher, having no idea of creation, could\n not but err when philosophizing about the origin of things.\n\n We need not follow our lecturer into the details of the Arabic\n philosophy. When we are told that the Arabian philosophers \u201chad\n rejected the theory of creation and adopted that of evolution,\u201d and\n that they reached this conclusion \u201cthrough their doctrine of emanation\n and absorption rather than from an investigation of visible nature,\u201d we\n may well dismiss them without a hearing. Dr. Draper seems to be much\n pained at the thought that a religious revolt against philosophy\n succeeded in \u201cexterminating\u201d such progressive ideas so thoroughly that\n they \u201cnever again appeared in Islam.\u201d But that which causes him still\n greater disgust is that \u201cif the doctrine of the government of the world\n by law was thus held in detestation by Islam, it was still more\n bitterly refused by Christendom, in which the possibility of changing\n the divine purposes was carried to its extreme by the invocation of\n angels and saints, and great gains accrued to the church through its\n supposed influence in procuring these miraculous interventions.\u201d These\n words, and others which we are about to quote, must have given great\n pleasure to the assembled Unitarian ministers; for we all know that to\n throw dirt at the church is a task singularly congenial to the natural\n bent of the sectarian mind. But, be this as it may, whoever knows that\n our lecturer is the author of the history of the conflict between\n religion and science, so truly described by the late Dr. Brownson as \u201ca\n tissue of lies,\u201d will agree that Dr. Draper\u2019s denunciations deserve no\n answer. When a man undertakes to speak of that of which he is\n absolutely ignorant, the best course is to let him blunder till his\n credit is entirely gone. The reader need not be informed that\n Christendom never opposed the doctrine of \u201cthe government of the world\n by law,\u201d and never imagined that there was a \u201cpossibility of changing\n the divine purposes\u201d through the invocation of angels and saints;\n whilst, if \u201cmiraculous interventions\u201d brought \u201cgreat gains to the\n church,\u201d the fact is very naturally explained by the principle that\n \u201cpiety is useful for all things,\u201d and that God\u2019s intervention cannot be\n barren of beneficial results. But Dr. Draper, who does not understand\n how God\u2019s intervention is compatible with the universal reign of law,\n denies all miracles, and denounces the church as a school of deceit,\n superstition, and hypocrisy, his hatred of miracles being his only\n proof that all miracles are frauds. His assumption is that, because the\n natural order is ruled by law, therefore no supernatural order can be\n admitted; which, if true, would equally warrant the following: Because\n bodies gravitate towards the centre of the earth, therefore no solar\n attraction can be admitted.\n\n The papal government, Dr. Draper assures us, could not tolerate\n \u201cuniversal and irreversible law.\u201d How did he ascertain this? Perhaps he\n thought that the papal government was embarrassed to reconcile\n irreversible law with miracles. But the popes never taught or believed\n that a miracle was a _reversal_ of law; they only taught that the\n course of nature, without any law being reversed, was susceptible of\n alteration, and that this alteration, when proceeding from a power\n above nature, was miraculous. We fancy that even Dr. Draper must\n concede this, unless he prefers to say with the fool that \u201cthere is no\n God.\u201d\n\n \u201cThe Inquisition had been invented and set at work.\u201d To do what? To\n overthrow the \u201cuniversal and irreversible law\u201d? Certainly not. What was\n it, then, called to do?\n\n \u201cIt speedily put an end, not only in the south of France but all over\n Europe, to everything supposed to be not in harmony with the orthodox\n faith, by instituting a reign of terror.\u201d It is scarcely necessary to\n remark that what the lecturer calls \u201ca reign of terror\u201d was nothing but\n self-defence against the murderous attacks of the Albigenses and other\n cut-throats of the same dye, who were themselves the terror of\n Christendom\u2014a circumstance which Dr. Draper should not have ignored.\n But whilst the Inquisition caused some terror to the enemies of\n Christian society, it actually restored the reign of law and secured\n the benefits of religious peace to countries which, but for its\n remedial action, would have sunk again into a lawless barbarism. And if\n the Inquisition \u201cput an end to everything contrary to the orthodox\n faith,\u201d no thoughtful man will find fault with it. False doctrines are\n a greater curse than even armed rebellions. Dr. Draper will surely not\n complain that the United States \u201cput an end\u201d to the rebellion of the\n Southern Confederates, though they were gallant fellows and fought for\n what they believed to be their right. But, while he finds it natural\n that thousands of valuable lives should have been destroyed for the\n sake of the American Union, he pretends to be scandalized at the\n punishment which the Inquisition, after regular trial, inflicted on a\n few worthless and contumacious felons for the sake of religious and\n civil peace and the preservation of the great Catholic union. Such is\n the delicacy of his conscience! Then he continues:\n\n \u201cThe Reign of Terror in revolutionary France lasted but a few\n months, the atrocities of the Commune at the close of the\n Franco-German war only a few days; but the reign of terror in\n Christendom has continued from the thirteenth century with\n declining energy to our times. Its object has been the forcible\n subjugation of thought.\u201d\n\n This is how Dr. Draper manipulates history. It would be superfluous to\n inform our readers that there has never been a reign of terror in\n Christendom, except when and where Lutherans, Calvinists, Anglican\n Puritans, or infidel revolutionists held the reins of power, and\n crowned their apostasy by tyrannical persecution, by plundering, and\n burning, and murdering, and demolishing, and prostituting whatever they\n could lay their hands on, with that diabolical fiendishness and cool\n brutality of which we had lately a new instance in the Paris Commune\n here mentioned by the lecturer. This very mention of the Commune, and\n of the reign of terror inaugurated by it, is a blunder on the part of\n Dr. Draper. The heroes of the Commune belong to _his_ school; they are\n infidels; they are men whose thought has not been \u201csubjugated\u201d by the\n church; and to confess that their ephemeral triumph constituted a reign\n of terror amounts to a condemnation of unsubjugated thought and a\n vindication of the principle acted on by the church, that from\n unbridled thought nothing can be expected but discord, confusion, and\n violence. Yet Dr. Draper, who is a profound chemist, knows how to make\n poison out of innocent drugs; and whilst the church aimed only at\n _preserving_ the loyalty of her children from the attacks of heresy and\n the snares of hypocrisy, the doctor depicts her as \u201csubjugating\u201d\n thought. This is just what might be expected. The snake draws poison\n from the same flowers from which the bee sucks honey:\n\n\n Spesso del serpe in seno\n Il fior si fa veleno;\n Ma in sen dell\u2019 ape il fiore\n Dolce liquor si fa.\n \u2014_Metastasio_.\n\n\n We have dwelt longer than we intended on this subject, which is, after\n all, only a digression from the principal question; yet Dr. Draper\n furnishes us with the opportunity of a further remark, which we think\n we ought not to omit. He says: \u201cThe Reformation came. It did not much\n change the matter. It insisted on the Mosaic views, and would tolerate\n no natural science that did not accord with them.\u201d On this fact we\n argue as follows. If the reason why Catholics rejected certain theories\n was that they were \u201cunder a reign of terror,\u201d and that their thought\n had been \u201cforcibly subjugated,\u201d it would seem that the Protestants,\n whose thought could not be subjugated, who laughed at the Inquisition\n and were inaccessible to terror, should have embraced those\n long-forbidden theories, were it only for showing to the world that\n they had broken all their chains and recovered unbounded liberty. What\n could prevent them from throwing away the book of Genesis and reviving\n the Arabian theory of evolution? Had they not rejected other parts of\n the Bible? Had they not freed themselves from the confession of sins,\n explained away the Real Presence, set at naught authority, and\n inaugurated free-thought? The truth is that they could not resuscitate\n a theory for which they could not account either by science or by\n philosophy, and which would have involved them in endless difficulties.\n It is common sense, therefore, and not reverence for the Mosaic views,\n that compelled them to abide by the Biblical record of creation. The\n consequence is that men of common sense had no need of being \u201cforcibly\n subjugated\u201d to the Mosaic views, and that the Inquisition had nothing\n to do with the matter. Hence Dr. Draper\u2019s declamation against the\n Inquisition was entirely out of place in a lecture on evolution. But\n his bias against the church led him still further. He wanted to\n denounce also the Congregation of the Index; and as he knew of no book\n on evolution condemned by it, he charged it with having condemned the\n works of Copernicus and Kepler. The reader may ask what these two great\n men have done for the theory of evolution. The lecturer answers that\n \u201cthe starting-point in the theory of evolution\u201d among Christians \u201cwas\n the publication by Copernicus of the book _De Revolutionibus Orbium\n C\u0153lestium_.\u201d At this we are tempted to smile; but he continues:\n\n \u201cHis work was followed by Kepler\u2019s great discovery of the three\n laws that bear his name.... It was very plain that the tendency\n of Kepler\u2019s discovery was to confirm the dominating influence\n of law in the solar system.... It was, therefore, adverse to\n the Italian theological views and to the current religious\n practices. Kepler had published an epitome of the Copernican\n theory. This, as also the book itself of Copernicus, was placed\n in the Index and forbidden to be read.\u201d\n\n It is evident that these statements and remarks have nothing to do with\n the subject of evolution, and that they have been introduced into the\n lecture for the mere purpose of slandering \u201cthe Italian theological\n views\u201d which were the views of the whole Christian world, and of\n decrying the Congregation of the Index, which opposed as dangerous the\n spreading of an opinion that was at that time a mere guess, and was\n universally contradicted by the men of science. Dr. Draper ignores\n altogether this last circumstance, and remarks that \u201cafter the\n invention of printing the _Index Expurgatorius_ of prohibited books had\n become essentially necessary to the religious reign of terror, and for\n the stifling of the intellectual development of man. The papal\n government, accordingly, established the Congregation of the Index.\u201d It\n is a great pity that we have no room here for instituting a comparison\n between the intellectual development of the Catholic and of the\n Protestant or the infidel mind. Such a comparison would show whether\n the _Index Expurgatorius_ has stifled our intellectual development as\n much as Protestant inconsistency, and the anarchy of thought which\n followed, have stifled that of other people. We are still able, after\n all, to fight our intellectual battles and to beat our adversaries with\n good arguments, whereas they are sinking every day deeper into\n scepticism, and know of no better weapons than arbitrary assumption,\n flippancy, and misrepresentation.\n\n The lecturer goes on to say that Newton\u2019s book substituted mechanical\n force for the finger of Providence; and thus \u201cthe reign of law, that\n great essential to the theory of evolution, was solidly established.\u201d\n This sentence contains three errors. The first is that the Newtonian\n theory of mechanical force suppresses Providence. The second is that\n the reign of law was not solidly established before the publication of\n Newton\u2019s work. The third is that the establishment of the law of\n mechanical forces lends support to the theory of evolution. Is this the\n result of \u201cintellectual development,\u201d as understood by Dr. Draper?\n Newton, whose intellect was undoubtedly more developed than that of the\n lecturer, did not substitute mechanical force for the finger of\n Providence, but continued to acknowledge the finger of Providence as\n the indispensable foundation of his scientific theory. Nor did he\n imagine that his theory was calculated to establish the reign of law.\n The reign of law was already perfectly established, so much so that it\n was on this very ground that Newton based his deductions. Finally,\n neither Newton, nor any really \u201cdeveloped intellect,\u201d ever confounded\n the mechanical with the vital forces so as to argue from the law of\n gravitation to the law of animal propagation. From this we can form an\n estimate of the intellectual development of man by free-thought. The\n lecturer blunders in philosophy by contrasting law against Providence;\n he blunders in history by attributing to Newton the discovery of the\n reign of law; and he blunders in logic by tracing the theory of\n evolution to a mere law of mechanics.\n\n Further on Dr. Draper gives a sketch of Lamarck\u2019s theory. Lamarck was\n Darwin\u2019s precursor. He advocated the doctrine of descent. According to\n him, organic forms originated by spontaneous generation, the simplest\n coming first, and the complex being evolved from them.\n\n \u201cSo far from meeting with acceptance,\u201d says Dr. Draper, \u201cthe\n ideas of Lamarck brought upon him ridicule and obloquy. He was\n as much misrepresented as in former days the Arabian\n nature-philosophers had been. The great influence of Cuvier,\n who had made himself a champion of the doctrine of permanence\n of species, caused Lamarck\u2019s views to be silently ignored or,\n if by chance they were referred to, denounced. They were\n condemned as morally reprehensible and theologically\n dangerous.\u201d\n\n The fact is, however, that there had been no necessity of\n \u201cmisrepresenting\u201d Lamarck\u2019s ideas, and that his infant Darwinism was\n condemned not only as morally reprehensible and theologically\n dangerous, but also as scientifically false. Cuvier had certainly the\n greatest influence on the views regarding this branch of knowledge; but\n his influence was not the result of a Masonic conspiracy, as is the\n case with certain modern celebrities, but the honest result of deep\n knowledge and strict reasoning; for men were not yet accustomed to\n believe without proofs, and scientists had not yet forgotten\n philosophy.\n\n Dr. Draper tells his audience that Geoffroy St. Hilaire \u201cbecame the\n opponent of Cuvier, and did very much to break down the influence of\n that zo\u00f6logist.\u201d Yes; but did he succeed in his effort? Did he destroy\n the peremptory arguments of the great zo\u00f6logist? Did he convince the\n scientific world, or make even a score of converts? No. The influence\n of Cuvier remained unimpaired, and evolution did not advance a step.\n Then Mr. Darwin came. Mr. Darwin is, we have reason to believe, the\n mouthpiece or chief trumpeter of that infidel clique whose well-known\n object is to do away with all idea of a God. Owing to this\n circumstance, he was sure to have followers. A few professors in\n Germany, and a few others in England, proclaimed with boldness the new\n theory; they wrote articles, delivered lectures, printed pamphlets in\n his honor; his works were widely advertised and strongly recommended;\n and the curiosity of the public, which had been raised by all these\n means, was carefully entertained by the scientific press. People read\n Darwin and smiled; read Wallace, the friend of Darwin, and were not\n converted; read Huxley, the great Darwinian oracle, and remained\n obdurate. Only two classes of men took to the new theory\u2014professors of\n unbelief and simpletons. Thus Darwinism in Europe, in spite of the\n great efforts of its friends, has been a failure. Here in America the\n same means have been employed with the same effect. No sooner was\n anything published in England or Germany in support of the new theory\n than some worthy associate of the European infidels republished it for\n the American people. New original articles were also added by some of\n our professors; and even Mr. Huxley did not disdain to devote his\n versatile eloquence to the enlightenment of our free but benighted\n citizens concerning the subject of evolution. What has been the result?\n Are the American people converted to the new doctrine? No. They laugh\n at it. The failure of Darwinism is as conspicuous and as complete in\n America as it has been in Europe.\n\n Has Dr. Draper, after all, converted any of the Unitarian ministers who\n attended his lecture? We think not; and the lecturer himself seems to\n have felt that his words fell on sceptical ears and failed to work on\n the brains or touch the hearts of his hearers. Towards the end of his\n lecture he exclaims: \u201cMy friends, let me plead with you. Don\u2019t reject\n the theory of evolution!\u201d It is manifest from this exhortation that the\n audience, in the opinion of the lecturer himself, was still reluctant\n to accept the theory. Had the lecturer thought otherwise, he would have\n said: \u201cMy friends, I need not plead with you. You have heard my\n arguments. I leave it to you to decide whether the theory of evolution\n can be rejected by intelligent men.\u201d This language would have shown the\n earnest conviction of the lecturer that he was right, and that his\n reasonings were duly appreciated and approved. But to say, \u201cDon\u2019t\n reject the theory,\u201d is to acknowledge that the arguments had not\n commanded the assent of the intellect, and that no other resource\n remained than a warm appeal to the good-will of the hearers. Such an\n appeal, in a scientific lecture, may seem out of place; but it is\n instructive, for it leads us to the conclusion that even Dr. Draper was\n convinced of the futility of his attempt.\n\n The only argument which we could find in his lecture in support of the\n Darwinian theory is so puerile that we believe not one of the assembled\n ministers can have been tempted to give it his adhesion. After pointing\n out that \u201ceach of the geological periods has its dominating\n representative type of life,\u201d the lecturer introduces his argument in\n the following form:\n\n \u201cPerhaps it may be asked: \u2018How can we be satisfied that the\n members of this long series are strictly the successive\n descendants by evolution from older forms, and in their turn\n the progenitors of the latter? How do we know that they have\n not been introduced by sudden creations and removed by sudden\n extinctions?\u2019 Simply for this reason: The new groups make their\n appearance while yet their predecessors are in full vigor. They\n come under an imperfect model which very gradually improves.\n Evolution implies such lapses of time. Creation is a sudden\n affair.\u201d\n\n O admirable philosophy! The predecessors were still vigorous when the\n successors made their appearance; _therefore_ the former were the\n progenitors of the latter! And why so? Because \u201cevolution implies lapse\n of time,\u201d whilst \u201ccreation is a sudden affair\u201d! Even a child, we think,\n would see that such reasoning is deceptive. But, since Dr. Draper is\n bold enough to take his stand upon it, we must be allowed to ask him\n two questions.\n\n First, admitting that \u201ccreation is a sudden affair,\u201d does he believe\n that God could not create the successors before the disappearance of\n their predecessors? If God could do this, what matters it that creation\n is \u201ca sudden affair\u201d? And if God could not do this, what insuperable\n obstacle impeded the free exertion of his power?\n\n Secondly, is there no alternative between genetic evolution and\n creation strictly so-called? If between these two modes of origination\n a third can be introduced, the doctor\u2019s argument falls to pieces. Now,\n \u201cproduction\u201d from pre-existing materials (earth, water, etc.) in\n obedience to God\u2019s command is neither genetic evolution nor creation\n strictly so-called, and need not be \u201ca sudden affair.\u201d And this mode of\n origination is just the one which seems more clearly pointed out by the\n Sacred Scriptures;[181] and therefore it should not have been ignored\n by the lecturer, if he wished to argue against the Scriptural record.\n Why did he, then, keep out of view this excellent explanation of the\n origin of species? Is it because it was convenient to conceal a truth\n which could not be refuted?\n\n Thus the only reason by which Dr. Draper attempts to prove the theory\n of evolution is a demonstrated fallacy, and the theory falls to the\n ground, in this sense, at least: that it remains unproved. But if every\n attempt at proving it involves some logical blunder, if it implies\n contradictories, if it is based on unscientific assumptions, as is\n evident from the argumentations of Darwin, Huxley, Youmans, and other\n advanced writers on evolution, and if history, geology, and philosophy\n unitedly oppose the theory with arguments which admit of no reply, as\n is known to be the case, then we must be allowed to conclude that the\n theory, besides being unproved, is fabulous and absurd.\n\n Dr. Draper, after citing some controvertible facts, of which he gives a\n yet more controvertible explanation from the Darwinian assumptions,\n says:\n\n \u201cNow I have answered, and I know how imperfectly, your\n question, \u2018How does the hypothesis of evolution force itself\n upon the student of modern science?\u2019 by relating how it has\n forced itself upon me; for my life has been spent in such\n studies, and it is by meditating on facts like those I have\n here exposed that this hypothesis now stands before me as one\n of the verities of Nature.\u201d\n\n Yes. The student of modern science, if he is unwilling to admit\n creation, must appeal to evolution, and call it \u201cone of the verities of\n Nature\u201d; but, though he may call it a \u201cverity,\u201d he also admits that it\n is a mere \u201chypothesis,\u201d by which the origin of organisms cannot be\n accounted for and against which a host of facts and reasons are daily\n objected by science and philosophy.\n\n \u201cIn doing this I have opened before you a page of the book of\n Nature\u2014that book which dates from eternity and embraces infinity.\u201d Is\n this a \u201cverity,\u201d a hypothesis, or an imposture?\n\n \u201cNo council of Laodicea, no Tridentine Council, is wanted to endorse\n its authenticity, nothing to assure us that it has never been tampered\n with by any guild of men.\u201d This is an allusion to the declarations of\n councils regarding the authenticity of the Bible. Does, then, modern\n science transform educated men into sorry jesters? If so, why does not\n Mr. Draper derive the monkey from the gentleman?\n\n \u201cThen it is for us to study it as best we may, and to obey its\n guidance, no matter whither it may lead us.\u201d Yes, it is for us to study\n the book of nature as best we may; but we must not forget that the\n author of this book is God, and that God does not contradict in the\n book of nature what he teaches in the book of Genesis. It is for us \u201cto\n obey its guidance.\u201d Yes; and therefore it is not for us to pervert its\n evidences, as Dr. Draper does, in order to exclude \u201cthe intervention of\n the divine power.\u201d\n\n As to \u201cwhither it may lead us\u201d we have no doubts; but the lecturer\n seems to believe that it may lead in two opposite directions. Here are\n his words:\n\n \u201cI have spoken of the origin and the progress of the hypothesis\n of evolution, and would now consider the consequences of\n accepting it. Here it is only a word or two that time permits,\n and very few words must suffice. I must bear in mind that it is\n the consequences from your point of view to which I must\n allude. Should I speak of the manner in which scientific\n thought is affected ... I should be carried altogether beyond\n the limits of the present hour. The consequences! What are\n they, then, to you? Nobler views of this grand universe of\n which we form a part, nobler views of the manner in which it\n has been developed in past times to its present state, nobler\n views of the laws by which it is now maintained, nobler\n expectations as to its future. We stand in presence of the\n unshackled, as to Force; of the immeasurable, as to Space; of\n the unlimited, as to Time. Above all, our conceptions of the\n unchangeable purposes, the awful majesty of the Supreme Being\n become more vivid. We realize what is meant when it is said:\n \u2018With him there is no variableness, no shadow of turning.\u2019 Need\n I say anything more in commending the doctrine of evolution to\n you?\u201d\n\n These are, then, the consequences \u201cfrom the point of view\u201d of the\n Unitarian ministers, as the lecturer very explicitly declares As to the\n consequences \u201cfrom the point of view\u201d of advanced scientists, the\n lecturer gives only a hint, because, had he spoken of the manner in\n which scientific thought is affected, the lecture would have proved\n rather too long. It is apparent, however, that the \u201cverity\u201d or the\n \u201chypothesis\u201d which leads the Unitarians to a \u201cSupreme Being\u201d can lead\n Dr. Draper and the scientific mind to something different, according to\n the manner in which scientific thought is affected. We may well say,\n although Dr. Draper preferred not to say it, that it leads to atheism\n or to pantheism; for the new \u201cverity\u201d was invented with the aim of\n escaping \u201cthe intervention of the divine power\u201d and of subjecting\n everything in the world to the \u201cuniversal reign\u201d of an abstraction\n called \u201cLaw.\u201d Dr. Draper himself tells us, as we have just seen, that\n the book of Nature (with a capital N) \u201cdates from eternity and embraces\n infinity\u201d; and surely, if the world is eternal and infinite, Nature is\n everything, and a personal God becomes an embarrassing superfluity. It\n seems, then, that Dr. Draper, when he mentions the divine power or the\n Supreme Being, does not speak the language of his \u201cscientific\u201d\n conscience, but the language which he considers to express the\n convictions of the Unitarian body. Perhaps it would have been more in\n keeping with the requirement of the subject, if he had frankly stated\n the \u201cconsequences\u201d which he, as a scientist, would draw from the\n \u201cverity\u201d he had proclaimed; but, as he may have feared that a frank\n statement would have created a little scandal, we are inclined to\n acquit him of the charge of \u201cscientific\u201d dishonesty\u2014the more so as the\n consequences which he deduces, taken in connection with the rest of the\n lecture, give a sufficient clue to the private views of the speaker.\n\n It is difficult, however, to understand how the acceptance of the\n theory of evolution can lead to \u201cnobler views of this grand universe,\u201d\n or to \u201cnobler views of the manner in which it has been developed,\u201d or\n to \u201cnobler views of the laws by which it is now maintained.\u201d To us\n these \u201cconsequences\u201d are incomprehensible; for is it nobler to view\n this grand universe as a mere mass of matter than to view it as full of\n the divine power of which it is the work? or is it nobler to derive man\n from the brute than to view him as the son of God and the image of his\n Creator? On the other hand, the laws by which the universe is now\n maintained are in direct opposition to the theory of evolution, as all\n men of science confess; hence a view of such laws suggested by the\n theory of evolution must be a false and contradictory view, and Dr.\n Draper, when calling it a \u201cnobler view,\u201d amuses himself at the expense\n of his audience. Fancy an assembly of grave men listening in silence to\n such rhetoric! and fancy a professor of materialism seriously engaged\n in the highly scientific business of beguiling such a grave audience!\n\n It is no less difficult to understand how the theory of evolution makes\n us \u201cstand in presence of the unshackled, of the immeasurable, and of\n the unlimited.\u201d These epithets do not designate God, for it is manifest\n that the theory of evolution has no claim to the honor of showing God\n as present in his creatures; nor can they be applied to the universe,\n for it is not true that the universe is \u201cunshackled as to Force,\n immeasurable as to Space, and unlimited as to Time\u201d; and, even were it\n true, it would not be a \u201cconsequence\u201d of evolution. What do they mean,\n then?\n\n But the most unintelligible of all such \u201cconsequences\u201d is that by the\n acceptance of the theory of evolution \u201cour conceptions of the\n unchangeable purposes, the awful majesty of the Supreme Being become\n more vivid.\u201d What \u201cpurposes\u201d can the Supreme Being have formed with\n reference to a universe which is not subject to \u201cthe intervention of\n the divine power\u201d? Is it wise to entertain purposes which one has no\n power to carry out? Or is the \u201cSupreme Being\u201d of Dr. Draper so unwise\n as to cherish purposes which must be defeated by \u201cuniversal,\n irreversible law\u201d? We strongly suspect that his \u201cSupreme Being\u201d is\n nothing but the universe itself, and that it is for this reason that he\n writes _Force_, _Space_, and _Time_ with capital letters, thus forming\n a mock Trinity \u201cunshackled, immeasurable, and unlimited,\u201d but\n consisting of material parts and controlled by the laws of matter, with\n which \u201cthere is no variableness, no shadow of turning.\u201d If so, then Dr.\n Draper has no God but the universe, the sun, the moon, and the stars,\n light, heat and electricity, gravitation, affinity, and motion; and\n this is \u201cthe awful majesty\u201d before which he bends his knee in\n scientific adoration.\n\n Having drawn these devout \u201cconsequences\u201d for the edification of the\n meeting, the lecturer, with a happy stroke of audacity, asks his\n hearers: \u201cNeed I say anything more in commending the doctrine of\n evolution to you?\u201d As if he said: \u201cDo you expect that an infidel has\n anything more to say in favor of _your_ Supreme Being? Have I not given\n you a sufficient proof of deference and self-abnegation by putting\n together a few equivocal phrases in honor of _your_ divinity? Need I\n torture my brain any longer for the sake of a view which is not mine?\u201d\n But, fortunately for Dr. Draper, a sudden recollection of the fact that\n Unitarianism and infidelity agree in rejecting the authority of the\n _Index Expurgatorius_ suggested to him the following words:\n\n \u201cLet us bear in mind the warning of history. The heaviest blow\n the Holy Scriptures have ever received was inflicted by no\n infidel, but by ecclesiastical authority itself. When the works\n of Copernicus and of Kepler were put in the Index of prohibited\n books the system of the former was declared, by what called\n itself the Christian Church, to be \u2018the false Pythagorean\n system, utterly contrary to the Holy Scriptures.\u2019 But the truth\n of the Copernican system is now established. There are persons\n who declare of the hypothesis of evolution, as was formerly\n declared of the hypothesis of Copernicus, \u2018It is utterly\n contrary to the Holy Scriptures.\u2019 It is for you to examine\n whether this be so, and, if so, to find a means of\n reconciliation.\u201d\n\n We do not doubt that the lecturer honestly believes what he says about\n the \u201cheaviest blow\u201d inflicted on the Holy Scriptures. But we would\n inform him that the Congregation of the Index does not make definitions\n of faith, and that its authority, however respectable, is disciplinary,\n not dogmatic. If he consulted our theologians, he would learn that not\n even \u0153cumenical councils are considered infallible as to the _reasons_\n by which they support their decisions, but only as to the decisions\n themselves. Much less can the theologians of the Index bind our\n judgment by giving expression to their theological views. The books\n which they forbid are forbidden; but the _reasons_ for which they are\n forbidden are not all necessarily incontrovertible, and this suffices\n to show that it is not \u201cthe Christian Church\u201d that declared the\n Copernican system contrary to the Holy Scriptures, for the church never\n defined such a point; such a declaration was the expression of a\n theological view which was then common, but which had no dogmatic\n consequences and could give no \u201cblow\u201d to the Holy Scriptures. Dr.\n Draper remarks that evolution, too, has been declared to be \u201ccontrary\n to the Holy Scriptures.\u201d The fact is true; but he should have added\n that the same hypothesis has been refuted by philosophy as a logical\n blunder, and rejected by science as a monstrous falsehood. Hence the\n two cases are not similar.\n\n \u201cLet us not be led astray,\u201d continues Dr. Draper, \u201cby the\n clamors of those who, not seeking the truth and not caring\n about it, are only championing their sect or attempting the\n perpetuation of their profits. My friends, let me plead with\n you. Don\u2019t reject the theory of evolution. There is no thought\n of modern times that more magnifies the unutterable glory of\n Almighty God!\u201d\n\n How edifying! how pathetic! but how ludicrous on the lips of an\n unbeliever! For the God of the lecturer is no creator, as creation is\n inconsistent with the pretended eternity of matter; he is not\n omnipotent, for he cannot work miracles; he is not provident, for Dr.\n Draper rejects all intervention of the divine power in the government\n of the universe, and says that \u201cthe capricious intrusion of a\n supernatural agency has never yet occurred\u201d; whence we see that God,\n according to him, would be an intruder, and even a capricious one, if\n he dared to meddle with the affairs of the material, moral, or\n intellectual world. Such being the God of the evolutionist, who does\n not see that the only meaning which can be legitimately attached to Dr.\n Draper\u2019s words is that the theory of evolution \u201cmagnifies the\n unutterable glory of almighty matter\u201d and does its best to suppress\n Almighty God?\n\n He gives another grave warning to his clerical hearers:\n\n \u201cRemember, I beseech you, what was said by one of old times:\n \u2018Ye men of Israel, take heed to yourselves what ye intend to\n do. And now I say unto you, if this counsel be of men it will\n come to naught; but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it,\n lest haply ye be found to be fighting against God.\u2019 Shall I\n continue the quotation?\u2014\u2018And to him they all agreed.\u2019\u201d\n\n This quotation from a speech of Gamaliel in the Jewish council would be\n appropriate, if the evolutionists, like the apostles, had wrought\n public miracles to prove their divine mission. In the case of the\n apostles all tended to prove that they were right, and that God was on\n their side. They spoke languages that they had never learned, they\n cured the sick without medicine, by a word or by their shadow, and\n filled the city with wonders which their enemies could not deny. When\n Mr. Darwin or Dr. Draper shall give us like evidences of their divine\n mission, we will \u201ctake heed to ourselves what we intend to do\u201d with\n their doctrine; but, as things are now, everything compels us to look\n on them as emissaries and ministers of the kingdom of darkness. We\n cannot put in the same balance evolution and creation; for all the\n weight would be on the side of the latter. A dream, a nonentity, an\n unscientific fiction, a paralogism, have no weight; whilst effects\n without causes, conclusions without premises, phrases without meaning,\n weigh only on the conscience of modern thinkers, but without affecting\n in the least the balance of truth. Thus we are not afraid that we \u201cbe\n found fighting against God\u201d while fighting for creation against\n evolution. The matter is too evident to need further explanation.\n\n We are tired of following Dr. Draper through his tortuous reasonings,\n and the reader is probably equally tired. On the other hand, there is\n little need of exposing the mischievous glorification of modern science\n in which the lecturer indulges in the interest of his materialistic\n views. When we are told that \u201cprofound changes are taking place in our\n conceptions of the Supreme Being,\u201d or that \u201cthe doctrine of evolution\n has for its foundation not the admission of incessant divine\n intervention, but a recognition of the original, the immutable _fiat_\n of God\u201d\u2014of a God, however, who did not create matter, and who must\n respect the dominion of universal and irreversible law under pain of\n being stigmatized as a \u201ccapricious intruder\u201d\u2014or when we are told that\n \u201cthe establishment of the theory of evolution has been due to the\n conjoint movement of all the sciences,\u201d and that \u201cKnowledge, fresh from\n so many triumphs, unfalteringly continues her movement on the works of\n Superstition and Ignorance,\u201d we need no great acumen to understand the\n meaning of this \u201cscientific\u201d slang. Declamation is the great resource\n of demagogues and charlatans. Unfortunately, there are charlatans and\n demagogues even among the doctors of science, and their number, though\n small, is apt to increase in the same proportion as their vagaries are\n diffused among the rising generation. Catholics, thank God! are less\n exposed to seduction than sectaries who have no guide but their\n inconsistent theories; but even Catholics should be on their guard lest\n they, too, be poisoned by the foul and infectious atmosphere in which\n they live. Indeed, all the modern errors have been refuted; but when a\n taste for error becomes predominant, and such fables as evolution are\n styled \u201cscience,\u201d then human weakness and human pride are easily drawn\n into the vortex of scepticism; and then we must be watchful and pray,\n for the time is at hand when _even the elect_, as the Gospel warns us,\n shall be in danger of seduction.