Part. I. Albany: Printed by C. Van Benthuysen & Sons.

THE

CATHOLIC WORLD.

A

MONTHLY MAGAZINE

OF

GENERAL LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.

VOL. XIII.

APRIL TO SEPTEMBER, 1871.

NEW YORK:

THE CATHOLIC PUBLICATION HOUSE,

9 Warren Street.

1871.

JOHN ROSS & CO.,

PRINTERS AND STEREOTYPERS,

27 ROSE ST., NEW YORK.

CONTENTS.

Albertus Magnus Vindicated, 712

America's Obligation to France, 836

Ancients, the Writing Materials of the, 126

Animas, Las, 353

Animals, Love for, 545

Bishop Timon, 86

Bordeaux, 158

Brébeuf, Memoir of Father John, 512, 623

Carlyle and Père Bouhours, 820

Catholic Associations, Spirit of, 652

Catholicity and Pantheism, 554

Cayla, A Pilgrimage to, 595

Cecilia, Saint, 477

Church, The, Accredits herself, 145

Church, What our Municipal Laws owe to the, 342

Civilization, Origin of, 402

Dion and the Sibyls, 56

Doña Fortuna and Don Dinero, 130

Döllinger, The Apostasy of, 415

Education and Unification, 1

Education, On Higher, 115

Egbert Stanway, 377

Egyptian Civilization according to the most Recent Discoveries, 804

England, The Serial Literature of, 619

Europe's Future, 76

Flowers, 305

Froude and Calvinism, 541

France, America's Obligation to, 836

Future, The Present and the, 452

Galitzin, The Mother of Prince, 367

Geneva, The Catholic Church in, 847

Genzano and Frascati, 737

Good Gerard of Cologne, The, 797

Gottfried von Strassburg's Hymn to the Virgin, 240

_Independent_, A Word to _The_, 247

Infallibility, 577

Ireland, Ancient Laws of, 635

Ireland, The Lord Chancellors of, 228

Irish Martyr, An, 433

Italian Guarantees and the Sovereign Pontiff, 566

Laws, Municipal, and the Church, 342

Letter from Rome, 134

Letter from the President of a College, 281

Liquefaction of the Blood of St. Januarius, 772

Locket, The Story of an Algerine, 643

Lourdes, Our Lady of, 98, 255, 396, 527, 662, 825

Lucas Garcia, 785

Mary Benedicta, 207

Mary Clifford's Promise Kept, 447

Mexican Art and its Michael Angelo, 334

On Higher Education, 115

Our Lady of Guadalupe, 189

Our Lady of Lourdes, 98, 255, 396, 527, 662, 825

Our Northern Neighbors, 108

Page of the Past and a Shadow of the Future, A, 764

Pantheism, Catholicity and, 554

Pau, 504

Père Jacques and Mademoiselle Adrienne, 677

Present and the Future, The, 452

Protestantism, Statistics of, in the U. S., 195

Reformation, The, Not Conservative, 721

Rome, How it Looked Three Centuries Ago, 358

Rome, Letter from, 134

Saintship, False Views of, 424

Santa Restituta, Legend of, 276

Sardinia and the Holy Father, 289

Sauntering, 35

Sayings of the Fathers of the Desert, 274

Scepticism of the Age, The, 391

Secular, The, Not Supreme, 685

Shamrock Gone West, The, 264

Sor Juan Inez de la Cruz, 47

Spanish America, Dramatic Moralists in, 702

Statistics of Protestantism in the U. S., 195

St. Januarius, Liquefaction of the Blood of, 772

The Church Accredits Herself, 145

Unification, Education and, 1

What Our Municipal Laws Owe to the Church, 342

Writing Materials of the Ancients, 126

Yorke, The House of, 15, 169, 317, 461, 604, 746

POETRY.

"Amen" of the Stones, The, 168

A Pie IX., 684

Disillusioned, 489

Gualberto's Victory, 96

King Cormac's Choice, 413

On a Great Plagiarist, 206

Rose, The, 571

Saint John Dwarf, 357

Sancta Dei Genitrix, 771

Sonnet, 603

St. Francis and St. Dominic, 745

St. Francis of Assisi, 133

St. Mary Magdalen, 511

The Cross, 14

The True Harp, 594

To the Crucified, 352

Vespers, 275

Warning, The, 125

NEW PUBLICATIONS.

Allies' St. Peter, 860

Anderson's Historical Reader, 855

Appleton's Annual Cyclopædia, 573

Barker's Text-Book of Chemistry, 142

Bret Harte's Poems, 144

Caddell's Never Forgotten; or, The Home of the Lost Child, 853

Catechism Illustrated, The, 854

Clement's Hand-Book of Legendary and Mythological Art, 143

Coleridge's Theology of the Parables, 432

Conyngham's Sarsfield, 143

Curtius's History of Greece, 575

Cusack's History of Kerry, 855

Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, 573

Elia; or, Spain Fifty Years Ago, 141

Fairbanks's History of Florida, 857

Familiar Discourses to the Young, 288

Fifty Catholic Tracts, 430

Folia Ecclesiastica, 144

Gaskin's Irish Varieties, 142

Glosswood, The Countess of, 288

Hamilton's Golden Words, 860

Heaven, The Happiness of, 286

Hefele on the Christian Councils, 718

Hemenway's Vermont, 857

Higginson's Sympathy of Religions, 286

Holy Exercise of the Presence of God, 854

Holmes on Mechanism in Thought and Morals, 139

Historical Gazetteer, 857

Illustrated Catholic Sunday-School Library, 573

Jesus and Jerusalem, 140

Kellogg's Arthur Brown, 143

Keon's Dion and the Sibyls, 429

La Grange's Thecla, 432

Lallemant's Spiritual Doctrine, 287

Lebon's Holy Communion, 573

Life and Writings of De Montfort, 141

Life of St. Gertrude, 859

Martyrs Omitted by Foxe, 575

Meditations on the Litany of the Most Holy Virgin, 431

Miles's Truce of God, 574

Moran's Life of Archbishop Plunkett, 574, 858,

Mrs. Stowe's Pink and White Tyranny, 859

Mulrenan's Sketch of the Church on Long Island, 854

Natural History of New York, 432

Oakeley's Priest on the Mission, 719

Perrone's Divinity of Christ, 286

Rome and Geneva, 283

Russell's My Study Windows, 427

Seelye on Roman Imperialism, 141

Sestini's Manual of Geometrical Analysis, 856

Seton's Romance of the Charter Oak, 288

Starr's Patron Saints, 853

Stowe's Little Pussy Willow, 144

Sullivan's Prayers and Ceremonies of the Mass, 144

Synchronology of Sacred and Profane History, 144

Vaughan's Life of St. Thomas Aquin., 427

Weiss's American Religion, 720

West's State of the Dead, 574

Whipple's Literature and Art, 430

Wonders of European Art, 576

Wonders of the Heavens, 432

Young's Catholic Hymns and Canticles, 719

* * * * *

THE CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. XIII., No. 73.--APRIL, 1871.[1]

UNIFICATION AND EDUCATION.[2]

The Hon. Henry Wilson, recently re-elected senator in Congress from

Massachusetts, may not be distinguished as an original thinker or

as a statesman of commanding ability, but no man is a surer index

to his party or a more trustworthy exponent of its sentiments and

tendencies, its aims and purposes. This gives to his article in

_The Atlantic Monthly_, indicating the policy to be pursued by the

Republican party, a weight it might not otherwise possess.

Mr. Wilson is a strong political partisan, but he is above all

a fervent Evangelical, and his aim, we presume, is to bring his

political party to coincide with his Evangelical party, and make each

strengthen the other. We of course, as a Catholic organ, have nothing

to say of questions in issue between different political parties so

long as they do not involve the rights and interests of our religion,

or leave untouched the fundamental principles and genius of the

American system of government, although we may have more or less to

say as American citizens; but when either party is so ill-advised

as to aim a blow either at the freedom of our religion or at our

federative system of government, we hold ourselves free, and in duty

bound, to warn our fellow-citizens and our fellow-Catholics of the

impending danger, and to do what we can to avert or arrest the blow.

We cannot, without incurring grave censure, betray by our silence the

cause of our religion or of our country, for fear that by speaking we

may cross the purposes of one or another party, and seem to favor the

views and policy of another.

Mr. Wilson's _New Departure_ is unquestionably revolutionary,

and therefore not lawful for any party in this country to adopt.

It is expressed in two words, NATIONAL UNIFICATION and NATIONAL

EDUCATION--that is, the consolidation of all the powers of

government in the general government, and the social and religious

unification of the American people by means of a system of universal

and uniform compulsory education, adopted and enforced by the

authority of the united or consolidated states, not by the states

severally each within its own jurisdiction and for its own people.

The first is decidedly revolutionary and destructive of the American

system of federative government, or the division of powers between a

general government and particular state governments; the second, in

the sense proposed, violates the rights of parents and annihilates

the religious liberty secured by the constitution and laws both of

the several states and of the United States.

The general government, in our American political system, is not the

national government, or any more national than the several state

governments. The national government with us is divided between a

general government having charge of our relations with other powers

and internal matters of a general nature and common to all the

states, and particular state governments having charge of matters

local and particular in their nature, and clothed with all the powers

of supreme national governments not expressly delegated to the

general government. In the draft of the federal constitution reported

by the committee to the convention of 1787, the word _national_ was

used, but the convention finally struck it out, and inserted wherever

it occurred the word _general_, as more appropriately designating the

character and powers of the government they were creating. It takes

under our actual system both the state governments and the general

government to make one complete national government, invested with

all the powers of government. By making the general government a

supreme national government, we make it the source of all authority,

subordinate the state governments to it, make them hold from it,

and deprive them of all independent or undivided rights. This would

completely subvert our system of government, according to which the

states hold their powers immediately from the political people, and

independently of any suzerain or overlord, and the general government

from the states or the people organized as states united in

convention. A more complete change of the government or destruction

of the federative principle, which constitutes the chief excellence

and glory of our system, it would be difficult to propose, or even to

conceive, than is set forth in Mr. Wilson's programme.