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n AFTER CASTEL-FIDARDO.\n\n A SOLDIER\u2019S LETTER.\n\n FROM THE ITALIAN.\n\n\n Wounded, my friend, and dying,\n Waiting the end, I lie\u2014\n A sword-cut in my right leg,\n A ball in my left thigh;\n\n Dying, and ever hoping\u2014\n And in that hope I die\u2014\n One day\u2014not here\u2014to see you,\n But in our home on high.\n\n Of this our earth all thought now\n For me has useless grown,\n All its bright days are ended,\n Its last dark shadow thrown.\n\n For my dear faith so freely\n My blood with joy I gave,\n And for the Holy Father,\n His earthly realm to save.\n\n Content am I, and fortunate,\n My duty to have done;\n And valorous too, as truly\n Became the church\u2019s son.\n\n Yet now our dear Lord calleth,\n And in his hands I leave\n My cause so dearly cherished:\n May he all loss retrieve\n\n Who will not me abandon,\n Nor valiant comrades mine,\n Nor yet his church, nor Vicar\n Who guards his spouse divine!\n\n Dear friend, to me be pitiful;\n Pray unto God for me;\n Leaving the world, this charity\n I beg so earnestly.\n\n This world I leave untroubled,\n Save by this one regret:\n That none of mine are near me\u2014\n Kind eyes that would be wet\n\n With tears of long-tried loving.\n My friends, in mercy pray\n For my poor soul, that draweth\n So near eternal day!\n\n A kiss my blood has tinted\n I beg each one receive\n That now I send you, waiting\n From life a last reprieve;\n\n Hoping one day to give you\n The blessed kiss of peace\n In our dear, common country\u2014\n Fair-shining Paradise.\n\n E\u2019en as I am, earth leaving,\n Your true and loving friend,\n So shall I be in heaven\n With love that knows no end.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n MICHAEL THE SOMBRE.\n\n AN EPISODE IN THE POLISH INSURRECTION, 1863\u20131864.\n\n CONCLUSION.\n\n On my arrival at the camp I found Father Benvenuto already installed as\n head chaplain and everything prepared for my reception. The poor\n general had died only two hours after my departure. He had been buried\n at Gory; but his soldiers, having heard that the Russians intended to\n dig up his body in order to mutilate it in their barbarous fashion, dug\n up the coffin and carried it to Koniec-Pol.\n\n The Russians, furious at finding the grave empty, hanged the parish\n priest of the village for having given permission for the removal of\n the body. The mother of the priest, who was seventy-five years of age,\n was dragged to the foot of the gibbet, and, like the Mother of Dolors,\n was made to assist at the execution of her only son. When they tried to\n remove her she fell down dead. Her soul had flown to heaven after that\n of her boy.\n\n No sooner had I entered on my new duties than I determined to start\n immediately with my squadron to protect Countess L\u2014\u2014\u2019s flight. But\n General C\u2014\u2014, at the head of the Russian garrison from Kielce, never\n ceased pursuing and attacking us, harassing our march day and night; so\n that it was not for fifteen days after my departure from the castle\n that I was enabled to carry out my plan. My troops, who always saw me\n with a frown, which I had adopted to keep them at a greater distance,\n had nicknamed me \u201cMichael the Sombre,\u201d and I signed all orders in that\n name.\n\n After repeated marches and counter-marches we managed at last to escape\n from our enemies, and arrived one evening at Syez after a forced march\n of ten hours, I encamped my men in a field about twenty minutes from\n the castle, whither I galloped, accompanied only by my orderly, whom I\n left at the outer gates to keep watch, while I asked an audience of\n Countess L\u2014\u2014 for \u201cMichael the Sombre.\u201d A footman admitted me directly\n without recognizing me in the least, and took me into a room where a\n lamp with a dark-green globe prevented any object from being easily\n distinguished. Overcome with fatigue, I threw myself into an arm-chair.\n I was full, however, of thankful emotion. God had indeed heard my\n prayer and brought me back in safety to be the preserver of those whom\n I held so dear. The door opened; the countess and her sister appeared,\n and began by the usual formal words of welcome and courtesy, asking me\n to be seated\u2014for I had, of course, risen on their entrance. As I did\n not answer, and continued looking at them with my eyes full of tears,\n they suddenly looked up too, and, with a joint cry, threw themselves\n into my arms. I had suffered terribly from hunger, cold, and fatigue\n during the past fortnight; but that moment of intense joy made me\n forget everything. Five minutes after I was surrounded by all the\n children; the youngest had scrambled up on my knees and thrown her arms\n tightly around my neck; Sophia had seized my helmet, and, putting it on\n before the glass, compared herself to Minerva. Stanislas had unhooked\n my sword, and Stephen was trying to take off my spurs. Half the night\n was spent in telling one another all that had passed in that eventful\n fortnight; and although I made light of my difficulties and position,\n yet I saw that the poor countess could hardly bear to realize what I\n must still go through before I was released from my command.\n\n This, however, was not a moment for doubt or hesitation. It was\n necessary to move immediately before the Russian spies could give the\n alarm; so that by daybreak the following morning the countess\u2019\n carriage, escorted by my flying column, started on the road to the\n frontier. Fortunately, we were not molested on the way, and, when we\n arrived at about a quarter of a mile from Myszkow, I halted my\n soldiers, and, putting on the ordinary dress of a civilian, I\n accompanied the ladies to the station and busied myself with their\n passports, tickets, and baggage with all the feverish anxiety of one\n who strove to forget the terrible ordeal through which I had yet to\n pass before I should be able to rejoin them. When the train came up I\n brought the ladies out on the platform, and, having procured a special\n compartment for them, made them get into it with the children. Then at\n last I could breathe freely. No one had discovered them\u2014they were safe!\n \u201cAdieu!\u201d I exclaimed, as I shook hands with them at the carriage-door.\n \u201cYou are now out of danger, for which I thank God with my whole heart.\n You will tell the count that I have fulfilled my promise to him, will\n you not? And you will not forget me?\u201d I added with a faltering voice.\n\n They looked at me as if stupefied. \u201cBut, Mika,\u201d exclaimed the countess,\n \u201cwe cannot go without you! You must be joking. It is not possible for\n you to stay behind. What on earth is there to detain you?\u201d\n\n \u201cYou forget,\u201d I replied as calmly as I could, \u201cmy promise to the dying\n general; my vow to remain with his troops until replaced, if he would\n only grant me this escort; Poland, which I have sworn to defend.\u201d\n\n \u201cBut this is dreadful!\u201d murmured the poor countess. \u201cHow can we enjoy\n our liberty, purchased at such a price?\u201d\n\n Mme. de I\u2014\u2014 said nothing. She was as white as a sheet; her hand\n tightened on mine, and she fixed her eyes on me as if she were turned\n into stone. More fully than the countess did she realize the full peril\n of the position. I was broken-hearted; but, fearing lest this scene\n should attract the attention of the officials or of any Russian spies,\n I left the carriage-door under pretence of having forgotten something.\n When I returned the train was already moving out of the station. The\n countess rushed to the window and wrung my hand convulsively for the\n last time. She could not speak. My eyes followed the receding train\n with a feeling of despair in my heart. It was carrying off all I loved\n best on earth, and I was alone. All of a sudden I heard my name called\n out with a cry of anguish from the carriage, and then, I think, for a\n moment I lost consciousness, as if struck by lightning, and remained\n motionless and stunned. Till that moment I had not realized the full\n bitterness of the sacrifice. I woke from this kind of stupor to hear\n voices in hot dispute behind me. I turned round and saw a Polish\n soldier, covered with dust and in a tattered uniform, struggling with\n two of the porters of the railroad, who were trying to stop him.\n\n \u201cWhat do you want to do?\u201d I exclaimed. \u201cWho are you looking for?\u201d\n\n \u201cMichael the Sombre,\u201d replied the soldier.\n\n \u201cI am the man,\u201d I replied quietly, drawing him aside out of the station\n to a part of the road where we could talk without being heard.\n\n \u201cO sir! make haste,\u201d the poor fellow cried. \u201cGenerals O\u2014\u2014, De la Croix,\n and Zaremba are fighting at Koniec-Pol and are being overwhelmed by the\n superior forces of the enemy. If they be not reinforced by two o\u2019clock\n they will all be cut to pieces.\u201d\n\n I instantly sent off a messenger to General Chmielinski to warn him of\n the danger; and then, without giving myself time to put on my uniform,\n I buckled my sword over my black coat, and galloped as hard as I could\n to the scene of action. I divided my squadron into three columns, and\n sent each, under the command of an officer, in three different\n directions. The Russian sentinels consequently gave the alarm on three\n sides at once, and the Russians, fancying themselves surrounded by a\n large force, were seized with an uncontrollable panic and fled in the\n direction of Shepca; Chmielinski\u2019s column, advancing exactly in that\n direction, met them, and the three infantry companies of which they\n were composed were literally cut to pieces. During the charge a ball\n had passed through my boot and wounded me in the right leg. Father\n Benvenuto was at my side in a moment and had me removed to Chezonstow,\n where the good Mother Alexandra, of whom I have before spoken, was at\n the head of the ambulance. She gave me up her own cell and would allow\n no one but herself to nurse me. During my illness a division arose\n among my troops. They dispersed; some went home, others joined a corps\n under the orders of Langewiecz, while the remainder followed Norbut.\n When sufficiently recovered from my wound, finding I was still too lame\n for active service, I accepted a mission for the Central Polish\n Committee at P\u2014\u2014, but was unable to obtain my release. From thence I\n started for N\u2014\u2014, where I made my will and a general confession, and\n then started again for the front, having my passport drawn up under the\n name of Michael L\u2014\u2014. This time I enlisted as a common soldier under the\n orders of General Sokol. After the first engagement I was appointed\n quartermaster and interpreter to a French officer, Ivon Amie, _dit_ De\n Chabrolles. On the next brush we had with the enemy I was promoted to\n be sub-lieutenant for having rescued the national flag from a Russian.\n Between Secemin and Rudnick we were attacked by six hundred Russians\n with two field-pieces. We were only two hundred and fifty men, with no\n cannon. Chabrolles, in his mad zeal, rushed forward, pistol in hand,\n and fired straight at the men who were loading their guns at only\n twenty paces off. Then he turned to give an order, and the enemy\u2019s fire\n (both pieces being pointed in his direction) carried off part of his\n shoulder. Regardless of his wound, he cheered on his men by word and\n deed, and they were on the point of capturing the guns when a Cossack\n thrust him through and through with his lance. I was by Chabrolles\u2019\n side and fired at his adversary, who fell before he had had time to\n draw out his weapon. This sad office devolved upon one of our own men.\n Chabrolles, when falling, gave me his hand. \u201cMy brother,\u201d he said\n faintly, \u201cif you get back to France go to Paris and see my mother. She\n is at 37 Rue Clerc au Gros Caillou. Tell her that her son has died as a\n brave Christian should die.\u201d Unable to reply, I tore my crucifix out of\n my breast and presented it to him. He made a last effort, kissed it\n with fervor, made the sign of the cross, and expired, his eyes raised\n to heaven.\n\n Our detachment was then entirely defeated. In vain I tried to rally our\n men; they fled in the utmost disorder. With a few braver spirits than\n the rest I managed, at least, to protect our retreat. I was just\n beginning to congratulate myself on our escape when a Cossack, with his\n lance at rest, rode straight at me. I had fired off my last pistol.\n With one hand I seized my sword to parry the charge; with the other I\n pressed my crucifix to my breast. The lance turned aside, went through\n the sleeve of my uniform and out at my back without touching my flesh.\n If I never believed in a miracle I should at this moment, when I\n realized that I was really unhurt, although death had seemed so\n inevitable. In this terrible fight we lost, besides Chabrolles, Major\n Zachowski and Captains Piotraszkiewicz and Krasmicki. At the close of\n the day I was promoted to be lieutenant of the Uhlans.\n\n One day I was ordered to convey some arms and ammunition to a distant\n outpost, and loaded the bottom of a britzska with about twenty guns and\n swords and fifty revolvers. I was in plain clothes, and my orderly,\n Badecki, acted as coachman. The road was supposed to be quite safe.\n Judge, then, of our fright when we discovered a large body of Russian\n cavalry riding directly towards us. It was too late to think of beating\n a retreat. A shudder passed through me; for it was the worst kind of\n death which threatened us\u2014not a glorious one on the field of battle,\n but a slow torture, or else to be hanged on the nearest tree. I prayed\n with my whole heart for deliverance, and felt that the hand of God\n alone could save us. After this moment of recollection calm again fell\n upon me and my presence of mind returned. The officer who commanded the\n corps came up a few seconds after and asked me who I was and where I\n was going. I replied \u201cthat I was the German tutor of Princess Ikorff (a\n Russian lady), and that I was going to Kielce to buy books.\u201d My story\n was confirmed by my Berlin accent; and as at this moment the Prussians\n were in odor of sanctity with their brethren, the Russians, the officer\n simply bowed and let us pass without interruption or suspicion. But the\n last Cossack of the band drew near to the carriage-door. \u201cNoble Sir!\u201d\n he exclaimed in that cringing voice which is natural to the race, \u201cgive\n me some kopecks to drink your health.\u201d In the state of excitement I was\n in I did not think of what I was doing, and threw him three ducats\n instead of kopecks. The poor fellow was so amazed that he hastened to\n show his gratitude after the Cossack fashion\u2014that is, by kissing my\n feet\u2014and calling me by every imaginable title: prince, duke, etc. This\n was a terrible moment for me. The guns were under my feet, only hidden\n by a slight covering of hay, the least displacement of which would have\n exposed them. God, in his mercy, did not allow it, and my Cossack,\n after a thousand obeisances and calling down on my head every blessing\n from St. George and St. Nicholas, left me and rejoined his companions.\n I arrived at my destination without further alarms, my heart filled\n with thankfulness to Him who had so mercifully preserved us from the\n worst of deaths.\n\n About the beginning of September Gen. Iskra was attacked by a strong\n corps, and I was sent off to his relief with about one hundred men. The\n Russians were repulsed; but we lost in this skirmish our Italian\n doctor, M. Vigani, and M. Loiseau, a French officer of artillery.\n During the night the Russians, having received reinforcements, returned\n to the attack. We were too few in numbers and too exhausted to attempt\n to fight, and retreated on Pradla. During this retreat my horse, which\n belonged to a private in the corps, made a false step and fell. I had\n fired the last barrel of my revolver, and one of my legs had got\n doubled up under my horse, which made me powerless. At this moment a\n Cossack galloped straight at me. I felt that my last hour was come, and\n recommended my soul to God.\n\n \u201cYield thyself, rebel!\u201d he cried out in bad Polish.\n\n \u201cA Frenchman dies, but never yields,\u201d I replied.\n\n My enemy hesitated for a moment, and then lowered his sword, which he\n had already raised to cut me down.\n\n \u201cListen,\u201d he said: \u201cIn the Crimea a Frenchman who had me at his mercy\n spared my life; for his sake I will spare thine. But give me all the\n money thou hast.\u201d\n\n I threw my purse to him, which contained about twenty roubles. The\n Cossack helped me to rise, and then said:\n\n \u201cNow fly for thy life; for my comrades are at hand, and they will not\n spare thee!\u201d\n\n During the whole war this was the only instance of humanity I ever\n heard of on the part of the Cossacks, and I gladly record it here.\n\n The following day Princess Elodie C\u2014\u2014 came to the camp, at the head of\n a deputation of Polish ladies, to thank me for my devotion to the cause\n of Poland.\n\n One day I was sitting, sadly enough, under a pine-tree. My troops,\n silent and sombre, were warming themselves by a great fire. For two\n days we had eaten nothing. As for me, I was thinking of the absent, and\n felt terribly lonely. When I looked up I saw two beautiful, intelligent\n heads watching me, as if saying: \u201cAre we, then, nothing to you\u2014we who\n have shared all your sufferings and dangers?\u201d They were my two only\n friends and companions: Al-Mansour, my Arab horse, and C\u00e6sar, my\n faithful Newfoundland dog. I got up and caressed them both. \u201cO my best\n friends!\u201d I exclaimed, \u201cyou will be with me till death, and if you\n survive me you will mourn for me more than any one else.\u201d And as I\n kissed them my eyes filled with tears. Al-Mansour laid his head on my\n shoulder, and C\u00e6sar licked my hand. They were my only comfort. One\n minute after a courier arrived to beg for reinforcements. Gen.\n I\u010bzioranski was fighting `c at Piaskowa-Scala. I whistled to C\u00e6sar, who\n was an excellent bearer of despatches, and would even fight to defend\n them, and fastened a note under his collar. Then, showing him the\n direction he was to take, I cried: \u201cHie quickly, C\u00e6sar! and return as\n soon as you can.\u201d And the dog started off like a shot.\n\n We mounted and galloped to Piaskowa-Scala. The action was short, and we\n managed to free I\u010bzioranski, who was surrounded on all sides. At the\n very moment when the Russians were giving way Al-Mansour bounded with\n me up in the air, gave a terrible cry, and fell. I had hardly time to\n get my feet out of the stirrups. He had been shot by a ball in the\n chest. The poor beast had a moment of convulsion, and then turned his\n beautiful, soft eyes towards me, as if to implore my help; then his\n legs stiffened and he trembled again all over. I bent over him and\n passed my hand through his thick and beautiful mane, calling him for\n the last time; and then ... I covered my face with both hands and\n sobbed like a little child. Al-Mansour had been a real friend to me. I\n had had him when quite young and unbroken; I had trained him entirely\n myself, and from Breslau to Warsaw I defy any one to have found a more\n beautiful or intelligent animal. I alone could ride him; he never would\n allow any one else on his back. For four years I had ridden him every\n day. The countess had given him to me, and I had brought him with me to\n the camp. Alas! he was no longer the splendid beast which used to\n excite the admiration of everybody in the castle stables. Fatigue and\n privations of all kinds had reduced him to a skeleton, so that his old\n grooms would not have known him again. I only loved him the more; and\n it used almost to break my heart when I saw him, for want of hay, oats,\n or even straw, eating the bark of trees to deaden the pangs of his\n hunger. He loved me as much as I loved him. I used to talk to him, and\n he understood me perfectly and answered me after his fashion. Although\n people who read this may laugh at me, it was yet a fact, which I am\n ready to maintain, that when I was wounded Al-Mansour had tears in his\n eyes; and nothing on earth will ever efface his memory from my heart.\n\n Another anecdote which I must relate here refers to a lad\u2014a very\n child\u2014whom I had in my squadron, and whose name was Charles M\u2014\u2014. At\n fifteen years of age he was a perfect marvel of cleverness, and had\n received, besides, an excellent education. He was born in Paris, his\n father being a Polish exile, and his mother, after twenty years\u2019\n residence in France, still yearned for the arid plains and marshes of\n Poland. \u201c_Boze \u00e8 Polska_!\u201d (God and Poland)\u2014those were the first words\n she taught her boy to pronounce; and Charles could never separate his\n worship of one from the other. This double love, strengthened by all\n the surroundings of his childhood, became in him a kind of fanaticism.\n When the insurrection broke out in Poland Charles was a boarder in the\n Polish college of Batignolles. He was just fifteen. From that moment\n his life became a continual fever. To go to Poland to fight, and, if\n necessary, to die for the soil of his fathers were the thoughts which\n took such possession of the lad that they became irresistible. He saved\n from his pocket-money and from whatever he gained in prizes the sum\n necessary for the journey, and, when he thought he had enough, he\n escaped from the college, leaving a note to explain his intentions,\n and, after many difficulties, arrived at the camp.\n\n I was then in command of the second squadron of Uhlans, under Gen.\n Sokol. Charles came straight to me to be enrolled. I flatly refused to\n accept him, saying he was too young and too weak to bear arms.\n\n \u201cWhat does it matter if one\u2019s arm be weak,\u201d he exclaimed, \u201cif hatred\n for our oppressors drive my blows home? It is true that I have only the\n height of a child, but in my love for Poland I have the heart of a man,\n and I will fight like a man!\u201d\n\n I remained inflexible. At that moment the general came into my tent and\n asked what was the question in dispute. I told him. After a moment or\n two of reflection he turned to me and said:\n\n \u201cYou must accept him. I am apt to judge of character by people\u2019s heads;\n and this one is filled with indomitable energy and courage.\u201d\n\n Charles was consequently enlisted, to his intense joy. I got him a\n little pony, and arms proportioned to his size, and he fought by my\n side like a lion in every encounter.\n\n After the fight at Piaskowa-Scala we returned to the camp, having\n fortunately found some provisions. The night was so dark that we were\n obliged to light torches, which the soldiers carried at certain\n distances. Passing before a pine-tree, the new horse I was riding\n suddenly shied and nearly threw me. I looked to see what had frightened\n him, and discovered a black object hanging from a branch of the tree. I\n called a soldier to bring his torch, that we might find out what it\n was. The light fell on the hanging form; it was my dear dog, C\u00e6sar. On\n the trunk of the tree was fastened a paper with this inscription: \u201cWe\n hang the dog until we can hang his master.\u201d I was thunderstruck.\n Al-Mansour, C\u00e6sar, both my friends in one day, perhaps at the very same\n hour! \u201cNothing, then, is left to me!\u201d I exclaimed with bitterness,\n feeling that my poor dog was quite cold\u2014\u201cnothing, not even those poor\n faithful beasts who loved me so much.\u201d\n\n \u201cYes,\u201d said a voice in my ear, \u201ca countryman is left to you, and, if\n you will, a friend!\u201d\n\n I turned round; it was little Charles, who was holding out his hand to\n me with looks full of sadness and sympathy. I pressed the child\u2019s hand.\n \u201cCharles!\u201d I exclaimed, \u201cwe will try and avenge them.\u201d And spurring my\n horse, I left the fatal spot far behind me in a few minutes.\n\n A day or two later we went to join the larger corps of General\n Chmielinski at the camp at Tedczyjowa. When I say \u201ccamp\u201d I make a\n mistake. None existed; we had only a few miserable tents and hardly any\n baggage. The men slept by parties of ten in the woods, on the cold\n ground, with such coverings or sheepskins as they could get together;\n many had only cloth cloaks. At break of day the _r\u00e9veil_ sounded,\n ordinarily at the entrance of some glade where the vedettes could\n embrace a wide space. At the first bugle sound the soldiers emerged\n from the forest. The men were gentle and sad. The indomitable and calm\n energy of their souls was reflected on their faces, though blanched\n with cold and worn with hunger and sufferings of every description.\n They had a kind of interior brightness in their look that cast over\n them a sort of sacred halo, before which I believe the veriest sceptic\n would have bowed with reverence. These men were all possessed with one\n idea: to die for their faith and their country. Nothing else, indeed,\n was left for them. The struggle was becoming more hopeless every day,\n and they knew it; yet they never dreamt of giving it up. The roll-call\n over and the sentries relieved, Father Benvenuto came in the midst of\n us, and every knee was bowed before the sacred sign he bore\u2014the sign of\n our redemption. There was indeed something glorious in that prayer in\n the open air, joined in audibly by all those men, united in one thought\n and in one wish, who were fighting with the certainty of eventual\n defeat, but who only asked of God the grace not to falter or turn back\n from the path which duty and the love of their country had marked out\n for them, albeit that path might have no issue but exile or death.\n Happy were those who fell in battle! They went at once to swell the\n glorious army of martyrs. The others, when not hanged, chained in a\n long and mournful procession, were sent to Siberia after that terrible\n word of farewell addressed to fathers and mothers, and wives and\n children, gathered sobbing by the roadside: \u201c_Do nie widzenia!_\u201d\u2014Never\n to meet again. Many of these poor fellows were fastened to an iron bar,\n sometimes ten of them together, and carried off in the direction of\n Kiew. Those who survived the horrors of the march or the lash of their\n drivers were taken across Greater Russia. A \u201csoteria,\u201d or company, of\n Cossacks surrounded these innocent men on every side as they toiled on\n and on, loaded with chains and treated worse than the vilest criminals.\n The lance and the whip were the only answer to pleas of exhaustion or\n sickness. A resigned silence was the sole refuge from the brutality of\n their escort, whose only orders were _not to spare the blood of those\n Polish dogs_. Any complaint brought down a hailstorm of blows on the\n unfortunate victims, even when not followed by death. Truly, the\n sufferings endured by the Poles will never be known till the day when\n all things shall be revealed.\n\n When we arrived at the camp we found that Father Benvenuto had preceded\n us by four or five hours. He had been commissioned to receive about one\n hundred volunteers who had arrived that morning from Galicia. The\n greater part of them were dressed in the gray _kontusz_ (or Bradenburg\n greatcoat), with the large leathern girdle of a _g\u00e9ral_ (a\n mountaineer). On their heads they wore the _roqatka_ (a kind of square\n cap, something like the _czapka_ of the Lancers). They generally had a\n common fowling-piece with two barrels, and a little hatchet in their\n waistbands. Each had a canvas bag and a hunting-pouch. These might be\n considered as the flower of the flock. They were mostly students from\n Lemberg and Cracow. Others were peasants dressed in short tunics with\n scythes in their hands. These were the _kopynicry_ (or mowers),\n half-soldiers, half-peasants, and famous in all the struggles of\n Poland. Besides these there were men of every age and condition of\n life, but all animated with the same patriotic spirit: citizens,\n villagers, Catholics, Protestants, Jews even, some wearing black coats,\n others workmen\u2019s blouses. Their arms were as varied as their costumes:\n parade swords, sabres blunted in the great wars with Napoleon, old\n muskets of Sobieski\u2019s days, halberds, and even old French weapons. Some\n had only hunting-knives and sticks. This curious assemblage of\n discordant elements, which anywhere else would have seemed grotesque,\n assumed under the circumstances an imposing, and even a touching,\n character.\n\n At the extreme end of the glade Father Benvenuto was praying before a\n great Christ stretched on his cross. When he rose he fastened an\n amaranth and white flag (which was the Polish banner) to the end of a\n lance. This flag bore on one side the picture of Notre Dame de\n Czenstochowa, the patroness of Poland; on the other a Lithuanian\n cavalier with the white eagle. He fixed the lance in the ground before\n the cross, and then made a sign to the volunteers to lay down their\n arms and draw near. When each had taken his place the good priest\n remained for a moment in silent prayer and recollection. His thin\n cheeks with their prominent cheekbones, his long white beard, his\n forehead furrowed with wrinkles and glorious wounds, and his tall and\n commanding figure gave him an appearance of energy, strength, and\n majesty which impressed the beholders with deep and affectionate\n veneration.\n\n \u201cBrothers!\u201d at last he said, \u201cit is a holy and yet a fearful cause to\n which you are about to devote yourselves. It is one beyond mere vulgar\n or animal courage; and before you enroll yourselves in our\n ranks\u2014before, in fact, you engage yourselves any further in the\n matter\u2014it is right you should know and fully realize what awaits you\n and what is expected of you.\u201d\n\n The patriots listened respectfully, their heads bare, standing before\n the crucifix and the banner. Around them, and as if to protect them,\n stretched the virgin forests, those fortresses of the Polish\n insurgents, while the sun shed its pale rays over the whole scene.\n\n \u201cWhat you have to expect,\u201d continued the good father, \u201cis this: You\n will suffer daily from hunger, for we have no stores; you will have to\n sleep on the bare ground, for we have no tents; you will have to march\n more often with bare feet than with shoes and stockings; you will\n shiver with cold under clothes which will be utterly insufficient to\n protect you from the rigors of this climate. If you are wounded, you\n will fall into the hands of the Muscovites, who will torture you. If\n you are afraid and refuse to go forward, your own comrades have orders\n to shoot you.\u201d\n\n \u201cWe are prepared for everything,\u201d they replied simply.\n\n The good father continued:\n\n \u201cHave you a family? They may as well mourn for you beforehand; for we\n have no leave in our ranks, except to go to the mines of Siberia or to\n death. Have you reconciled yourselves to God? I can only lead you to\n death and prepare you to meet it. Are you ready to die for your\n country?\u201d He paused, and then added: \u201cThere is still time to draw back.\n I can facilitate your return to your homes. Weigh the matter well\n before you decide.\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, no!\u201d they exclaimed with one voice, \u201cwe will not turn back. We\n wish to fight to-day, to-morrow\u2014when you will\u2014but to fight and die for\n our country. A cheer for Poland! Another cheer for our Mother!\u201d\n\n \u201cMy brethren,\u201d began the venerable priest again, \u201cdo not give way to\n illusions. You are lost if you imagine that you can conquer the enemy\n in a few months. Woe be to us all if we forget that it is a giant\u2019s\n struggle in which we are engaged, and that a whole generation must\n perish before we can expiate the sins of our fathers! Therefore I ask\n you again: Are you ready to march to battle, knowing that in the end\n you _must_ be defeated, that you _must_ be overpowered by numbers, and\n that you have nothing to hope for either in victory or\n defeat\u2014_nothing_, not even glory, which lays its crowns of laurel on\n the graves of the brave?\u201d\n\n Here his voice faltered; but, mastering his emotion, the venerable old\n man, lifting his eyes to heaven and stretching out his hands towards\n the crucifix, exclaimed with almost superhuman enthusiasm: \u201cO my God!\n thou who knowest the hearts of all men, give to these thy servants the\n spirit of courage, self-sacrifice, and faith. Blot out the memory of\n our beloved Warsaw from their hearts, and with it the remembrance of\n their mothers, their sisters, their betrothed! Let them henceforth see\n naught but the glorious army of martyrs and their mother Poland, torn\n and blood-stained. Let their ears be closed to all whispers of home,\n and be open only to hear the laments of the widows and orphans, the\n groans from the depth of the dungeons, the cries which the east wind\n brings us across Muscovy from the Siberian mines! May they have but one\n thought, one wish, one will\u2014to pursue and annihilate this Russian\n vampire, which for nearly a century has fastened on the breasts of our\n Virgin of Poland, and has become drunk with her tears and with her\n blood!\u201d\n\n \u201cMay God hear and grant thy prayer!\u201d replied the volunteers with one\n voice. \u201cWhat thou willest we will; what thou commandest we will do.\n Lead us to death or to torture; we will not shrink from either.\u201d\n\n A look of deep joy lit up for a moment the old man\u2019s face and made him\n seem as one inspired. He blessed the banner, and then gave out the\n Polish national hymn, _Boze c\u00f3s Polske przesz tak licznie wieki_, of\n which the following is an English translation:[182]\n\n I.\n\n\n O God! who gave Poland her wonderful dower\n Of faith through long ages, of strength and of glory,\n And now spreadst that faith like a shield o\u2019er an hour\n The saddest and darkest of all in her story\n\n\n CHORUS.\n\n\n Great God! to thine altars we suppliants come;\n Give us back the blest freedom of faith, hearth, and home.\n\n\n II.\n\n\n O thou who, in pity, and touched by her fall,\n Still strengthenst thy children to fight in thy name.\n And showeth the world, \u2018midst her sorrow and thrall,\n The deeper her suffering, the brighter her fame;\n\n\n III.\n\n\n O God! whose all-powerful arm can o\u2019erthrow\n The proudest of kingdoms, like huts built on sand,\n Avert from thy children these dark clouds of woe.\n Raise the hopes of the Poles; give them back their dear land.\n\n\n IV.\n\n\n Give back to old Poland her bright days of yore,\n To her fields and her cities the blessings of peace.\n Give plenty, give freedom, give joy as before;\n Oh! cease to chastise us and fill us with grace.\n\n\n V.\n\n\n O merciful God! by thy marvellous might\n Keep far from us slaughter and war\u2019s fierce despair;\n \u2018Neath the sway of the angel of peace and of light\n Let all be united in love and in prayer.\n\n Great God! to thine altars we suppliants come;\n Give us back the blest freedom of faith, hearth, and home.\n\n\n The soldiers, kneeling, repeated this in chorus, and, rising, gave\n another cheer for Poland. Then Gen. Chmielinski, who was standing to\n the right of Father Benvenuto, turned to them and said: \u201cNow, my\n children, go and rest and recruit your strength. You will need it all;\n for the enemy we have to fight is strong and numerous, and many among\n us will appear before God to-morrow.\u201d\n\n The soldiers did as they were bid, and prepared themselves to pass the\n night as comfortably as they could, feeling that it was indeed the last\n many would spend on earth. I was going to do the same when I was sent\n for by Gen. Sokol, whom I found talking over plans with Gen.\n Chmielinski. \u201cLieut. L\u2014\u2014,\u201d he said to me, \u201cwe are very anxious for\n exact information as to the amount of the Russian force. Are you\n tired?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, but not enough to refuse a perilous mission. What is there to be\n done?\u201d\n\n \u201cTo go with a picked body of men on whom you can rely, and reconnoitre\n the Russian strength and position; but, for heaven\u2019s sake, be very\n prudent. You know the full extent of the danger.\u201d\n\n \u201cYes. Thanks for having chosen me,\u201d I replied; and, bowing to the two\n officers, I withdrew and told Badecki to have my horse saddled\n immediately. Whilst I was looking to the loading of my pistols young\n Charles M\u2014\u2014 came up.\n\n \u201cLieutenant,\u201d he exclaimed, \u201cyou are going to reconnoitre the Russian\n army?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes,\u201d I replied. \u201cWhy do you ask?\u201d\n\n \u201cWill you let me go with you?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, my boy. To-morrow\u2019s fight may be a serious one, for which you will\n need all your strength.\u201d\n\n The poor little fellow made a wry face, but went and lay down again at\n the foot of a tree. I only took with me Badecki and an old soldier\n named Zeromski, who had distinguished himself in the campaign of 1830.\n He had an austere and severe countenance, which, however, brightened\n into the sweetest and gentlest smile possible when you spoke to him. He\n was as laconic as a Spartan and kept himself always aloof; but under\n fire his bravery was heroic, and almost amounted to rashness. His\n comrades had nicknamed him _Stalowy-serce_ (heart of steel).\n\n We reconnoitred the enemy\u2019s position without being discovered, and were\n returning towards the edge of the camp, when my horse stumbled against\n the root of a tree and fell on one knee. My orderly, Badecki, looked at\n me anxiously, shook his head, coughed, sighed, and turned uneasily in\n his saddle.\n\n \u201cWhat on earth is the matter, Badecki?\u201d I exclaimed. \u201cOne would think\n you were sitting on a wasp\u2019s nest.\u201d\n\n \u201cLieutenant,\u201d he answered, sighing, \u201cit is because your horse stumbled\n just now.\u201d\n\n \u201cWell, and what is that to you?\u201d I replied.\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t you know, lieutenant, that if a horse stumbles before a battle\n it forebodes misfortune to his rider? I always remarked that in the\n campaign of 1830.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh! you believe that, do you?\u201d I said, smiling. \u201cAnd you,\n Zeromski\u2014have you remarked it too?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo, I have not done so myself, but I have been always told so.\u201d\n\n Arrived at the camp, I hastened to give in my report to General Sokol.\n He thanked me warmly, and added:\n\n \u201cNow is your opportunity, lieutenant, to win your captain\u2019s epaulets.\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, general, or a good sabre-cut. I hope it may be one or the other.\u201d\n\n Sokol laughed and said:\n\n \u201cIt is certain that, if these unlicked cubs of Russians are as numerous\n as you say, they will give us trouble.\u201d\n\n Leaving the general\u2019s quarters, I went and wrapped myself up in my\n bear-skin, and, throwing myself under a tree, fell asleep in a moment.\n I was completely worn out with fatigue.\n\n Only two hours later, however, I was awakened by the sentries being\n relieved. The day had just dawned. The first thing which recurred to my\n memory was Badecki\u2019s words. I had a sort of presentiment that they\n would turn out to be true. After a few moments of fervent prayer I took\n out my pocket-book and made a slight sketch of the spot where the\n battle would most likely be fought, and where, perhaps, that very night\n they would dig my grave. I wrote a few lines with the sketch, folded\n them up, and directed it.\n\n Scarcely had I made my last preparations in this way than our advanced\n posts gave the signal that the enemy was approaching. It was part of\n the army of Gen. C\u2014\u2014, and consisted of two battalions of infantry,\n several _soterias_ of Cossacks and dragoons, and four pieces of\n artillery. They numbered upwards of three thousand men. We had only\n twelve hundred, many of whom were but raw recruits.\n\n Very soon every soul was on the alert and armed. Father Benvenuto was\n the first to appear.\n\n \u201cMy children!\u201d he cried, \u201cmany amongst us will fall this day. You are\n all, thank God! prepared for whatever may be his will. Kneel, and I\n will give you all a last absolution and benediction.\u201d\n\n Every one knelt with the venerable priest, who prayed for a few minutes\n in a low voice and commended us all to God. Then, rising, he added with\n emotion:\n\n \u201cMy children, I absolve you and bless you all, in the name of the\n Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.\u201d\n\n \u201cAmen!\u201d we all responded, and rose filled with fresh strength and\n courage.\n\n \u201cLet every one of you do his duty,\u201d continued he; \u201cthat is all I will\n say at this moment to patriots who wish to free our dear and holy\n Poland or die in the attempt.\u201d\n\n The men went silently to take each his place in the ranks. Gen. Zaremba\n was to assume the chief command that day.\n\n \u201cWhat will do us the most mischief and paralyze our operations,\u201d he\n said, \u201care those field-pieces. If they had not those cannon we should\n win.\u201d\n\n Count S\u2014\u2014, captain of artillery, came forward. \u201cIf you will give me\n leave, general, I will go and spike their guns. Are there two hundred\n men amongst you who will follow me to certain death? Let them make the\n sacrifice of their lives for the safety of all.\u201d\n\n Nearly a thousand men volunteered for this terrible service, though\n they knew perfectly well that, in all probability, not one would return\n alive.\n\n \u201cWell,\u201d exclaimed the general, \u201cwe are twelve hundred men; let us draw\n lots.\u201d\n\n A few minutes later the two hundred, favored by fate and their own\n heroism, separated themselves from the rest and gathered round their\n intrepid leader, forming what might well be called the _phalanx of\n death_. Charles M\u2014\u2014 burst into tears at not having been one of those\n selected.\n\n \u201cDon\u2019t be afraid,\u201d I said to him; \u201cto-day we shall all be equally\n favored.\u201d\n\n The general then disposed of his small force in the best manner he\n could. He desired no one to fire a single shot till the enemy was\n within one hundred paces. Those among the sharpshooters and zouaves who\n had breech-loaders were to reserve their second shots till those who\n had only single-barrelled guns were reloading. In the event of\n confusion or defeat I was ordered with my Uhlans to charge the\n fugitives, always taking care to double back with my column behind the\n fusileers. These dispositions having been made, and distinct orders\n given to each corps, we all remained at our posts in silence, awaiting\n the enemy\u2019s approach. On they came, in the well-known serried masses of\n the Russian troops, and not a shot was fired till they arrived at the\n appointed distance. Then, with a shout and a sharp cry, the signal was\n given, our men fired, and upwards of one hundred Russians fell. So\n unprepared were they for this sudden discharge that the men behind the\n front rank fell back, in spite of the efforts of their officers, and,\n scattering to the right and left, became the victims of my Uhlans or\n were cut to pieces by the scythes of the _kopinicry_. Then the Russians\n in their turn fired, and twenty of our Poles fell. This was the moment\n chosen by Count S\u2014\u2014 and his two hundred heroes to dash in amidst the\n Russian artillery and try and silence their cannon. Passing through the\n Russian ranks like a flash of lightning, the count and my brave old\n Zeromski succeeded in spiking two of their field-pieces. Whilst ramming\n in his gun a ball broke the count\u2019s arm; the next took off his head.\n Zeromski had his head broken by the butt-end of a musket, and fell at\n the very moment when he had succeeded in spiking a gun to the cry of\n \u201c_Niech zeja Polske_!\u201d (Hurrah for Poland!)\n\n We could not look on in cold blood and see the horrible massacre of\n these two hundred. Comrades and all with one accord threw themselves\n into the enemy\u2019s ranks. The voice of our officers fell on dead ears; we\n were engaged in a hand-to-hand fight with equal fury on both sides. Now\n and then, when our Poles gave way before superior numbers, the Russian\n artillery had time to load their remaining guns, and when our poor\n fellows came back to the charge they were simply mowed down before the\n heavy fire that opened upon them. But still no one thought of\n self-preservation, only how to deal the hardest blows. All strategy or\n tactics had become impossible, and officers and men alike fought inch\n by inch for their lives. From the first moment when the fighting had\n become general I was attacked by a quartermaster of dragoons. We both\n fought with swords; but I was so exhausted that I could hardly keep my\n saddle, and all I could do was to try and parry the strokes of my\n adversary. All of a sudden a violent cramp seized my right arm; but at\n that critical moment I heard the voice of little Charles behind me:\n \u201cHold on for a minute longer!\u201d he cried; and, galloping with his pony\n across a heap of dead, he fired off his pistol close to the head of my\n enemy, who dropped without a word. But at the same instant I saw the\n heroic child stagger and turn deadly white; a ball had struck him in\n the chest.\n\n \u201cAdieu, lieutenant! Adieu, brother!\u201d he murmured, as he slipped off his\n horse to the ground. \u201cMy poor mother! How she will cry! My Lord and my\n God, have mercy upon me!\u201d\n\n Those were his last words. I bore him on my shoulders, and carried him\n out of the field of battle, and laid him down under a tree. I put my\n hand on his heart; it had ceased to beat. The generous child had died\n to save me. He had a beautiful smile on his face, and two tears\n glistened on his cheeks. I closed his eyes, and, kissing his forehead,\n said: \u201cSleep in peace, my brave boy! If I survive this day I will carry\n these tears to your poor mother.\u201d\n\n I called two of the pioneers, and told them to dig a separate grave for\n poor Charles, that his body might not fall into the enemy\u2019s hands; and\n then, jumping on the horse of a Cossack who had just been killed, I\n threw myself again into the fray. All my strength had come back. I\n fought like one possessed; and this over-excitement lasted till I felt\n the cold steel going through me. A Cossack had thrust his lance into my\n left breast. I lifted up my heart to God for one moment, and then fell,\n pressing my crucifix convulsively. My orderly, seeing me fall, carried\n me off rapidly to a carriage which was already full of wounded men.\n Thanks to Father Benvenuto, who never ceased watching over me, I came\n back to life again and met the loving and sisterly eyes of Mother\n Alexandra, who again insisted on my sharing her cell. I was in great\n danger for five days, and, if I did not sink under my sufferings, it\n was owing to the devoted care of which I was the object. One night my\n secret was well-nigh discovered. Mother Alexandra had been called away\n to some other patient and had left me to the care of a young sister. My\n fever ran high, and, being delirious, I tore off the bandages from my\n wound and threw them away. Frightened at my state, the sister luckily\n ran to fetch Mother Alexandra, exclaiming: \u201cCome as quickly as you can;\n the lieutenant is dying!\u201d She flew back to me, and remained alone by my\n bedside. Her presence calmed me at once, and I allowed her to bandage\n me up again and stop the blood, which had burst out in streams from the\n wound.\n\n In the same house we had forty-five wounded from this battle, wherein\n the Poles had displayed prodigies of valor. The Russian loss was very\n great, and if they were not altogether crushed, it was owing to their\n numerical superiority. As it was, they retired in good order, for we\n had not sufficient men to follow them in their retreat. When I was\n allowed to go out of my cell I went to see my comrades. I helped the\n sisters in dressing their wounds, and, when my strength would allow me,\n I used to read aloud to them as we sat round the stove. At the end of a\n month, out of forty-five wounded thirty-two were convalescent.\n\n At the end of six weeks I felt myself strong enough to bear the motion\n of a horse, and so accepted a mission for my old general, who, by the\n orders of the Central Committee, came to take the command of the forces\n in the place of General Iskra, who had been condemned to death for high\n treason. As ill-luck would have it, on this occasion my usual\n good-fortune deserted me and I fell into the hands of a Russian patrol,\n who seized me, tied my hands behind my back, and marched me off to the\n little town of Kielce. As I was still very weak and walked with\n difficulty, they accelerated my march by blows from the butt-ends of\n their muskets. At Kielce I was taken straight to the headquarters of\n Gen. C\u2014\u2014. All Polish soldiers who had fallen into the hands of this\n brute since the beginning of the war had been hanged. From the window,\n close to which I had been placed, I could see the gibbet, with two\n shapeless bodies hanging from it on which birds of prey were already\n feasting. The sight filled me with horror, and feeling sure this time\n that my last hour was at hand, I recommended my soul to God, made a\n fervent act of contrition, and prepared myself as well as I could to\n die.\n\n The general came in for the usual interrogatory, and frowned when he\n looked at me.\n\n \u201cYou are from the rebel army?\u201d he exclaimed in bad Polish.\n\n \u201cI do not know any rebels,\u201d I replied proudly. \u201cI am of the army of\n the Crusaders.\u201d (We called the war a Crusade, and all of us wore a\n white cross sewed on our uniforms.)\n\n At this reply General C\u2014\u2014\u2019s face darkened and, with a furious gesture,\n he made a step toward me. \u201cDo you know,\u201d he cried, \u201cto what fate you\n have exposed yourself by falling into my hands?\u201d\n\n \u201cYes, perfectly,\u201d I replied, turning my head in the direction of the\n dead bodies.\n\n \u201cAnd you are not afraid?\u201d\n\n \u201cNo. I belong to a nation which does not know the feeling.\u201d\n\n \u201cYet you are very pale.\u201d\n\n \u201cOh!\u201d I replied eagerly, \u201cdo not think it is from fear. Six weeks ago I\n was wounded in an engagement with your troops, and to-day I have gone\n out for the first time.\u201d\n\n Here the Muscovite smiled.\n\n \u201cWhat is your age? Nineteen? Do you know that there are very few Poles\n as young as you are who would face death in this way without a\n shudder?\u201d\n\n \u201cBut I am not a Pole; I am French.\u201d\n\n \u201cDo you speak the truth?\u201d\n\n \u201cI never lie,\u201d I replied, presenting him my man\u2019s passport.\n\n He examined it carefully.\n\n \u201cThis saves you,\u201d he said at last, beginning to be almost civil. \u201cWe\n have not yet the right to hang the French, even though they may have\n fought with the rebel troops. I shall send you with an escort across\n the frontier of Silesia; but if ever you again set foot on Russian soil\n you will be hanged without mercy and without shrift.\u201d\n\n I was sent out of his presence, escorted by two Cossacks, thoroughly\n unlicked bears, who had orders to shoot me on the least suspicious\n movement on my part. I had the pleasure of these gentlemen\u2019s society in\n a third-class carriage during the whole journey from Myszkow to\n Szczakowa\u2014that is, for four mortal hours. You can imagine, therefore,\n that I did not breathe freely till I had stepped out of the carriage\n and found myself once more on Silesian soil, released from their\n attentions.\n\n I felt now that my vow had been kept and my promise fulfilled. I had\n shed my blood for Poland, and any further effort on my part would have\n been worse than useless.\n\n I determined, therefore, to rejoin the countess and her children, who\n were at that moment at the waters of Altwasser. I pass over the joy of\n our reunion. We soon went on to Dresden for the winter, and once more\n that happy family were together, though in exile.\n\n I heard soon after that Father Benvenuto had been struck by a ball in\n the heart at the battle of Swientz-Krszysz, at the very moment when he\n was lifting up the crucifix to bless his soldiers. The memory of this\n saint will be for ever revered in Poland, and in the hearts of all\n those who had the happiness of knowing him. With his heroic death I\n close my account of this episode in a war which, however mistaken on\n the part of those who first conceived so hopeless an attempt, was\n carried on to the last with a faith, a courage, and a patriotism that\n deserve to be immortalized in the history of any country, and will\n redound to the eternal honor of this persecuted and unhappy people.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE LATE DR. T. W. MARSHALL.\n\n The _renaissance_ of English Catholic literature has been a growth of\n the last quarter of a century. From the time when Dr. Newman became a\n convert to the church there has been a continual stream of the most\n ardent Catholic literature, didactic, controversial, and devotional. Of\n devotional works we need hardly speak at all, since they are much the\n same in all Catholic countries, and are mostly modelled on one spirit\n of one faith. Of works which are didactic it is superfluous to say\n anything, for all teachers of the Catholic faith teach the same thing.\n But of works which are controversial it is desirable to take notice,\n because they indicate the peculiar spirit of the age, the nature of the\n anti-Catholic opposition, and the growth or the decay of old\n prejudices. There is probably no literature in any country in the world\n which is so full of original lines of pure controversy as that of the\n modern English school of Catholic converts. Nor is there any difficulty\n in accounting for this fact. When we remember that English converts\n have stepped across that huge gulf which divides old-fashioned\n Protestantism from Catholicity; that they have brought with them from\n the \u201cEstablishment\u201d the most perfect knowledge of all the arguments\n which can be devised against the acceptance of \u201cthe faith\u201d; that they\n are often highly educated men, who have been as \u201cintellectually\u201d as\n they have been \u201cspiritually\u201d converted\u2014we should be surprised if they\n did not sometimes write controversy with both a newness and a richness\n of intuition.\n\n For example, let us take the great Dr. Newman, whose vast stores of\n digested learning often sparkle or are sweetened with delicious touches\n of the perception of the humorous\u2014a boon to his readers which is not\n only due to his wit but to the drolleries of the old heresy which he\n has left. Or let us take Dr. Faber\u2014that \u201cpoet of Catholic dogmas,\u201d as a\n Protestant lady has described him\u2014and note the exquisite appreciation\n with which he contrasts Catholic truths with their denial or their\n imitation in Protestantism. These two writers could not have written as\n they have done unless they had been brought up as Protestants. They\n might have been equally luminous and profound; they might have wanted\n nothing of Catholic science; but their appreciation of contrast, which\n is one of the essentials of humor, could not have been nearly so\n developed.\n\n Yet, delightful as it would be to dwell on the rich gifts of these two\n writers\u2014the profound Newman and the poetical Faber\u2014it is with reference\n to another writer that we would say something at this time\u2014to one who\n has but recently passed away. Dr. T. W. Marshall, who twice visited the\n United States, and who gained great repute as a lecturer, was among the\n most gifted of the controversialists\u2014in some senses he was unique\u2014who\n have contributed to English Catholic literature. We are not speaking of\n his learning, though this was considerable; nor of his reasoning power,\n though this, too, was very striking; for there are many English\n Catholic writers who, both in learning and in reasoning, may be\n esteemed to have surpassed Dr. Marshall; but we are speaking of him as\n a \u201cpure controversialist,\u201d as one who made controversy his sole\n pursuit, or who, at least, will be always remembered as a polemic, and\n this both as a speaker and as a writer. Now, in the capacity of a\n polemic\u2014of a \u201cpopular\u201d polemic\u2014we have affirmed that Dr. Marshall was\n unique; and let us indicate briefly in what respects.\n\n We have spoken at the beginning of the immense advantage which is\n possessed by those Catholics who attempt to write controversy when\n their first years have been passed in the camp of the Anglican\n \u201cEstablishment,\u201d and so they have learned all its secrets. Dr. Marshall\n was \u201cbred and born\u201d an Anglican. He was the descendant of a long line\n of Protestants. He was educated at two English public schools, and\n subsequently spent three years at Cambridge; emerging from the\n university to \u201ctake orders\u201d in the Establishment, and soon becoming\n incumbent of a parish. Finding his lot cast in a pleasant rural\n district, where he had but very few clerical duties, he devoted his\n spare time to the study of the Fathers; and, while reading, he made\n copious notes. The present writer, who had the happiness to be his\n pupil, remembers well with what avidity he used to devour the big tomes\n which he borrowed from the not distant cathedral library. Finding, as\n he read on, that the Fathers were \u201cstrangely Roman Catholic,\u201d that\n \u201cthey most distinctly were none of them Protestants,\u201d he may be said to\n have read and to have written himself into the faith, which he embraced\n the moment that he realized it. And no sooner was he received into the\n Catholic Church than he devoted all his talents to the proving to\n English Protestants the truths of which he himself was convinced.\n _Christian Missions_ was his first great work, though it had been\n preceded by more than one brilliant pamphlet; and _My Clerical Friends_\n and _Protestant Journalism_ followed in much later years. Besides these\n works there was the unceasing contribution to more than one of the\n English Catholic papers, to several magazines or periodicals, and also\n to a few secular weeklies. It may be remembered with what raciness, and\n at the same time with what depth, he used to punish \u201cour Protestant\n contemporaries\u201d for their inventions and their puerilities about the\n church. His series on the \u201cRussian Church\u201d was especially brilliant,\n and produced much sensation among High-Churchmen. But his many other\n series, such as \u201cFictitious Appeals to a General Council,\u201d \u201cSketches of\n the Reformation,\u201d \u201cTwo Churches,\u201d \u201cModern Science,\u201d were all deserving\n of most careful digestion, and produced their due effect upon\n Anglicans. It was when probing the Ritualists, week after week, with\n the most terrible weapons of Catholic logic, that Dr. Marshall was\n seized with his last illness, and he laid aside for ever that pen\n which, for thirty years, had been the dread of many insincere\n Protestants.\n\n If we examine critically into the merits and demerits of this\n accomplished theologian and controversialist, we shall find three\n points in particular which mark him off from other men, and which\n render him, as we have said, unique. First, he had the capacity of\n uniting extensive learning with a lightness, even a gayety, of style;\n weaving scores of quotations into a few pages of easy writing, without\n ever for a moment becoming dull. He played and he toyed with any number\n of quotations, as though he had them all at his fingers\u2019 ends; and he\n \u201cbrought them in\u201d in such a way that, instead of cumbering his pages,\n they made them more diverting and light. Let it be asked whether this\n one particular art is not worthy of universal imitation? Nine out of\n every ten of even good polemical writers \u201cdrag their quotations in by\n the head and shoulders,\u201d or hurl them down upon the pages as though\n they had been carted with pitch-forks and had to be uncarted in similar\n fashion. A lightness and a tripping ease in the introduction of\n quotations is one of the most captivating of gifts; for it takes the\n weight off the learning, the drag off the style, the \u201cbore\u201d off the\n effort of controversy. It would be very easy to name half a score of\n good books, vastly learned and admirably fitted for the shelves, which\n are simply rendered unreadable by that after-dinner sleepiness which\n comes from too heavy a table. Now, is it not desirable that even wise\n men should make a study of this art of trippingly weaving\n quotations?\u2014for, as a matter of fact, a quotation badly used might just\n as well not be used at all. Dr. Marshall made quotations a grace of his\n style, instead of an interruption of his text; and so neatly did he\n \u201cTunbridge-ware\u201d them into his pages that they fitted without joint and\n without fissure. This is, we think, a great merit; and if Dr. Marshall\n had done nothing more than suggest to learned writers that it is\n _possible_ to quote immensely yet trippingly, he would have rendered a\n service to all polemics. He has been, perhaps, \u201can original\u201d in this\n respect; or, if not an original, he has at least been unique in the\n excellence of the practice of the art.\n\n The second feature in his writings which strikes us as admirable is an\n individuality in the neatness of expression. Short sentences, quite as\n pithy as short, with a calm grace of defiant imperturbability, make his\n writings equally caustic and gay. Scholarly those writings certainly\n are; they have all the honeyed temperance of art and much of the\n perfection of habit. No one could write as Dr. Marshall could write\n unless he had made writing his study. No doubt style \u201cis born, not\n made\u201d; but most styles are better for education, and we could name but\n few writers of whom we could say that their style was apparently _more_\n natural than it was acquired. Of Dr. Newman it might be said \u201cthe style\n is the man,\u201d for there is a personal repose in his writings; and we\n could imagine Dr. Newman, even if he had not been a great student,\n still writing most beautifully and serenely. \u201cThe perfection of Dr.\n Newman\u2019s style is that he has no style\u201d was a very good remark of a\n learned critic; but then we cannot talk of such very exceptional men as\n giving a rule for lesser writers. Now, Dr. Marshall had a very marked\n style. It was ease, with equal art and equal care. The care was as\n striking as the ease. This, it will be said, proves at once that Dr.\n Marshall was not what is called \u201ca genius.\u201d Well, no one ever pretended\n that he was. A man may be both admirable and unique without having one\n spark of real genius; and a man may have graces of style, with highly\n cultured arts of fascination, and yet be no more than just sufficiently\n original to attract a marked popular attention. Few men attain even to\n this standard; and certainly, as writers of controversy, very few men\n even approach to it. What we assert is that to be \u201ccontroversially\n unique\u201d a writer must be exceptional in certain ways, and especially in\n the two ways we have particularized\u2014namely, light quoting and light\n writing. We return, then, to the opinion that for neatness of\n phraseology; for the \u201cart,\u201d if you will, of suave cuttingness; for the\n clever combination of the caustic with the calm, of the profoundly\n indisputable with the playful, Dr. Marshall was really remarkable. He\n could say a thing quietly which, if robbed of its quietness, would have\n been, perhaps, a veritable insult. Perhaps it was the more pungent\n because quiet; and here we touch the third and last of the literary\n characteristics which we propose to notice briefly at this time.\n\n \u201cMilk and gall are not a pleasing combination,\u201d observed a\n gentleman\u2014who was an Anglican at the time\u2014after reading _Our Protestant\n Contemporaries_. He added that he did not care for milk\u2014he was too old\n to find it sufficiently stimulating\u2014but he objected to gall, at least\n when it was directed against some favorite convictions of his own mind.\n Most persons will agree with this old gentleman, who, however, became a\n convert to the church. Yet it may be said that there are two apologies\n which may be offered for this defect\u2014if defect, indeed, it be\u2014of \u201cmilk\n and gall.\u201d First, let it be remembered that the keen perception of the\n ridiculous, which is generally a characteristic of superior minds,\n finds its richest exploration in what, from a certain point of view,\n may be regarded as those immense fields of folly which are popularly\n denominated English Protestantism. To the humorous mind there is\n nothing so humorous as the mental gymnastics of Protestants. To\n suppress this humorous sense becomes impossible to any writer who does\n not look on gloom as a duty. Dr. Newman only suppresses it in this way:\n that his huge mind works above the mere playground, or avoids it as too\n provocative of games. He descended into it once in _Loss and Gain_, and\n he became fairly romping towards the close; now and then, too, we can\n detect the laughing spirit which only veils itself, for decorum, in his\n grave writings; but he feels probably that _his_ weapons are too sharp\n to need satire, for he is not a controversialist, but a reasoner. When\n he does, for the moment, write satire, he shows what he could do, if he\n would; but we are glad that the normal attitude of his mind is rather\n didactic than playful.\n\n Of lesser writers we cannot expect that their discrimination should be\n hampered by a grave sense of doctorship; it is not necessary that they\n should sit in professors\u2019 chairs; they are writing for the million,\n whose perceptions of what is true must be aided by their perceptions of\n what is false. Moreover, the English mind, not being normally\n humorous\u2014which is a great national loss in all respects\u2014requires to be\n jolted and jerked into an attitude which would be most useful for the\n intelligence of truth. If we could only get Englishmen to see the\n comedy of heresy, they might soon want the gravity of truth; but they\n are constitutionally dull in apprehending those fallacies which\n southern peoples can see through in a moment. Now, a writer who can\n teach Englishmen to laugh at their Protestantism, to appreciate its\n anomalies and its shams, to see the difference between a parson and a\n priest, between ten thousand opinions and one faith, and generally to\n get rid of morbid sentiment and prejudice, and to look at things in a\n thoroughly healthful way, has \u201ctaken a line\u201d which is as salutary for\n feeble souls as is bright mountain air for feeble bodies. Dr. Marshall\n used to laugh _with_ Protestants at their shams much more than he used\n to laugh _at_ the victims. But it is true that there was sometimes an\n acerbity in his remarks which gave offence to those who loved not the\n humor. Could this be helped? Be it remembered that acerbity, in the\n apparent mood of expression, is often more intellectual than it is\n moral; it is simply an attitude of conviction, or it is the natural\n vexation of a profound religious faith which cannot calm itself when\n protesting against folly. Nor do we think it at all probable that, if\n there were _no_ gall in controversy, more converts would be made to the\n truth. And, after all, what do we mean by the word \u201cgall\u201d? Is humor\n gall? Is satire gall? Is even acerbity, when it is obviously but\n vexation, a fatal undoing of good? Much will depend on the mood of the\n reader. Some readers like spice and cayenne even in their \u201creligious\u201d\n opponents. Most readers know that mere literary temperament cannot make\n a syllogism out of a fallacy. All readers distinguish between caprices\n of temperament and the attitude of the reason and the soul. It is only\n on account of the mental babes among Protestants that it is to be\n regretted that all Catholics are human. For the ordinary, strong reader\n a good dash of human nature is much better than is too much of \u201cthe\n angel.\u201d Take mankind for what they are, and we like the honesty of the\n irritation which sometimes puts the gall into the milk. It might be\n desirable that our first parent had not fallen. If he had not fallen we\n should not have had controversy. But since he has fallen, and since we\n must have controversy, we must also of necessity have gall.[183]\n\n We have only to express regret that so useful a writer as Dr.\n Marshall has passed away out of the ranks of controversialists. As a\n speaker, too, Dr. Marshall was most delightful; indeed, he spoke\n quite as well as he wrote. At the time when he was in the United\n States it was thought by some persons that Dr. Marshall was quite the\n model of a speaker; for he was at once gentle and commanding, refined\n yet highly pungent, scholarly yet most easy to be understood. These\n praises were allowed by every one to be his due. We have, then, to\n lament the loss of a really richly-gifted Catholic, who, though an\n Englishman, was cosmopolitan. And when we remember that such men as\n Dr. Marshall (with Dr. Faber, or Mr. Allies, or Canon Oakeley) were\n born Protestant\u2014intensely Protestant\u2014Englishmen, we can appreciate\n what was involved in their conversion to the church, both in the\n intellectual and in the purely social sense. Conversion means more\n than a change of conviction to such Englishmen as have been born of\n Protestant parents; it means the revolution of the whole life of the\n _man_, as well as of the whole life of the Christian. Such men seem\n to be born over again. When they have passed away we can say for\n them, with as much hope as charity, _Requiescant in pace_.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n PAPAL ELECTIONS.\n\n II.\n\n In the twelfth century the cardinals of the Holy Roman Church were in\n full and undisputed possession of the right of electing the Sovereign\n Pontiff; and although the exercise of this right is commonly attributed\n to the Sacred College, only from the passing of the famous decree of\n the Third Council of Lateran, in 1179, beginning _Licet de vitanda\n discordia in electione Romani Pontificis_ (cap. vi. _de Elect._), it\n rather supposes the cardinals to be already the sole papal electors,\n and merely determines what majority of their votes shall constitute a\n valid election.[184] Factious and semi-ignorant persons have often\n protested against this exclusive right of the cardinals to elect the\n visible head of the church. Of such a kind was Wycliffe, whose\n diatribe, _Electio Pap\u00e6 a cardinalibus per diabolum est introducta_,\n was condemned by the Council of Constance (artic. xl. sess. viii.); and\n Eybel, whose errors were exposed by Mamacchi, under his poetical name\n of Pisti Alethini, as a member of the Academy of the Arcadians.[185]\n\n In early times, when the pope died at Rome the cardinals met to elect a\n successor in the Lateran or the Vatican basilica, or in the cathedral\n of any other city in which they might have determined to hold the\n election. Conclave is the term used exclusively for many centuries for\n the place in which the cardinals meet in private to elect a pope; but\n it was used in the early middle ages of any room securely shut,[186]\n just as, among the ancient Romans, _conclave_ was a covered and\n enclosed apartment or hall that could be fastened with a lock and\n key\u2014_cum clavi_. Long before the pontificate of Gregory X. the\n cardinals who assembled for a papal election met in some part of a\n large and noble building\u2014generally the sacristy of a cathedral\u2014where\n they transacted the business of the day, and returned after each\n session to their private abodes. The gloss _Nullatenus_, on the decree\n of Alexander III., says that if two-thirds\u2014the majority required\u2014of the\n cardinals will not agree upon a candidate, they should be closely\n confined until they do\u2014_includantur in aliquo loco de quo exire non\n valeant donec consenserint_\u2014and mentions several popes elected after\n the cardinals had been subjected to a reasonable duress. This is\n precisely the conclave. It was not, however, until the year 1274 that\n the mode of procedure in a papal election was settled\u2014after the\n incursions of the barbarians and the many vicissitudes to which the\n Holy See then became subject had deranged the earlier and apostolic\n manner\u2014and the rules and regulations of the modern conclave were\n published. After the death of Clement IV. in Viterbo, on Nov. 22, 1268,\n the eighteen cardinals composing the Sacred College met there to elect\n his successor; but not agreeing after a year and a half, although the\n kings of France and Sicily, St. Bonaventure, General of the\n Franciscans, and many influential, learned, and holy men came in person\n to urge them to compose their differences and relieve the church of her\n long widowhood, they were all got together one day, by some artifice,\n in the episcopal palace, which was instantly closed upon them and\n surrounded with guards. Even this imprisonment did not change their\n temper, and after some further delay the captain of the town, Raniero\n Gatti, took the bold resolution of removing the entire roof and\n otherwise dilapidating the edifice, in hopes that the discomforts of\n the season, added to their confinement, might break the stubbornness of\n the venerable fathers.[187] This move succeeded, and a compromise was\n effected among the discordant cardinals on the 7th of September, 1271,\n in virtue of which the papal legate in Syria, Theobald Visconti,\n Archdeacon of Liege, was elected. This was not the first time that\n extraordinary and almost violent measures had been taken to bring the\n cardinals to make a prompt election. At Viterbo the captain of the town\n coerced their liberty; at Naples the commandant of the castle bridled\n their appetite when, after the death of Innocent IV., in 1254, he\n diminished day by day the quantity of food sent in to them\u2014_cibo per\n singulos dies imminuto_\u2014until they agreed upon a worthy subject.[188]\n\n Gregory X., who was so singularly elected at Viterbo while far away in\n Palestine, called a general council, which met at Lyons on May 2, 1274.\n Five hundred bishops, over a thousand mitred abbots and other\n privileged ecclesiastics, the patriarchs of Constantinople and Antioch,\n the grand master of the famous Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, the\n kings of France and Aragon, besides ambassadors from Germany, England,\n Sicily, and other important nations, took part in it. The pope was\n resolved to establish the manner of electing the Roman Pontiff on a\n better principle, and now drew up a constitution which, in spite of\n considerable opposition from the cardinals, was read between the fourth\n and fifth sessions, and finally received the approbation of the\n fathers. This is substantially the code that still regulates the\n conclave. The original constitution, which had been suspended by some\n popes and not observed by the cardinals in several elections, was\n introduced into the body of canon law[189] by Boniface VIII., in order\n to impress it, if possible, with a more solemn and perpetual obligation\n of observance; and when some of the cardinals, incensed at the transfer\n of the see to Avignon, maintained that, despite all this, the Sacred\n College could modify or abolish it at discretion, it was confirmed by\n the General Council of Vienne and their factious spirit reproved. This\n conciliar decree has also a place in the canon law, where it is found\n among the Clementines (_Ne Romani, 2 de elect._)[190]\n\n \u201cWhere the danger is known to be greatest,\u201d says the preamble to Pope\n Gregory\u2019s constitution, \u201cthere should most care be taken. How many\n risks and what great inconvenience a long vacancy of the Holy See\n entails is shown by looking back upon the disorders of other days. It\n is, therefore, wise that, while diligently engaged in reforming minor\n evils, we should not neglect to provide against calamity. Now,\n therefore, whatever our predecessors, and particularly Alexander III.,\n of happy memory, have done to remove a spirit of discord in the\n election of the Roman Pontiff, the same we desire to remain in full\n force; for we do not intend to annul their decrees, but only by our\n present constitution to supply what experience points out to be\n wanting.