Mr. Wilson, however, is hardly justified in calling the revolution

he proposes a "New Departure." It has been the aim of a powerful

party, under one name or another, ever since 1824, if not from

the origin of the government itself. This party has been steadily

pursuing it, and with increasing numbers and influence, ever since

the anti-slavery agitation seriously commenced. At one time, and

probably at all times, it has been moved chiefly by certain business

interests which it could not advance according to its mind by state

legislation, and for which it desired federal legislation and the

whole power of a national government, but which it could not get

because the constitution and the antagonistic interests created by

slave labor were opposed to it. It then turned philanthropist and

called in philanthropy to its aid--philanthropy which makes light

of constitutions and mocks at state lines, and claims the right

to go wherever it conceives the voice of humanity calls it. Under

the pretext of philanthropy, the party turned abolitionist, and

sought to bring under the action of the general government the

question of slavery manifestly reserved to the states severally,

and which it belonged to each to settle for itself in its own way.

A civil war followed. The slaves were emancipated, and slavery

abolished, professedly under the war-power of the Union, as a

military necessity, which nobody regrets. But the party did not

stop here. Forgetful that the extraordinary war-power ceases with

the war, and military necessity can no longer be pleaded, it has,

under one pretext or another, such as protecting and providing for

the freed-men and reconstructing the states that seceded, continued

to exercise it ever since the war was over, and by constitutional

amendments of doubtful validity, since ratified in part under

military pressure by states not yet reconstructed or held to be

duly organized states in the Union, it has sought to legitimate it,

and to incorporate it into the constitution as one of the ordinary

peace-powers of the government.

The party has sometimes coincided, and sometimes has not strictly

coincided, with one or another of the great political parties

that have divided the country, but it has always struggled

for the consolidation of all the powers of government in the

general government. Whether prompted by business interests or by

philanthropy, its wishes and purposes have required it to get rid of

all co-ordinate and independent bodies that might interfere with,

arrest, or limit the power of Congress, or impose any limitation on

the action of the general government not imposed by the arbitrary

will of the majority of the people, irrespective of their state

organization.

What the distinguished senator urges we submit, therefore, is simply

the policy of consolidation or centralization which his party has

steadily pursued from the first, and which it has already in good

part consummated. It has abolished slavery, and unified the labor

system of the Union; it has contracted a public debt, whether

needlessly or not, large enough to secure to the consolidation of

the powers of a national government in the general government the

support of capitalists, bankers, railroad corporators, monopolists,

speculators, projectors, and the business world generally. Under

pretence of philanthropy, and of carrying out the abolition of

slavery, and abolishing all civil and political distinctions of

race or color, it has usurped for the general government the power

to determine the question of suffrage and eligibility, under the

constitution and by the genius of our government reserved to the

states severally, and sends the military and swarms of federal

inspectors into the states to control, or at least to look after,

the elections, in supreme contempt of state authority. It has

usurped for the general government the power of granting charters of

incorporation for private business purposes elsewhere than in the

District of Columbia, and induced it to establish national bureaus

of agriculture and education, as if it was the only and unlimited

government of the country, which it indeed is fast becoming.

The work of consolidation or unification is nearly completed, and

there remains little to do except to effect the social and religious

unification of the various religions, sects, and races that make up

the vast and diversified population of the country; and it is clear

from Mr. Wilson's programme that his party contemplate moulding the

population of European and of African origin, Indians and Asiatics,

Protestants and Catholics, Jews and pagans, into one homogeneous

people, after what may be called the New England Evangelical

type. Neither his politics nor his philanthropy can tolerate any

diversity of ranks, conditions, race, belief, or worship. A complete

unification must be effected, and under the patronage and authority

of the general government.

Mr. Wilson appears not to have recognized any distinction between

unity and union. Union implies plurality or diversity; unity excludes

both. Yet he cites, without the least apparent misgiving, the fathers

of the republic--Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, Jay, and

Madison--who were strenuous for the union of the several states, as

authorities in favor of their unity or consolidation in one supreme

national government. There were points in which these great men

differed among themselves--some of them wished to give more, some of

them less, power to the general government--some of them would give

more, some of them less, power to the executive, etc., but they all

agreed in their efforts to establish the union of the states, and not

one of them but would have opposed their unity or consolidation into

a single supreme government. Mr. Wilson is equally out in trying, as

he does, to make it appear that the strong popular sentiment of the

American people, in favor of union, is a sentiment in favor of unity

or unification.

But starting with the conception of unity or consolidation, and

resolving republicanism into the absolute supremacy of the will

of the people, irrespective of state organization, Mr. Wilson can

find no stopping-place for his party short of the removal of all

constitutional or organic limitations on the irresponsible will of

the majority for the time, which he contends should in all things

be supreme and unopposed. His republicanism, as he explains it,

is therefore incompatible with a well-ordered state, and is either

no government at all, but universal anarchy, or the unmitigated

despotism of majorities--a despotism more oppressive and crushing to

all true freedom and manly independence, than any autocracy that the

world has ever seen. The fathers of the republic never understood

republicanism in this sense. They studied to restrict the sphere of

power, and to guard against the supremacy of mere will, whether of

the monarch, the nobility, or the people.

But having reached the conclusion that true republicanism demands

unification, and the removal of all restrictions on the popular

will, Mr. Wilson relies on the attachment of the American people to

the republican idea to carry out and realize his programme, however

repugnant it may be to what they really desire and suppose they

are supporting. He knows the people well enough to know that they

do not usually discriminate with much niceness, and that they are

easily caught and led away by a few high-sounding phrases and popular

catchwords, uttered with due gravity and assurance--perhaps he does

not discriminate very nicely, and is himself deceived by the very

phrases and catchwords which deceive them. It is not impossible. At

any rate, he persuades himself unification or consolidation can be

carried forward and effected by appeals to the republican instincts

and tendencies of the American people, and secured by aid of the

colored vote and woman suffrage, soon to be adopted as an essential

element in the revolutionary movement. The colored people, it is

expected, will vote as their preachers direct, and their preachers

will direct as they are directed by the Evangelicals. The women

who will vote, if woman suffrage is adopted, are evangelicals,

philanthropists, or humanitarians, and are sure to follow their

instincts and vote for the unification or centralization of

power--the more unlimited, the better.

But the chief reliance for the permanence in power of the party of

consolidation is universal and uniform compulsory education by the

general government, which will, if adopted, complete and preserve

the work of unification. Education is the American hobby--regarded,

as uneducated or poorly educated people usually regard it, as a sort

of panacea for all the ills that flesh is heir to. We ourselves,

as Catholics, are as decidedly as any other class of American

citizens in favor of universal education, as thorough and extensive

as possible--if its quality suits us. We do not, indeed, prize so

highly as some of our countrymen appear to do the simple ability to

read, write, and cipher; nor do we believe it possible to educate

a whole people so that every one, on attaining his majority, will

understand the bearing of all political questions or comprehend the

complexities of statesmanship, the effects at large of all measures

of general or special legislation, the bearing on productive industry

and national wealth of this or that financial policy, the respective

merits of free trade and protection, or what in a given time or given

country will the best secure individual freedom and the public good.

This is more than we ourselves can understand, and we believe we are

better educated than the average American. We do not believe that

the great bulk of the people of any nation can ever be so educated

as to understand the essential political, financial, and economical

questions of government for themselves, and they will always have to

follow blindly their leaders, natural or artificial. Consequently,

the education of the leaders is of far greater importance than the

education of those who are to be led. All men have equal natural

rights, which every civil government should recognize and protect,

but equality in other respects, whether sought by levelling downward

or by levelling upward, is neither practicable nor desirable. Some

men are born to be leaders, and the rest are born to be led. Go where

we will in society, in the halls of legislation, the army, the navy,

the university, the college, the district school, the family, we

find the few lead, the many follow. It is the order of nature, and

we cannot alter it if we would. Nothing can be worse than to try to

educate all to be leaders. The most pitiable sight is a congressional

body in which there is no leader, an army without a general, but

all lead, all command--that is, nobody leads or commands. The best

ordered and administered state is that in which the few are well

educated and lead, and the many are trained to obedience, are willing

to be directed, content to follow, and do not aspire to be leaders.

In the early days of our republic, when the few were better educated

than now and the many not so well, in the ordinary sense of the term,

there was more dignity in the legislative, judicial, and executive

branches of the government, more wisdom and justice in legislation,

and more honesty, fidelity, and capacity in the administration. In

extending education and endeavoring to train all to be leaders, we

have only extended presumption, pretension, conceit, indocility, and

brought incapacity to the surface.

These, we grant, are unpopular truths, but they, nevertheless, are

truths, which it is worse than idle to deny. Everybody sees it, feels

it, but few have the courage to avow it in face of an intolerant and

tyrannical public opinion. For ourselves, we believe the peasantry

in old Catholic countries, two centuries ago, were better educated,

although for the most part unable to read or write, than are the

great body of the American people to-day. They had faith, they had

morality, they had a sense of religion, they were instructed in the

great principles and essential truths of the Gospel, were trained to

be wise unto salvation, and they had the virtues without which wise,

stable, and efficient government is impracticable. We hear it said,

or rather read in the journals, that the superiority the Prussian

troops have shown to the French is due to their superior education.