\u201d\n\n The whole decree may be divided into fifteen paragraphs, which are\n called the Fifteen Laws of the Conclave. They are summarized as\n follows:\n\n On the death of the pope the cardinals, having celebrated for nine days\n his obsequies in the city where he died, shall enter the conclave on\n the tenth day, whether absent colleagues have arrived or not, and be\n accompanied by a single attendant, whether lay or clerical, or at most,\n in case of evident necessity, by two attendants. The conclave shall be\n held in the palace last occupied by the pope, and there the cardinals\n must live in common, occupying a single spacious hall not cut off by\n curtains or partitions, and so carefully closed on every side that no\n one can secretly pass in or out. One room, however, may be cut off for\n private purposes\u2014_reservato libero ad secretam cameram aditu_\u2014but no\n access shall be allowed to any cardinal, nor private conversation with\n nor visits to him, except from those who, by consent of all the other\n cardinals, may be summoned to consult on matters germane to the affair\n in hand; nor shall any one send letters or messages to their lordships\n or to any of their familiars, on pain of excommunication. A window or\n other opening shall be left in the hall of conclave, through which the\n meals are introduced, but it must be of such a size and shape that no\n human being can penetrate thereby. If, after three days from the\n opening of the conclave, no election has been made, the prelates\n appointed to attend to this shall allow each cardinal no more than one\n dish at dinner and supper during the next five days, after which only\n bread and water until they come to a conclusion. The cardinals shall\n take nothing from the papal treasury during the vacancy of the see; but\n all its revenues are to be carefully collected and watched over by the\n proper officers. They shall treat of nothing but the election, unless\n some imminent danger to the temporalities of the Holy See may demand\n their attention; and, laying aside all private interests, let them\n devote themselves entirely to the common weal; but if any cardinal\n shall presume to attempt by bribes, compacts, or other arts to entice\n his brethren to his own side, he shall suffer excommunication, nor\n shall any manner of agreement, even if sworn to, be valid. If a\n cardinal draw off from the conclave, or should he retire from motives\n of health, the election must still proceed; yet, if he recover, he\n shall be readmitted. Cardinals arriving late or at any stage of the\n proceedings, as also those who may be under censures, shall be\n received. No one can give his vote outside of the conclave. Two-thirds\n of the votes of all the electors present[191] are requisite to elect;\n and any one not radically disqualified[192] is eligible to the Papacy.\n The feudal superiors of the territory and the municipal officers of the\n city in which the conclave is held are charged to observe these\n regulations, and shall swear in presence of the clergy and people to do\n so. If they fail to do their duty they shall be excommunicated, be\n declared infamous and lose their fiefs, and the city itself shall be\n interdicted and deprived of its episcopal dignity. Solemn funeral\n services are to be held in every important place throughout the\n Catholic world as soon as news arrives of the pope\u2019s death; prayers are\n to be recited daily and fast days appointed for the speedy and\n concordant election of an excellent pontiff.\n\n In this provident constitution of Gregory X. are contained in brief the\n rules and regulations which have ever since governed the conclave. In a\n few points, however, its severity has been relaxed, particularly by\n Clement VI. in the bull _Licet de Constitutione_, dated December 6,\n 1351; and in others some small modifications have been introduced, in\n accordance with the manners and customs of a more refined age, by\n Gregory XV. (Ludovisi, 1621\u20131623) in his comprehensive ceremonial.[193]\n Thus Clement VI. (De Beaufort, 1342\u20131352), while recommending the\n greatest frugality at table during the seclusion of the conclave,\n removed the alimentary restrictions and left it to the cardinals\n themselves to select the kind, quality, and amount of their food, but\n forbade the prandial civilities of sending tidbits from one table to\n another. The same pope allowed each cardinal to have his bed enclosed\n by curtains, and to have two attendants, or conclavists, in every case.\n The monastic simplicity of a common sleeping-room was done away with in\n the sixteenth century, when each cardinal was allowed the use of a\n separate cell, which Pius IV. commanded should be assigned by lot. When\n a cardinal\u2019s name and number have been drawn, his domestics upholster\n it with purple serge or cloth, if their master was created by the late\n pope; but if by a former one, with green\u2014a difference in color that was\n first observed in the conclave for the election of Leo X. A few\n articles of necessary furniture, such as a bed, table, kneeling-bench,\n and a couple of chairs, complete the interior arrangements. On the\n outside of his cell each cardinal affixes a small escutcheon emblazoned\n with his arms, which serves as a substitute for that vulgar modern\n thing called a door-plate. While great care is still taken to hinder\n suspicious communications between the conclave and the outer world, it\n is no longer prohibited to visit a cardinal or member of his suite,\n although the colloquy must be held at some one of the entries, and\n whatever is spoken be heard by the prelates doing duty there. Instead\n of the single small window\u2014more like an _oubliette_ than anything\n else\u2014which Gregory prescribed, openings in the shape of pivotal or\n revolving wooden frames, like those used in nunneries and called\n _tours_ in French, were adopted at the suggestion of Paride de\u2019 Grassi,\n master of ceremonies to Leo X. Eight of them are always connected on\n different sides with the hall of conclave, wherever it may be. The ten\n days before the conclave can open begin from the very day of the pope\u2019s\n death; but sometimes a much longer time has elapsed\u2014as, for instance,\n after the death of Alexander VI., when the violence of C\u00e6sar Borgia and\n the presence of a French army in Rome occasioned a delay of thirty\n days; and again, when Cardinal Ferreri was arrested on his way from\n Vercelli to the conclave by the Duke of Milan, his loyal colleagues\n waited for him eight days beyond the usual time. The conclave in which\n Julius III. was elected in 1550 was not opened until nineteen days\n after his predecessor\u2019s death, to oblige the French cardinals, who had\n not yet all arrived at Rome. In early ages, before it became customary\n to give the hat to occupants of episcopal sees other than the seven\n suburbican ones, and when cardinals were strictly bound to reside _in\n curia_\u2014_i.e._, to live near the pope of whose court they were the\n principal personages\u2014there was generally no necessity for a\n considerable delay. Anastasius the Librarian[194] says that Boniface\n III., in the year 607, made a decree forbidding any one to treat of a\n future pope\u2019s election during the lifetime of the living one, or until\n three days after his death; but, as Mabillon shows,[195] this three\n days\u2019 delay was observed in the Roman Church long before the seventh\n century, as appears from the despatch sent to the Emperor Honorius\n after the death of Pope Zosimus in the year 418. It is not known when\n it began to be observed as a law. In many cases an election took place\n either on the very same day that a pope died or on the following one,\n particularly during the era of persecutions and in the tenth and\n twelfth centuries, when the seditious disposition of the populace and\n the factions of rival barons made any unnecessary delay extremely\n hazardous. During the fifteenth, sixteenth, and following centuries the\n conclaves have generally been short, averaging about two weeks each.\n But during the greater part of the middle ages, after the supremacy of\n the Sacred College during the vacancy of the Holy See was undisputed,\n and the cardinals had little to fear from princes or people, their own\n dissensions often occasioned an interregnum of months, and even years,\n to the discredit of their order and the scandal of the Christian world.\n\n The election should take place in Rome, if possible, because Rome is,\n or ought to be, the ordinary residence of the Sovereign Pontiffs; but\n both before and after Pope Gregory\u2019s constitution many elections have\n been held elsewhere, according as the Curia was in one place or\n another. Urban II. was elected in Terracina; Calixtus II. in Cluny;\n Lucius III. in Velletri; Urban III. in Verona; Gregory VIII. in\n Ferrara; Clement III., Alexander VI., Honorius III. in Pisa; Innocent\n IV. in Anagni; Alexander IV. and Boniface VIII. in Naples; Urban IV.,\n Gregory X., and Martin IV. in Viterbo; Innocent V. in Arezzo; Honorius\n IV., Celestin V., and Clement V. in Perugia. During the stay of the\n popes in France John XXII., Benedict XII., Clement VI., Innocent VI.,\n Urban V., and Gregory XI. were elected at Avignon. John XXIII. was\n elected at Bologna, and Martin V. at Constance, since whom all his\n successors, except Pius VII., have been elected in Rome. The law of\n Gregory X. commanded that the conclave should be held there where the\n last pope died\u2014_Statuimus ut, si eundem pontificem in civitate, in qu\u00e2\n cum sua curia residebat, diem claudere contingat extremum, cardinales\n omnes conveniant in palatio, in quo idem pontifex habitabat_\u2014because in\n one sense, as of ancient Rome,\n\n\n ... Vejos habitante Camillo,\n Illico Roma fuit;\n\n\n and of modern Rome, _Ubi Papa, ibi Roma_. When, however, he was absent\n only on some extraordinary occasion, the election was to be held in\n Rome itself, no matter where he died. Gregory XI., who brought back the\n see from Avignon, intending to return to France on business and to\n better his health, but wishing to assure an Italian election and the\n permanent re-transfer of the Holy See to Rome, made a decree on March\n 19, 1378, ordering a majority of the cardinals, should his death occur\n during his absence, to meet in any part of Rome, or, if more\n convenient, in some neighboring city, and there elect a successor.\n Clement VIII. restricted the place of holding the conclave to Rome\n alone, in a bull issued October 6, 1529, on occasion of his journey to\n Bologna to crown the Emperor Charles V., and in another one, dated\n August 30, 1533, when going to France to confer with Francis I.\n\n When Pius IV. had a mind to go to Trent and preside in person at the\n council, he declared on September 22, 1561, that a papal\n election\u2014should one become necessary by his death while away\u2014was to be\n held in Rome, unless it were under an interdict, in which case in\n Orvieto or Perugia. Clement VIII., when going to Ferrara to receive\n back the fief which had reverted to the Holy See on the death of\n Alphonsus d\u2019Este, declared on March 30, 1598, that, should he die\n before returning, the subsequent election was to be held nowhere but in\n Rome. Long usage, continued up to the beginning of the present century,\n has consecrated the Vatican as the most proper seat of the conclave.\n The first pope elected there was Benedict XI. in 1303, and the next was\n Urban VI. in 1378. When Honorius IV., of the great house of Savelli,\n died where he had lived and held his court, in his family mansion on\n the Aventine, some remains of which are seen near the convent of _Santa\n Sabina_, the cardinals, in scrupulous observance of the first law of\n Gregory\u2019s constitution, met there and elected his successor, Nicholas\n IV., on February 22, 1288. Eugene IV. in 1431, and Nicholas V. in 1447,\n were elected in the Dominican convent of the Minerva, the great\n dormitory of the friars being fitted up for the cardinals, and the\n election itself being held in the sacristy behind the choir, over the\n door of which a large fresco painting and a Latin inscription\n commemorate the event. There were several projects on foot in the\n seventeenth century to establish with every possible convenience, and\n in accordance with the prescriptions of the Roman ceremonial of\n election, a hall of conclave which should serve for all future\n occasions. The venerable Lateran and the more modern Quirinal each had\n its advocates, and Pius VI. is said by Cancellieri to have intended the\n vast and magnificent sacristy building which he erected alongside of\n St. Peter\u2019s for such a purpose; but his immediate successor was elected\n in Venice on account of the French troubles, and all of _his_\n successors have been elected in the Quirinal palace.\n\n On the pope\u2019s death the Sacred College, or apostolic senate of Rome,\n succeeded to the government of the States of the Church. All the\n officers of the government were instantly suspended until provision was\n made to carry on the public business. Only the chamberlain of the Holy\n Roman Church, the grand penitentiary, and the vicar-general, who are\n always cardinals, continued to exercise their powers by a privilege\n granted to them by Pius IV. The chamberlain (camerlengo) was the\n executive or head of the government, acting as a quasi-sovereign, and\n was consequently honored with a special guard and allowed to coin money\n stamped with his family arms and the distinctive heraldic sign of the\n vacancy of the see, which is a pavilion over the cross-keys. With him\n were associated three other cardinals, each for three days at a time,\n one from each of the three orders, beginning with the dean, the first\n priest, and first deacon, and so on in turn of seniority. The secretary\n of the Sacred College, who is always a prelate of very high rank, was\n prime minister and transacted all the correspondence and other\n relations of the cardinals with foreign ambassadors and the\n representatives of the Holy See at foreign courts. Clement XII.\n provided that if the chamberlain and grand penitentiary should die\n during the conclave, the cardinals are to elect a successor to him\n within three days; but if the cardinal-vicar die, the vicegerent, who\n is always a bishop _in partibus_, succeeds _ex-officio_ to his\n faculties. The Sacred Congregation of Rome are privileged to transact\n business of small importance through their secretaries, and even to\n finish affairs of whatever importance, if at the pope\u2019s death they were\n so far advanced as to need only the secretary\u2019s signature.\n\n If a cardinal fall ill and choose to remain in conclave, provision is\n made to take his vote; but he may retire, if he wish, losing his vote,\n however, which cannot be given outside of the conclave or by proxy. If\n he recover he is obliged in conscience to return, because it is a duty\n of his office, and not a mere personal privilege, to take part in papal\n elections. All cardinals, unless specially deprived by the pope before\n his death of the right of electing and of being elected, can vote and\n are eligible, even if under censures. Thus, cardinals De Noailles and\n Alberoni were invited to the conclave at which Innocent XIII. was\n elected; but cardinals Baudinelli-Saoli and Coscia had been deprived,\n the one by Leo X. and the other by Clement XII., of what is called in\n canon law the active and passive voice. The cardinals may elect whom\n they please; nor is it necessary to be either a member of the Sacred\n College or an Italian to become pope. In former ages the choice of\n subjects was more confined than it is at present; for we learn from the\n acts of a council composed chiefly of French and Italian bishops,\n convened at Rome in 769 by Stephen III., _alias_ IV., to condemn the\n anti-pope Constantine, who was not even a cleric, that no one who was\n not either a cardinal-priest or deacon could aspire to the\n Papacy\u2014_Nullus unquam pr\u00e6sumat ... nisi per distinctos gradus\n ascendens, diaconus aut presbyter cardinalis factus fuerit, ad sacrum\n pontificatus honorem promoveri_.[196]\n\n Nevertheless, in view, presumably, of the greater good of the church,\n many persons have since been elected who did not answer to this\n description. This was the case with Gregory V. in 996; Sylvester II. in\n 999; Clement II. in 1046; Damasus II. in 1048; Leo IX. in 1049; Victor\n II. in 1055; Nicholas II. in 1058; Alexander II. in 1061; Calixtus II.\n in 1119; Eugene III. in 1145; Urban IV. in 1261; Gregory X. in 1271;\n Celestine V. in 1294; Clement V. in 1305; Urban V. in 1362, and Urban\n VI. in 1378, since whom no one not a cardinal has been elected,\n although several have come near being chosen. At the conclaves at which\n Adrian VI. and Clement VII. were elected Nicholas Schomberg, a\n celebrated Dominican and archbishop of Capua, received a number of\n votes; and as late as the middle of the last century, at the conclave\n from which proceeded Benedict XIV., Father Barberini, ex-general of the\n Capuchins and apostolic preacher, was repeatedly voted for. No matter\n what may have been a man\u2019s previous condition, he can be elected; and\n there are not a few instances of persons of ignoble birth or mean\n antecedents having been exalted to the Papacy, which they have\n illustrated by their virtues or their learning: \u201cChoose the best, and\n him who shall please you most of your mother\u2019s sons (_children of the\n Catholic Church_), and set him on his father\u2019s throne\u201d[197] (_as\n vicegerent of God in his kingdom on earth_).\n\n However, since Sixtus V. (1585\u20131595), who is said to have been a\n hogherd in his youth, all the popes have belonged to noble families;\n for, says Cardinal Pallavicini, the celebrated Jesuit and historian of\n the Council of Trent, nobility of birth, although no necessary\n condition, adds dignity and splendor to the pontificate\u2014_reca\n grandecoro ed ornamento al pontificato_.[198] But then he belonged to a\n princely family himself and wrote two centuries ago.\n\n Almost every European nationality has had a representative on the papal\n throne; but for several centuries the Italians have jealously guarded\n its steps from any one but themselves, and perhaps with reason so long\n as the pope was temporal sovereign of a large part of the Peninsula.\n Adrian V., of Utrecht (1522\u20131523), was the last _foreigner_ ever\n allowed to wear the tiara, and he for his relations with the powerful\n emperor Charles V., rather than for his undoubted virtues and learning;\n and yet so great was the indignation of the Romans when his name was\n announced that the cardinals were insulted and some of them maltreated\n as they left the conclave. But if a Hollander might be tolerated for\n some grave political reasons\u2014not a Frenchman under any condition. In\n the conclave of 1458 the worthiest subject to very many of his brethren\n seemed the Cardinal d\u2019Estouteville, Archbishop of Rouen\u2014the same who\n built the magnificent church of San Agostino at Rome. But _Timeo Danaos\n et dona ferentes_; so when there was a fine chance of his getting the\n requisite number of votes, Orsini and Colonna, as heads of the Roman\n party, deliberately turned the tide in favor of Piccolomini, although\n his record was bad and his health not good. When Clement V. (Bertrand\n de Got, archbishop of Bordeaux, 1505\u20131514) was elected, he summoned the\n Sacred College to Lyons to assist at his coronation. When the order\n reached the cardinals old Rosso Orsini, their dean, rose and said: \u201cMy\n venerable brethren, soon we shall see the Rhone\u2014but, if I know the\n Gascons, the Tiber will not soon see a pope again.\u201d And so\n D\u2019Estouteville, with all his wealth and learning and high connections,\n was made to feel that\n\n\n Necdum etiam caus\u00e6 irarum s\u00e6vique dolores\n Exciderant animo.\n\n\n Gregory X. prescribed that a strict watch should be kept over the\n conclave wherever it might be held. When held in Rome the\n representatives of the noblest families have a principal part in\n maintaining order in the city and protecting the cardinals from any\n kind of interference. The marshal of the Holy Roman Church and guardian\n of the conclave watches over the external peace and quiet of the Sacred\n College. This is one of the highest offices held by a layman at the\n Roman court. It is hereditary, and belonged for over four hundred years\n to the great baronial family of Savelli until its extinction. It passed\n in 1712 to the princely family of Chigi. The very ancient and now ducal\n family of Mattei was charged with preserving the peace of the _Ghetto_\n and _Trastevere_. For this purpose it used to raise and equip a small\n body of troops which was kept up as long as the conclave lasted. The\n majordomo of the late pope is _ex-officio_ governor of the conclave\n since the time of Clement XII. (Corsini, 1730\u20131740). Although he also\n exercises some external jurisdiction, he is more particularly required\n to attend to the domestic wants of the cardinals and preserve order\n within the palace where the conclave may be held. Delegations from the\n various colleges of the Roman prelacy\u2014apostolic prothonotaries,\n auditors of the pope, clerks of the chamber, etc.\u2014taking their orders\n daily from the governor, are to be stationed at one or other of the\n _Ruote_, or turnstile windows, during the whole of the conclave.\n _Pr\u00e6lati_, says Pius IV.,[199] _ad custodiam conclavis deputati, sub\n p\u0153na perjurii et suspensionis a divinis, maxima et exquisita diligentia\n utantur in inspiciendis ac perscrutandis epulis, aliisve rebus, ac\n personis conclavi intrantibus, ac de eo exeuntibus, ne sub earum rerum\n velamine liter\u00e6, aut not\u00e6, vel signa aliqua transmittantur_.\n\n In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when every species of\n gambling and games of chance was practised with frenzied passion in\n Italy, it was very common in Rome, although prohibited under severe\n penalties by Pius IV. and Gregory XIV. as a sort of sacrilege, to bet\n on the cardinals whose \u201cbackers\u201d thought they had a chance of being\n elected.\n\n The collect _Pro eligendo Pontifice_\u2014that God may grant a worthy pastor\n to his church\u2014is said at all Masses throughout the world from the\n beginning of the conclave until news arrives of the pope\u2019s election. In\n Rome there is a daily procession of the clergy from the Church of St.\n Lawrence _in Damaso_ to St. Peter\u2019s basilica (if the conclave be held\n in the Vatican), chanting the litany of the saints and other prayers.\n When the procession arrives there a Mass _de Spiritu Sancto_ is said by\n a papal chaplain in a temporary chapel fitted up near the main entrance\n to the conclave. The singing is by the papal choir.\n\n The literature, if we may call it so, of papal elections is varied and\n extensive. Besides the letters, bulls, and conciliar decrees of\n twenty-eight popes from Boniface I. in 419 to Pius IX., there is a host\n of writers on the subject, some of whom are distinguished for piety and\n learning, while others are noted for their hatred of the Holy See.\n Almost every conclave from Clement V.\u2019s down has had its chronicler or\n historian. The oldest special treatise extant on a papal election is\n one written by Cardinal Albericus, a monk of Monte Cassino, in 1050\u2014_De\n Electione Romani Pontificis, liber_.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE HOLY CAVE OF MANRESA.\n\n _DIGITUS DEI EST HIC!_\n\n It is difficult to bring it home to one\u2019s mind that Manresa is a place\n of petty industries and striving for worldly gain; that it ever had a\n hand in war or bloodshed, or, indeed, ever took any active part in the\n turmoil of ordinary life; for its very name has for more than three\n hundred years been almost synonymous with solitude and ascetic piety,\n on account of the _Santa Cueva_, or Holy Cave, so celebrated throughout\n the Christian world, where, amid the ecstasies of divine contemplation\n and the severities of the most rigorous penance, St. Ignatius de Loyola\n laid the foundation of the Society of Jesus, and by the infusion of\n supernatural light, to use the expression of the Congregation of the\n Rota, composed his famous _Spiritual Exercises_\u2014a work which, said St.\n Francis de Sales two hundred years ago, \u201chas given as many saints to\n the church of God as it contains letters.\u201d\n\n But Manresa is, in fact, a busy, thriving place of about fifteen\n thousand inhabitants, on the direct railway line from Barcelona to\n Zaragoza. It is a centre of industry, and contains a number of cotton\n and woollen mills by no means in harmony with its medi\u00e6val walls and\n towers that rise up out of the plain, gray and time-worn, and with many\n a mark of ancient conflict. For it is a walled town, and was in\n existence before the Roman conquest. We should say _city_, for so it\n has been styled ever since the ninth century, at least; and Don Jaime\n of Aragon, by a diploma of April 22, 1315, conferred on it, for its\n loyal services, the perpetual title of _buena y leal ciudad_. Nay,\n more, after Marshal Macdonald came here in 1811, and burned five\n hundred houses and factories, and slaughtered many of the inhabitants\n with a ferocity almost unequalled, the Spanish Cortes gave it the\n qualification of _muy noble y muy leal_ city (for these Spanish towns\n have their gradations of titled rank, of which they are as jealous as\n an ancient hidalgo of his family quarterings), on account of the\n bravery of the people, who rallied in their desperation and madness,\n and, pursuing the enemy, amply avenged their dead in true national\n fashion.\n\n We arrived at Manresa after dark, and, as there was not a single\n vehicle at the station, we gave our travelling-bags to a porter, and\n followed after him on foot through narrow, ascending, tortuous,\n dimly-lighted streets to the Fonda de San Domingo, very Spanish in\n character, with a court full of diligences and stables on the ground\n floor, and an enormous dining-room above, out of which opened the\n bedrooms\u2014at least, ours did. This was by no means favorable to repose,\n for the hilarity of its _habitu\u00e9s_ was kept up to a late hour, to say\n nothing of the singing and music in the neighboring streets. This would\n not have surprised us in Andalucia, but in an industrious place like\n Manresa we expected to find that labor had laid its repressing hand on\n the people, as is so often the case with us in the north. But the\n elastic temperament of the race causes a rebound as soon as the hour of\n toil is over. Then the dance and the song have their time, and\n castanets and the tambour take the place of the shuttle and the\n spindle. Manresa is noted for the publication of romanceros, ballads,\n and complaintes, illustrated with coarse engravings, which are sold\n under the general name of _pliegos_. This kind of literature is a key\n to the character of the people, and therefore not without its interest;\n but the sound of these jolly songs in such a place, and at so late an\n hour, was, it must be confessed\u2014unreasonable as we may appear\u2014very much\n to our disgust; for not only were we fatigued with our journey, but our\n thoughts were continually wandering off to the lonely cave and its\n mystic tome.\n\n We were up betimes in the morning, notwithstanding, and, seeing the\n tower of a church from our window, we hurried out; for all through\n Spain, as in Italy, if there is anything worth seeing in a town, it is\n certainly the churches. However, it was not a question of art with us,\n though by no means insensible to the grand in architecture or to the\n beautiful in painting and sculpture. The church we soon came to had\n given its name to the Fonda. It was the church of St. Dominic, an\n edifice of the fourteenth century, formerly connected with a Dominican\n convent. It is a grim, mouldy church, with a tomb-like atmosphere about\n it\u2014and, indeed, it is partly paved with memorial stones of those who\n sleep in the damp vaults below. But it was quiet and solemn, and there\n was a certain grave simplicity about it peculiar to the Dominican\n churches in Spain. A priest was saying Mass in subdued tones at the\n very altar where St. Ignatius once saw the glorious Humanity of our\n Saviour at the elevation of the Host, and a few people were kneeling\n here and there on the flag-stones, praying devoutly. St. Dominic and\n the dog with a flaming brand still seemed to be keeping watch and ward\n over the place, though his children are banished from his native land.\n The adjoining convent often gave St. Ignatius hospitality, and it was\n at one of its windows, after being tempted to despair in view of his\n sins, that he exclaimed: \u201cLord, I will not do aught that will offend\n thee!\u201d He often made the _Via Crucis_ in the cloisters, bearing a large\n wooden cross on his shoulders from station to station, shedding floods\n of tears over the divine Sufferer. This cross is still religiously\n preserved, and bears the inscription:\n\n\n Enecvs A\n Lohola porta\n bat hanc crv\n cem, 1522\n\n\n \u2014Ignatius de Loyola bore this cross, 1522.\n\n We found Manresa exceedingly picturesque by daylight, rising abruptly,\n as it does, out of the valley of the Llobregat on one side and that of\n the Cardoner on the other. The railway station is at the foot of the\n eminence, with the river between, and the effect of the steep cliffs,\n crowned by the noble and loyal city, is very striking. Directly\n opposite, as if it sprang out of the mount, rises the Seo, a venerable\n cathedral of the fourteenth century, beautifully mellowed and embrowned\n by time. Further to the left are the spires of the Carmen and the tower\n of San Miguel; while at the right, but lower down, built into the very\n side of the cliff, so that it seems like a continuation of it, is the\n church of the Jesuits, with the Santa Cueva which gives celebrity to\n the city. One would like to see the Holy Cave in its primitive\n simplicity; but such was the devotion of pilgrims who came here in\n thousands after the canonization of St. Ignatius that, to save it from\n being carried off piecemeal, it was found necessary to place some\n safeguard around it, and it is now enclosed within the walls of the\n church.\n\n Crossing the bridge that leads from the station, and walking along the\n opposite bank beneath the long arms of the umbrageous plane-trees for\n five minutes, we turned to the left, and, going up a short street,\n found ourselves directly beneath the overhanging cliff, which is\n tapestried with vines and the delicate fronds of the maiden-hair, kept\n green and fresh by little cascades of clear water that come trickling\n down the rocks with a pleasant murmur, glittering like the facets of a\n thousand jewels in the bright morning sun. Here is the Holy Cave,\n though no longer open on the side of the valley, towards which turn\n with interest so many hearts from the ends of the earth. We passed\n beneath the church walls, with its long line of sculptured saints, of\n rather coarse workmanship in the Renaissance style, but producing a\n striking effect from the valley below. One more turn to the left up a\n steep path, and we were on the terrace leading to the entrance. A\n statue of St. Ignatius is over the door. One always recognizes his\n striking physiognomy, with the noble dome of solemn thought that crowns\n it, and we saluted it with reverence and love, as we had done in many a\n strange land, as a symbol of the paternal kindness we had met with from\n the order to which he has bequeathed his spirit.\n\n The church consists of a single aisle, with four small chapels on each\n side, and a latticed gallery above for the inmates of the residence.\n There is nothing remarkable about it, and, in fact, it was never\n completed according to the original plan, owing to the suppression of\n the order in Spain. Seeing an open door on the gospel side of the\n sanctuary, we went directly towards it and found ourselves in a long,\n narrow passage lined with portraits of the Jesuit saints, and, at the\n further end, a doorway secured by a strong iron grating, above which is\n graven:\n\n SANTA CUEVA.\n\n Finding the grating ajar, we pushed it back, and, descending three\n stone steps, found ourselves in the Holy Cave. It is long and narrow,\n being about thirty feet in length, seven in width, and about the same\n in height. A small octagon window is cut through the wall that closes\n the original entrance, and there is a feeble lamp hanging before the\n altar, but neither gives light enough to disperse the gloom, and, as\n there was no one in the cave, it was as silent and impressive as a\n tomb. You could only hear the pleasant rippling of the water over the\n rocks without. The pavement is the solid rock, and the upper part of\n the cave is in its rough state, but the lower part of the walls is\n faced with marble, and jasper, and a series of bas-reliefs that tell\n the history of the saint. An inscription on the wall says:\n\n \u201cIn this place, in the year 1522, St. Ignatius composed the book of\n _Exercises_, the first written in the Society of Jesus, which has been\n approved by a bull from his Holiness Paul III.\u201d\n\n At the right, as you enter, is a projection, or shelf, in the wall, on\n which the _Spiritual Exercises_ were written, and there is a cross\n hollowed in the rock where the saint used to trace the holy sign before\n beginning to write. One\u2019s first impulse is to kiss the ground where his\n holy feet once stood, and pray where he so often prayed. St. Ignatius\n said he learned more in one short hour of prayer in the cave of Manresa\n than all the doctors in the world could have taught him. Here, like St.\n Jerome, trembling before the judgments of God, he used to smite his\n breast with a hard stone. Here he wept over the sufferings of Christ,\n with whose bodily Presence he was often favored, as well as the\n presence of the angels and their Queen. \u201cFlow fast, my tears,\u201d wrote he\n in this very place, \u201cbreak forth, my heart, in bitter sighs, that I may\n weep worthily over the sorrows of my Saviour! O Jesus! may I die before\n I cease to have a horror of sin. God liveth, in whose sight I stand;\n for while there is breath in me, and the spirit of life in my nostrils,\n my lips shall not give utterance nor my heart consent to\n iniquity.\u201d[200]\n\n A phalanx from his right hand is preserved here in a crystal reliquary,\n set in gold and jewels, on which is graven the Scriptural exclamation\n of Pope Paul III. after reading the Constitutions of St. Ignatius:\n\n Digitus Dei est hic. Paulus III.\n\n \u2014The finger of God is here!...\n\n Over the altar is a large bas-relief of the saint, kneeling before a\n cross in the Holy Cave and gazing up at the Virgin, who, enthroned on a\n cloud, is dictating to him the _Spiritual Exercises_, according to the\n constant local tradition. This relief is framed in black marble with\n white mouldings, and on each side are angels of white marble playing on\n musical instruments. These, as well as the other sculptures, were done\n by Francisco Grau, a Manresan artist of local celebrity. Among the\n others is one in which St. Ignatius, arrayed like the Spanish\n _caballero_ he was, with sword in hand, is keeping his vigil before the\n altar of Our Lady of Montserrat. In the next he is giving his rich\n garments to a beggar, coming down from the mount. Beyond is the miracle\n of the Pozo, of which we shall speak further on, and many such.\n\n There were, at the time of our visit, four Jesuit Fathers in the\n adjoining _Casa_, and a daily service was held in the Santa Cueva. Many\n indulgences are attached to the place, on the usual conditions, granted\n by Pope Gregory XV. and other pontiffs. The cave, of course, was\n regarded from the time of St. Ignatius as a place singularly favored by\n Heaven. In his day it belonged to Don Fernando Roviralta, a great\n friend of the saint. He lived to be over a hundred years of age, and at\n his death he bequeathed it to his nephew, Don Mauricio Cardona, who\n sold it January 27, 1602, to the Marquesa de Ailona, who in the\n following year gave it to the Jesuits. As soon as it fell into their\n possession means were used to ornament it, and in the course of time a\n _Casa de retiro_ was built adjoining, with a church intended to be one\n of the finest in Catalonia. The Countess of Fuentes, a native of\n Manresa, gave one thousand escudos to ornament the Holy Cave. Don Pedro\n Osorio, commissary-general of Lombardy, came here on foot from\n Barcelona when seventy years of age, and presented eight thousand\n escudos for the same purpose. And finally the crown took it under its\n protection, and Philip V. gave it a valuable chalice on which were\n graven the royal arms. Not only Don John of Austria, but several of the\n kings of Spain, came here to visit a place of historic as well as\n religious interest, for the mysterious influences that have gone out of\n this Holy Cave have been a power in the world. The public documents of\n Manresa show the devotion of the Christian world to have been such that\n some days in the year 1606 there were more than a thousand visitors,\n many of whom came from a distance. They used to carry away with them\n pieces of the Holy Cave, which they preserved as relics. A fragment was\n sent to Queen Margaret of Austria, who had it set in gold surrounded by\n rubies and diamonds, and wore it on festivals of great solemnity.\n\n When St. Ignatius came to Manresa there were only about a thousand\n families in the place, it having been reduced by wars and pestilence to\n one-fourth its former size. It is said that he stopped at the bridge\n leading to the city to pray at the chapel of Nuestra Se\u00f1ora de la\n Guia\u2014Our Lady of Guidance\u2014and was there supernaturally directed to the\n cave. It was then surrounded by shrubs and brambles, and was almost\n inaccessible. Though so near the city, it seemed retired, for it lay\n towards the broad valley, and was shaded by thorn-bushes and the\n cistus, which gave it an aspect of solitude. The pavement was uneven,\n and it was much smaller than at the present day. The birds of the air\n made it their home, and water trickled down the walls. The first thing\n the saint did was to prostrate himself on the ground and kiss it, then,\n with a sharp stone, trace a cross on the wall, still to be seen.\n\n From the windows of the passage now leading to the Santa Cueva is the\n same landscape St. Ignatius had before him from the mouth of the cave;\n only in his day the country was wilder, and therefore more beautiful,\n if possible, and there were no factories, no railway, in the valley to\n disturb the peaceful solitude. It is certainly a landscape of\n surpassing beauty, and we could imagine his exaltation of soul in\n gazing at it; for St. Ignatius had the soul of a poet and was a great\n admirer of nature. He loved to walk in the meadows and gardens, to\n observe the form, color, and odor of flowers; and from time to time,\n when at Rome, used to go forth on his balcony to look at the starry\n heavens, as if to refresh his soul.\n\n Directly beneath the cliff is the swift-gliding stream, and, beyond it,\n a hill crowned with the tower of Santa Catalina, then dark with sombre\n pines and gigantic oaks, but now descending in gentle terraces covered\n with the silvery olive. At the left opens the smiling valley of the\n Llobregat, covered with perpetual verdure, once called the Valle del\n Paraiso\u2014the Vale of Paradise\u2014and in the distance, against the bluest of\n heavens, rise the marvellous pinnacles of Montserrat, the sacred\n mountain of Spain.\n\n Over the present entrance to the Holy Cave is an ancient stone\n crucifix, once part of the famous Cruz del Tort, at which St. Ignatius\n so often went to pray. On the eve of his festival, 1627, the Christ was\n seen, to the astonishment of every one present at Vespers, to exude\n blood, first from the side, then from the hands and feet, and finally\n from the thorn-crowned head. We went to visit the cross from which it\n was removed for preservation. On leaving the Santa Cueva we kept on, up\n the side of the hill, by a circuitous road the saint must often have\n trod, then towards the east by an old narrow street. We passed a\n crucifix in a niche, with red curtains before it, and a hanging lamp.\n Just beyond came several peasants with scarlet Catalan caps, broad\n purple sashes, blue trowsers, black velvet jackets, and alpargatas\n laced with wide blue tape across their white stockings. They were\n driving mules that looked as gay as their owners, with their heads\n streaming with bright tassels and alive with tinkling bells. We soon\n came to a house on which was a fresco representing the Virgin appearing\n to St. Ignatius. Just opposite this was a terrace on the edge of the\n hill, where stood the Cruz del Tort, a lofty stone cross with several\n stone steps around the base. It was on these steps that St. Ignatius,\n while praying here one day, as he was accustomed to do, and shedding\n floods of tears, had the mystery of the Holy Trinity made clear to him\n by some vision which he compares to three keys of a musical instrument.\n His eyes were opened to a new sense of divine things. His doubts fell\n off like a garment. His whole nature seemed changed, and he felt ready,\n if need were, to die for what was here made manifest to him. On the\n cross is this inscription:\n\n\n Hic habvit St. Ignativs\n Trinitatis visionem, 1522.\n\n\n While we were saying a prayer at the foot of the cross a peasant woman,\n who was passing by, stopped to tell us how San Ignacio came here to do\n penance and had a vision of God. The terrace occupies an opening\n between the houses which frame an incomparable view over the valley of\n the Llobregat, with the solemn turrets of Montserrat in full sight. The\n tall gray cross against that golden sky, with the Vale of Paradise\n spread out at the foot, is certainly one of the most ravishing views it\n is possible to conceive. Steps descend from the cross, winding a little\n way down the side of the cliff, which is covered with ivy, to a pretty\n fountain fed by clear water bubbling from the rocks.\n\n Turning back from the Cruz del Tort, and passing through the suburbs,\n we soon came into the city among streets that looked centuries old. We\n passed San Antonio in a niche, and soon came to a small Plaza with a\n painting of St. Dominic at the corner, and in the centre a stone\n obelisk with a long inscription, of which we give a literal\n translation:\n\n \u201cTo Ignatius de Loyola, son of Beltran, a native of Cantabria,\n the founder of the Society of Jesus, who, in his thirtieth\n year, while valiantly fighting in defence of his country, was\n dangerously wounded, but being cured by the special mercy of\n God, and inspired with an ardent desire to visit the holy\n places at Jerusalem, after making a vow of chastity, set forth\n on the way, and, laying aside his military ensigns in the\n temple of Mary, the Mother of God, at Montserrat, clothed\n himself in sackcloth, and in this state of destitution came to\n this place, where with fastings and prayers he wept over his\n past offences, and avenged them like a fresh soldier of Christ.\n In order to perpetuate the memory of his heroic acts, for the\n glory of Christ and the honor of the Society, Juan Bautista\n Cardona, a native of Valencia, bishop of Vich, and appointed to\n the see of Tortosa, out of great devotion to the said father\n and his order, dedicates this stone to him as a most holy man\n to whom the whole Christian world is greatly indebted, Sixtus\n V. being pope, and Philip II. the great and Catholic king of\n Spain.\u201d\n\n On another side is the following:\n\n \u201cThis monument, having been overthrown during a time of\n calamity, has been restored and commended to posterity by the\n most noble ayuntamiento of the city of Manresa, out of\n ineffaceable love, Pius V. being Sovereign Pontiff, Carlos IV.\n king, and Ignacio de la Justicia governor of the city. 1799.\u201d\n\n Bishop Cardona, the first to set up this monument, was an able writer\n of the golden age of Spanish literature, and a man of such vast\n knowledge that he was employed by Philip II. in the formation of the\n royal library at the Escorial. He was a great admirer of St. Ignatius,\n and left an inedited manuscript, now in the National Library, entitled\n _Laus St. Ignatii_.\n\n While we were standing before this obelisk we were agreeably convinced\n that, notwithstanding all the ravages of pestilence and the massacres\n of the French, the good and loyal city was in no danger of being\n depopulated; for the doors of a large edifice on one side of the square\n opened, and forth came a swarm of boys that could not have been\n equalled, it seemed to us, since the famous crusade of children in the\n thirteenth century. They came from a school in what was once the\n Jesuits\u2019 college, built out of the ancient hospital of Santa Lucia,\n where St. Ignatius used to minister to the sick, and sometimes seek\n shelter himself. This was what we were in search of. Connected with the\n college is the modern church of St. Ignatius, and from one side of the\n nave you enter the old church of the hospital, which has been carefully\n preserved. Here we found the Capilla del Rapto, a small square chapel,\n opening into the aisle and covered with frescos. It is so called\n because it was here St. Ignatius lay rapt in ecstasy from the hour of\n complines on the eve of Passion Sunday till the same hour on the\n following Saturday. It was during this wonderful withdrawal into the\n spiritual world that the foundation of the Society of Jesus was\n revealed to him, as is stated in an inscription on the wall. For more\n than two centuries a solemn octave has been annually celebrated here in\n commemoration of this divine ecstasy. Beneath the simple altar lies the\n saint in effigy, wearing the coarse robe which made the _gamins_ of\n that day call him _El Saco_, or Old Sackcloth, till they found out he\n was a saint. Over the altar is a painting of the Rapto, in which,\n unable to endure the vision of Christ Glorified with mortal eyes, St.\n Ignatius is mercifully rapt in ecstasy. Angels bend around him, holding\n the banner of the Holy Name that has become the watchword of the\n Society. _In hoc vocabitur tibi nomen._ On one side of the chapel he is\n represented catechising the children, and on the other he stands in his\n penitential garments, exhorting the patients of the hospital, while\n some lord, doubtless Don Andr\u00e9s de Amigant, is kneeling to him in\n reverence.\n\n The original pavement of stone is covered with a wooden floor to\n preserve it, but a brass plate, on which is inscribed the name of\n Jesus, is raised to show the spot where the saint\u2019s head lay in his\n ecstasy. The stone is worn with kisses, and has been partly cut away by\n pilgrims. Behind the chapel is the room where he used to teach children\n the catechism, and there is the same old stone stoup for holy-water\n that was used in his day. Here, too, is an inscription:\n\n\n Serviendo en este Hospital\n Ignacio a gloria Divina,\n Ense\u00f1aba la Doctrina\n En las piedras de este umbral.\n\n\n A few months after his arrival at Manresa St. Ignatius fell ill and was\n taken to this hospital among the poor with whom he now identified\n himself. But Don Andr\u00e9s de Amigant, a nobleman of the place, soon had\n him removed to his own house, where he and his wife nursed him till he\n recovered. It was a pious custom of theirs to take two patients from\n the hospital every year, and tend them as if our Saviour in person. For\n this Don Andr\u00e9s was styled \u201cSimon the Leper\u201d by the wits of Manresa,\n and Do\u00f1a I\u00f1\u00e9s, his wife, was called Martha. This admirable charity had\n been practised in the family nearly two hundred years. It appears by a\n MS. in possession of the Marquis de Palmerola, its present\n representative, that a remote ancestor of his, Gaspar de Amigant,\n introduced the practice into his family in 1364, out of devotion. He\n added two rooms to his house, where he kept two poor patients,\n providing every remedy and means of subsistence, and, as soon as they\n recovered, diligently sought out others to supply their places, that,\n as he said, so religious an exercise might never be wanting in his\n family. How faithful his descendants were to so holy a practice appears\n from the statement that Juan de Amigant in 1478, having, \u201caccording to\n his custom,\u201d received a woman named Ign\u00e8s Buxona into his house, she\n bequeathed to him when she died, having no relations, the patronage of\n the benefice of San Francisco in the Seo of Manresa.\n\n Many traditions concerning St. Ignatius have been preserved in this\n pious family. A cross has been recently discovered on the wall of the\n chapel of _S. Ignacio enfermo_ during some repairs, similar to that in\n the Santa Cueva. And there is a curious old family painting\n commemorating his illness in the house. The convalescent saint is\n represented sitting up in bed, supported by the left hand of Don\n Andr\u00e9s, who with his right offers him a cup of broth. Behind are Do\u00f1a\n Angela, his mother, Do\u00f1a I\u00f1\u00e9s, his wife, and all the other members of\n the household, each one with some restoring dish in hand. In front of\n the bed is the inscription:\n\n Stvs\n Ignativs\n de Loyola\n lang\n vens\n\n \u2014that is, St. Ignatius ill.\n\n At the foot of the bed is another:\n\n\n H\u00e6c omnia evenervnt 22 Ivlii anno 1522.\n\n\n \u2014All these things took place July 22, 1522. His illness, by this,\n appears to have occurred about four months after his arrival at\n Manresa.\n\n The honor of having St. Ignatius was disputed by many noble families of\n the place. In the _patio_ of one of the houses he sometimes visited, in\n the street called Sobreroca, is a picture of him, now indulgenced by\n the diocesan authority.\n\n The college of St. Ignatius was founded in 1603. The ayuntamiento of\n Manresa, touched by a discourse during the Lent of 1601 at the Seo,\n purchased the ancient hospital of Santa Lucia, and established the\n Jesuits here soon after. The college became a flourishing institution,\n and they were before long able to build a new church and adorn the\n precious chapel of the Rapto.\n\n When Carlos III. issued the decree for the expulsion of the Jesuits,\n April 3, 1767, the residence at Manresa was at first overlooked, and\n the fathers, as usual, celebrated the octave of the _Maravilloso\n Rapto_. On the very day it ended, April 11, the eve of Palm Sunday, at\n the same hour when St. Ignatius awoke from his mysterious trance,\n crying: \u201cAy Jesus! Ay Jesus!\u201d the venerable fathers were seized and\n carried away amid the tears of the citizens to Tarragona, where they\n were put on a vessel of war, and, with nine hundred from Aragon, were\n transported to Ajaccio. The island of Corsica had on it at one time\n three thousand Jesuits who, for no crime, had been barbarously torn\n from their native land. Among them were the venerable Pignatelli and\n several who were eminent for letters. But on the 15th of August, 1769,\n Napoleon Bonaparte was born at Ajaccio, who proved the scourge of\n Spain.\n\n The churches of the Jesuits were dismantled and the temporalities sold.\n The vestments and sacred vessels were given to poor churches of the\n diocese, but even these were mostly sold afterwards to help to defray\n the expenses of the war of independence. The chalice of Philip V.,\n given to the Santa Cueva, was, however, saved.\n\n Manresa has the glory of having been the first city in Catalonia to\n sound the war-cry against Bonaparte, and by the battle of Bruch, in\n which a handful of men routed the French army, to convince Spain that\n the Great Captain\u2019s troops were not invincible. After the French had\n captured Tortosa they came to Manresa, and the house of the Santa Cueva\n was turned into a barrack and the church into a stable. With the\n restoration of the Bourbons returned the Jesuits. At Manresa the people\n rang the bells, and went out to meet them with cries of _Viva la\n Compa\u00f1ia_! The mules were taken from their carriages, and men drew them\n to the Seo, where the clergy and people with tears of emotion chanted\n the _Te Deum_. On July 25, 1816, they were reinstated in their former\n places, the keys of the Santa Cueva were presented to them in a silver\n basket, and on the 31st of July the festival of St. Ignatius was\n celebrated with solemn pomp in the Seo, with a congratulatory discourse\n on the restoration of the society.\n\n Manresa has always been a religious city, as is to be seen by the\n number of solidly-built churches and the remains of its monastic\n institutions. When St. Ignatius quitted the place it is said there was\n hardly a person left unconverted. And when he was canonized there was a\n general explosion of joy, exhibited in Spanish fashion by dances,\n comedies, Moorish fights, illuminations, fireworks, salvos of\n artillery, triumphal arches and bowers\u2014all of which contrast strangely\n with the penitential life of the saint in his cave.\n\n There is something very friendly and cordial about the people.\n Inquiring our way to the Seo of an old woman, she said as she pointed\n it out: \u201cGo with God; may he preserve you from all ill.\u201d\n\n We went on through the steep, narrow streets, which are often hewn out\n of the rock. The houses show traces of war and violence, and would be\n gloomy but for the galleries and hanging gardens with flowers and\n orange-trees. The women were gossiping from balcony to balcony. The\n _plazas_ were lively with trade. Everywhere was an interesting picture\n of Spanish life. In one place we passed a group of women around a well,\n washing at a huge tank, beating their clothes with wooden paddles, all\n laughing, all talking, all looking up with a flash of wonderful\n expression in their brown faces.\n\n The Seo is an immense Gothic edifice, the first stone of which was laid\n October 9, 1328, but the crypt is several centuries older. The nave is\n of enormous width, which gives it an air of grandeur, and there are\n some fine stained windows, though greatly injured by the French. It is\n gloomy, but, when lighted up for a solemn service, presents an imposing\n appearance. There are queer Saracens\u2019 heads on the walls of the choir,\n and steps lead to one of those subterranean churches full of solemn\n gloom so favorable to meditation and solitary prayer.\n\n Among the notable things to be seen at Manresa is the Pozo di Gallina,\n where took place what is called the _primer milagro_ of St. Ignatius.\n Tradition says, as he was crossing the principal street of the city,\n called Sobreroca, on his way from the Carmen to the hospital of Santa\n Lucia, he met a child crying for fear of her mother, because the hen\n she was carrying home had escaped and fallen into an old well close by.\n Touched by her grief, the saint paused a moment, as if in prayer, and,\n while he stood, the water in the well rose to the brim, bringing with\n it the hen, which with a smile he restored to the child and went on his\n way. An oratory was afterwards built here, and the healing virtues of\n the water\u2014such is the power of charity\u2014have often been experienced by\n the people of Manresa, as is testified by the inscription from the pen\n of the learned Padre Ramon Sol\u00e1:\n\n\n Disce, viator, amor quid sit quo Ignatius ardet\n Testis aqua est, supplex hanc bibe, doctus abi.\n\n\n S. Ignacio de Loyola\n en el a\u00f1o del Se\u00f1or de 1522\n hizo aqui el primer milagro\n sacando viva \u00e1 flote hasta el\n borde una gallina ya ahogada.\n\n\n This favored hen naturally became an object of special care, and it\n seems to have become the ancestress of an illustrious breed which kings\n did not disdain to have set before them at table.\n\n We can fancy this _gallina resucitada_ laying now and then an egg, as\n Hawthorne says of the Pyncheon hens, \u201cnot for any pleasure of her own,\n but that the world might not absolutely lose so admirable a breed.\u201d\n Brillat-Savarin pretended that the redeeming merit of the Jesuits was\n the discovery and introduction of the turkey into Europe.[201] Had he\n only known of this race of hens, rendered meet for the palates of\n princes by their great founder, they might have had an additional title\n to his approbation. Father Prout, speaking of the Jesuits being accused\n of having a hand in every political disturbance for the last three\n hundred years, compares them to Mother Carey\u2019s chickens, which always\n make their appearance in a storm, and, for this reason, give rise to a\n belief among sailors that it is the _fowl_ that has raised the tempest!\n How ominous, then, was this Spanish hen of Manresa! We could not find\n out whether there are any scions of this time-honored race still living\n in their ancestral coops, or whether they were all suppressed with the\n order as dangerous to the state; but we do know that six of the\n breed\u2014three _pollos_ and three _pollas_\u2014in a line direct from the\n famous hen, were, in the beginning of the year 1603 (the miracle of the\n Pozo, it must be remembered, took place in 1522), sent to her Catholic\n majesty, Queen Margaret of Austria, who received them with as many\n demonstrations of pleasure as would have been consistent with royal\n etiquette in Spain.\n\n We trust no supposititious egg was ever smuggled into the nest of this\n illustrious _gallina_ to deteriorate the breed. P\u00e8re Vani\u00e8re, a learned\n French Jesuit of note in the last century, has described in an able\n Latin poem, part of which has been translated by Delille, the sorrows\n of a poor old hen when she found, for instance, that she had hatched a\n brood of ducks, which became the torment of her life by their\n inclination for water. As Hood has it:\n\n\n \u201cThe thing was strange\u2014a contradiction\n It seemed of nature and her works,\n For little chicks beyond conviction\n To float without the aid of corks.\u201d\n\n\n Imagine, then, the woes of this maternal hen, in her new-fledged pride\n of race, should any Moorish or Guinea fowl taint her ennobled Spanish\n blood!\n\n There is a hotel at Manresa, called the Chicken, of about the same\n stamp as the San Domingo, though Mr. Bayard Taylor, whose experience in\n such matters transcends ours, satisfied himself that, \u201calthough the\n Saint has altogether a better sound than the Chicken, the Chicken is\n really better than the Saint!\u201d\n\n It was one of St. Ignatius\u2019 favorite devotions, while at Manresa, to\n visit the sanctuary of Our Lady of Viladordis, on the banks of the\n Llobregat, about three miles from the city. The last time he went there\n he gave his hempen girdle of three strands to the tenant of a\n neighboring farm-house who had often offered him hospitality, and\n assured him that as long as he and his posterity should continue to aid\n the poor they would never lack the means of a decent livelihood, and,\n though they might not attain great wealth, they would never be reduced\n to absolute poverty; which prophecy has been fulfilled to the present\n day, for the family still continues to exist. In this rural church a\n solemn jubilee is celebrated every year on Whitmonday in memory of St.\n Ignatius. Over the altar is a picture of the saint inscribed: \u201cSt.\n Ignatius, founder of the Jesuits, in the year 1522, the first of his\n conversion, frequented this church of Our Lady of Viladordis, and here\n received singular favors from Heaven, in memory of which this devout\n and grateful parish dedicates this portrait, Feb. 19, 1632.\u201d\n\n In 1860 Queen Isabella II., the great-granddaughter of Carlos III.,\n came to Manresa, and, after visiting the Santa Cueva, expressed a wish\n to the city authorities that a monument so important in the religious\n history of Spain, and associated with the chief glory of Manresa,\n should be carefully preserved. This excited fresh interest. Spontaneous\n contributions from the _devotos de S. Ignacio_ flowed in for the\n restoration of the church and the ornamentation of the cave. To the\n former was transferred the miraculous image of Nuestra Se\u00f1ora de la\n Guia, before which St. Ignatius often used to pray. Pope Pius IX.\n conferred new indulgences on the Holy Cave, and its ancient glory had\n already revived when the revolution of September, 1868, broke out,\n overthrowing the royal government and compelling the Jesuits once more\n to take the road of exile. But the bishop of the diocese has watched\n over the cave, and it continues to be visited by pilgrims from all\n parts of the world.\n\n A visit to the Santa Cueva marks an era in one\u2019s life; for it is one of\n those places that produce an ineffaceable impression on the soul. Thank\n God! there are such places where the claims of a higher life assert\n themselves with irresistible force. Who that ever made a retreat with\n the _Spiritual Exercises_ in hand has not turned longingly to the Holy\n Cave in which they were written? Followed there, they seem to acquire\n new significance and authority. Wonderful book, that for three hundred\n years has on the one hand been regarded with admiration and love, and\n on the other been the object of distortion and abuse! Some have gone so\n far as to declare it a book of servilism and degradation; others, more\n happy, look upon it as an inexhaustible mine of wise directions in the\n practice of virtue. The sons of St. Ignatius have never ceased to\n meditate on the little volume which embodies the religious experience\n of their founder. They cherish it the more for giving them so large a\n draught in the chalice of ignominy, and they carry it with them through\n the wilderness of this world, as the children of Israel did the ark, to\n ensure their happy progress in the spiritual life. Pope Paul III., in\n his bull _Pastoralis Officii_, says: \u201cOut of our apostolic authority\n and certain knowledge, we approve, we praise, we confirm by this\n document these teachings and these spiritual exercises, exhorting in\n the Lord, with all our might, the faithful of both sexes, one and all,\n to make use of these _Exercises_, so full of piety, and to follow their\n salutary directions.\u201d\n\n Manresa may well be proud of her Holy Cave, for it was here the great\n soul of St. Ignatius was tempered for his vast undertakings. But he did\n not indulge in any spiritual dalliance. His work once planned, he went\n boldly forth to achieve it.\n\n\n \u201cForth to his task the giant sped;\n Earth shook abroad beneath his tread,\n And idols were laid low.\n\n \u201cIndia repaired half Europe\u2019s loss;\n O\u2019er a new hemisphere the cross\n Shone in the azure sky,\n And, from the isles of far Japan\n To the broad Andes, won o\u2019er man\n A bloodless victory!\u201d\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE MIRACLE OF SEPTEMBER 16, 1877.\n\n ABRIDGED FROM THE FRENCH OF M. HENRI LASSERRE.\n\n In the month of August, 1874, Canon Martignon, previously\n _cur\u00e9-archipr\u00eatre_ of Algiers, arrived at Lourdes. He was a man of\n about forty years of age, and while in Africa had been attacked by an\n affection of the chest which entirely deprived him of the use of his\n voice; he had therefore crossed the Mediterranean to seek healing in\n the city of Mary.\n\n At the rocks of Massabielle he prayed, drank of the miraculous font,\n and bathed in the piscina, but without obtaining the cure he sought.\n\n Not disheartened, he resolved to make a novena. This, too, was\n unaccompanied by any change for the better.\n\n \u201cWell, then,\u201d he said, \u201cI will make a novena of weeks.\u201d And he took up\n his abode at Lourdes for sixty-three days.\n\n On the sixty-fourth day, finding himself in absolutely the same state,\n he left for Pau, to seek a temporary alleviation in the mildness of its\n climate. But soon reproaching himself for having quitted Lourdes, and\n regarding his having done so as an act of weakness and a want of faith,\n and, moreover, possessing in the depth of his heart a conviction that\n sooner or later the Blessed Virgin would grant his prayer, he returned\n to the sacred grotto and took up his abode in the town.\n\n An invalid, he constituted himself the guide and guardian of the sick\n and suffering. Pilgrims who of late years may have spent any time at\n Lourdes will recollect having seen there a priest, still young, with a\n long, light beard, a distinguished countenance, with a bright\n earnestness and sweetness in the expression of the eyes; a tall, slight\n figure, the chest somewhat narrowed and the shoulders bent by\n suffering\u2014a priest who led the blind, assisted the lame and infirm, to\n the piscina, and spent the whisper of his failing voice in cheering and\n consoling the afflicted. This was the Abb\u00e9 Martignon.\n\n \u201cIf Our Blessed Lady does not cure me this time,\u201d he would say,\n smiling, \u201cI have made up my mind for a novena of years, then a novena\n of centuries; and after that I will stop.\u201d\n\n He had the joy of seeing several of the sick of whom he had been the\n guide and stay miraculously cured; but he himself, though experiencing\n at times some slight alleviation, did not obtain the complete recovery\n he sought.\n\n Did he at last feel that there was some secret resistance on the part\n of the Blessed Virgin to grant the favor he solicited? We do not know;\n but it seemed to us that, while his faith continued the same and his\n charity ever on the increase, the virtue of hope was with him gradually\n turning into that of resignation\u2014or, to speak more accurately, that he\n was _postponing_ his hope. Happy to remain in this corner of the earth,\n on which the feet of the Queen of Heaven had rested, and to pray daily\n at the sacred grotto, he did not begin the novena of years and of\n centuries of which he had smilingly spoken.\n\n \u201cI stay here,\u201d he would say, \u201cat the disposal of Our Lady of Lourdes,\n like a person sitting in an ante-chamber waiting for an audience. She\n will hear me when she pleases. My turn will come; I shall have my hour\n or minute, and will take care not to let it escape me.\u201d\n\n For this hour and this minute he waited three years. Then, a few months\n ago, he felt an impulse within him urging him to knock again at the\n heavenly gate. He resolved to make a novena which should end on the\n Feast of Our Lady of the Seven Dolors. He had not observed that, this\n being a movable feast, the first day of the novena would this year\n (1877) coincide with the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin,[202] and that\n his prayer would thus go, as it were, from the birth of Mary to the\n last sigh of Jesus\u2014from the cradle of the Mother to the sepulchre of\n her Son.\n\n Had the Abb\u00e9 Martignon been cured he would have returned to Algeria;\n and we imagine that if at first the Blessed Virgin refused his request,\n it was because she had no intention of so soon granting leave of\n departure to such a servant. Neither God nor his priest were losing\n anything by this refusal. When such and such a temporal blessing\u2014that\n is to say, the copper coin\u2014is denied to our prayers, it is because the\n gold and the rich increase are being laid up in store for us, either in\n this world or the world to come. Besides, a new mission had been\n imposed on the ardent zeal and charity of the Abb\u00e9 Martignon: one which\n flowed naturally from the function to which he devoted himself of\n consoling the afflicted.\n\n From the commencement of his sojourn at Lourdes he had found a man more\n suffering than the sick and more tried than the ordinarily afflicted,\n and to him also he had ministered aid and support. He to whom we\n allude\u2014the Abb\u00e9 Peyramale\u2014had had the signal honor of receiving a\n message from heaven, and of accomplishing, in spite of every obstacle,\n the divine command. But the Blessed Virgin, doubtless reserving for him\n a higher place, had said: \u201cI will show him how much he must suffer for\n love of me\u201d; and the most unlooked-for troubles had been sent to\n torture his heroic heart.\n\n By a strange contrast he was at the same time on Calvary and on Thabor.\n While his name was celebrated throughout Christendom, while he was\n blessed by the people whose beloved father and patriarch he was, he had\n also, especially during these latter times, the bitter pain of being\n misjudged, forsaken, and obstinately persecuted in that matter which he\n had most at heart\u2014in his zeal for the Lord\u2019s house. Like the Cyrenian,\n he was the man bearing the cross, and his robust shoulders were bruised\n and bleeding beneath the sacred burden, while around his sufferings, as\n around those of his Master, many shook their heads, saying: \u201cHe has\n been the instrument of Mary; let her now help and deliver him!\u201d\n\n When, at the time of the apparitions, now nearly twenty years ago, he\n had asked Our Lady to make roses bloom in the time of snow, she, who\n was in that same place to work so many miracles, refused this one, and\n to the priest whom she had chosen replied by the austere word,\n \u201c_Penance_.\u201d The illustrious Abb\u00e9 Peyramale, the priest of the\n Immaculate Conception, had thus been condemned to suffer. It was he of\n whom, for some years, the Abb\u00e9 Martignon was the filial comforter and\n the friend of every hour.\n\n It is not our purpose here to dwell on the sorrows beneath the weight\n of which sank the venerable cur\u00e9 of Lourdes; we would only call to mind\n that, when the basilica of the grotto was completed and enriched with\n the gifts of all the world\u2014the basilica which was to be the point of\n arrival for the processions commanded by Our Lady\u2014he undertook to\n rebuild the parish church, which ought to be their point of departure.\n\n He died at his work, without having been able to complete it, and\n having more than once announced his death as a sort of necessity\u2014a last\n sacrifice on his part in the interest of the house of God.\n\n The unfinished church had stopped at the height of the arches. Aid on\n which he had been led to rely had failed him, and his efforts had been\n impeded by inconceivable hostilities.\n\n \u201cI shall not enter the promised land,\u201d he would say; \u201cI shall only see\n it afar off. _I must die to repair the ruin._ When I am here no more,\n all difficulties will be smoothed. My death will pay all\u201d\u2014sorrowful\n words, which brought tears to his eyes and to the eyes of those who\n loved him! We ourselves had the sad consolation of being present at his\n departure. God chose the Feast of the Nativity of Our Blessed Lady to\n open the gates of eternity to her faithful servant.\n\n Around the death-bed of Mgr. Peyramale were his brother and other\n relations, his _vicaires_, friends, and those of his flock who had been\n able to penetrate into his room. Among this tearful family was the Abb\u00e9\n Martignon, broken down with grief, and scarcely thinking of himself,\n his malady, or his cure, or yet of his novena to Our Lady of the Seven\n Dolors, which, by a curious coincidence, was to begin that same day.\n\n Mgr. Peyramale, after a long agony, had just rendered his last sigh to\n earth and his immortal soul to God. In that hour of grief and\n desolation his friend, while raising his heart to her who is the\n _Consolatrix Afflictorum_, recollected his promised novena.\n\n What was passing in his mind? Kneeling by that bed and holding in his\n the lifeless hands of the cur\u00e9 of Lourdes, he remained for some time\n bowed down in silence. Then, rising, he said to some of those present:\n \u201cI have just said the first prayer of my novena to Our Lady of Sorrows,\n and made my request for a cure, in presence of these holy remains; and\n I conjure Our Lady of Lourdes to permit that in her own name, and _on\n the ninth day_, our friend may himself transmit to me the answer\u201d;\n adding: \u201cThe choice God has made of the 8th of September to call to\n himself the Priest of the Apparitions sufficiently authorizes me to\n associate his first remembrance (_souvenir_) with my humble\n supplication.\u201d\n\n Side by side with a great sorrow a great hope from this moment entered\n in and possessed the heart of the sick priest. The thought of recovery\n did not, assuredly, lessen his grief for the loss of his friend; but\n seeing himself henceforth alone in France, it was a happiness to him to\n know that his protector was in heaven, and that it would be doubtless\n owing to the intervention of that friend, next to that of God and Our\n Blessed Lady, that he should receive the favor so long solicited.\n\n He spoke of this with conviction. It seemed to him that, with such an\n intercessor, the Blessed Virgin would, _on the ninth day_, put herself\n in some sort at the disposal of his prayer. He even wrote to Paris, to\n the Rev. P\u00e8re Picard of the Assumption, to tell him of his hope.\n Already he spoke of what he would do when he was cured, and how he\n would employ himself in furthering the unfinished work of the cur\u00e9 of\n Lourdes. He prayed with fervor; friends joined him in his novena; and\n thus the time went on until Saturday, the 15th of September\u2014the eve of\n _the ninth day_.\n\n On this Saturday, in the morning, he received a telegram to tell him\n that M. and Mme. Guerrier were on their way to Lourdes, and to ask if\n he would kindly meet them at the station with a carriage.\n\n M. and Mme. Guerrier were utterly unknown to him. A letter only, which\n he had received from the cur\u00e9 of St. Gobain twenty-four hours before\n the telegram, informed him that Mme. Guerrier had for several years\n been suffering from a very serious illness, and was starting for\n Lourdes to seek a cure, full of faith that it would be granted. This\n lady and her husband were earnestly recommended to the Abb\u00e9 Martignon,\n as this was their first visit to the city of the Blessed Virgin.\n\n The canon gladly undertook this act of charity, and went to the station\n in good time to meet the three o\u2019clock train. Leaving him for a time\n occupied with his Breviary in the waiting-room, we will relate by what\n series of circumstances M. and Mme. Guerrier were brought to Lourdes on\n that day.\n\n M. Edouard Guerrier, judge of the peace at Beaune, married, about\n fifteen years ago, Mlle. Justine Biver, a religious and excellent lady.\n Her father was a distinguished physician, and her two brothers occupied\n high commercial positions, one being general director of the Company of\n St. Gobain, and the other director of the celebrated glass\n manufactories of St. Gobain and Chauny.\n\n God had blessed this union with three children, healthy and\n intelligent, to whose training and education their mother devoted\n herself, bringing them up especially in the love of God and of the\n poor.\n\n Thus passed eleven years of unbroken happiness. In 1874, however, a\n dark cloud suddenly over-shadowed this clear sky. The health of Mme.\n Guerrier broke down rapidly, and violent headaches, frequent faintings,\n and increasing weakness were succeeded by a general state of paralysis,\n which seized successively several important organs of the frame. The\n spine and lower limbs became powerless, and the sight dim and\n enfeebled. The sufferer was unable to sit up in bed, and obliged to\n remain always lying down. Finally the lower limbs became not only\n incapable of movement but insensible to pain, so that, if pinched or\n pricked, they remained without feeling. During the long fits of\n fainting it often seemed as if life must become extinct. Death was\n knocking at the door, and mourning had already entered the home lately\n so bright with happiness.\n\n Unable to continue the education of her children, the poor mother could\n only assist them in their religious duties. Night and morning they\n knelt at her bedside, adding to their prayers an earnest petition for\n her recovery.\n\n In this state Mme. Guerrier had continued about two years, when Alice,\n her eldest girl, was about to make her First Communion, on April 2,\n 1876. This great day constantly occupied the thoughts of this Christian\n mother. She thought of it for her child, and also a little for herself.\n It seemed to her as if, in coming to take possession of this young\n heart, the compassionate Saviour would surely bring some relief to her\n own great needs, and leave in the house some royal token of his visit\n and sojourn there. Had he not, on entering the house of Simon Peter,\n healed the sick mother-in-law, enabling her to rise and serve him?\n\n \u201cI am certain of it,\u201d she said. \u201cOn that day I shall get up and walk.\u201d\n\n Alice made her First Communion on the appointed day; and in the evening\n the priest who had prepared her, and a few members of the family, were\n assembled at dinner. No change, however, had taken place in the state\n of the sick lady, and her place was remaining empty, as for so many\n months past, when, at the moment the party were about to sit down to\n table, suddenly recovering her lost powers, she rose, dressed, and came\n to take her place amid her family circle. Her sight was clear, the\n spine had recovered its strength, and she walked and moved with the\n same ease as before her illness.