We do not believe a word of it. We have seen no evidence that the

French common soldiers are not as well educated and as intelligent as

the Prussian. The superiority is due to the fact that the Prussian

officers were better educated in their profession, were less

overweening in their confidence of victory, and maintained better

and severer discipline in their armies, than the French officers.

The Northern armies in our recent civil war had no advantage in the

superior education of the rank and file over the Southern armies,

where both were equally well officered and commanded. The _morale_

of an army is no doubt the great thing, but it does not depend on

the ability of the common soldier to read, write, and cipher; it

depends somewhat on his previous habits and pursuits--chiefly on the

officers. Under the first Napoleon, the Prussians were not superior

to the French, though as well educated. Good officers, with an able

general at their head, can make an efficient army out of almost any

materials.

It is not, therefore, for political or military reasons that we

demand universal education, whether by the general government or

under the state governments. We demand it, as far as practicable,

for other and far higher reasons. We want it for a spiritual or

religious end. We want our children to be educated as thoroughly as

they can be, but in relation to the great purpose of their existence,

so as to be fitted to gain the end for which God creates them. For

the great mass of the people, the education needed is not secular

education, which simply sharpens the intellect and generates pride

and presumption, but moral and religious education, which trains up

children in the way they should go, which teaches them to be honest

and loyal, modest and unpretending, docile and respectful to their

superiors, open and ingenuous, obedient and submissive to rightful

authority, parental or conjugal, civil or ecclesiastical; to know and

keep the commandments of God and the precepts of the church; and to

place the salvation of the soul before all else in life. This sort

of education can be given only by the church or under her direction

and control; and as there is for us Catholics only one church, there

is and can be no proper education for us not given by or under the

direction and control of the Catholic Church.

But it is precisely education by the Catholic Church that Mr. Wilson

and his party do not want, do not believe in, and wish to prevent

us from having even for our own children. It is therefore they

demand a system of universal and uniform compulsory education by

the authority and under the direction of the general government,

which shall effect and maintain the national unification proposed,

by compelling all the children of the land to be trained in national

schools, under Evangelical control and management. The end and aim

of the _New Departure_, aside from certain business interests, is

to suppress Catholic education, gradually extinguish Catholicity in

the country, and to form one homogeneous American people after the

New England Evangelical type. Of this there can be no reasonable

doubt. The Evangelicals and their humanitarian allies, as all their

organs show, are seriously alarmed at the growth of Catholicity in

the United States. They supposed, at first, that the church could

never take root in our Protestant soil, that she could not breathe

the atmosphere of freedom and enlightenment, or thrive in a land of

newspapers and free schools. They have been disappointed, and now

see that they reckoned without their host, and that, if they really

mean to prevent the American people from gradually becoming Catholic,

they must change fundamentally the American form of government,

suppress the freedom of religion hitherto enjoyed by Catholics, and

take the training of all children and youth into their own hands. If

they leave education to the wishes and judgment of parents, Catholic

parents will bring up their children Catholics; if they leave it

to the states separately, Catholics in several of them are already

a powerful minority, daily increasing in strength and numbers, and

will soon be strong enough to force the state legislatures to give

them their proportion of the public schools supported at the public

expense.

All this is clear enough. What, then, is to be done? Mr. Wilson, who

is not remarkable for his reticence, tells us, if not with perfect

frankness, yet frankly enough for all practical purposes. It is to

follow out the tendency which has been so strengthened of late,

and absorb the states in the Union, take away the independence of

the state governments, and assume the control of education for the

general government, already rendered practically the supreme national

government;--then, by appealing to the popular sentiment in favor of

education, and saying nothing of its quality, get Congress, which

the Evangelicals, through the party in power, already control, to

establish a system of compulsory education in national schools--and

the work is done; for these schools will necessarily fall into

Evangelical hands.

Such is what the distinguished Evangelical senator from Massachusetts

calls a "New Departure," but which is really only carrying out

a policy long since entered upon, and already more than half

accomplished. While we are writing, Mr. Hoar, a representative

in Congress from Massachusetts, has introduced into the House of

Representatives a bill establishing a system of national education

under the authority of the general government. Its fate is not

yet known, but no doubt will be, before we go to press. The

probabilities are that it will pass both Houses, and if it does, it

will receive the signature of the President as a matter of course.

The Evangelicals--under which name we include Congregationalists,

Presbyterians, Dutch Reformed, Baptists, and Methodists, etc.--all

the denominations united in the Evangelical Alliance--constitute,

with their political and philanthropic allies, the majority in

Congress, and the measure is advocated apparently by the whole

Evangelical press and by the larger and more influential republican

journals of the country, as any number of excerpts from them now

before us will satisfy any one who has the curiosity to read them.

We did think of selecting and publishing the more striking and

authoritative among them, but we have concluded to hold them in

reserve, to be produced in case any one should be rash enough to

question our general statement. There is a strong popular feeling in

many parts of the country in favor of the measure, which is a pet

measure also of the Evangelical ministers generally, who are sure to

exert their powerful influence in its support, and we see no reason

to doubt that the bill will pass.

But while we see ample cause for all citizens who are loyal to

the system of government which Providence enabled our fathers to

establish, and who wish to preserve it and the liberties it secures,

to be vigilant and active, we see none for alarm. The bill, if

it passes, will be manifestly unconstitutional, even counting

the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments as valid parts of the

constitution; and there may be more difficulty in carrying it into

effect than its framers anticipate. It is part and parcel of a New

England policy, and New England is not omnipotent throughout the

Union, nor very ardently loved; not all the members of the several

evangelical denominations will, when they understand it, favor the

revolution in the government Mr. Wilson would effect. There are in

those denominations many men who belong not to the dominant party,

and who will follow their political rather than their denominational

affinities; also, there are in them a large number, we should hope,

of honest men, who are not accustomed to act on the maxim, "the end

justifies the means," loyal men and patriotic, who consider it no

less disloyalty to seek to revolutionize our government against the

states than against the Union, and who will give their votes and all

their influence to preserve the fundamental principles and genius of

our federative system of government, as left us by our fathers, and

resist, if need be, to the death the disloyal policy of unification

and education proposed by Mr. Wilson.

The Southern states are reconstructed and back now in their place

in the Union, and will not be much longer represented by Northern

adventurers, or men of little ability and less character, but very

soon by genuine Southern men, who, while strictly loyal to the Union,

will speak the genuine sentiments of the Southern people. The attempt

to New-Englandize the Southern people has not succeeded, and will not

succeed. When to the Southern people, who will never acquiesce in

the policy of unification, we add the large number of people in the

Northern states who from their political convictions and affinities,

as well as from their conservative tendencies, will oppose

consolidation, we may feel pretty sure that the policy Mr. Wilson

presents as that of the Republican party will not be adopted, or if

adopted will not be permitted to stand. As not wholly inexperienced

in political matters, and looking at the present state of parties and

temper of the nation, we should say that Mr. Wilson, as a party man,

has committed a blunder, and that, if he has fancied that his _New

Departure_ is fitted to strengthen his party as a political party,

and to give it a new lease of power, he has miscalculated. Nothing

in our judgment would be more fatal to the continuance of his party

in power than for it boldly and unequivocally to accept Mr. Wilson's

programme. There is such a thing as reaction in human affairs, and

reactions are sometimes very powerful.

The educational question ought not to present any serious difficulty,

and would not if our Evangelicals and humanitarians did not wish

to make education a means of preventing the growth of the church

and unmaking the children of Catholics, as Catholics; or if they

seriously and in good faith would accept the religious equality

before the state which the constitution and laws, both of the Union

and the several states, as yet recognize and protect. No matter what

we claim for the Catholic Church in the theological order--we claim

for her in the civil order in this country only equality with the

sects, and for Catholics only equal rights with citizens who are not

Catholics. We demand the freedom of conscience and the liberty of our

church, which is our conscience, enjoyed by Evangelicals. This much

the country in its constitution and laws has promised us, and this

much it cannot deny us without breaking its faith pledged before the

world.

As American citizens, we object to the assumption of the control

of education, or of any action in regard to it, by the general

government; for it has no constitutional right to meddle with it,

and so far as civil government has any authority in relation to

it, it is, under our system of government, the authority of the

states severally, not of the states united. We deny, of course,

as Catholics, the right of the civil government to educate, for

education is a function of the spiritual society, as much so as

preaching and the administration of the sacraments; but we do not

deny to the state the right to establish and maintain public schools.

The state, if it chooses, may even endow religion, or pay the

ministers of religion a salary for their support; but its endowments

of religion, when made, are made to God, are sacred, and under the

sole control and management of the spiritual authority, and the

state has no further function in regard to them but to protect the

spirituality in the free and full possession and enjoyment of them.

If it chooses to pay the ministers of religion a salary, as has been

done in France and Spain, though accepted by the Catholic clergy

only as a small indemnification for the goods of the church seized

by revolutionary governments and appropriated to secular uses, it

acquires thereby no rights over them or liberty to supervise their

discharge of their spiritual functions. We do not deny the same or an

equal right in regard to schools and school-teachers. It may found

and endow schools and pay the teachers, but it cannot dictate or

interfere with the education or discipline of the school. That would

imply a union of church and state, or, rather, the subjection of the

spiritual order to the secular, which the Catholic Church and the

American system of government both alike repudiate.

It is said, however, that the state needs education for its own

protection, and to promote the public good or the good of the

community, both of which are legitimate ends of its institution.

What the state needs in relation to its legitimate ends, or the ends

for which it is instituted, it has the right to ordain and control.

This is the argument by which all public education by the state is

defended. But it involves an assumption which is not admissible.

The state, having no religious or spiritual function, can give only

secular education, and secular education is not enough for the

state's own protection or its promotion of the public good. Purely

secular education, or education divorced from religion, endangers

the safety of the state and the peace and security of the community,

instead of protecting and insuring them. It is not in the power of

the state to give the education it needs for its own sake, or for

the sake of secular society. The fact is, though statesmen, and

especially politicians, are slow to learn it, and still slower to

acknowledge it, the state, or secular society, does not and cannot

suffice for itself, and is unable to discharge its own proper

functions without the co-operation and aid of the spiritual society.

Purely secular education creates no civic virtues, and instead of

fitting unfits the people for the prompt and faithful discharge of

their civic duties, as we may see in Young America, and indeed in

the present active and ruling generation of the American people.

Young America is impatient of restraint, regards father and mother

as old-fogies, narrow-minded, behind the age, and disdains filial

submission or obedience to them, has no respect for dignities,

acknowledges no superior, mocks at law if he can escape the police,

is conceited, proud, self-sufficient, indocile, heedless of the

rights and interests of others--will be his own master, and follow

his own instincts, passions, or headstrong will. Are these the

characteristics of a people fitted to maintain a wise, well-ordered,

stable, and beneficent republican government? Or can such a people be

developed from such youngerlings? Yet with purely secular education,

however far you carry it, experience proves that you can get nothing

better.

The church herself, even if she had full control of the education

of all the children in the land, with ample funds at her command,

could not secure anything better, if, as the state, she educated

for a secular end alone. The virtues needed for the protection of

the state and the advancement of the public or common good, are and

can be secured only by educating or training the children and youth

of a nation not for this life as an end, but for the life to come.

Hence our Lord says, "Seek first the kingdom of God and his justice,

and all these things shall be added unto you." The church does not

educate for the secular order as an end, but for God and heaven; and

it is precisely in educating for God and heaven that she secures

those very virtues on which the welfare and security of the secular

order depend, and without which civil society tends inevitably to

dissolution, and is sustained, if sustained at all, only by armed

force, as we have seen in more than one European nation which has

taken education into its own hand, and subordinated it to secular

ends. The education needed by secular society can be obtained only

from the spiritual society, which educates not for this world, but

for the world to come. The virtues needed to secure this life are

obtained only by seeking and promoting the virtues which fit us for

eternal life.

This follows necessarily from the fact that man is created with a

spiritual nature and for an immortal destiny. If he existed for this

life only, if he were, as some sciolists pretend, merely a monkey or

a gorilla developed, or were like the beasts that perish, this indeed

would not and could not follow, and the reconciliation of the nature

and destiny of man with uniform human experience would be impossible.

We should be obliged, in order to secure the peace and good order

of society, as some unbelieving statesmen do not blush to avow, to

educate in view of a falsehood, and take care to keep up the delusion

that man has a religious nature and destiny, or look to what is false

and delusive for the virtues which can alone save us from anarchy and

utter barbarism. Yet what would serve the delusion or the falsehood,

if man differs not by nature from the dog or the pig? But if man

has really a spiritual nature and an immortal destiny, then it must

necessarily follow that his real good can in no respect be obtained

but in being educated and trained to live for a spiritual life, for

an immortal destiny. Should not man be educated according to his

spiritual nature and destiny, not as a pig or a monkey? If so, in his

education should not the secular be subordinated to the spiritual,

and the temporal to the eternal? We know well, experience proves it,

that even the secular virtues are not secured when sought as the end

of education and of life, but only in educating and living for that

which is not secular, and in securing the virtues which have the

promise of the life of the world to come.

All education, as all life, should be religious, and all education

divorced from religion is an evil, not a good, and is sure in the

long run to be ruinous to the secular order; but as a part of

religious education, and included in it, secular education has its

place, and even its necessity. Man is not all soul, nor all body,

but the union of soul and body; and therefore his education should

include in their union, not separation--for the separation of soul

and body is the death of the body--both spiritual education and

secular. It is not that we oppose secular education when given in

the religious education, and therefore referred to the ultimate end

of man, but when it is given alone and for its own sake. We deny

the competency of the state to educate even for its own order, its

right to establish purely secular schools, from which all religion

is excluded, as Mr. Webster ably contended in his argument in the

Girard will case; but we do not deny, we assert rather, its right to

establish public schools under the internal control and management of

the spiritual society, and to exact that a certain amount of secular

instruction be given along with the religious education that society

gives. This last right it has in consideration of the secular funds

for the support of the schools it furnishes, and as a condition on

which it furnishes them.

Let the state say distinctly how much secular education in the public

schools it exacts, or judges to be necessary for its own ends, and so

far as the Catholic Church has anything to do with the matter it can

have it. The church will not refuse to give it in the schools under

her control. She will not hesitate to teach along with her religion

any amount of reading, writing, arithmetic, history, geography,

music, and drawing, or the sciences and the fine arts, the state

exacts and provides for; nor will she refuse to allow it to send,

if it chooses, its own inspectors into her schools to ascertain if

she actually gives the secular education required. Let it say, then,

what amount of secular education it wants for all the children of

the land, and is willing to pay for, and, so far as Catholics are

concerned, it can have it, and of as good quality, to say the least,

as it can get in purely secular schools, and along with it the

religious education, the most essential to it as well as to the souls

of all.

But the difficulty here, it is assumed, is that the spiritual

society with us is divided into various denominations, each with its

distinctive views of religion. That, no doubt, is a damage, but can

be easily overcome by bearing in mind that the several divisions

have equal rights, and by making the public schools denominational,

as they are in Prussia, Austria, France, and to a certain extent in

England, where denominational diversities obtain as well as with

us. Where the community is divided between different religious

denominations, all standing on a footing of perfect equality before

civil society, this is the only equitable system of public schools

that is practicable. If the state does not adopt it, it must--1, let

the whole business of education alone, and make no public provision

for it; 2, establish purely secular, that is, godless schools,

from which all religion is excluded, to which no religious people

can be expected to consent, and which would ruin both public and

private virtue, and defeat the very purpose of all education; or,

3, it must practically, if not theoretically, recognize some one

of the several denominations as the state religion, and remit the

education of childhood and youth to its management and control, as

is virtually the case with our present public schools, but which

would be manifestly unjust to all the others--to non-evangelicals, if

evangelicalism is made the state religion, or to the Evangelicals,

if a non-evangelical denomination be established as the religion of

the state. The only way to be just to all is, as everybody can see,

to recognize in practice as well as in profession the equal rights

of all denominations in the civil order--make the public schools

denominational, and give to each denomination that asks it for the

sake of conscience its fair and honest proportion, to be as to their

internal economy, education, and discipline under its sole control

and management.

Mr. Wilson proposes for our admiration and imitation the Prussian

system of public schools, and though we do not know that it is

superior to the Austrian or even the French system, yet we think

highly of it. But, what the Evangelical senator does not tell us,

the Prussian system is strictly the denominational system, and each

denomination is free and expected to educate in its own schools its

own children, under the direction of its pastors and teachers,

in its own religion. The Prussian system recognizes the fact that

different communions do exist among the Prussian people, and does

not aim to suppress them or at unification by state authority. It

meets the fact as it is, without seeking to alter it. Give us the

Prussian system of denominational schools, and we shall be satisfied,

even if education is made compulsory. We, of course, protest against

any law compelling us to send our children to schools in which our

religion cannot be freely taught, in which no religion is taught, or

in which is taught in any shape or degree a religion which we hold to

be false or perilous to souls. Such a law would violate the rights

of parents and the freedom of conscience; but with denominational

schools compulsory education would violate no one's conscience and

no parental right. Parents ought, if able, to have their children

educated, and if they will not send their children to schools

provided for them by the public, and in which their religion is

respected, and made the basis of the education given, we can see no

valid reason why the law should not compel them. The state has the

right, perhaps the duty, in aid of the spiritual society and for its

own safety and the public good, to compel parents to educate their

children when public schools of their own religion, under the charge

of their own pastors, are provided for them at the public expense.

Let the public schools be denominational, give us our proportion of

them, so that no violence will be done to parental rights or to the

Catholic conscience, and we shall be quite willing to have education

made compulsory, and even if such schools are made national, though

we should object as American citizens to them, we should as Catholics

accept them. We hold state authority is the only constitutional

authority under our system to establish schools and provide for them

at the public expense; but we could manage to get along with national

denominational schools as well as others could. We could educate in

our share of the public schools our own children in our own way, and

that is all we ask. We do not ask to educate the children of others,

unless with the consent or at the request of parents and guardians.

The Prussian system of denominational schools could be introduced

and established in all the states without the least difficulty,

if it were not for Evangelicals, their Unitarian offshoots, and

their humanitarian allies. These are religious and philanthropic

busybodies, who fancy they are the Atlas who upholds the world,

and that they are deputed to take charge of everybody's affairs,

and put them to rights. But they forget that their neighbors have

rights as well as themselves, and perhaps intentions as honest and

enlightened, and as much real wisdom and practical sagacity. The

only obstacle to the introduction and establishment of a just and

equitable system of public schools comes from the intolerant zeal of

these Evangelicals, who seek to make the public schools an instrument

for securing the national, social, and religious unification they

are resolved on effecting, and for carrying out their purpose of

suppressing the church and extirpating Catholicity from American

soil. They want to use them in training our children up in the way of

Evangelicalism, and moulding the whole American population into one

homogeneous people, modelled, as we have said, after the New England

Evangelical type. Here is the difficulty, and the whole difficulty.

The denominational system would defeat their darling hope, their pet

project, and require them to live and let live. They talk much about

freedom of conscience and religious liberty and equal rights; but the

only equal rights they understand are all on their side, and they

cherish such a tender regard for religious liberty, have so profound

a respect for it, that they insist, like our Puritan forefathers, on

keeping it all to themselves, and not to suffer it to be profaned or

abused by being extended to others.

Prussia, though a Protestant country, does not dream of making the

public schools a machine either for proselytism or unification.