\n\n The priest intoned a hymn of thanksgiving, all present answering. Every\n one felt that He who that morning had given himself in the divine\n Banquet was invisibly present at the family feast. During the night\n Mme. Guerrier\u2019s sleep was calm and profound; but in the morning, when\n she attempted to rise, her limbs refused their service, having fallen\n back into their helpless state. Was it, then, a dream or an illusion?\n Was it an effect of the nerves, the imagination, or the will?\n\n The day of her daughter\u2019s First Communion He would not disappoint the\n mother\u2019s hope and faith.... But afterwards he willed her to understand\n that, for purposes known to him alone, she was still to bear the weight\n of her trial. The intolerable headaches returned no more, the faintings\n ceased, and the sight remained clear and distinct. From this day the\n resignation of Mme. Guerrier, already very great, became greater still.\n Her soul as well as her body had received grace from on high. The\n dimness of vision which had hidden from her the faces of her husband\n and children had disappeared before the breath of Heaven, and, although\n she remained infirm and always stretched upon her bed, she was filled\n with thankfulness and joy. From the beginning of her illness she had\n never seen her aged parents. She lived at Beaune, in the C\u00f4te d\u2019Or, and\n they at St. Gobain, in the department of Aisne, one hundred and forty\n leagues away, and, Dr. Biver being then in his eighty-second year, any\n journey was a difficulty to him. His daughter longed to see him once\n more, and from April to September this longing continued to increase.\n In vain the exceeding risk as well as difficulty of travelling in her\n state was represented to her; she at last persuaded her husband to\n consent to the imprudent undertaking upon which she had set her heart.\n\n As the physicians had foreseen, the journey very seriously aggravated\n Mme. Guerrier\u2019s sufferings, which increased to such a degree that, even\n after some weeks of repose, it was impossible for her to attempt to\n return to Beaune. The slightest movement often brought on an alarming\n crisis.\n\n The consequence of such a state, under existing circumstances, was\n nothing less than the breaking up of the family. The husband, on\n account of his duties as judge of the peace, was compelled to reside at\n Beaune, while the condition of his wife rendered it impossible for her\n to quit St. Gobain. She had asked to have her children with her, and\n thus, between every two audiences, when possible, M. Guerrier took a\n journey of one hundred and forty leagues and back, in order to spend a\n few days with those who made all the happiness of his life.\n\n Nearly a year passed in this way. A moment of improvement was\n constantly watched for which might permit Mme. Guerrier to travel; but\n this moment was waited for in vain. On the contrary, the paralysis was\n beginning to affect the left arm, and the thought of her journey\n thither made that of the homeward one very alarming.\n\n Last August, M. Guerrier being at St. Gobain in the same painful state\n of hope deferred, his wife astonished him by saying: \u201cMy dear, I wish\n to make a pilgrimage to Lourdes. I shall be cured there. You must take\n me.\u201d\n\n M. Guerrier, seriously alarmed at this proposal, energetically\n withstood an idea which he believed could not be acted upon without a\n fatal result.\n\n \u201cMy dear wife, you are asking impossibilities,\u201d he said. \u201cThink what it\n has cost us for having, eleven months ago, yielded to your wishes by\n attempting the journey from Beaune to St. Gobain! Remember that from\n that time you have not even been able to bear being carried into the\n garden or drawn a few paces in a sofa-chair. And yet you would venture\n to travel across France, to a part of the country where we are utter\n strangers, with the pleasant prospect of being unable to get away\n again! Do not think of it, dearest! It would be tempting God and\n running a risk that would be simply madness.\u201d\n\n \u201cI am certain that I shall be cured at Lourdes,\u201d was the answer, \u201cand I\n wish to go thither.\u201d\n\n It was a struggle of reason against faith and hope, and, both parties\n being resolute, the struggle lasted for some days. Mme. Guerrier\u2019s\n faith, however, communicated itself to her two brothers; they advised\n her husband to grant her wish, and he, weary of contention, at last\n gave a reluctant consent. Provided with a medical certificate as to the\n state of his wife\u2019s health, he requested of the minister a few weeks\u2019\n leave of absence, in order to take her to the Pyrenees.\n\n It was on Saturday, the 8th of September, Feast of the Nativity, that\n the journey was resolved upon.\n\n M. Guerrier felt, however, no small anxiety at the prospect (in case\n his worst fears should be realized) of finding himself in a place\n where, knowing no one, he could expect no aid or support beyond the\n services to be had at hotels.\n\n \u201cIf only,\u201d he said, \u201cI knew of any one there who could guide us a\n little! I shrink from this plunge into the unknown.\u201d\n\n On the 10th or 11th of September the Abb\u00e9 Poindron, cur\u00e9 of St. Gobain,\n saw, announced in a newspaper, the death of Mgr. Peyramale, and in the\n account given of his last moments observed the name of the Abb\u00e9\n Martignon. He went immediately to M. Guerrier, and said: \u201cYou will have\n some one at Lourdes to receive and direct you. I know Canon Martignon,\n and am writing to recommend you particularly to his kind care. On the\n way telegraph to him the hour of your arrival. He will be prepared for\n it.\u201d\n\n The exact time of the dreaded departure was then fixed for Wednesday,\n the 12th of September. It was arranged that the travellers should stop\n at Paris for a day\u2019s repose, and that the rest of the journey should,\n if possible, be made without another halt until they reached Lourdes.\n An invalid carriage was engaged of the railway company to be in\n readiness.\n\n Great was the anxiety of the family.... The children, however, rejoiced\n beforehand, implicitly believing that their mother would be cured:\n Marie, the youngest, who never remembered seeing her otherwise than in\n bed and infirm, exclaimed: \u201cMamma will come back to us like another\n mamma, and we shall have a mamma who can walk.\u201d\n\n \u201cAnd,\u201d joined in little Paul, who in this respect had sometimes envied\n other children of his acquaintance, \u201cmamma will be able to take us on\n her lap.\u201d\n\n \u201cYes,\u201d said Alice, \u201cshe will come back quite well.\u201d\n\n In order to spare Mme. Guerrier\u2019s aged father the uncertainties and\n anxieties which preceded the decision, he had not been told what was in\n contemplation until everything was arranged, and the only thing that\n remained was to obtain his consent.\n\n The venerable physician was deeply moved on hearing from his daughter\n her intention of visiting that distant sanctuary to seek from the\n Mother of God a cure which human science had proved powerless to\n effect. He consented without hesitation, and, when the moment of\n departure arrived, raised his hands over his afflicted child in a\n parting benediction.\n\n The journey was painful. At Paris it was not without great difficulty\n that Mme. Guerrier was transported to the house of her brother, M.\n Hector Biver.\n\n Their brother-in-law, M. Louis Bonnel, professor at the _lyc\u00e9e_ at\n Versailles, met them there. \u201cI have just ascertained,\u201d he said, \u201cthat\n Henri Lasserre is at Lourdes. I knew him formerly; he is a friend of\n mine. Here is a letter for him.\u201d And thus it was that the writer of the\n present account was enabled later to learn all its details.\n\n Notwithstanding the courage of the sick lady, her prostration was so\n complete when the train entered the station at Bordeaux that her\n husband dared not allow her then to go further, and insisted on her\n again taking a day\u2019s repose.\n\n * * * * *\n\n On Saturday, the 15th of September, the travellers arrived at Lourdes.\n The Abb\u00e9 Martignon was at the station, having prepared everything\n necessary. Two porters bore Mme. Guerrier to a commodious carriage, and\n the three repaired to the furnished apartments of Mme. Detroyat, where\n the abb\u00e9 had engaged a room. This room was on the first or second\n story, and the helpless state of Mme. Guerrier rendered it absolutely\n necessary that she should have one on the ground floor. The canon had\n not been made aware of this, and was consequently in much perplexity.\n\n \u201cDo not be uneasy,\u201d said Mme. Detroyat. \u201cYou are very likely to find a\n room that will suit you, close by, at the house of M. Lavigne.\u201d\n\n M. Lavigne is the owner of a very pleasant house, surrounded by shrubs\n and flowers. The garden gate opens on the highroad which passes through\n Lourdes and forms its principal street. The house is in the lower part\n of the town, between the _cit\u00e9_ and the station.\n\n M. Lavigne, with the greatest kindness, put his house at the disposal\n of the pilgrims, and thus they were soon installed in a large room on\n the ground floor, temporarily transformed into a bedroom and opening\n into the garden.\n\n After resting for a time they repaired to the grotto; M. Guerrier\n having engaged two men-servants to assist him in lifting his wife from\n the carriage to the foot of the statue of Mary Immaculate. It was then\n about five o\u2019clock. There it was that we first saw Mme. Guerrier. Her\n husband gave us the letter of M. Louis Bonnel, and thus we became\n acquainted with the trials of this family.\n\n The prayer of Mme. Guerrier was ardent and absorbed. Motionless and\n fixed, as if in ecstasy, her gaze never quitted the material\n representation of the Holy Virgin, who had appeared where now her image\n stands, and whom she had come so far to invoke. Everything in her\n countenance and aspect expressed faith and hope.\n\n Before setting out Mme. Guerrier had received absolution, and as much\n as possible disposed her soul for the reception of the great grace she\n implored. She was ready. Her husband, though a practical Christian, was\n still a little behindhand. Burdened as he had been with all the weight\n of temporal anxieties, he had not been quite so active in arranging for\n his spiritual needs. With an exceeding watchfulness he had attended to\n everything relating to the comfort of his charge, but the preparation\n of himself he had delayed, awaiting for this, the decisive moment and\n the latest hour.\n\n At Lourdes this hour came.\n\n Late in the evening he requested the Abb\u00e9 Martignon to hear his\n confession. As he had all along intended, he desired on the morrow to\n receive Holy Communion with his wife.\n\n And thus in the sacrament of penance, after the avowal of his faults,\n he had the consolation of pouring out his troubles and deep anxieties\n into the sympathizing heart of his confessor. The details of these\n confidences are the secret of God, but this we know well: that the\n confessor, who is God\u2019s lieutenant for the time, and who, in the name\n of the Father of all, pronounces the words of pity and pardon, often\n experiences, more fully than other men, the sentiment of deepest\n compassion. And great was the compassion of the Abb\u00e9 Martignon for the\n misfortune of this distressed husband, for the sufferings of the wife,\n and the mourning of their family. He put aside all consideration of\n himself to think only for them. Not that he forgot his own sufferings,\n or the bright hope with which he was looking forward to the morrow; on\n the contrary, he remembered this; but a thought of a higher order,\n which had already presented itself to his mind, recurred to him now,\n and he at once acted upon it.\n\n \u201cLet your wife have confidence,\u201d he said to his penitent, \u201cand do you\n have confidence as well. I saw her when she was praying this evening at\n the grotto. She is one of those who triumph over the heart of God and\n compel a miracle.\u201d Then, telling him about his own novena, he added:\n \u201cTo-morrow, then, at eight o\u2019clock I shall celebrate the Mass which is\n my last hope!... Well, say to Mme. Guerrier that not only will I say\n this Mass _for her_, but that, _if I am to have a share in the sensible\n answer which I solicit, I give up this share to her_. I make over to\n her intention all the previous prayers of this novena, and _I\n substitute her intentions for mine_, so that, if the answer is to be a\n cure, _it shall not be mine but hers_. Let her, before she goes to\n sleep to-night, and to-morrow on awaking, associate with her prayers\n the name of Mgr. Peyramale, and at eight o\u2019clock come, both of you, to\n my Mass at the basilica. I have good hope that something will happen.\u201d\n\n In accepting with simplicity such an offer as this M. and Mme. Guerrier\n could not measure the heroism and the extent of the sacrifice which the\n Abb\u00e9 Martignon was making in their favor. For this the knowledge of a\n long past was necessary\u2014a past of which they knew nothing.\n\n The sick lady did not fail to mingle in her prayers the name of Mgr.\n Peyramale, and towards eight o\u2019clock in the morning she was taken to\n the basilica to be present at the last Mass of this novena, her feeling\n of assured confidence in her recovery being singularly strengthened by\n the noble act of self-denial made in her favor.\n\n Since the previous day the crypt and upper church had been filled by\n the pilgrims from Marseilles. It would have been difficult to carry a\n sick person through the dense multitude, especially one to whom the\n least shock or movement caused suffering and fatigue. One of the first\n chapels on entering was therefore chosen in which to say the Mass. It\n happened to be the first on the left, dedicated to Ste. Germaine\n Cousin.\n\n Mme. Guerrier heard the Mass seated on a chair, her feet, absolutely\n inert, being placed on a _priedieu_ in front of her.\n\n While reading the epistle the remembrance of Mgr. Peyramale suddenly\n presented itself with extraordinary clearness before the mind of the\n celebrant, when he came to the last lines, and saw these words, whose\n striking fitness impressed itself irresistibly upon him:\n\n \u201cThe Lord ... hath so magnified thy name this day that thy praise shall\n not depart out of the mouth of men, who shall be mindful of the power\n of the Lord for ever; for that thou hast not spared thy life by reason\n of the distress and tribulation of thy people, but in the presence of\n the Lord our God _thou hast repaired our ruin_.\u201d[203]\n\n \u201cI must die to repair the ruin,\u201d had often been the words of Mgr.\n Peyramale.\n\n At the moment of the Elevation all were kneeling except the paralyzed\n lady. In her powerlessness she was compelled to remain reclining, the\n sacred Host being brought to her where she lay.\n\n Scarcely had she received the Blessed Sacrament when she felt in\n herself a strange power which seemed as if impelling her to rise and\n kneel, while an inner voice seemed to command her to do so.\n\n Near to her knelt her husband, absorbed in prayer and thanksgiving\n after Communion. He heard the soft rustling of a dress, looked up, and\n saw his wife kneeling by his side.\n\n Respect for the holy place alone prevented the exclamation of wonder\n that rose to his lips. Instinctively he looked towards the altar\u2014it was\n at the moment of the _Dominus vobiscum_\u2014and his eyes met those of the\n priest, which were radiant with joy and emotion. At the Last Gospel\n Mme. Guerrier rose without effort and continued standing. As for her\n husband, he could scarcely remain upright, his knees trembled so. He\n gazed at his wife, afraid to speak to her or to believe the testimony\n of his senses, while she remained praying and giving thanks in the\n greatest calmness and recollectedness of spirit.\n\n The priest laid aside his sacred vestments and knelt at a corner of the\n altar to make his thanksgiving, with what fervor may be imagined.\n\n The sign he had asked had been given, luminous and unmistakable, _on\n the ninth day_, when, at the Mass said by himself, the requested answer\n came which by an heroic act of charity he had transferred to another.\n Whatever may have been the joy of the recovered lady, that of the\n priest was greater still. His friend, the Cur\u00e9 Peyramale, now in\n heaven, had already begun to manifest his presence there, while the\n circumstances attending the miracle seemed to show that Mary herself\n took in hand the glorification of the faithful servant who had been\n here below the minister of her work.\n\n * * * * *\n\n Neither the Abb\u00e9 Martignon nor those who had accompanied him had then\n paid any attention to the details of the little side-chapel into which\n a hand more delicate and strong than that of man had led them; and yet\n the stones, the sculptures, and inscriptions there were so many voices\n which repeated the same name. It was the first chapel on entering, and\n the commencement of the basilica. Under the window, on three large\n slabs of marble, is inscribed an abridged account of the eighteen\n apparitions, including the message with which Bernadette was charged by\n Our Blessed Lady: \u201cGo and tell the priests that I wish a chapel to be\n built to me here\u201d\u2014a message which indicated the mission and the person\n of him who had dug the foundation and laid the first stone.\n\n Above the great arch which forms the entrance to this chapel is\n inscribed the word \u201c_P\u00e9nitence_\u201d\u2014the answer to the request for roses to\n bloom in February, and which spoke of suffering; while on the right of\n the altar, over the smaller arch leading to the next chapel, the\n sculptor has represented Simon the Cyrenian bearing the cross of Jesus.\n\n On the altar is carved the young shepherdess saint (also of the south\n of France) who seemed best to typify the favored child of\n Lourdes\u2014namely, the pure and innocent Ste. Germaine Cousin. Bernadette\n was wont to say: \u201cOf all my lambs I love the smallest best.\u201d Ste.\n Germaine is represented with a lamb at her feet, while behind her is\n the dog, symbol of _Vigilance_, _Fidelity_, and _Strength_, these\n virtues recalling the energetic pastor who had never suffered\n persecution to touch the child of Mary.\n\n If, in granting this cure, Our Lady of Lourdes had not intended\n specially to associate with it the remembrance of her servant, would\n she not have chosen another _moment_ than this ninth day, asked for\n beforehand, another _place_ than this significative chapel, and another\n _circumstance_ than the last Mass of the novena made by that servant\u2019s\n intimate friend? In all these delicate harmonies of detail we seem to\n perceive the divine hand.\n\n * * * * *\n\n We resume the narrative.\n\n After her act of thanksgiving Mme. Guerrier rose from her knees, calm\n and serene, without the least excitement, physical or moral, but still\n radiant from the heavenly contact, and, turning to her husband, she\n said: \u201cGive me your arm, dear; let us go down.\u201d\n\n Still fearing that what he saw was too good to last, M. Guerrier wished\n to summon the porters.\n\n \u201cNo,\u201d said the Abb\u00e9 Martignon; \u201clet her walk.\u201d\n\n Taking her husband\u2019s arm, she pressed it for a moment to her heart,\n full of happiness and gratitude; then, with a firmer step than he,\n descended the two steps of the chapel and crossed the nave.\n\n The Marseilles pilgrims thronged the church, singing the power of the\n Immaculate Mother of God, not knowing that close beside them, in a\n little side-chapel, during the stillness of a Low Mass, that benignant\n power had just been put forth.\n\n On leaving the basilica Mme. Guerrier descended with ease the\n twenty-five steps of the stone flight at the foot of which the carriage\n was waiting.\n\n The coachman gazed at Mme. Guerrier in amazement and remained\n motionless, until, on a sign from her husband, he got down and opened\n the door.\n\n \u201cNo,\u201d said the cured lady; \u201cI wish to go to the grotto.\u201d\n\n \u201cCertainly; we will drive there.\u201d\n\n \u201cNot at all. Your arm is enough. I will walk.\u201d\n\n \u201cShe is cured,\u201d said the Abb\u00e9 Martignon; \u201clet her do as she wishes.\u201d\n\n So, all together, they walked to the grotto.\n\n Here Mme. Guerrier made her second act of thanksgiving before the image\n of Mary Immaculate. Then, after drinking of the miraculous spring, she\n went to the piscina, in which, though cured, she wished to bathe. After\n this immersion she lost entirely a certain stiffness which had\n remained, and which had somewhat impeded the free play of the\n articulations.\n\n She made a point of returning on foot to the town, the carriage\n preceding at a slow pace; but about half-way the Abb\u00e9 Martignon said,\n smiling: \u201cMadame, _you_ are cured, but I am not; and I must own that I\n can go no further. In charity to me let us get into the carriage.\u201d\n\n \u201cWillingly,\u201d she replied, and, hastening to it, she sprang lightly in.\n\n They traversed Lourdes, until, a little below the _old_ parish church,\n they turned into the Rue de Langelle, and stopped near the rising walls\n of the _new_ one.\n\n Mme. Guerrier and her companions alighted, and, descending some steep\n wooden steps, entered the crypt. Here was a tomb, as yet without\n inscription. She sprinkled some holy water over it with a laurel spray\n that lay there, and then knelt down and made her third act of\n thanksgiving by the venerated remains of Mgr. Peyramale.\n\n During the week which had followed the death of this holy priest no\n pilgrimage had appeared in the mourning town. It was on this same day\n of glory that the first, that of Catholic Marseilles, came to pray at\n his tomb, and thus the first crown (from a distance) placed upon it\n bears the date of the event we have just related: \u201c_Les P\u00e9lerins\n Marseillais, 16 Septembre, 1877_.\u201d\n\n When M. and Mme. Guerrier returned to the house of M. Lavigne great was\n the joy of those who had so kindly received them. They regarded this\n miracle as a benediction upon their house, and heard with deepest\n interest the details of what had taken place.\n\n \u201cMadame,\u201d then said M. Lavigne, \u201care you aware into what place exactly\n Providence led you in bringing you to us?... You are in the house which\n was the presbytery of Lourdes at the time of the apparitions; and you\n occupy the room in which M. le Cur\u00e9 Peyramale questioned Bernadette and\n received from her mouth the commands of the Blessed Virgin.\u201d\n\n After remaining some days at Lourdes M. and Mme. Guerrier returned to\n St. Gobain. The journey was rapid and without fatigue. Passing over its\n earlier details, we quote the following portions of a letter from M.\n Guerrier, now before us:\n\n \u201cWhen we reached Chauny my wife\u2019s younger brother, M. Alfred Biver, was\n waiting for us at the station, full of anxiety; for, in spite of the\n letters and telegrams, he could not believe. What was his surprise when\n my beloved wife threw herself into his arms!\u2014a surprise from which he\n could not recover, and which drew from him repeated exclamations during\n the drive of fourteen or fifteen kilometres from Chauny to St. Gobain.\n We drove rapidly, for we were eager to reach home. How long the way\n appeared! At last there was the house! It was then about five in the\n evening. We saw the whole family waiting for us, great and small:\n sisters, sisters-in-law, nephews, nieces, and, above all, our dear\n little ones\u2014all were at the door, eager to make sure that their\n happiness was real.\n\n \u201cAh! when they saw their mother, sister, aunt alight alone from the\n carriage and hasten towards them, it was a picture which no human\n pencil could paint. What joy! what tears! what embraces! The mother of\n my Justine was never weary of embracing the daughter whom Our Lady of\n Lourdes restored to her upright, walking with a firm step\u2014cured.\n\n \u201cDetained by his eighty-three years, her father was in his sitting-room\n up a few stairs. We mounted; he was standing at the door, his hands\n trembling more from happiness than age, and his noble countenance\n glistening with tears.\n\n \u201c\u2018My daughter!...\u2019\n\n \u201cMme. Guerrier knelt before him. \u2018Father,\u2019 she said, \u2018you blessed me\n when, incurably afflicted, I started for Lourdes; bless me now that I\n return to you miraculously cured\u2014as I said I should....\u2019\n\n \u201cAnd, as if nothing were to be wanting to our happiness, it so happened\n that this very day was the _f\u00eate_ of her who returned thus triumphantly\n to her father\u2019s house. What a glad feast of St. Justine we celebrated!\n\n \u201cBut this is not all. The family had its large share; the church also\n must have hers. The excellent cur\u00e9 of St. Gobain, the Abb\u00e9 Poindron,\n had obtained from the lord bishop of Soissons authority to have solemn\n benediction in thanksgiving for the incomparable favor that had been\n granted to us.\n\n \u201cOn the day after our arrival, therefore, we repaired to the parish\n church, through crowds of awestruck and wondering people. The bells\n were ringing joyously, and the church was full as on days of great\n solemnity. Above the congregation rose the statue of Notre Dame de\n Lourdes, and, facing it, a place was prepared for her whom Mary had\n deigned to heal. The priest ascended the pulpit, and related simply and\n without comment the event that was the occasion of the present\n ceremony, after which some young girls, veiled and clad in white, took\n upon their shoulders the statue of Our Lady of Lourdes, and the\n procession began; my dear wife and myself walking immediately behind\n the image of our heavenly benefactress, amid the enthusiastic singing\n of hymns of praise and the triumphal sound of the organ.... Then the\n _Te Deum_ burst forth. Our Lord God was upon the altar....\u201d\n\n If earth has festivals like this, what must be the festivals of\n Paradise?\n\n * * * * *\n\n Here we would fain close our narrative, leaving the hearts of our\n readers to sun themselves in these heavenly rays. But in this world\n there is no light without a shadow. In the letter we have just quoted\n M. Guerrier, after speaking with fervent gratitude of the heroic\n charity of Canon Martignon, says how earnestly he and his are praying\n for the restoration of his health. Alas! these prayers are not yet\n granted. A few weeks after the event here related he left Lourdes for\n Hy\u00e8res, being too ill to return, as he had desired, to his own\n archbishop in Algiers.\n\n In the midst of her joy Mme. Guerrier has a feeling very like remorse.\n \u201cPoor Abb\u00e9 Martignon!\u201d she lately said to us; \u201cit seems to me as if I\n had stolen his cure.\u201d\n\n No! This lady has, it is true, received a great and touching favor; but\n assuredly a still more signal grace was granted to that holy priest\n when he was enabled to perform so great an act of self-renunciation and\n charity\u2014an act which bestows on him a resemblance to his divine Master,\n who said: \u201cGreater love than this no man hath, to lay down his life for\n his people.\u201d Let us not presume to pity him, for he has chosen \u201cthe\n better part.\u201d\n\n May his humility pardon us the pain we shall cause him by publishing,\n contrary to his express prohibition, this recent episode of his life!\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n PIUS THE NINTH.\n\n In the afternoon of Thursday, February 7, our Holy Father, Pope Pius\n IX., died.\n\n In his person passes away one who to two hundred millions of spiritual\n subjects was the greatest figure of the age, and who to all the rest of\n the world, if not the greatest, was certainly the most conspicuous. The\n history of the last thirty years\u2014that larger history that takes within\n its scope the whole human family rather than this or that nationality\n or people\u2014will in after-times centre around him. It will be seen that\n he has had a hand in shaping it, though to-day it may seem that that\n hand was brushed rudely aside or lifted only in impotent menace against\n the irresistible movements and the natural aspirations of the age. Time\n is a great healer and revealer of truth; and time will deal gently and\n justly with the memory of Pius IX. When the smoke of the long battle\n that has been raging in Europe, and more or less over all the world,\n during the last half-century, shall have finally cleared away, and\n men\u2019s eyes be better prepared to regard all things honestly, truth, now\n obscured and hidden, will come to light, and the persistent action,\n misnamed reaction, of Pius IX. will appear to have been the truest\n wisdom and the soundest policy.\n\n The field, of which this wonderful life is the central figure, is so\n vast, its lights and shadows so changing, its surface so diversified,\n and the events with which it is crowded are so many and so great, that\n one shrinks from attempting to picture it even faintly. Yet we cannot,\n even with the brief time allowed us, permit the Holy Father to go to\n his grave without a tribute of admiration and respect for his memory,\n however inadequate that tribute may be. Into the minute details of his\n life we do not purpose here to enter. These are already sufficiently\n well known, and there are ample sources of information from which to\n gather them. We purpose rather passing a rapid glance over the most\n prominent events that mark the career of the Pope, that give it its\n significance and make of it one of the most remarkable in history.\n\n Whoever attempts to deal with Pius IX., with a view to what the man\n was, what he achieved, what he failed to achieve, the meaning, the\n purport, and the influence of his life, must necessarily regard him in\n a twofold aspect: first, as a temporal prince, a man occupied with\n human and secular affairs; secondly, as the supreme head of the\n Catholic Church, the vicar of Christ on earth, and the father of the\n faithful. As the one his life was a failure, outwardly at least. He has\n gone to his grave shorn of all his earthly possessions and dignities;\n and his successor will enter into office much as the first pontiff\n entered, with no authority save that bequeathed him by his divine\n Master. As the second\u2014as supreme pastor of the church\u2014Pius IX. yields\n to none of his illustrious predecessors in point of moral and real\n dignity and grandeur. This is the strange and significant contrast in\n the man\u2019s life: the decadence and utter loss of the temporal power and\n principality of the church under his reign, with a contrary deepening\n and strengthening of the bonds that bind him to the faithful as their\n spiritual father and guide. In both these aspects we shall look at him:\n as a prince who failed in much that he attempted, and as a spiritual\n ruler who grew stronger by his very losses; under whom the church has\n marvellously, almost miraculously, developed; and who leaves it to-day\n in a spiritually stronger condition than perhaps it has ever been in.\n As a temporal sovereign there may have been greater popes than he; as a\n spiritual, few, if any, have surpassed him. And much, very much of the\n growth of the church within the period of his troubled reign is\n undoubtedly to be attributed to the personal influence of the pontiff,\n to his own high example of virtue and burning zeal, and to the keen eye\n he had for the church\u2019s truest interests and welfare.\n\n He was ushered into a revolutionary epoch, in a time when disaster was\n heaped upon the church and on civil society. Lacordaire says of\n himself: \u201cI was born on the wild and stormy morning of this nineteenth\n century.\u201d The same is true of him who became Pius IX. He was born at\n Sinigaglia, May 13, 1792, while Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette were\n prisoners and waiting for the scaffold to release them from their woes.\n Napoleon I. had not yet arisen. The United States had not much more\n than come into being. Joseph II. ruled and reigned in Austria. France\n was in the hands of the progeny of Voltaire. Sardinia did not exist.\n Catholic Ireland did not exist politically. Australia was almost an\n unknown land. It was a period of moral earthquakes. The progeny of\n Voltaire were very active in the propagation of their doctrines; and\n Italy, which for centuries had been the battle-ground of kings and the\n theatre of petty rival factions, offered an inviting soil for the evil\n seed. In 1793 the heads were struck off from Louis and his queen; the\n Goddess of Reason was enthroned in Notre Dame; and the reign of\n \u201cliberty, fraternity, equality\u201d began and ended with\u2014\u201cdeath.\u201d\n\n Then came that grim child of the Revolution, Napoleon, and changed\n everything. He had an eye to religion, and he wanted a sort of tame\n pope whom he might use as a puppet. Italy felt his iron heel, and\n things went from bad to worse there. It saw the pope, with others of\n its treasures, carried off by this rough-and-ready conqueror. In 1805\n this same conqueror had himself crowned \u201cKing of Italy\u201d\u2014king of a\n kingdom which did not exist, save as a pillage-ground for whoever chose\n to enter. In 1808 the Papal States were \u201cirrevocably\u201d incorporated with\n the French Empire. So decreed the omnipotent conqueror. Where is his\n empire now? Where was it and where was he a few years afterwards? He\n was eating his heart out at St. Helena; his empire had vanished; and\n the pope whom he had captured and imprisoned was back in Rome.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n ROME PREPARED FOR REVOLUTION.\n\n All this time the young Giovanni Masta\u00ef-Ferretti was pursuing his\n studies as conveniently as he could under such circumstances. We do not\n recall these events in the earlier life of the boy idly, but with a\n very distinct purpose: to show that when in 1846 Pius IX. was elevated\n to the Papacy, and to the guardianship of the church\u2019s temporalities,\n he stepped into no bed of roses. He stepped, on the contrary, into a\n very hot-bed of revolution\u2014a revolution that, with less or more of\n secrecy, had overspread Europe, and that found its most convenient as\n well as its most necessary centre of attack in Rome and in the Papal\n States. Italy had long been the prey of Europe. The people had suffered\n terribly from foreign invasions. They suffered almost equally from home\n intrigues and jealousies. With all this the popes had nothing to do. It\n was simply a repetition of the history of the Italian peninsula from\n the disruption of the Roman Empire down. The outer barbarians were\n always knocking at her gates and trampling on her soil, invited there\n by native quarrels.\n\n It is necessary to bear these things well in mind, in order to judge\n rightly of the difficulties against which Pius IX. had to contend. He\n was elected to an impoverished and disturbed principality, to a centre\n of revolution in an era of revolution. All Italy groaned with trouble.\n The people were ripe for any mad-cap scheme which should profess to\n better their condition. There was revolution in the air, all around\n them, all over the world. There were burning ideas afloat of people\u2019s\n rights, and people\u2019s wrongs, and people\u2019s futures. Schemes of\n regeneration for the human race were abundant as the schemers; and some\n of these were very keen, far-sighted, and resolute men. Mazzini was one\n of them. His policy was simple enough, and it is the policy of all his\n followers to-day: For the people to rule you must first destroy the\n rulers\u2014kings; before destroying the kings, who (in Europe at least) are\n the representatives of authority, you must destroy the priests who\n preach submission to lawful authority. Death to the priests! death to\n the kings! and then, long live the people!\n\n That, we believe, is a fair presentation of the Mazzini programme for\n the regeneration of Italy and of the rest of the world. It has its\n fascinations for empty minds and empty stomachs, and the masses of the\n people, particularly of the Italians, just about the time of which we\n write had both empty minds and empty stomachs. The people of the Papal\n States, in common with the people of all the other Italian States, and,\n indeed, of states generally, were not in the happiest condition\n possible. Wars and foreign invasions and constant turmoil from day to\n day are not the best agents of good government. So Pius IX. came to an\n uneasy throne.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n PIUS IX. AS A POLITICAL REFORMER.\n\n The cry of the Roman people, of the whole Italian people, as of all\n people just then, was for reform. They wanted a share in the\n government; and there was no harm in that. The new pontiff began his\n reign by at once setting about practical reform. His scheme was\n excellent. The details of it must be found elsewhere. Practically it\n amounted to letting the people have a just and rational share in the\n government. It was not universal suffrage. But the Papal States were\n not the United States; and there are intelligent and patriotic men in\n the United States even who begin to doubt about the actual efficacy of\n universal suffrage as a panacea for all political or social evils. It\n is not long since Mr. Disraeli laid down the daring doctrine in the\n English House of Commons that universal suffrage was not a natural\n right of man, to which doctrine nobody seemed to object. The Pope,\n then, set earnestly and practically to work at every kind of reform. He\n set on foot a scheme of government which should admit the laity to\n their lawful place in civic functions. He looked to the laws of\n commerce, which were in a very bad state. He struck at vicious\n monopolies, in return for which the monopolists struck viciously at\n him. He was very careful about the finances, his treasury being low\n indeed, or rather non-existent. He advised the people, who, under the\n impulse of a steady conspiracy, seized every opportunity at the\n beginning of his reign of getting up festivals in his honor, to spend\n their money at home, or hoard it for an evil hour, or devote it to some\n charitable or educational purpose. He was clement to political\n offences. He was kind and charitable to the oppressed Jews of Rome, and\n removed their civil disabilities before England thought of doing so.\n\n All this is matter of fact, beyond question or dispute. It was\n recognized by the outer world. All the crowned heads of Europe, with\n the exception of Austria and the Italian principalities, who found\n themselves in a position of painful contrast, sent their hearty\n congratulations to the Pope; and the voice of New York\u2014non-Catholic New\n York\u2014joined in with them. The Pope was, for the time being at least,\n the most popular man in the world as well as in Italy. And he deserved\n his popularity, for he was real and resolute in what he attempted.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n WHY HE FAILED AS A REFORMER.\n\n How, then, came the sad sequel? Why did all this fail? Pius IX. looked\n even beyond the Papal States in his political schemes. He wished for a\n united Italy. He was a true Italian. He proposed a confederation of the\n Italian States, which, without infringing on any people\u2019s rights,\n should constitute one Italy, show a united front to the foreigner, and\n remove all excuse for foreign interference. Why was this, too, a\n failure?\n\n Because it was intended that it should be a failure. Because the men\n who used the clamor for reform as an agitating force among the people\n wanted nothing so little as actual reform, least of all in the prince\n of the church. Good government was what most they feared; for good\n government makes, as far as government can make, people happy and well\n off and reconciled to order. But order and contentment among the people\n were precisely what Mazzini least desired.\n\n Pius IX. was in heart and soul and act a reformer of reformers. As a\n temporal ruler he desired nothing in this world so much as the welfare\n and happiness of his people, and he took all honest means to bring\n about that happiness and welfare. But he was met at the outset by a\n strong and wide-spread conspiracy\u2014a conspiracy that had existed long\n before his time, that had laid its plans and arranged its mode of\n action, and that was ready to do any diabolical deed in order to carry\n its purpose through. The very willingness of the Pope to concede\n reforms helped it. It took him up and petted and played with him. The\n clubs that roamed the streets and shouted themselves hoarse with _Viva\n Pio Nono!_ and _Viva Pio Nono solo!_ were instruments of the\n conspirators. The offices which the Pope threw open to the laity were\n seized upon by conspirators. His guards and soldiers were corrupted and\n led by corrupt officers and generals. Some of the clergy even felt the\n contamination. Ministry after ministry was tried and changed, and only\n succeeded in exasperating the minds of the people, as it was intended\n they should. The Pope had faith in human nature, and could not believe\n but that the honest measures which he devised for the benefit of his\n subjects would be honestly accepted by them. Although he knew of the\n conspiracy against his throne and against society, perhaps he scarcely\n realized its depth and intensity. The horrible assassination of De\n Rossi undeceived him, and the reformer and gentle prince had to fly for\n his life and in disguise from his own subjects.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n TRIUMPH OF THE REVOLUTION.\n\n Not two years of his reign have passed, and the Pope is already an\n exile at Gaeta. Pandemonium reigned in Rome. It was not the secret\n societies alone who brought all this about. They were aided by some, at\n least, of the crowned heads of Europe; and Palmerston, as infamous a\n politician as ever conspired against the right, was hand and glove with\n them, ably seconded by Gladstone, whose recent attack on the Pope\n cannot have surprised those who remembered his political career.\n Meanwhile Piedmont was creeping to the front in Italy, and though at\n first Mazzini was as thoroughly opposed to Charles Albert as to the\n Pope and the priests, the conviction grew upon the conspirators that\n kings might sometimes be utilized as well as killed, and that Italy\n might, for the time being at least, be united under the Sardinian. This\n conviction only came slowly, and there was a man at the head of affairs\n in Piedmont who was keen in reading the signs of the times, and who\n never missed a chance. Cavour utilized the secret societies, and the\n secret societies utilized Cavour. In like manner Louis Napoleon, then\n coming to the front in France, utilized, and was in turn utilized by,\n them. Palmerston, Cavour, Louis Napoleon, a dangerous and powerful\n triad, were with the conspirators, while Austria blundered on with\n characteristic stupidity, actually courting the fate which has since\n overtaken it.\n\n It may be said that we concede too much power to the secret societies.\n Who and what are they after all? A handful of men working in the dark,\n led by crack-brained enthusiasts who write inflammatory letters and\n publish silly pamphlets at safe distances from the scene of action.\n They are more than this, however. They are well organized, and they\n trade on real wrongs and disaffection too well grounded. Certainly, in\n the earlier period of the Pope\u2019s reign men were far from being, as a\n whole, well governed in Europe. They were not at rest; they had not\n been at rest from the beginning of the century. Reforms from their\n rulers came very slowly and grudgingly. The conspirators possessed all\n the daring of adventurers, and spread out a political _El Dorado_\n glittering before the hungry eyes of bitter and disappointed men. In\n such a state of affairs the wildest chimeras seem possible to the\n common mind, and in this lies the real strength of secret societies,\n which find their growth cramped only where men are freest and best off,\n as among ourselves.\n\n A fair idea of what the reign of \u201cthe people\u201d meant may be gathered\n from the state of Rome while the pontiff was in exile at Gaeta. It was\n cousin-german to the reign of the _Commune_ in Paris in more recent\n days. And for this the Pope was driven from his own city. These were\n the reformers who could not be satisfied with the Holy Father\u2019s\n rational measures of real reform. These were the \u201cheroes\u201d honored by\n England, by the United States, by all the enlightened and advanced men\n of all lands. It was for opposing and condemning these that Pius IX. is\n regarded by enlightened non-Catholics as a reactionist of the worst\n type, a foe to progress, an enemy to popular liberties. A government of\n assassins was preferred by the world, or at least by a very large\n portion of it, to the mild and beneficent sway of Pius IX. For\n condemning cut-throats he is against the spirit of the age; and for\n refusing to honor men like Mazzini and Garibaldi\u2014men who openly\n professed and caused to be practised murder as a necessary political\n instrument\u2014he is condemned as one who refused to recognize the\n progressive spirit of the times in which we live.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE POPE AND LOUIS NAPOLEON.\n\n While the Pope was at Gaeta, and while Rome was in the hands of what,\n without fear of contradiction, may be described as the vilest of vile\n rabbles, the baleful star of Louis Napoleon was rising over France. He\n was false from the very beginning to the Pope, and the Pope understood\n him. But he was tricky and adroit. He had the born conspirator\u2019s liking\n for mystery and secrecy and intrigue. He seemed by nature incapacitated\n to speak and act openly. He never was a friend to the Pope. By means\n that are already known and stamped in history he came to the lead of\n what, in spite of all vicissitudes and awful changes, remained at heart\n a Catholic nation. The trickster realized his position and trimmed his\n sails accordingly. He cared nothing for the Pope or for Catholicity;\n but the French people did. Moreover, the protection of the Pope and\n French predominance in Italy was a part of the Napoleonic legend, and\n likely to advance his own cause. French cannon, then, and French\n bayonets cleared the way for the return of the Pope to Rome. Not\n France, Catholic France alone, but all the world, had been shocked at\n the awful excesses perpetrated by the revolutionists in Rome, as was\n the case earlier still at the outbreak of the first French Revolution.\n France only anticipated Europe in its action by staying the reign of\n blood.\n\n Louis Napoleon thenceforth assumed the character of protector of the\n interests of the Holy See. He was the persistent enemy of those\n interests. He was altogether opposed to ecclesiastical rule in an\n ecclesiastical state. This friend and protector of the Pope labored all\n his political life, and used the great influence of a Catholic nation,\n to bring about what has since been consummated: the robbery of the\n States of the Church, the invasion of the Holy See, the Piedmontese\n ascendency in Italy, and the reducing of the head of the Catholic\n Church to a political cipher in his own states. Yet intelligent men are\n surprised at the ingratitude displayed by Pius IX. towards Louis\n Napoleon! Pius IX. loved France; he despised the dishonest trickster to\n whose hands the fate of so noble a nation was for a time committed. He\n despised him, for he knew him with that instinctive knowledge by which\n all honest and open natures detect duplicity and fraud, under whatever\n smiling guise they may appear. Some good qualities the man may have\n had. Open honesty was not one of them. Some regard for the Catholic\n religion he may have had. He never allowed it to interfere with his\n schemes or with the schemes of those of whom after all he was a tool,\n never a master. Louis Napoleon knew perfectly well that the Pope\n understood him and his schemes.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE POPE AGAIN AS A REFORMER.\n\n Pius IX. returned to Rome in 1850. He immediately set to work to repair\n the losses which his subjects had sustained during his absence. He\n proceeded in his work of reform. Within seven years he succeeded in\n clearing off the enormous debt with which the country had been saddled.\n The French commission, of which M. Thiers was a member, appointed to\n examine and report on the political wisdom and practical value of the\n institutions granted to his states by Pius IX., reported to the\n Republican Government (1849):\n\n \u201cBy a large majority your commission declares that it sees in\n the _motu proprio_ (the Pope\u2019s decree reorganizing the\n government of the Pontifical States) a first boon of such real\n value that nothing but unjust pretensions could overlook its\n importance.... We say that it grants all desirable provincial\n and municipal liberties. As to political liberties, consisting\n in the power of deciding on the public business of a country in\n one of the two assemblies and in union with the executive\u2014as in\n England, for instance\u2014it is very true that the _motu proprio_\n does not grant this sort of political liberty, or only grants\n it in the rudimentary form of a council without deliberative\n voice.\n\n \u201c... That on this point he (the Pope) should have chosen to be\n prudent, that after his recent experience he should have\n preferred not to reopen a career of agitation among a people\n who have shown themselves so unprepared for parliamentary\n liberty, we do not know that we have either the right or the\n cause to deem blameworthy.\u201d\n\n And Palmerston, whose testimony is surely as unbiassed as that of\n Thiers, said of the same act in 1856:\n\n \u201cWe all know that, on his restoration to his states in 1849,\n the Pope published an ordinance called _motu proprio_, by which\n he declared his intentions to bestow institutions, not indeed\n on the large proportions of a constitutional government, but\n based, nevertheless, on popular election, and which, if they\n had only been carried out, must have given his subjects such\n satisfaction as to render unnecessary the intervention of a\n foreign army.\u201d\n\n We have gone into this matter of reform and home government in the\n Papal States at some length, because it is precisely on this ground of\n all others that the temporal power of the popes is attacked. Priests\n are unfit to rule, it is said; their business is with the souls of men,\n to tend to spiritual wants. They should have no concern with the things\n of this world. This may be all very well, and is a very convenient way\n of disposing of rights and properties which do not belong to us. If the\n invasion of the Papal States and their occupation by a hostile power is\n justified on the ground that the Pope was a priest, and, _because_ a\n priest, unfit to rule his subjects, that at least is intelligible. We\n have seen, however, that Pius IX. was in heart and in act a wise and\n just ruler, who aimed at doing nothing but good, and who did nothing\n but good, to his people, but who was steadily prevented from doing all\n the good he wished and attempted to do by conspiracy at home and\n abroad. Had he been left alone to work out the constitution he framed,\n to carry through the reforms he proposed and entered upon, it is beyond\n question that the States of the Church would have been more happily\n governed and more peacefully ordered than any states in the world. But\n he was prevented from ruling as he wished as well by the opposition of\n governments, such as those of Palmerston, Cavour, and Louis Napoleon,\n as by the organized conspiracy within his own domains\u2014a conspiracy that\n sprang from causes with which he had had nothing to do, which assailed\n him because by his very position he was the symbol and type and\n fountain-head of all earthly order, and which would not be reconciled\n to good. He trod on volcanic ground from the beginning. All that a good\n man could do to dissipate the evil elements he did. But the conspiracy\n abroad and the conspiracy at home were too much for him. Indeed, the\n existence of the Papacy as a temporal power always depended on the\n sense of right and the good-will of men. There have been a few fighting\n popes in other days; but as a matter of fact the Papacy has always been\n a power built essentially on peace; and if powerful enemies insisted on\n invading it, it was always open to them. The pope, like the Master\n whose vicar he is, is \u201cthe prince of peace.\u201d\n\n It is needless here to enter into the details of the intrigues and\n events that led up to the invasion of the Papal States, and to their\n forced blending into what is called united Italy. We cannot here go\n into the question as to when invasion is necessary and justifiable.\n Common sense, however, is a sufficient guide to the doctrine that no\n invasion of another\u2019s territory or property is justifiable or\n necessary, unless the holder of that property is incapable; unless that\n property has been and is being grossly abused; unless those who live on\n that property invite the invasion on just grounds; and unless the\n invader can guarantee a better holding and guardianship of the\n property, a reform in its administration, a sacred regard for rights\n that are sacred. If any man can show us that any one of these\n conditions was fulfilled by the Sardinian invasion of the Papal States,\n we are open to conviction. Nor in this matter are we taking the rights\n and property of the church as something apart from ordinary rights and\n property, though they are so. We base our whole opposition to this most\n infamous usurpation and robbery on known and accepted natural rights\n common to all property and holders of property. It is useless to tell\n Europe that it solemnly sanctioned a sacrilege. Europe has forgotten\n the meaning of the word sacrilege. It has still some sense of what\n robbery and wrong mean, though constant practice in robbery and wrong\n and nefarious proceedings has so blunted its moral sense that it can\n always readily connive at the wrong, especially when the wrong is done\n to the Catholic Church.\n\n We invite all honest men to contrast the condition of the Papal States\n to-day, under the present Italian _r\u00e9gime_, with their condition under\n the Papal _r\u00e9gime_. They cannot show that that condition is bettered.\n All Italy is in a chronic state of legal and secret terrorism. There\n was no terrorism under Pius IX. The people groan under taxes such as in\n their worst days they never had to sustain. Parliamentary\n representation and freedom of election in Italy is a farce. As for the\n social and moral effects of the invasion, they have been dwelt upon so\n often and are so patent that they need no mention here. Pius IX. failed\n as a political leader and ruler, not because he was not a wise and just\n and benevolent ruler, but because, as we said, it was intended that he\n should fail. The combinations against him were too powerful. The wonder\n is that he withstood them so long. But history will faithfully record\n that the last ruler\u2014the last, at least, as things are at present\u2014of the\n temporalities of the church was the best and most just prince in\n Europe, and the one who cared most for the material and moral advance\n of his people.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n PIUS IX. AS HEAD OF THE CHURCH.\n\n So much for one aspect of the Pope\u2019s life and character. It is a sad\n and a saddening one\u2014the one in which he is most bitterly and unjustly\n assailed. Thus far the story has been one of a long and disastrous\n failure. We turn now to look at him in his greater character as Pontiff\n and High-Priest of the Catholic Church\n\n Here the heart lifts, the eyes grow dim, the pen falters, as we glance\n across the ocean and see the meek old man who has done so much for the\n church, who has served her so faithfully, who has given her so high and\n holy an example of undaunted faith, of burning zeal, of universal\n charity, of meekness and long-suffering, laid out at last on the bier\n to which the eyes of all the world turn in sorrowing sympathy and\n respect. In this is his true triumph. In the midst of universal\n disaster the great and mighty church, which was entrusted to him in a\n condition that was truly deplorable, so far as its existence in the\n various states of the world went, has gathered together its strength,\n has renewed its youth like the eagle, has flown abroad on the wings of\n the wind to the uttermost parts of the earth. In 1846 how stood the\n church in Europe? In England the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill had not yet\n been passed. The Act of Catholic Emancipation had only been granted in\n 1829. Ireland was still a political nonentity. Catholicity in France\n was suffering under the worst features of the Napoleonic Code. In\n Austria it was strangled by Josephism. In all places it was under a\n ban. In the United States and Australia it was still almost a stranger.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n WONDERFUL GROWTH OF THE CHURCH.\n\n But a new spirit was awakening among men. The American Revolution was\n productive of important results to mankind. The French Revolution,\n which followed, gave a startling impetus to these. All over the world\n men were rising to a new sense of their natural rights. The awakening\n found expression in deplorable and revolting excesses here and there,\n but there were some right principles under the mass of extravagances\n and chimeras afloat. These principles good, earnest Catholics hastened\n to grasp and utilize. They beat the progeny of Voltaire, they beat the\n liberal philosophers, the apostles of liberty, equality, and\n fraternity, with their own weapons. They gave the right and lawful\n meaning to those words and would not surrender their claims. Thus\n uprose O\u2019Connell, who gave the cue and the lead to so many other\n illustrious champions of civil and religious liberty. O\u2019Connell roared\n and thundered in England, and made himself heard over the world.\n Montalembert and Lacordaire and the unfortunate De Lamennais took up\n the great Irish leader\u2019s cry in France. G\u00f6rres sharpened his pen in\n Germany. Balmes arose in Spain. Brownson was won over in the United\n States. Louis Veuillot found the antidote to his infidel poison, and\n the school of Voltaire found one of their doughtiest warriors heart and\n soul in the Catholic ranks. A crowd of men, equally illustrious or\n nearly so, sprang up and around these leaders. Catholic laymen took\n heart, entered zealously into good works and political life, and many a\n one lent his powerful pen and voice to the service of the church, in\n places often where the priest could not well enter. Catholicity\n assumed, if we may so say, a more manly and aggressive tone. The\n children of Voltaire were wont to laugh at it as a thing of cassocks\n and sacristans. They were astonished to find the young, the\n enthusiastic, the noble entering on what was veritably a new crusade,\n and defending their faith courageously and ably wherever they found it\n attacked. What Pius IX. had attempted in his temporal dominions had\n actually and, as it were, spontaneously come to pass in the spiritual\n domain. The laity assumed their lawful place in the life of the church.\n The Holy Father encouraged them in every way possible; and his aged\n eyes have been gladdened by witnessing in all lands a new army of\n defenders of the faith growing up and disciplined, and daily increasing\n in numbers, strength, and usefulness.\n\n He saw the faith in France and in the German states revive wonderfully.\n Able and zealous bishops were appointed; the education of the clergy,\n on which he always insisted with especial vehemence, was very carefully\n cultivated. Bands of missionaries followed the newly-opened rivers of\n commerce and carried the faith with them to new lands. The Irish famine\n of 1846\u20131847 sent out a missionary nation to the United States, to\n Australia, to England itself. Priests went with them, or followed them,\n and in time grew up among them. While Sardinia was confiscating church\n property, destroying monasteries and institutions of learning, and\n turning priests and monks out of doors, England and her possessions and\n the United States were beginning to receive them, and, in accordance\n with the principles of their government, letting them do their own work\n in their own way.\n\n And so the church has gone on developing with the greatest impetus in\n the most unpromising soil. Already men say wonderingly that it is\n strongest and best off in Protestant lands. Pius IX. had the happiness\n of creating the hierarchy in England, in the United States, and in\n Australia, in the British possessions\u2014wherever the faith is to-day\n reputed to be in the most flourishing condition. But all this has not\n come about by accident. There was a very active, keen, and observant\n man at the head of affairs. It is wonderful how the Pope, with the\n troubles that were for ever pressing upon him regarding the affairs of\n the Papal States, could have found time to attend to those wider\n concerns of the universal church. But if he loved Rome and its people\n with a love that was truly paternal, his first care was always for the\n church of which he was the guardian. His heart was in every work and\n enterprise for the advancement of the faith. His eye was all-seeing.\n His prayers were unceasing.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n GREAT EVENTS OF THE PONTIFICATE.\n\n The definition of two great dogmas marks the pontificate of Pius IX.\n and will make it memorable for ever in the annals of the church: the\n dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mother, and of\n the Papal Infallibility. The last was a death-blow to schism and\n heresy. We do not mean that schism and heresy will die out because of\n it. But it roots them out of their holes; and henceforth they will know\n that over them hangs a voice, not often used, indeed, or idly, but\n which, once it has uttered its last and final and solemn decision, is\n irrevocable. The scenes that Rome witnessed in its last declining days\n as the city of the popes will dwell in the memory of men. The bishops\n of all the earth, in numbers unprecedented, flocking to what was vainly\n thought to be the rocking chair of Peter, was perhaps one of the most\n striking testimonies to a scoffing and unbelieving age of the immense\n vitality of the faith, of the vastness, the splendor, and renown of the\n Catholic Church. A more solemn testimony still was the joyful\n acceptance by the faithful of the dogma of Papal Infallibility, which,\n it was thought by those who knew not the Catholic faith, would rend the\n church asunder. The canonization of the martyrs of Japan, the thronging\n of the bishops and faithful to Rome on the occasion of the various\n jubilees, and the crowning event of last year, when all the Catholic\n world assisted at the celebration of the fiftieth episcopal jubilee of\n Pius IX., are other events that mark this great pontificate with\n significance and splendor. These last were as much personal tributes to\n the man as of respect to the supreme head of the church, and they\n showed, if aught were needed to show, that Pius, stripped of his\n dominions, bereft of his possessions, imprisoned in the Vatican, lived\n and reigned as, perhaps, no other pope lived and reigned in the hearts,\n not of a small section of his people, but of all the great church that\n covers the earth.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n THE POPE\u2019S PERSONAL CHARACTER.\n\n One feature of all others marks the character of Pius IX. Personally\n the meekest and most yielding of men, he was always filled with the\n sense of his position and his sacred charge. We do not mean that as\n Pope he was proud, overbearing, intolerant. He was anything but that.\n But in all that touched the faith and the sacred prerogatives that had\n been placed in his pure hands he was simply inflexible. He would not\n yield a jot of them. He would not compromise. He would not temporize. A\n singularly open, honest, and frank character, ready to trust all men,\n he seemed to scent out danger from afar off when it threatened what was\n dearer to him than life\u2014life was always a small matter in his eyes\u2014the\n chair of Peter and the faith of Christ. The utterances of his bulls and\n encyclical letters, the speeches that he delivered, sometimes off-hand,\n on important subjects, bear all one tone, never contradict one another.\n They are resolute and bold and breathe authority throughout. He saw\n from the first the movement of the age, and that it was moving in a\n false direction. The movement was, in one word, towards a complete\n rejection of divine authority, of divine revelation, and consequently\n of the church as a divine institution, and of all authority save such\n as men choose to set up for themselves. From his first papal allocution\n to the Syllabus of Errors to be condemned, he always struck at this\n spirit, and this spirit recognized its vigilant foe and master. Hence\n the rage with which his utterances were received in the courts of\n Europe and by the infidel press. But he never swerved from his course.\n He was never weary of condemning what he knew to be wrong; and the\n state of public opinion to-day regarding rights that were once held as\n sacred even by large and powerful non-Catholic bodies is a sufficient\n vindication, if any were needed, of the pontiff\u2019s course. Rights,\n natural and supernatural, are everywhere invaded. The cloister is\n desecrated. The home is threatened with disruption by divorce and an\n easy marriage that is no marriage. Innocent infants are no longer\n consecrated to God. \u201cFree\u201d thought finds its issue in \u201cfree\u201d religion,\n and free religion means no religion. The sense of right has yielded to\n the sense of force. Education is handed over to infidels. This is the\n larger growth of the conspiracy that swept away the States of the\n Church only by way of a beginning to a wider sweeping that was to\n desolate the earth.\n\n All this was what Pius IX. felt coming on and resisted to his last\n breath. He guarded the church well, and, if human judgment be allowed\n to follow him, he goes before his divine Master with a clean heart and\n untroubled conscience, having done his work thoroughly. We shall miss\n that majestic figure from our busy scene. We shall miss the grand old\n man seated prophet-like on the now bare and barren rock of Peter, the\n storms of the earth roaring around and threatening to overwhelm him,\n and he calm and unmoved, his head lifted above them clear and lovely in\n the white light of heaven. We shall miss the face that we all know as\n we know and cherish the picture of a father: with its large, bright\n eyes, its sweet lips, and that smile that could only come from a heart\n free from guile and clear from constant communings with heaven. Set the\n men of the age beside him, and see how they dwarf and dwindle away. Set\n Cavour, Louis Napoleon, Bismarck, Thiers, Palmerston, those known as\n the greatest among the leaders of men, by Pius IX., and what a\n contrast! The story of the struggle that he waged is told in this. Ages\n stamp themselves in the men they deify. In brutal, debased, but\n \u201ccivilized\u201d pagan Rome statues were set up to men like Nero and\n Domitian and Claudius and Diocletian; and these were the gods of the\n degenerate Romans. The gods of to-day, the idols of the people, are the\n men we have mentioned above and the lower brood of the Mazzinis,\n Garibaldis, Victor Emanuels, Gambettas. To the worshippers of these\n heroes Pius IX. was a despot and a ruler of a brood of despots, an\n enemy of the human race. The gown of the cleric has become the garb of\n ignominy and darkness; the blood-red cap of the revolutionist the\n beacon of liberty and light. The intellectual stream of Voltaire and\n the Voltairists, the men of \u201cscience\u201d of to-day, filters down into the\n mud and blood of the rabble. These dainty gentlemen prepare the\n dynamite, leaving others more ignorant to fire it. This is the progress\n that Pius IX. stigmatized, and these the lights of the age whom he\n condemned. But his work has been effectual. He guarded the vineyard of\n the Lord. He made straight its paths. He weeded it well and watered it,\n if not with his heart\u2019s blood, with the labors and sufferings of a long\n life that never knew rest or thought but of good to the whole human\n race. He has left to the world the example of a life of unspotted\n virtue, of large and wise charity, of undaunted courage and zeal, of\n meekness and childlike simplicity. He goes to his grave amid the tears\n and benedictions of the mightiest body on earth, followed by the\n sorrowing sympathy of all who esteem piety, honor integrity, and admire\n courage.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n NEW PUBLICATIONS.\n\n\n MORNING OFFICES OF PALM SUNDAY, HOLY THURSDAY, AND GOOD FRIDAY.\n Together with a Magnificat for Holy Saturday and a few selections\n for the Tenebr\u00e6 Function. Arranged and edited by Edwin F.\n MacGonigle, St. Charles\u2019 Seminary, Overbrook, Pa.\n\n The publication of this work is another comforting evidence of the\n reality of the revival of a better taste amongst church musicians, and\n of the demand of church people for a style of music at the divine\n offices which, at least, shall not outrage every sentiment of religious\n reverence and respect which they have for the house of God.\n\n Although giving but few selections from the vast number of sentences,\n anthems, etc., enjoined to be sung during the great week, the choice\n made proves that there is a more general knowledge of the Rubrics than\n has hitherto prevailed amongst church musicians, and a consequent\n desire to produce the offices of the church in their entirety. It will\n also serve a purpose\u2014to us a very desirable one\u2014which is to turn the\n attention of choir-masters and organists to the _sanctioned chant\n melodies_ for the Holy-Week services, which are, in our judgment, after\n long experience, quite unequalled by any musical melodies that were\n ever written.\n\n We fail to see any possible reason for a harmonized _morceau de\n musique_ to take the place of the cantor\u2019s chanting of the _Recordare_\n at the _Tenebr\u00e6_ function, nor can we discover any special merit in the\n composition itself. The works of Sig. Capocci seem to us to be better\n suited for exhibition at one of our \u201cVesper Series\u201d concerts at\n Chickering and other halls than for practical use _in choro_ before an\n altar\u2014unless, indeed, the hearing of a musical concert is to be the\n proper and most edifying manner of satisfying the precept of hearing\n Mass devoutly, or of piously assisting at Vespers and Benediction.\n\n Can the editor give any authority for the whining _Fa_# in the first\n member of the cadence of the _Benedictus_, No. 1, here treated as\n _Do_#? Sig. Capocci may have so written it; but then he ought to have\n known better.\n\n Those who use concerted music for their church services, and who\n possess capable singers, will no doubt be pleased to add this\n publication to their collection of \u201cchurch music.\u201d\n\n\n A VISIT TO THE ROMAN CATACOMBS. By Rev. J. Spencer Northcote, D.D.,\n canon of Birmingham. London: Burns and Oates. 1877. (For sale by The\n Catholic Publication Society Co.)\n\n This book is another proof of the untiring attention that Canon\n Northcote continues to devote to the object of his special studies\u2014the\n Roman Catacombs, to which, as he modestly tells us, he first applied\n himself in 1846. The length of time that he has devoted to the subject,\n his diligence, scholarship, and perfect orthodoxy, make him the\n standard authority among English-speaking Catholics on all matters\n connected with those wonderful subterranean cemeteries which are\n inexhaustible mines of treasure to students of Christian antiquities,\n and points of attraction to all really learned, as well as to some\n ignorant and conceited, visitors to Rome. The traveller to the Tiber\n and the Seven Hills who does not visit the Catacombs has not seen one\n of the three Romes, and returns with a very inadequate knowledge of the\n Eternal City. A study of the Roman Catacombs is as necessary to enable\n one to understand the manners and customs of the early Christians, and\n to appreciate the various stages of the doctrines and practices of the\n church from apostolic times to the period that followed the triumph of\n religion under Constantine, and its splendid development of ritual and\n of ceremonial during the middle ages, as the careful examination of the\n deeply-planted roots of a mighty oak is wanted to show the lover of\n nature how so noble a tree grows up the monarch of the forest, \u201cand\n shooteth out great branches, so that the birds of the air may lodge\n under the shadow of it\u201d (Mark iv. 32).\n\n We are glad to learn from the preface of this short but interesting and\n instructive _Visit to the Roman Catacombs_ that a second and enlarged\n edition of the _Roma Sotteranea_ of the same author, published in\n conjunction with Rev. W. R. Brownlow in 1869, and which will contain\n the substance of De Rossi\u2019s recently-issued third volume, is in\n preparation. We shall heartily welcome it. The present little book\n contains a great amount of information in a convenient, attractive, and\n well-written form.\n\n\n MATERIALISM: A Lecture by P. J. Smyth, M.P., M.R.I.A., Chev. Leg.\n d\u2019Hon. Dublin: Joseph Dollard. 1877.\n\n This is a strong and outspoken defence of Christianity by a layman from\n the lecture platform against the attacks of materialism on religion as\n addressed to popular assemblies under the cloak of science. The lecture\n reaffirms the primitive convictions of the soul and the common consent\n of mankind against the unsupported assertions of the modern materialist\n school. The Irish people have heroically withstood the assaults made\n against their religious faith\u2014assaults more cruel and persistent than\n have been even charged upon the Spanish Inquisition\u2014and that, too, from\n a nation which boasts of being the champion of religious liberty. It is\n a cheering sign to see that they are fully able to defend their faith\n with personal intelligent conviction against the materialism of the\n demagogues of science. Ireland has a class of thoroughly-educated\n laymen, and when religion is invaded from every quarter, as it is in\n our day, it is time that men who have deep and strong religious\n feelings should speak out in words which are fraught with the power of\n intelligent conviction and in tones which will make themselves heard.\n Mr. Smyth\u2019s lecture is solid, manly, and eloquent, and we hope to hear\n from him again and often.\n\n\n RECORDS OF A QUIET LIFE. By Augustus J. C. Hare, author of _Walks in\n Rome_, etc. Revised for American readers by William L. Gage. Boston:\n Roberts Brothers. 1876.\n\n The author of this volume, in presenting the picture of the Hare\n family, labored under the impression that he was revealing a model life\n to the public. Confined to non-Catholics, perhaps he and the writer of\n the American preface were not mistaken, and this class of readers will\n derive profit from its perusal. The Hares were Anglican clergymen, in\n charge of parishes, and with families. The volume furnishes pictures of\n the performance of their parochial duties, the life of their family\n circles, and the characteristics of their members. The Hares were above\n the common run of men of their class in intellectual gifts and\n scholarly attainments. They appear to have done their best to fulfil\n the duties of their position with the incoherent fragments of Christian\n truth which their sect teaches. A Catholic feels after reading this\n volume as if he had been passing through a picture-gallery of\n second-class artists. Our counsel to non-Catholic readers is: read\n these _Records_, and then take up the _Life of the Cur\u00e9 of Ars_, or\n _The Inner Life of P\u00e8re Lacordaire_, or _A Sister\u2019s Story_, or _The\n Life of Madame Swetchine_, and you will understand, if not fully\n appreciate, our meaning.\n\n\n IS THE HUMAN EYE CHANGING ITS FORM UNDER THE INFLUENCES OF MODERN\n EDUCATION? Edward G. Loring, M.D. New York. 1878.\n\n This is a very clever _brochure_ upon a very vexed question\u2014namely,\n does compulsory education of the young under certain bad hygienic and\n dietetic conditions produce ocular deformity, and is such deformity\n hereditary? Dr. Loring produces certain eminent German oculists who\n state that myopia (near-sightedness) is certainly hereditary. The\n doctor only partially agrees with the German _savants_ whom he cites,\n and believes that no organ having reached its highest state of\n perfection, as has the human eye, can be changed by hereditary\n transmission, unless under conditions that affect the human organism as\n a whole, and that it would take ages to accomplish this under the most\n favorable conditions. The doctor explains why educated Germans as a\n rule are myopic by stating that the German forcing system for children\n under fifteen is radically wrong, and, moreover, that Germans as a\n nation are not fond of out-door sports. He further argues that their\n manner of cooking and sanitary arrangements are bad; all which, under\n certain conditions, will tend to produce hereditary myopia. Americans,\n it is stated, exhibit in some respects an inclination to follow the\n German plan rather than adhere to the traditional educational system of\n our ancestors of the English race.