She is contented to recognize Catholics as an integral part of her

population, and to leave them to profess and practise their own

religion according to the law of their church. Our Evangelicals would

do well to imitate her example. We Catholics are here, and here we

intend to remain. We have as much right to be here as Evangelicals

have. We are too many to be massacred or exiled, and too important

and influential a portion of the American people to be of no account

in the settlement of public affairs. We have votes, and they will

count on whichever side we cast them; and we cannot reasonably be

expected to cast them on the side of any party that is seeking to

use its power as a political party to suppress our church and our

religion, or even to destroy our federative system of government, and

to leave all minorities at the mercy of the irresponsible majority

for the time, with no other limit to its power than it sees proper to

impose on itself; for we love liberty, and our church teaches us to

be loyal to the constitution of our country.

The wisest course, since there are different religious denominations

in the country, is to accept the situation, to recognize the fact,

acquiesce in it, and make the best of it. Any attempt to unmake,

by the direct or indirect authority of the state, Catholics of

their faith or any denomination of its belief, is sure to fail.

Each denomination is free to use Scripture and reason, logic and

tradition, all moral and intellectual weapons, against its rivals,

and with that it should be contented. Whatever may be the rightful

claims of the church in the theological order, she is contented with

the civil protection of her equal rights in the political order. She

asks--with the wealth, the fashion, the public opinion, the press,

nine-tenths of the population of the country, and the seductions

of the world against her--only "an open field and fair play." If

she does not complain, her enemies ought to be satisfied with the

advantages they have.

We have entered our protest against a party programme which threatens

alike the genius of the American government and the freedom of

religion, for so much was obviously our duty, both as Catholics and

citizens. We are aware of the odds against us, but we have confidence

in our countrymen that, though they may be momentarily deceived

or misled, they will, when the real character of the programme we

have exposed is once laid open to them, reject it with scorn and

indignation, and hasten to do us justice.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by

REV. I. T. HECKER, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at

Washington, D. C.

[2] _New Departure of the Republican Party._ By Henry Wilson. _The

Atlantic Monthly_, Boston, January, 1871.

THE CROSS.

In weary hours to lonely heights

When thou hast travelled sore,

A sorrowing man hath borne his cross

And gone thy way before.

Thine eyes cannot escape the sign

On every hand that is

Of him who bore the general woe,

Nor knew a common bliss.

But men, remembering his face,

Dreamed of him while they slept,

And the mother by the cradle side

Thought of his eye, and wept.

Now haunts the world his ghost whose fate

Made all men's fates his own;

So for the wrongs of modest hearts

A myriad hearts atone.

Oh! deeply shall thy spirit toil

To reach the height he trod,

And humbly strive thy soul to know

Its servant was its God.

Only earth's martyr is her lord;

Such is the gain of loss:

And, looking in all hearts, I see

The signal of the cross.

THE HOUSE OF YORKE.

CHAPTER I.

GENEALOGIES.

Under a thickly-branched tree in the northern part of one of the

southern counties of Maine is a certain gray rock, matted over with

dim green lichens that are spotted with dead gold. From under this

rock springs a sparkling little stream. It is no storied fountain,

rich with legends of splendor, poetry, and crime, but a dear, bright

little Yankee brook, with the world all before it. That world it

immediately proceeds to investigate. It creeps through thready

grasses and russet pine-needles; it turns aside, with great respect,

for a stone no larger than a rabbit; and when a glistening pitchy

cone drops into it, the infant river labors under the burden. When

the thirsty fawn comes there to drink, nearly the whole rivulet flows

down its throat, and the cone is stranded high and dry; what there

is left flows southward. A sunbeam pierces the scented gloom, creeps

down a tree-trunk, steals over a knoll of green-and-brown tree-moss,

which then looks like a tiny forest on fire, over yellow violets,

which dissolve in its light, over a bank of rich dark mould veined

with the golden powder of decayed pine-trees, moist and soft, and

full of glistening white roots, where the flowers push down their

pearly feet. Over the bank, into the water, goes the sunbeam, and the

two frolic together, and the stream dives under the gnarled roots,

so that its playmate would believe it lost but for that gurgle of

laughter down in the cool, fresh dark. Then it leaps up, and spreads

itself out in a mirror, and the elder-tree, leaning over to look at

the reflection of its fan-like leaves and clusters of white flowers,

gets very erroneous ideas concerning its own personal appearance;

for the palpitating rings that chase each other over the surface of

the water make the brown stems crinkle, the leaves come to pieces

and unite again, and the many flowers in each round cluster melt all

together, then twinkle out individually, only to melt again into that

bloomy full moon. Over this shimmer of flowers and water big bees

fly, buzzing terribly, dragon-flies dart, or hang, purple-mailed,

glittering creatures, with gauzy wings, and comical insects dance

there, throwing spots of sunshine instead of shadow down to the leafy

bed. Then the brook flows awhile in a green tranquil shadow, till,

reaching the interlaced roots of two immense trees that hold a bank

between them, it makes a sudden, foamy plunge the height of a stag's

front. She is a bride then, you may say--she is Undine, looking

through that white veil, and thinking new thoughts.

Now the bear comes down to drink and look at his ugly face in the

deepening wave, foxes switch their long tails about the banks, deer

come, as light-footed as shadows, drink, and fling up their short

tails, with a flit of white, and trot away with a little sniff, and

their heads thrown back, hearing the howl or the long stride of the

wolf in pursuit. Rabbits come there, and squirrels leap and nibble in

the branches above. Besides, there are shoals of pretty, slim fishes.

So through the mellow gloom and sunny sparkle of the old forest, the

clear brook wanders, growing wiser, and talking to itself about many

things.

Presently the wild creatures withdraw, sunburnt children wade across

from bank to bank, grassy clearings abound, there are farm-houses,

and cows with tinkling bells; and then comes a bridge, and boats

dance upon the water, and the stream is a river! Alas for the Indian

name it brought up out of the earth with it, and lisped and gurgled

and laughed to itself all the way down--the name spiked with _k_'s

and choky-looking _gh_'s, rough to the eye, but sweet in the mouth,

like a hazel-nut in the burr. The white settlers have changed all

that.

Now, indeed, the young river puts on state, and lets people see that

it is not to be waded through; and when they build a dam across,

it flows grandly over, in a smooth, wine-colored curve. Times are

changed, indeed, since the little gray birds with speckled breasts

looked with admiration at its first cascade, since the bear, setting

down his great paw, clumsily splashed the whole stream up over

his shaggy leg. There are farms to keep up appearances before,

mill-wheels to turn, and ships to bear up. Pine-cones, indeed!

Besides, a new and strange experience has come to it, and its bosom

pulses daily with the swelling of the tides. And here one village

street, with white houses, follows its course a mile or so, and

another street with white houses comes down to its bank from the

west, crosses over, and goes up eastward. This town, with its two

principal streets forming a cross near the mouth of the river, a

white cross at the end of a silver chain--shall we call it Seaton?

It is a good enough name. And the river shall be Seaton River, and

the bay into which it flows shall be Seaton Bay. But the ocean that

makes the bay, and drinks the river, shall be Atlantic still.

We have spoken!

We follow the road that follows the stream on its eastern bank, cross

West Street, get into a poor, dwindling neighborhood, leave the

houses nearly all behind, go over two small, ill-conditioned hills,

and find at our right a ship-yard with wharves, at our left a dingy

little cottage, shaped like a travelling-trunk, and not much larger

than some. It stands with its side toward the dusty road, a large,

low chimney rises from the roof, there is a door with a window at

each side of it. One can see at a glance from the outside how this

house is divided. It has but two rooms below, with a tiny square

entry between, and a low attic above. Each room has three windows,

one on each of the three outer walls.

The kitchen looked toward the village through its north window.

Opposite that was a large fireplace with an ill-tempered, crackling

fire of spruce-wood, throwing out sparks and splinters. It was April

weather, and not very warm yet. In the chimney-corner sat Mr. Rowan,

sulkily smoking his pipe, his eyes fixed on the chimney-back. He

was a large, slouching man, with an intelligent face brutalized by

intemperance. Drunkard was written all over him, in the scorched

black hair, not yet turning gray, in the dry lips, bloated features,

and inflamed eyes. He sat in his shirt-sleeves, waiting impatiently

while his wife put a patch in his one coat. Mrs. Rowan, a poor,

faded, little frightened woman, whom her female acquaintances called

"slack," sat near the south window, wrinkling her brows anxiously

over the said patch, which was smaller than the hole it was destined

to fill. The afternoon sunshine spread a golden carpet close to

her feet. In the light of it one could see the splinters in the

much-scoured floor, and a few fraggles in the hem of Mrs. Rowan's

calico gown.

At the eastern window sat Edith Yorke, eleven years of age, with a

large book on her knees. Over this book, some illustrated work on

natural history, she had been bending for an hour, her loose mop of

tawny hair falling each side of the page. So cloistered, her profile

was invisible; but, standing in front of her, one could see an oval

face with regular features full of calm earnestness. Bright, arched

lips, and a spirited curve in the nostrils, saved this face from the

cold look which regular features often give. The large, drooping

eyelids promised large eyes, the forehead was wide and not high, the

brows long, slightly arched, and pale-brown in color, and the whole

face, neck, hands, and wrists were tanned to a light quadroon tint.

But where the coarse sleeve had slipped up was visible an arm of

dazzling whiteness. Outside the window, and but two rods distant,

hung a crumbling clay bank, higher than the house, with a group of

frightened alder-bushes looking over the top, and holding on with all

their roots. Some day, in spite of their grip--the sooner, perhaps,

because of its stress--the last frail hold was to be loosed, and the

bushes were to come sliding down the bank, faster and faster, to

pitch headlong into the mire at the bottom, with a weak crackling of

all their poor doomed branches.