\n\n Children, the doctor argues, must not be pushed in their studies until\n after fifteen, at which period the danger from over-use of the eye is\n diminished; and it is thus that watchmakers, type-setters, and other\n artisans who continuously use their eyes upon minute objects have\n better sight than the studious professional man or laborious scientific\n worker. We may sum up the article in a few lines when we say that\n nothing good, either physical or mental, can accrue from forcing young\n minds beyond a certain extent, and that we have reached, possibly\n passed, the ultimum in our present system of education. Encourage, as\n far as possible, out-door sports, and let the heavy mental work be done\n after fourteen. Give our children air and light, lest harm be done to\n the race.\n\n\n AN AMERICAN ALMANAC AND TREASURY OF FACTS, STATISTICAL, FINANCIAL, AND\n POLITICAL, FOR THE YEAR 1878. Edited by Ainsworth R. Spofford,\n Librarian of Congress. New York and Washington: The American News\n Company.\n\n Few persons in this country are more competent to compile a volume such\n as this than the Librarian of Congress. Himself a practical bookseller,\n he brought years of the necessary experience to his aid. The results of\n this experience are manifest in the intelligently-arranged and\n trustworthy volume before us. It contains a vast amount of really\n useful information, on agriculture, politics, banks, finances,\n libraries, the census, chronology, commerce, the post-office, gold and\n silver coinage, education\u2014in fact, on every practical subject about\n which persons need ready and accurate information. Its statistics can\n be relied on as trustworthy. It is preceded by a short \u201cHistory of\n Almanacs,\u201d in which Mr. Spofford enumerates several that have appeared\n of late years, though he has forgotten to mention the _Illustrated\n Catholic Family Almanac_, now in its tenth year. This, we presume, was\n an oversight; for, if we are not mistaken, it has been a guide to some\n of the statisticians in Washington with regard to the statistics of\n Catholic colleges and institutions of learning conducted by Catholics.\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n Footnotes\n\n\n-----\n\nFootnote 1:\n\n Macaulay.\n\nFootnote 2:\n\n _Marble Faun_, vol. ii. p. 129, Tauch. Ed.\n\nFootnote 3:\n\n John Dwight\u2019s translation.\n\nFootnote 4:\n\n See _Sum_ of St. Thomas, i. 2, cviii.\n\nFootnote 5:\n\n Words of Pius IX.\n\nFootnote 6:\n\n Lutheran I am not; nor Zwinglian; still less Anabaptist. In short. I\n am one who believes in, honors, and respects the holy, true, and\n Catholic Church.\n\nFootnote 7:\n\n Childlike simplicity.\n\nFootnote 8:\n\n _The Jukes: A Study in Crime, Pauperism, Disease, and Heredity_,\n _etc._ By R. L. Dugdale. With an Introduction by Elisha Harris, M.D.\n New York: G. P. Putnam\u2019s Sons.\n\nFootnote 9:\n\n THE CATHOLIC WORLD, June, 1876, \u201cHammond on the Nervous System.\u201d\n\nFootnote 10:\n\n _Some Remarks on Crime-Cause._ Richard Vaux.\n\nFootnote 11:\n\n _St. Hedwige, Duchess of Silesia and Poland_. By F. Becker. Collection\n of Historical Portraits. No. VIII. Herder & Co., Freiburg in Breisgau\n and Strassburg. 1872.\n\nFootnote 12:\n\n Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury.\n\nFootnote 13:\n\n Belatucadus was also the name of a divinity worshipped by the ancient\n Britons. A rock situated a little to the north of Belenus still\n retains the name of Tombalaine or Tombal\u00e8ne, formerly _Tumba Beleni_.\n Several strange legends linger about both these rocks. The ancient\n poem of _Brut_, of which a MS. copy is preserved in the archivium of\n Mount St. Michael, has the story of King Arthur, Sir Launcelot, and\n Elaine, and makes out the etymology of the northern rock to be Le\n Tombe (d\u2019)Elaine.\n\nFootnote 14:\n\n These priestesses were in the habit of selling to the seafaring men\n who came to consult them arrows of pretended virtue in calming\n tempests, if thrown into the sea, during a storm, by one of the\n youngest sailors on board. In the ancient Druidic poem called _Ar\n Rannou_, or _The Series_, where the _Child_ says, \u201cSing me the number\n Nine,\u201d the _Druid_ answers, \u201c... Nine Korrigan with flowers in their\n hair, robed in white wool, dancing around the fountain in the light of\n the full moon.\u201d (See De Villemarqu\u00e9, _Barzaz Breiz_, p. 6.) Pomponius\n Mela designates as _Garrigena_ (evidently Korrigan Latinized) the\n \u201cnine priestesses or sorceresses of the Armorican Isle of Sein.\u201d\n\nFootnote 15:\n\n Monsieur de la Fruglaye mentions the existence, near to Morlaix, of a\n vast forest which has been submerged by the ocean. In a black and\n compact stratum, which is covered for the most part by a fine white\n sand, he found traces of very ancient and abundant vegetation: whole\n trees thrown in every direction\u2014yews, oaks, large trunks, and green\n mosses. Beneath this layer the soil appeared to be that of meadows,\n with reeds and rushes, etc. Here all the plants were undisturbed and\n in a vertical position, and the roots of the ferns still had their\n downy coating. (See _Observations sur les origines du Mont St.\n Michel_. Maury.)\n\n A similar, though gradual, sinking of the coast is going on on the\n western coast of France and England, also at Alexandria, Venice, Pola,\n and the coast of Dalmatia, besides other localities.\n\nFootnote 16:\n\n See _Itin\u00e9raire dans le Mont St. Michel_, par Edouard Le H\u00e9richer.\n\nFootnote 17:\n\n _Proceedings at the Tenth Annual Meeting of the Free-Religious\n Association, held in Boston, May 31 and June 1, 1877_. Boston:\n Published by the Free-Religious Association, 231 Washington Street.\n 1877.\n\nFootnote 18:\n\n Vide Moehler\u2019s _Symbolism_.\n\nFootnote 19:\n\n _The Impeachment of Christianity_, p. 6.\n\nFootnote 20:\n\n Ibid. p. 1.\n\nFootnote 21:\n\n P. 26.\n\nFootnote 22:\n\n P. 23.\n\nFootnote 23:\n\n P. 29.\n\nFootnote 24:\n\n P. 28.\n\nFootnote 25:\n\n _Is Romanism Real Christianity?_ p. 14.\n\nFootnote 26:\n\n P. 22.\n\nFootnote 27:\n\n P. 28.\n\nFootnote 28:\n\n P. 28.\n\nFootnote 29:\n\n P. 29.\n\nFootnote 30:\n\n P. 30.\n\nFootnote 31:\n\n P. 33.\n\nFootnote 32:\n\n P. 34.\n\nFootnote 33:\n\n P. 40.\n\nFootnote 34:\n\n P. 42.\n\nFootnote 35:\n\n The fact of St. James having taken this journey has been generally\n considered indubitable, although Baronius held it as uncertain.\n Mariana, in his history, affirms that all written documents were\n destroyed in Spain, first by the persecution of Diocletian, and\n afterwards by the Moorish invasion and its attendant wars. The silence\n of ancient testimony is thus fully explained, and the learned Suarez,\n writing on the subject, says: \u201cIt matters little that the local\n histories of the time make no mention of this journey of St. James;\n for, besides that nothing happened in it so extraordinary or notorious\n that the renown thereof would necessarily spread abroad, Spain had at\n that period no writers careful to collect the facts of her history,\n and strangers would not be likely to know anything about it,\n especially as being of a religious nature, concerning which men would\n not trouble themselves at all.... If St. Luke had not left in writing\n the acts of St. Peter and St. Paul, many of their journeyings would be\n forgotten, or rest only upon such traditions as might be preserved by\n the churches they founded.\u201d\n\nFootnote 36:\n\n Tome vi. _Aprilis_.\n\nFootnote 37:\n\n _In fest. Sancti Isidori, lect. 2a._\n\nFootnote 38:\n\n See the account as given by John de Beka in the _Chronicle of\n Utrecht_.\n\nFootnote 39:\n\n Datum Viterbii, XII. Kalend. Junii.\n\nFootnote 40:\n\n We published last month an article on the Indian question, based\n chiefly on the official reports to and of the Board of Indian\n Commissioners. We publish this month a second article on the same\n question by another writer, one who is personally familiar with the\n matter of which he treats, and whose observations and suggestions on\n so important a subject cannot fail to command attention.\u2014ED. C. W.\n\nFootnote 41:\n\n\n Audax omnia perpeti,\n Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas.\n\n\nFootnote 42:\n\n \u201cGentiles have often said before me that Mormonism is as good as any\n other religion, and that Mr. Joseph Smith \u2018had as good a right to\n establish a church as Luther, Calvin, Fox, Wesley, or even bluff King\n Hal\u2019\u201d (_The City of the Saints_, by Richard F. Burton).\n\nFootnote 43:\n\n It was one of Mr. Finney\u2019s doctrines that whenever we pray with\n sufficient faith, God, so to speak, is bound not only to answer the\n prayer, but to give us the precise thing we ask for; in other words,\n that we know better than God what is good for us. \u201cThere are men and\n women still alive and among us,\u201d says Dr. Spring, \u201cwho remember the\n circumstances of the death of Mrs. Pierson, around whose lifeless body\n her husband assembled a company of _believers_, with the assurance\n that if they prayed in faith she would be restored to life. Their\n feelings were greatly excited, their impressions of their success\n peculiar and strong. They prayed, and prayed again, and prayed _in\n faith_. But they were disappointed. There was none to answer, neither\n was there any that regarded.\u201d The italics are Dr. Spring\u2019s.\n\nFootnote 44:\n\n _Remarkable Visions._ By Orson Pratt, one of the Twelve Apostles of\n the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Liverpool, 1848.\n\nFootnote 45:\n\n Mormon books contain representations of six plates of brass, inscribed\n with unknown figures, which are said to have been dug out of a mound\n in Pike County, Illinois, in 1843. Like those which Moroni is supposed\n to have revealed to Joseph Smith they are described as bell-shaped and\n fastened together by a ring. But the evidence that any such plates\n were ever found is not satisfactory, and the characters on the\n published pictures of them bear little or no resemblance to those\n which Joseph Smith presented to the world as a fac-simile of a part of\n the Book of Mormon.\n\nFootnote 46:\n\n Many suppose that Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum fabricated plates\n of some basemetal and imposed them upon their credulous followers. But\n if they had gone to the trouble of doing this it is probable that they\n would have shown them to a number of people, and not confined the\n exhibition to a handful of their immediate associates. The mere fact\n that evidence as to the existence of any plates at all is so defective\n seems to us conclusive that there were none\u2014not even forged ones.\n\nFootnote 47:\n\n \u201cRevelation given to Joseph Smith, Jr., May, 1829, informing him of\n the alteration of the manuscript of the fore part of the Book of\n Mormon.\u201d\u2014_Covenants and Commandments_, sec. xxxvi.\n\nFootnote 48:\n\n Five thousand copies were printed, yet the first edition is\n excessively rare. The later editions differ a little from the\n original. The \u201cthird European edition,\u201d which is now before us, was\n published at Liverpool in 1852.\n\nFootnote 49:\n\n Oliver Cowdery was expelled from the church some years later for\n \u201clying, counterfeiting, and immorality,\u201d and died a miserable\n drunkard. Sidney Rigdon attempted to rule the church by revelation\n after the death of Joseph Smith, and, being \u201ccut off\u201d at the demand of\n Brigham Young, led away a small sect of seceders. Parley P. Pratt,\n having induced a married woman to become his polygamous wife, was\n killed by the outraged husband. Orson Pratt is still living, and one\n of the ablest of the Mormon leaders.\n\nFootnote 50:\n\n Although these lectures bear Smith\u2019s name, it is understood that they\n were really written by Sidney Rigdon.\n\nFootnote 51:\n\n _Autobiography of Joseph Smith_, quoted by Stenhouse.\n\nFootnote 52:\n\n This is quoted by Capt. Burton, but he does not give his authority.\n\nFootnote 53:\n\n About the time of the invention of Mormonism Robert Owen\u2019s communistic\n propaganda was making an extraordinary sensation in America. In his\n \u201cDeclaration of Mental Independence\u201d at New Harmony, July 4, 1826,\n Owen declared that man had up to that hour been the slave of \u201ca\n trinity of monstrous evils\u201d\u2014Irrational Religion, Property, and\n Marriage.\n\nFootnote 54:\n\n In the \u201cRevelation on Celestial Marriage\u201d Joseph Smith is styled \u201chim\n who is anointed both as well for time and for all eternity; and that,\n too, most holy,\u201d and it is added: \u201cI have appointed unto my servant\n Joseph to hold this power in the last days, and there is never but one\n on the earth at a time on whom this power and the keys of this\n priesthood are conferred.\u201d Hence a government by the quorum of\n apostles, in the Mormon idea, can never be anything but an\n interregnum. They believe that Heaven will not fail to send them a\n \u201cprophet, seer, and revelator,\u201d and, as Brigham succeeded Joseph, so\n they look for some one in the appointed time to succeed Brigham. _Uno\n avulso, non deficit alter_.\n\nFootnote 55:\n\n To avoid unpleasantness, the \u201cLegislature of Deseret\u201d annually\n re-enacts _en bloc_ the laws of the territorial legislature of Utah.\n\nFootnote 56:\n\n _The Mormon Prophet._ By Mrs. C. V. Waite. Cambridge. 1866.\n\nFootnote 57:\n\n Address by Brigham Young in the Salt Lake City Tabernacle. April 9,\n 1852, four months before the publication of Joseph\u2019s \u201cRevelation.\u201d\n\nFootnote 58:\n\n \u201cYou believe that Adam was made of the dust of this earth. This I do\n not believe. I never did and I never want to, because I have come to\n understanding and banished from my mind all the baby stories my mother\n taught me when I was a child\u201d (Sermon by Brigham Young, Oct. 23,\n 1853).\n\nFootnote 59:\n\n Joseph Smith professed to get this version by inspiration.\n\nFootnote 60:\n\n They made it over to him as trustee, retaining, however, the use of\n it. Thus an additional tie was made to keep them true to the faith.\n Brigham could at any time take away all that they possessed, and if\n they left the Territory they would have to go penniless.\n\nFootnote 61:\n\n See the whole passage in the _Popular Science Monthly_ for November,\n 1872.\n\nFootnote 62:\n\n The site of the fort in New York attacked by Champlain in 1615 has\n only recently been determined, although a number of leading historians\n have been discussing it for some years.\n\nFootnote 63:\n\n A foot or more of soft black soil (_humus_) on the bottom of the\n cellar refuted the suspicion entertained by some that this excavation\n was of more recent origin than the ancient buildings.\n\nFootnote 64:\n\n Indians, some of whom are no mean anatomists, have since pronounced\n one of them to be part of a _vertebra_ in all probability human.\n\nFootnote 65:\n\n Even at this day our pagan Ojibwas make such a use of human bones.\n They either carry them in their \u201cmedicine bags\u201d as \u201cmanitous\u201d or grind\n them to powder, which they apply especially to their puncturing\n instruments. In diseases of the head the powder of the skull is used;\n in the case of a sore leg, that of the _tibia_ or _femur_, etc.\n\nFootnote 66:\n\n _Short Studies on Great Subjects._ By James Anthony Froude, M.A. New\n York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1877.\n\nFootnote 67:\n\n Alexandre de Saint-Cheron. Introduction to Harber\u2019s translation of\n Ranke\u2019s _History of the Papacy_. Second edition. Paris. 1848.\n\nFootnote 68:\n\n Prince Bismarck.\n\nFootnote 69:\n\n _North American Review_, Sept.-Oct., 1877, art. on \u201cPerpetual Forces.\u201d\n\nFootnote 70:\n\n The word \u201croyal\u201d has so degenerated in these days that we feel no\n scruple in applying it to Victor Emanuel.\n\nFootnote 71:\n\n Froude\u2019s _History of England_, vol. ii. p. 447. Scribner & Co. 1870.\n\nFootnote 72:\n\n _St. Louis and Calvin_, p. 149. Macmillan & Co.\n\nFootnote 73:\n\n\n \u201cLet them not come forth\n Till the ninth ripening year mature their worth.\u201d\n \u2014Horat. _Ars Poet_., 388, Francis\u2019 trans.\n\n\nFootnote 74:\n\n\n \u201cThan if far Cadiz, Libya\u2019s plain,\n And either Carthage owned your sway.\u201d\n \u2014Horat. _Carm._ ii. 2.\n\n\n _En passant_, it may be said that this stanza, which begins\n\n\n \u201cLatius regnes, avidum domando\n Spiritum quam si,\u201d etc.,\n\n\n furnishes a curious parallel to the words of Holy Writ, Prov. xvi. 32:\n \u201cHe that ruleth his spirit [is better] than he that taketh cities.\u201d It\n is far from being the only passage in Horace which in spirit, if not\n in letter, suggests the inspired writers so strongly as to tempt one\n to believe that he must have had some acquaintance with them. Cf.\n Virgil\u2019s _Pollio_.\n\nFootnote 75:\n\n Byron, however, if we are to take literally the well-known lines in\n _Childe Harold_, can scarcely rank with true lovers of our Horace:\n\n\n \u201cThen farewell, Horace, whom I hated so,\n Not for thy faults, but mine; it is a curse\n To understand, not _feel_, thy lyric flow,\n To comprehend but never love thy verse.\u201d\n\n\nFootnote 76:\n\n \u201cWhy is all _journeyman-work_ of literature, as I may call it, so much\n worse done here than it is in France?... Think of the difference\n between the translations of the classics turned out for Mr. Bohn\u2019s\n library and those turned out for M. Nisard\u2019s collection!\u201d\u2014M. Arnold,\n _Essays in Criticism_, Am. ed., p. 51.\n\nFootnote 77:\n\n \u201cI can understand that we must not make form everything in poetry. But\n why, in dealing with an art, we should take no account of the\n _technique_ of that art, should make light of those who excel in its\n _technique_, I do not understand at all.\u201d\n\nFootnote 78:\n\n\n \u201cWith a mind undisturbed take life\u2019s good and life\u2019s evil,\n Temper grief from despair, temper joy from vain-glory;\n For, through each mortal change, equal mind,\n O my Dellius, befits mortal born.\u201d\n\n \u2014Horat. _Carm._ ii. 3, Lord Lytton\u2019s trans.\n\n\nFootnote 79:\n\n\n \u201cFell Care climbs brazen galley\u2019s sides;\n Nor troops of horse can fly\n Her foot, which than the stag\u2019s is swifter\u2014ay,\n Swifter than Eurus when he madly rides\n The clouds along the sky.\u201d\n\n \u2014_Carm._ ii. 16, Martin\u2019s translation.\n\n\nFootnote 80:\n\n We do not here forget such songs as Shakspeare\u2019s \u201cCome away, come\n away, Death,\u201d or Ben Jonson\u2019s \u201cSee the chariot at hand here of Love,\u201d\n or the anapests and dactyls in the madrigals. But we think it cannot\n be gainsaid that the general tendency of the earlier poets was to\n simple rhythms, and that the intricate arrangements of rhyme and\n novelties of metre in which modern poets delight were little known to\n them, or, if known, little relished.\n\nFootnote 81:\n\n\n \u201cFled are the snows; and the green, reappearing,\n Shoots in the meadow and shines on the tree.\u201d\n\n\nFootnote 82:\n\n _Note by the author of the article._\u2014The import of this needs some\n further explanation. Since the body is full of various and contrary\n physical forces, these must come either from the soul as the active\n principle giving the _materia_ of the body its first being, or from\n the elements which are the chemical components of the blood, bones,\n and other integral parts of the body. The soul cannot furnish them,\n because it does not possess them. Therefore the elements remain, and\n the material substance remains, and they are not divested of their\n substantial formality.\n\nFootnote 83:\n\n Viz., that the modern theory destroys the unity of substances, and\n particularly the unity of the human nature or substance.\u2014_Author of\n the article_.\n\nFootnote 84:\n\n Cant. iv. 7.\n\nFootnote 85:\n\n Ex. xvi. 33; Heb. ix. 4.\n\nFootnote 86:\n\n See THE CATHOLIC WORLD, July, 1877, \u201cThe European Exodus.\u201d\n\nFootnote 87:\n\n Among the Catholic colleges whose teaching staff is wholly or mainly\n German, and whose students are largely of German birth, we may\n mention the Redemptorist Convent and House of Studies at Ilchester,\n Maryland, which has a staff of 11 learned professors; St. Charles\n Borromeo\u2019s Seminary of the Congregation of the Precious Blood,\n Carthagena, Ohio; St. Joseph\u2019s College, Cincinnati, conducted by the\n Brothers of the Holy Cross; Seminary of St. Francis of Sales,\n Milwaukee; College of St. Laurence of Brundusium, Calvary, Ohio,\n conducted by the Capuchin Fathers; St. Vincent\u2019s Abbey of the Order\n of St. Benedict, Beatty\u2019s Station, Pennsylvania, with a staff of 25\n professors; St. Francis\u2019 Monastery, Loretto, Pennsylvania; St.\n Francis Solanus\u2019 Convent of the Franciscan Fathers, Quincy, Illinois;\n St. Joseph\u2019s College, conducted by the Franciscan Fathers, at\n Teutopolis, Illinois; Franciscan College, Allegany, New York; St.\n Ignatius\u2019 College, Buffalo; Franciscan Collegiate Institute,\n Cleveland; Gymnasium of the Franciscan Fathers at Cincinnati; St.\n Joseph\u2019s College, Rohnerville, California, under the direction of the\n Priests of the Precious Blood; and St. John\u2019s College, conducted by\n the Benedictines, at St. Joseph, Minnesota. We may add in this place\n that thirteen of our sixty-eight American prelates are of German\n birth or descent.\n\nFootnote 88:\n\n See THE CATHOLIC WORLD, August, 1877, \u201cColonization and Future\n Emigration.\u201d\n\nFootnote 89:\n\n By Carlyle.\u2014ED. C. W.\n\nFootnote 90:\n\n _The Beginnings of Christianity._ With a View of the State of the\n Roman World at the Birth of Christ. By George P. Fisher, D.D.,\n Professor of Ecclesiastical History in Yale College, etc. New York:\n Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1877.\n\nFootnote 91:\n\n Mr. Leeser, a late eminent Jewish scholar and minister of a synagogue\n in Philadelphia, translated the original text of Gen. i. 11: \u201cThe\n Spirit of God _was waving_ over the face of the waters.\u201d\n\nFootnote 92:\n\n Wisdom i. 14, 15.\n\nFootnote 93:\n\n P. 5.\n\nFootnote 94:\n\n Pp. 393\u2013395.\n\nFootnote 95:\n\n Pp. 464, 465.\n\nFootnote 96:\n\n We should prefer to say contrived by the human intelligence,\n constructed and directed by the human will.\n\nFootnote 97:\n\n P. 465.\n\nFootnote 98:\n\n P. 66.\n\nFootnote 99:\n\n Pp. 137\u2013139.\n\nFootnote 100:\n\n P. 140.\n\nFootnote 101:\n\n P. 42.\n\nFootnote 102:\n\n _Short Studies on Great Subjects._ By James Anthony Froude, M.A. New\n York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1877.\n\nFootnote 103:\n\n We cannot, in the space of an article of this kind, give chapter and\n verse for every statement we may make. Limits forbid this. In saying\n that incoherency and inconsistency mark the Protestant tradition\n throughout, we are aware that we make a very large and very grave\n assertion. To those who feel inclined to doubt its truth we would\n recommend as the readiest and fullest confirmation of it the very\n able series of articles on the Protestant tradition which appeared\n last year in the London _Tablet_\u2014a series that, enlarged and carried\n further, we should like to see published in book-form.\n\nFootnote 104:\n\n Mr. Froude probably means the children of Catholic parents, who were\n encouraged by the state to apostatize, and thereby enter into the\n possession of their family estates; as otherwise there was no legal\n possibility of a Protestant being injured by a Catholic.\n\nFootnote 105:\n\n _The English in Ireland in the Eighteenth Century_. By James Anthony\n Froude, M.A. Vol. I. London: Longmans, Green & Co. 1872.\n\nFootnote 106:\n\n Herein is plainly confirmed the view we took of Mr. Froude\u2019s theory\n of might and right in our last article, \u201cMr. Froude on the Revival of\n Romanism,\u201d Dec., 1877.\n\nFootnote 107:\n\n The Great Hall at Westminster, so called from William Rufus, who\n built it (1097) for a banqueting-hall\u2014and kept his word.\n\nFootnote 108:\n\n See, for the true character of this much-maligned and really\n lamb-like sovereign, Froude\u2019s _History of England_. Yet\u2014so harsh is\n the judgment of men\u2014it is this very prince of whose robber\u2014we should\n say resumption of the church lands the Protestant antiquary, Sir\n Henry Spelman, writes: \u201cGod\u2019s blessing, it seemeth, was not on it;\n for within four years after he had received all this, and had ruined\n and sacked three hundred and seventy-six of the monasteries, and\n brought their substance to his treasury, ... he was drawn so dry that\n Parliament was constrained to supply his wants with the residue of\n all the monasteries of the kingdom, great ones and illustrious, ...\n by reason whereof the service of God was not only grievously wounded\n and bleedeth at this day, but infinite works of charity were utterly\n cut off and extinguished.\u201d\n\nFootnote 109:\n\n _Riding the wild mare_\u2014i.e., playing at see-saw. The kneeling of the\n ox refers to an old English superstition that at midnight on\n Christmas Eve the oxen would be found kneeling in their stalls.\n\nFootnote 110:\n\n A peculiar peal of bells rung at Christmas-tide on the church-bells\n in Languedoc\u2014doubtless, like _Noel_, from _natalis_.\n\nFootnote 111:\n\n _Du Darwinisme: ou l\u2019homme singe_. Paris, 1877, page 170.\n\nFootnote 112:\n\n _On the Intrusion of certain Professors of Physical Science into the\n Region of Faith and Morals_: An address delivered to the members of\n the Manchester Academia of the Catholic Religion by J. Stores Smith,\n Esq.\n\nFootnote 113:\n\n _Manuel d\u2019une Corporation Chr\u00e9tienne_, par L\u00e9on Harmel. Tours, Marne,\n Paris: au Secr\u00e9tariat de l\u2019\u0153uvre des Cercles Catholiques d\u2019Ouvriers,\n 10 Rue du Bac. 1877.\n\nFootnote 114:\n\n 1 Tim. iii. 7.\n\nFootnote 115:\n\n Cyprian, Epist. lxvii.\n\nFootnote 116:\n\n Celestine, Epist. ii. 5.\n\nFootnote 117:\n\n _De Clericis_, lib. i, cap. vi.\n\nFootnote 118:\n\n Lib. v. _Biblioth._ ad. not. 118.\n\nFootnote 119:\n\n _De Concord. Sacerd. et Imp._, lib. viii. cap. ii.\n\nFootnote 120:\n\n _Vet. et Nov. Ecclesia Discipl._, par. ii. lib. ii. cap. i.\n\nFootnote 121:\n\n Epist. v.\n\nFootnote 122:\n\n Epist. lv. No. vii., ed. Tauchnitz, Lipsi\u00e6. 1838.\n\nFootnote 123:\n\n _Apud Wouters, Hist. Eccl. Comp._, vol. i. p. 65.\n\nFootnote 124:\n\n 1 Cor. x. 24.\n\nFootnote 125:\n\n 1 Tim. ii 11.\n\nFootnote 126:\n\n Cfr. Alzog\u2019s _Church Hist._, Papisch & Byrne, vol. i. p. 396.\n\nFootnote 127:\n\n See Chrysostom, _De Sacerdotio_, iii. 15.\n\nFootnote 128:\n\n See Graziani, _Lettera di S. Clemente Primo Papa e Martire ai\n Corinti_, ... _corredata di note critiche e filologiche_, Rome, 1832.\n\nFootnote 129:\n\n Cfr. Devoti, _Inst. Can._, lib. i. tit. v. sect. i. par. vii., in\n note.\n\nFootnote 130:\n\n See Augustine, Epist. clv.; Synesius, Epist. lxvii.; Baronius, ad an.\n 304; Baluze, _Miscell._, ii. 102.\n\nFootnote 131:\n\n _H. E._, vi. 43.\n\nFootnote 132:\n\n Compare Tertullian, _Apol._, xxxvii.\n\nFootnote 133:\n\n Cfr. Novaes, whose voluminous, erudite, and orthodox work, the _Lives\n of the Popes_, is enriched with preliminary dissertations on every\n subject relating to the Papacy and the Cardinalate.\n\nFootnote 134:\n\n De Rossi, in his _Bullettino di Archeologia Cristiana, Anno iv._,\n Jan.-Feb., 1866, has given the reasons for the preponderating\n influence which the cardinal-deacons had in the affairs of the\n church, and for their frequent succession to the Papacy. Indeed, it\n became in the third and fourth centuries an almost invariable rule to\n elect the archdeacon to succeed to the chair of St. Peter.\n\nFootnote 135:\n\n Cap. _Si duo_, viii, dist. lxxix.\n\nFootnote 136:\n\n Strange to say, Vigilius did, although not immediately succeed to the\n Papacy, and is reckoned the sixty-first in the series of pontiffs.\n\nFootnote 137:\n\n See the controversy apud Ferraris, _Bibliotheca_, Art. \u201cPapa.\u201d\n\nFootnote 138:\n\n Const. _Prudentes Bullar. Rom._, tom. iv. par. ii. page 90.\n\nFootnote 139:\n\n Pagi, _Breviarium RR. FP._, vol. i. p. 129, _in vita Symmachi_.\n\nFootnote 140:\n\n In a curious old ballad sung in low French by the Scotch in the\n king\u2019s service occurs the contemptuous line, _Les Romains bien tout\n villain mutinail_. Francisque-Michel, _Les Ecessais en France_.\n\nFootnote 141:\n\n _Apologia del Pontificato di Benedetto X._, par. i. cap. ii. num. 2.\n\nFootnote 142:\n\n Odoacer, the first king of Italy in olden times, become so by\n violence and usurpation like the first king of Italy of modern times,\n and the first to interfere in a papal election, was captured in\n March, 493, and put to death by his victorious rival, Theodoric.\n\nFootnote 143:\n\n Darras, _General History of the Catholic Church_, vol. ii. p. 66.\n\nFootnote 144:\n\n Some writers, it must be said, attribute the imposition of this\n odious burden to the Gothic kings. Graveson, who agrees with them,\n says (_Hist. Eccl._, tom. ii. page 62) that the money was always\n distributed in alms to the poor.\n\nFootnote 145:\n\n Cap. _Quia Sancta_, xxviii. Dist lxiii.\n\nFootnote 146:\n\n Paul the Deacon, _apud Pagi_ (_Breviarium, RR. PP._, tom. i. p. 350).\n\nFootnote 147:\n\n When a successor to the throne was elected or appointed during the\n emperor\u2019s lifetime he was called King of Rome or of the Romans.\n\nFootnote 148:\n\n Ad an. 884.\n\nFootnote 149:\n\n _In Ord. Rom._ cap. xvii. page 114.\n\nFootnote 150:\n\n Ad an. 884.\n\nFootnote 151:\n\n _De Nummo Argenteo Benedicti III._, pag. 22 et seq.\n\nFootnote 152:\n\n _Vet. et Nov. Eccl. Discipl._, part ii. lib. ii. cap. xxvi par. 6.\n\nFootnote 153:\n\n _Primacy of the Apostolic See_, p. 243.\n\nFootnote 154:\n\n _Die Deutschen P\u00e4pste_, 2 vols., Regensburg, 1839.\n\nFootnote 155:\n\n See a long and interesting note to the point headed, _Quali\n consequenze discendano dalla condizione della chiesa romana al secolo\n x._ in Mozzoni\u2019s _Tavole Cronologiche critiche della Storia della\n Chiesa Universale_. _Secolo Decimo_, Rome 1865.\n\nFootnote 156:\n\n Cap. _In Nomine Domini_, i. dist. xviii.\n\nFootnote 157:\n\n Ix., cap. _Licet, 6. de Elect._\n\nFootnote 158:\n\n Bede\u2019s _Ecclesiastical History of England_, p. 217. Edited by J. A.\n Giles, D.C.L. (Henry G. Bohn).\n\nFootnote 159:\n\n This thought is taken from St. Teresa.\n\nFootnote 160:\n\n One of the most recent and significant signs of change in the\n Anglican communion is the movement in favor of confession. It may be\n well to inform our readers that the above article is from the pen of\n Mgr. Capel, than whom no man in England probably is better fitted\n from his position, knowledge, and experience to treat of such a\n subject.\u2014ED. C. W.\n\nFootnote 161:\n\n This strange narrative, which has never hitherto been published in\n any language, is the autobiography of a friend of the Lady Herbert of\n Lea, who has translated it for THE CATHOLIC WORLD.\u2014ED. C. W.\n\nFootnote 162:\n\n _The Final Philosophy; or, System of Perfectible Knowledge issuing\n from the Harmony of Science and Religion_. By Charles Woodruff\n Shields, D.D., Professor in Princeton College. New York: Scribner,\n Armstrong & Co. 1877.\n\nFootnote 163:\n\n Have we no word to express shortly the meaning of the fine German\n word \u201c_Thaten-drang_\u201d?\n\nFootnote 164:\n\n _Katholische Stimme_.\n\nFootnote 165:\n\n Sparks\u2019 _Life of Arnold_, p. 218.\n\nFootnote 166:\n\n Pp. 25\u201327.\n\nFootnote 167:\n\n The remains of St. Honorat are now in a church at Cannes.\n\nFootnote 168:\n\n Near Cap Roux is an inlet called Aur\u00e8le from the old Roman road along\n the shore.\n\nFootnote 169:\n\n Is. i. 18.\n\nFootnote 170:\n\n 1 Cor. xv. 31.\n\nFootnote 171:\n\n _Report of the Joint Special Committee to investigate Chinese\n Immigration_. Washington, 1877.\n\nFootnote 172:\n\n\n \u201cWho, perched on one foot, as though \u2019twere a feat,\n Some hundreds of verses an hour would repeat.\u201d\n\n \u2014Horat., _Sat._ i. 4, 9.\n\n\nFootnote 173:\n\n A couplet from this great work is quoted in the _Dunciad_:\n\n\n \u201cSo when Jove\u2019s block descended from on high\n (As sings thy great forefather, Ogilby),\n Loud thunder to its bottom shook the bog,\n And the hoarse nation croaked, \u201cGod save King Log!\u201d\n\n\nFootnote 174:\n\n\n \u201cAnd iron slumber fell on him, hard rest weighed down his eyes,\n And shut were they for ever more by night that never dies.\u201d\n\n \u2014_\u00c6neid_, x. 745\u2013746, Morris\u2019 translation.\n\n\nFootnote 175:\n\n The translation of the Earl of Lauderdale appeared before Pitt\u2019s, but\n it was really completed before Dryden\u2019s, and the latter had the use\n of it in MSS. in preparing his own, as he admits in his preface. Some\n three or four hundred of the earl\u2019s lines were adopted by Dryden\n without change.\n\nFootnote 176:\n\n\n \u201cThere is her temple, there they stand an hundred altars meet,\n Warm with Sab\u00e6an incense smoke, with new-pulled blossoms sweet.\u201d\n\n \u2014_\u00c6neid_, i. 415\u2013416, Morris\u2019 trans.\n\n\nFootnote 177:\n\n\n \u201cWhence she with kindness prompt\n And eyes glistering with smiles,\u201d\n\n\n Carey gives it, which is certainly English, but\u2014\n\nFootnote 178:\n\n _La Vie Domestique, ses Mod\u00e8les et ses R\u00e8gles\u2014d\u2019apr\u00e8s les documents\n originaux_. Charles de Ribbe. Paris: Edouard Baltenweck.\n\nFootnote 179:\n\n In regard to the heroic virtue that can be practised in the married\n state there can be no question. As little can there be any question\n that in the scale of perfection the religious is the higher\n state.\u2014ED. C. W.\n\nFootnote 180:\n\n He refused the chancellorship when Boucherat gave up the seals, but\n did his work effectually as commissioner of finance and overseer of\n public work in the south and west of France between 1650 and 1690.\n\nFootnote 181:\n\n _Dixit etiam Deus: Producant aqu\u00e6 reptile anima viventis, et volatile\n super terram.... Producat terra animam viventem in genere suo ... et\n factum est ita._\u2014Gen. i. 20, 24.\n\nFootnote 182:\n\n The translation is from the graceful pen of Lady Georgiana Fullerton.\n\nFootnote 183:\n\n As for \u201cgall,\u201d there is, according to the writer\u2019s own showing, more\n of fallen than regenerate humanity in it. The less gall, then, the\n better. The Holy Father has recently favored the Catholic press by\n selecting St. Francis de Sales as its patron saint. The more closely\n writers adhere to the saint\u2019s spirit the nearer they will approach\n their divine model, and the more abundant will their labors be in\n good fruits.\u2014ED. C. W.\n\nFootnote 184:\n\n Marchetti, _Critica al Fleury_, vol. ii. p. 193.\n\nFootnote 185:\n\n _Ad auctorem opusc. Quid est Papa?_ vol. ii. p. 112.\n\nFootnote 186:\n\n Du Cange, _Gloss._, ad verb.\n\nFootnote 187:\n\n Macri, _Hierolexicon_, ad verb. _Conclave_.\n\nFootnote 188:\n\n Biondo da Forl\u00ec, lib. vii. decad. 2.\n\nFootnote 189:\n\n Cap. _Ubi periculum. 3 de Elect. in 6_.\n\nFootnote 190:\n\n Ne Romani electioni Pontificis indeterminata opinionum diversitas\n aliquod possit obstaculum vel dilationem afferre; nos, inter c\u00e6tera\n pr\u00e6cipue attendentes, quod lex superioris per inferiorem tolli non\n potest, opinionem adstruere, sicut accepimus satagentem, quod\n constitutio felicis recordationis Gregorii Pap\u00e6 X. pr\u00e6decessoris\n nostri, circa electionem pr\u00e6fatam edita in concilio Lugdunensi, per\n coetum cardinalium _Roman\u00e6 ecclesi\u00e6_ ipsa vacante modificari possit,\n corrigi vel immutari, aut quicquam ei detrahi sive addi, vel\n dispensari quomodolibet circa ipsam seu aliquam ejus partem, aut\n eidem etiam renunciari per eam tanquam veritati non consonam de\n fratrum nostrorum consilio reprobamus, irritum nihilominus et inane\n decernentes, quicquid potestatis aut jurisdictionis, ad Romanum, dum\n vivit, Pontificem pertinentis (nisi quatenus inconstitutione pr\u00e6dicta\n permittitur) coetus ipse duxerit eadem vacante ecclesia exercendum,\n _etc._\n\nFootnote 191:\n\n Voting by proxy is not recognized in the conclave.\n\nFootnote 192:\n\n Such, for instance, is a woman, a manifest heretic, an\n infidel\u2014_i.e._, one who is not baptized.\n\nFootnote 193:\n\n _C\u00e6remoniale continens ritus electionis Romani Pontificis, cui\n pr\u00e6figuntur Constitutiones Pontifici\u00e6, et Conciliorum decreta ad eam\n rem pertinentia._ Rom\u00e6, 1622, in 410.\n\nFootnote 194:\n\n _Lib. Pontif._, tom. iv., _in vita Bonif_.\n\nFootnote 195:\n\n _Mus. Ital._, cap. xvii. p. 112.\n\nFootnote 196:\n\n Labb\u00e9, _Concil._, tom. vi. col. 1721.\n\nFootnote 197:\n\n 4 Kings x. 3.\n\nFootnote 198:\n\n _Hist. of Alex. VII._\n\nFootnote 199:\n\n _Const. In eligendis Bullar. Rom._, tom. iv. part ii. pag. 145.\n\nFootnote 200:\n\n _Spiritual Exercises_. Second Day.\n\nFootnote 201:\n\n Turkeys were introduced into France by the Jesuits in 1570, in which\n year they were first eaten at M\u00e9zi\u00e8res, department of Ardennes, at\n the marriage of Charles IX. and Elizabeth of Austria.\n\nFootnote 202:\n\n The Feast of Our Lady of Dolors is on the 3d Sunday of September.\n This Sunday, in 1877, fell on the 16th\u2014_i.e._, the ninth day after\n the Nativity of Our Lady, which is on the 8th of September.\n\nFootnote 203:\n\n Hodie nomen tuum ita magnificavit, ut non recedat laus tua de ore\n hominum, qui memores fuerint virtutis Domini in \u00e6ternum, pro quibus\n non pepercisti anim\u00e6 tu\u00e6 propter angustias et tribulationem generis\n tui, sed subvenisti ruin\u00e6 ante conspectum Dei nostri (Epistle in the\n Mass of Our Lady of the Seven Dolors, third Sunday in September).\n\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\n\n\n \u25cf Transcriber\u2019s Notes:\n \u25cb Missing or obscured punctuation was silently corrected.\n \u25cb Typographical errors were silently corrected.\n \u25cb Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only\n when a predominant form was found in this book.\n \u25cb Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_)\n and text that was bold, is enclosed by equal signs (=Now!=).","title":"The Catholic World, Vol. 26, October, 1877, to March, 1878","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":485037}