Presently the child looked up, with lights coming and going in

her agate-colored eyes. "How wonderful frogs are!" she exclaimed

involuntarily.

There was no reply.

She glanced at her two companions, scarcely conscious of them, her

mind full of something else. "But everything is wonderful, when you

come to think of it," she pursued dreamily.

Mr. Rowan took the pipe from his mouth, turned his forbidding face,

and glowered at the girl. "You're a wonderful fool!" he growled; then

resumed his pipe, feeling better, apparently, for that expression

of opinion. His wife glanced up, furtive and frightened, but said

nothing.

Edith looked at the man unmoved, saw him an instant, then, still

looking, saw him not. After a while she became aware, roused herself,

and bent again over the book. Then there was silence, broken only by

the snapping of the fire, the snip of Mrs. Rowan's scissors, and the

lame, one-sided ticking of an old-fashioned clock on the mantelpiece.

After a while, as the child read, a new thought struck up. "That's

just like! Don't you think"--addressing the company--"Major

Cleaveland said yesterday that I had lightning-bugs in my eyes!"

Without removing his pipe, Mr. Rowan darted an angry look at his

wife, whose face became still more frightened. "Dear me!" she said

feebly, "that child is an idjut!"

This time the long, fading gaze dwelt on the woman before it went

back to the book again. But the child was too closely ensphered in

her own life to be much, if at all, hurt. Besides, she was none of

theirs, nor of their kind. Her soul was no dying spark struggling

through ashes, but a fire, "alive, and alive like to be," as children

say when they wave the fire-brand, winding live ribbons in the air;

and no drop of their blood flowed in her veins.

The clock limped over ten minutes more, and the patch was got into

its place, after a fashion, botched somewhat, with the knots on the

outside. Mr. Rowan took the coat, grumbled at it, put it on, and

went out, glancing back at the child as he opened the door. She was

looking after him with an expression which he interpreted to mean

aversion and contempt. Perhaps he mistook. May be she was wondering

at him, what sort of strange being he was. Edith Yorke was very

curious regarding the world she had got into. It seemed to her a

queer place, and that she had at present not much concern in it.

Her husband out of the way, Mrs. Rowan took her knitting-work, and

stood a moment at the north window, gazing up toward the town, with a

far-away look of blunted expectancy, as if she had got in the habit

of looking for help which never came. Then she drew a long sigh,

that also a habit, and, resuming her chair, began to knit and to

rock herself, letting her mind, what there was left of it, swing to

and fro, unmeaningly and miserably, to the sound of the clock as it

ticked. "O dear! O dear!"--that was what the ticking always said to

this poor soul. As she sat, the afternoon sun, sinking lower, crept

about her feet, climbed to her lap, got hold of her knitting, and ran

in little bright flashes along the needles, and snapped off in sparks

at the ends, so that she seemed to be knitting sunshine.

This woman was what remained at forty of a pretty, flaxen-haired

girl of eighteen, who had captivated handsome Dick Rowan, for he

had been handsome. A faded rag of a woman she was, without hope or

spirit, all the color and life washed out of her in a bitter rain

of tears. The pink cheeks had faded, and only the ghost remained of

that dimple that had once seemed to give meaning to her smiles. The

curly hair was dry and thin, and had an air of chronic untidiness.

The blue-gray eyes were dim and heavy, the teeth were nearly all

gone. The pretty, chirping ways that had been captivating when youth

covered their silliness--oh! where had they gone? She was a weak,

broken-hearted, shiftless little woman, and her husband hated her. He

felt wronged and cheated by her. He was more disappointed than Ixion,

for in this cloud there had never even been a goddess. If she had

sometimes turned upon him, when he acted like a brute, and scorned

him for it, he would have liked her better; but she shrank, and

cowered, and trembled, made him feel himself ten times the brute she

dared not call him, yet gave him nothing to resent. "Gentle, is she?"

he cried out once in a rage. "She is not! She is weak and slavish. A

person cannot be gentle who cannot be something else."

So the poor woman suffered, and got neither pity nor credit from the

one who caused her suffering. It was hard; and yet, she was nobler

in her misery than she would have been in happiness. For sorrow gave

her now and then a touch of dignity; and when, stung with a sudden

perception of her own nothingness, she flung her desperate hands

upward, and called upon God to deliver her, a certain tragical power

and beauty seemed to wrap her round. Mrs. Rowan happy would have been

a trivial woman, meaning no great harm, because meaning no great

anything; but the fiery furnace of pain had scorched her up, and what

remained was pure.

When the two were alone, Edith dropped her book, and looked across

the room at her companion. Mrs. Rowan, busy with her own sad

thoughts, took no notice of her, and presently the child glanced

past her, and out the window. The view was not bad. First came

the dusty road, then the ship-yard, then the river sparkling, but

rather the worse for sawdust and lath-edgings that came down from

the lumber-mills above the village. But here all that was sordid

came to an end. The meanness and misery on the hitherward bank were

like witches, who cannot cross running water. From the opposite bank

rose a long, grassy hill, unmarred by road or fence. In summer-time

you could see from far away the pinkness of the wild-roses that had

seen fit to bind with a blooming cestus the dented waist of this

hill. Behind them was a green spray of locust and laburnum trees,

then dense round tops of maples, and elms in graceful groups,

half-hiding the roofs and gables of Major Cleaveland's house--the

great house of the village, as its owner was the great man. Behind

that was a narrow rim of pines and spruces, making the profile of

an enchanted city against the horizon, and above that a vast hollow

of unobstructed sky. In that space the sunsets used to build their

jasper walls, and calm airs stretch long lines of vapor across, till

the whole west was a stringed instrument whereon a full symphony of

colors played good-night to the sun. There the west wind blew up

bubbles of wry cloud, and the new moon put forth her gleaming sickle

to gather in the sheaf of days, a never-failing harvest, through

storm and sunshine, hoar-frost and dew. There the pearly piles of

cumuli used to slumber on summer afternoons, lightnings growing in

their bosoms to flash forth at evening; and there, when a long storm

ended with the day, rose the solid arch of cerulean blue. When it had

reached a certain height, Edith Yorke would run into the south room,

and look out to see the rainbow suspend its miraculous arch over

the retreating storm. This little girl, to whom everything was so

wonderful when she came to think of it, was a dear lover of beauty.

"O dear! O dear!" ticked the clock; and the barred sunshine turned

slowly on the floor, as if the ugly little house were the hub of a

huge, leisurely wheel of gold.

Edith dropped her book, and went to Mrs. Rowan's side, taking a stool

with her, and sitting down in the midst of the sunshine.

"I'm afraid I shall forget my story, Mrs. Jane, unless I say it over

again," she said. "And, you know, mamma told me never to forget."

Mrs. Rowan roused herself, glad of anything which could take her mind

from her own troubles. "Well, tell it all over to me now," she said.

"I haven't heard it this long time."

"Will you be sure to correct me if I am wrong?" the child asked

anxiously.

"Yes, I will. But don't begin till I have taken up the heel of this

stocking."

The stitches were counted and evened, half of them taken off on to a

thread, and the other half, with the seam-stitch in the middle, knit

backward once. Then Edith began to repeat the story confided to her

by her dead mother.

"My grandpapa and grandmamma were Polish exiles. They had to leave

Poland when Aunt Marie was only a year old, and before mamma

was born. They couldn't take their property with them, but only

jewels, and plate, and pictures. They went to Brussels, and there

my mamma was born, and the queen was her godmother, and sent the

christening-robe. Mamma kept the robe till she grew up; but when

she was in America, and was poor, and wanted to go to a party, she

cut it up to make the waist and sleeves of a dress. Poverty is no

disgrace, mamma said, but it is a great inconvenience. By-and-by,

they left Brussels, and went to England. Grandpapa wanted some way to

get money to live on, for they had sold nearly all their pictures and

things. They stayed in England not very long. Countess Poniatowski

called on grandmamma, and she had on a black velvet bonnet with red

roses in it; so I suppose it was winter. Then one day grandpapa took

mamma out to walk in a park; so I suppose that was summer. There were

some gentlemen in the park that they talked to, and one of them, a

gentleman with a hook nose, who was sitting down on a bench, took

mamma on his knees, and started to kiss her. But mamma slapped his

face. She said he had no right to kiss people who didn't want him

to, not even if he were a king. His name was the Duke of Wellington.

Then they all came to America, and people here were very polite to

them, because they were Polish exiles, and of noble birth. But they

couldn't eat nor drink nor wear politeness, mamma said, and so they

grew poorer and poorer every day, and didn't know what they would do.

Once they travelled with Henry Clay two weeks, and had quite a nice

time, and they went to Ashland and stayed all night. When they went

away the next day, Mr. Clay gave mamma and Aunt Marie the little mugs

they had had to drink out of. But they didn't care much about 'em,

and they broke 'em pretty soon. Mamma said she didn't know then that

Mr. Clay was a great man. She thought that just a mister couldn't

be great. She had always seen lords and counts, and grandpapa was a

colonel in the army--Colonel Lubomirski his name was. But she said

that in this country a man might be great, even if he wasn't anything

but a mister, and that my papa was as great as a prince. Well, then

they came to Boston, and Aunt Marie died, and they buried her, and

mamma was almost nine years old. People used to pet and notice her,

and everybody talked about her hair. It was thick and black, and

it curled down to her waist. One day Doctor Somebody, I can never

recollect his name, took her out walking on the Common, and they

went into Mr. John Quincy Adams's house. And Mr. Adams took one of

mamma's curls, and held it out, and said it was long enough and large

enough to hang the Czar with. And she said that they might have it

all if they'd hang him with it. And then poor grandpapa had to go

to Washington, and teach dancing and fencing, because that was all

he could do. And pretty soon grandmamma broke her heart and died.

And then after a little while grandpapa died. And, after that, mamma

had to go out sewing to support herself, and she went to Boston, and

sewed in Mr. Yorke's family. And Mr. Yorke's youngest brother fell in

love with her, and she fell in love with him, and they married each

other in spite of everybody. So the family were awfully angry. My

papa had been engaged ever since he was a little boy to Miss Alice

Mills, and they had put off getting married because she was rich, and

he hadn't anything, and was looking round to see how he should get a

fortune. And the Millses all turned against him, and the Yorkes all

turned against him, and he and mamma went off, and wandered about,

and came down to Maine; and papa died. Then mamma had to sew again to

support herself, and we were awfully poor. I remember that we lived

in the same house with you; but it was a better house than this, and

was up in the village. Then mamma's heart broke, and she died too.

But I don't mean to break my heart, Mrs. Jane. It's a poor thing to

do."

"Yes!" sighed the listener; "it's a poor thing to do."

"Well," resumed the child, "then you kept me. It was four years ago

when my mamma died, but I remember it all. She made me promise not to

forget who my mother was, and promise, with both my hands held up,

that I would be a Catholic, if I had to die for it. So I held up both

my hands, and promised, and she looked at me, and then shut her eyes.

It that all right?"

"Yes, dear!" Mrs. Rowan had dropped her knitting as the story went

on, and was gazing dreamily out the window, recalling to mind her

brief acquaintance with the fair young exile.

"Dick and I grew to be great friends," Edith continued rather

timidly. "He used to take care of me, and fight for me. Poor Dick!

He was mad nearly all the time, because his father drank rum, and

because people twitted him, and looked down upon him."

Mrs. Rowan took up her work again, and knit tears in with the yarn.

"And Dick gave his father an awful talking-to, one day," Edith

went on, still more timidly. "That was two years ago. He stood up

and poured out words. His eyes were so flashing that they dazzled,

and his cheeks were red, and he clinched his hands. He looked most

splendid. When I go back to Poland, he shall be a general in the

army. He will look just as he did then, if the Czar should come near

us. Well, after that day he went off to sea, and he has not been back

since."

Tears were running down the mother's cheeks as she thought of her

son, the only child left her of three.

Edith leaned and clasped both her hands around Mrs. Rowan's arm,

and laid her cheek to them. "But he is coming back rich, he said he

would; and what Dick said he'd do he always did. He is going to take

us away from here, and get a pretty house, and come and live with us."

A hysterical, half-laughing sob broke through the listener's quiet

weeping. "He always did keep his word, Edith!" she cried. "Dick was a

gallant lad. And I trust that the Lord will bring him back to me."

"Oh! he'll come back," said Edith confidently, and with a slight air

of haughtiness. "He'll come back himself."

All the Christianity the child had seen had been such as to make the

name of the Lord excite in her heart a feeling of antagonism. It is

hard to believe that God means love when man means hate; and this

child and her protectors had seen but little of the sunny side of

humanity. Christians held aloof from the drunkard and his family, or

approached them only to exhort or denounce. That they had any kinship

with that miserable man, that in his circumstances they might have

been what he was, never seemed to occur to them as possible. Dick

fought with the boys who mocked his father, therefore he was a bad

boy. Mrs. Rowan flamed up, and defended her husband, when the Rev.

Dr. Martin denounced him, therefore she was almost as bad as he.

So shallow are most judgments, arraigning effects without weighing

causes.

Nor did Edith fare better at their hands. She was to them a sort

of vagabond. Who believed the story of her mother's romantic

misfortunes? She was some foreign adventuress, most likely. Mr.

Charles Yorke, whom they respected, had married a native of Seaton,

and had two or three times honored that town with a short visit. They

knew that he had cast off his own brother for marrying this child's

mother. Therefore she had no claim on their respect.

Moreover, some of the ladies for whom young Mrs. Yorke had done

sewing had not the pleasantest of recollections connected with her.

A poor person has no right to be proud and high-spirited, and the

widowed exile was a very fiery woman. She would not sit at table with

their servants, she would not be delighted when they patronized her,

and she would not be grateful for the scanty wages they gave her.

She had even dared to break out upon Mrs. Cleaveland when that lady

had sweetly requested her to enter her house by the side door, when

she came to sew. "In Poland a person like you would scarcely have

been allowed to tie my mother's shoes!" she cried. The lady answered

suavely, "But we are not in Poland, madam;" but she never forgave the

insolence--still less because her husband laughed at it, and rather

liked Mrs. Yorke's spirit.

These were the ladies whom Edith had heard talk of religion; so she

lifted her head, dropped her eyelids, and said defiantly, "Dick will

come home himself!"

"Not unless the Lord lets him come," said the mother. "Oh! no good

will come to us except by him. '_Unless the Lord build the house,

they labor in vain that build it: unless the Lord keep the city, he

watcheth in vain that keepeth it._'"

"I don't think you have much to thank him for," remarked the child

quietly.

"I will thank him!" the woman cried out in a passion. "I will trust

him! He is all the hope I have!"

"Well, well, you may!" Edith said soothingly. "Don't let's talk about

it any more. Give me the scissors, and I'll cut the fraggles off the

hem of your gown. Suppose Dick should come home all of a sudden, and

find us looking so! I hope he will let us know, don't you? so that we

can put our best clothes on."

The best clothes in question were a black bombazine gown and shawl,

and an old-fashioned crape bonnet and veil, all sewed up and hidden

away under Edith's bed in the little dark attic, lest Mr. Rowan, in

one of his drunken frenzies, should destroy them. These articles were

the mourning which Mrs. Rowan had worn seven years before, when her

last daughter died. With them was another bag, belonging to Edith,

equally precious to its owner, but from other reasons. There was

a scarlet merino cape, lined with silk of the same color, both a

little faded, and a faded crape scarf that had once been gorgeous

with red and gold. In the innermost fold of this scarf, wrapped

in tissue-paper, and tucked inside an old kid glove of remarkable

smallness, were two locks of hair--one a short, thick wave of

yellow-brown, the other a long, serpentine tress of ebony blackness.

While they talked, the door of the room opened, and Mr. Rowan looked

in. "Aren't we going to have any supper to-night?" he demanded.

Edith fixed a look on him that made him shrink out, and bang the door

behind him. His wife started up, glanced at the clock, and went about

her work.

"Let me help you, Mrs. Jane," the child said.

"No, dear. There isn't much to do, and I'd rather do it." Mrs.

Rowan's voice had a sepulchral sound, her head being deep in the

fireplace, where she was putting one hook into another on the crane,

to let the tea-kettle down. She emerged with a smooch of soot on her

hair and forehead, and began flying round bringing a table into the

middle of the floor, putting up the leaves, spreading the cloth,

taking down the dishes, all with trembling haste. "If you want to

knit a few times across the heel of that stocking, you may. But be

careful not to knit too tightly, as you almost always do. You can

begin to narrow when it's two of your forefingers long."

Edith took the knitting, and went to her favorite chair in the back

window. The room had grown smoky in consequence of Mrs. Rowan's

piling of soft wood on to the fire, and hurrying about past the

fireplace, so she pushed up the window, and fastened it with a wooden

button fixed there for the purpose. Then she began to knit and think,

and, forgetting Mrs. Rowan's directions, pulled the yarn so tightly

over her fingers that she worked a hard, stiff strip across the heel,

into which the looser knitting puckered. The child was too much

absorbed to be aware of her mistake, and it did not matter; for that

stocking was never to be finished.

While she dreamed there, a deeper shadow than that of the clay bank

fell over her. She looked up with a start, and saw Mr. Rowan standing

outside the window. He had placed himself so as to avoid being seen

by any one in the room, and was just turning his eyes away from her

when she caught sight of him.

"Lean out here!" he said. "I want to speak to you."

She leaned out and waited.

"What makes you stare at me the way you sometimes do?" he asked

angrily, but in a low voice, that his wife might not hear. "Why don't

you say right out what you think?"

"I don't know what I do think," replied Edith, dropping her eyes.

"You think that I am a wretch!" he exclaimed. "You think I am a

drunkard! You think I abuse my wife!"

She neither answered nor looked up.

He paused a moment, then went on fiercely. "If there is anything I

hate, it is to have people look at me that way, and say nothing. If

you scold a man, it looks as if you thought there was something in

him that could tell black from white; and if you are impudent, you

put yourself a little in the wrong, and that helps him. He isn't so

much ashamed of himself. But when you just look, and say nothing, you

shut him out. It is as much as to tell him that words would be thrown

away on him."

"But," Edith objected, much at a loss, "if I answered you back, or

said what I thought, there would be a quarrel right off."

"Did I fight when Dick gave me such a hauling-over before he went

away?" the man questioned in a rough tone that did not hide how his

voice broke, and his blood-shot eyes filled up with tears. "Didn't

I hang my head, and take it like a dog? He said I had acted like a

brute, but he didn't say I was one, and he didn't say but I could be

a man yet, if I should try. Wasn't I sober for three months after he

went away? Yes; and I would have kept sober right on if I had had

some one to thorn and threaten me. But she gave up, and did nothing

but whimper, and it maddened me. When I ordered her to mix my rum for

me, she did it. I should have liked her better if she had thrown it,

tumbler and all, into my face."

"You'd better not find fault with her," said Edith. "She's a great

deal better than you are."

The child had a gentle, sincere way of saying audacious things

sometimes that made one wonder if she knew how audacious they were.

The man stared at her a moment; then, looking away, answered without

any appearance of anger, "I suppose she is; but I don't think much of

that kind of goodness when there's a hard job to be done. You can't

lift rocks with straws. I'm sorry for her; but, for all that, she

aggravates me, poor thing!"

He leaned back against the house, with his hands in his pockets, and

stared at the clay bank before him. Edith looked at him, but said

nothing. Presently he turned so suddenly that she started. "Girl," he

said, "never do you ridicule a man who has been drinking, no matter

what he does! You may hate him, or be afraid of him, but never laugh

at him! You might as well look down into hell and laugh! Do you

know what it is to be in the power of rum? It is to have serpents

twining round you, and binding you hand and foot. I've gone through

the streets up there with devils on my back, pushing me down; wild

beasts tearing my vitals; reptiles crawling round me; the earth

rising up and quaking under my feet, and a horror in my soul that no

words can describe, and the men and women and children have laughed

at me. Perhaps they were such shallow fools that they didn't know;

but I tell you, and you know now. Don't you ever dare to laugh at a

drunkard!"

"I never will!" Edith cried out, in an agony of terror and pity. "O

you poor man! I didn't know it was so awful. O you poor man!"

Mr. Rowan had stopped, gasping for breath, and, with his patched

sleeve, wiped off the perspiration that was streaming down his face.

Edith tore off her little calico apron with such haste as to break

the strings. "Here, take this!" she said, reaching it out to him.

He took it with a shaking hand, and wiped his face again; wiped his

eyes again and again, breathing heavily.

"Couldn't you be saved?" she asked, in a whisper. "Isn't there any

way for you to get out of it?"

"No!" he said, and gave her back her apron. "No; and I wish that I

were dead!"

"Don't say that!" the child entreated. "It is wicked; and perhaps you

will die if you say it."

The drunkard raised his trembling hands, and looked upward. "I wish

to God that I were dead!" he repeated.

Edith shrank back into the room. She was too much terrified to listen

to any more. But after a moment he called her name, and she leaned

out again. His face was calmer, and his voice more quiet. "Don't

tell her what I have been talking about," he said, nodding toward

the room. "I would sooner tear my tongue out by the roots than say

anything to her."

"I won't tell," Edith promised.

"Supper's ready," Mrs. Rowan announced, coming towards the window.

She had heard her husband's voice in conversation with Edith, and

wondered greatly what was going on.

Mr. Rowan turned away, with a look of irritation, at sound of her

timid voice, walked round the house, and came sulkily in to his

supper.

Their meals had always been comfortless and silent; but now Edith

tried to talk, at first with Mrs. Rowan; but when she saw that the

woman's tremulous replies, as if she did not dare to speak in her

husband's presence, were bringing an uglier frown to this face, and

that he was changing from sullen to savage, she addressed her remarks

and questions to him. Mr. Rowan was a surveyor, and a good one,

when he was sober, and he was a man of some general information and

reading. When he could be got to talk, one was surprised to find

in him the ruins of a gentleman. Now his answers were surly enough,

but they were intelligent, and the child, no longer looking at him

from the outside, questioned him fearlessly, and kept up a sort of

conversation till they rose from table.

It was Mr. Rowan's custom to go out immediately after supper, and

not come home till late in the evening, when he would stagger in,

sometimes stupid, sometimes furious with liquor. But to-night he

lingered about when he had left the table, lighted his pipe, kicked

the fire, wound up the clock, and cursed it for stopping, and

finally, as if ashamed of the proposal even while making it, said to

Edith, "Come, get the checker-board, and see if you can beat me."

She was quick-witted enough, or sensitive enough, not to show any

surprise, but quietly brought out the board, and arranged the chairs

and stand. It was a square of board, rough at the edges, planed on

one side, and marked off in checks with red chalk. The men were bits

of tanned leather, one side white, the other side black. She placed

them, smiled, and said, "Now, I'm ready!"

Mrs. Rowan's cheeks began to redden up with excitement as she went

about clearing the table, and washing the dishes, but she said

nothing. She had even tact enough to go away into the bedroom,

when her work was done, and leave the two to play out their game

unwatched. There she sat in the falling dusk, her hands clasped on

her knees, listening to every sound, expecting every moment to hear

her husband go out. The three curtains in the room were rolled up to

the very tops of the windows, and, in their places, three pictures

seemed to hang on the smoky walls, and illumine the place. One was

a high clay bank, its raw front ruddy with evening light, its top

crowned with a bush burning like that of Horeb. The second was a hill

covered with spruce-trees, nothing else, from the little cone, not

a foot high, to the towering spire that pierced the sky. Some faint

rose-reflections yet warmed their sombre shadows, and each sharp

top was silvered with the coming moonlight. The third window showed

a deserted ship-yard, with the skeleton of a bark standing on the

stocks. The shining river beyond seemed to flow through its ribs,

and all about it the ground was covered with bright yellow chips and

shavings. Above it, in the tender green of the southwestern sky, a

cloud-bark freighted with crimson light sailed off southward, losing

its treasure as it went. These strong, rich lights, meeting and

crossing in the room, showed clearly the woman's nervous face full

of suspense, the very attitude, too, showing suspense, as she only

half-sat on the side of the bed, ready to start up at a sound. After

a while she got up softly, and went to the fireplace to listen. All

was still in the other room, but she heard distinctly the crackling

of the fire. What had come over him? What did it mean?

Presently there was a slight movement, and Edith's voice spoke out

brightly: "Oh! I've got another king. Now I have a chance!"

The listener trembled with doubt and fear. Her husband was actually

sitting at home, and playing checkers with Edith, instead of going

out to get drunk! He could not mean to go, or he would have gone at

once. She longed to go and assure herself, to sit down in the room

with him, but could scarcely find courage to do so. She held her

breath as she went toward the door, and her hand faltered on the

latch. But at last she summoned resolution, and went out.

The lamp was lighted, the checker-board placed on the table beside

it, and the two were talking over the slackening game. Edith had a

good head for a child of her age, but her opponent was an excellent

player, and she could not interest him long. She was trying every

lure to keep him, though, and made a new tack as Mrs. Rowan came

in, relating an experience of her own, instead of questioning him

concerning his. "I want to tell you something I saw last night in my

chamber," she said.

Edith's chamber was the little dark attic, which was reached by a

steep stairway at one side of the fireplace.

"I was in bed, wide awake, and it was pitch dark. You know you put

the cover over the skylight when it rained, the other day, and it has

not been taken off. Well, instead of shutting my eyes, I kept them

wide open, and looked straight into the dark. I've heard that you

can see spirits so, and so I thought I might see my mamma. Pretty

soon there was a great hole in the dark, like a whirlpool, and after

a minute there was a little light down at the bottom of it. I kept

on looking, just as if I were looking down into a deep well, and

then there came colors in clouds, sailing about, just like clouds in

the sky. Some were red, others pink, others blue, and all colors.

Sometimes there would be a pattern of colors, just like figures in a

carpet, only they were blocks, not flowers. I didn't dream it. I saw

it as plainly as I see the fire this minute. What do you suppose it

was, Mr. Rowan?"

He had listened with interest, and did not appear to find anything

surprising in the recital.

"I don't know much about optics," he answered; "but I suppose

there is a scientific reason for this, whether it is known or not.

I've seen those colors--that is, I did when I was a child; and De

Quincey, in his _Opium Confessions_, tells the same story. I don't

believe that grown people are likely to see them, for the reason that

they shut their eyes, and their minds are more occupied. You have to

stare a good while into the dark, and wait what comes, and not think

much of anything."

"Yes," said Edith. "But what do you guess it is?"

Mr. Rowan leaned back in his chair, with his hands clasped behind his

head, and considered the matter a moment, some finer intelligence

than often showed there kindling behind his bloated face.

"I should guess it might be this," he said. "Though the place appears

at first to be dark, there are really some particles of light there.

And since there are too few of them to keep up a connection in their

perfect state, they divide into their colors, and make the clouds you

saw. I don't know why particles of light should not separate, when

they have a great deal to do, and not much to do it with. Air does."

"But what made them move?" Edith asked. "They were never still."

"Perhaps they were alive."

She stared, with scintillating eyes.

Mr. Rowan gave a short, silent laugh. He knew that the child was

only questioning in order to keep him. "No reason why not," he said.

"According to Sir Humphry Davy, and some other folks, I believe, heat

isn't caloric, but repulsive motion. It isn't matter, but it moves,

goes where nothing else can, passes through stone and iron, and can't

be stopped, and can't be seen. Now, a something that is not matter,

and yet is powerful enough to overcome matter, must be spirit. Heat

is the soul of light; and if heat is spirit, light is alive. _Voilà

tout!_"

He had forgotten himself a moment in the pleasure of puzzling his

questioner; but catching his wife looking at him with an expression

of astonishment, he came back to the present. The smile died out of

his face, and the frown came back.

"Don't you want to play _solitaire_?" Edith struck in desperately.

He made a slight motion of dissent, but it was not decided; so she

brought out the pack of soiled cards, and laid them before him.

There was a moment of hesitation, during which the heart of the wife

throbbed tumultuously, and the nerves of the child tingled with an

excitement that seemed to snap in sparks from her eyes. Then he

took the cards, shuffled them, and began to play. Mrs. Rowan opened

a book, and, holding it upside down, so as to hide her face, cried

quietly behind the page. Her husband saw that she was crying, cast

a savage glance at her, and seemed about to fling the cards down;

but Edith made some remark on the game, leaned toward him, and laid

her head lightly on his arm. It was the first time in all their

acquaintance that she had voluntarily touched him. At the same time

she reached her foot, and pushed Mrs. Rowan's under the table. Mrs.

Rowan dropped her book, turned her face away quickly, and said, with

an effort of self-control rare for her: "Why, it's nine o'clock! I'll

go to bed, I think; I'm tired."

Nobody answering, or objecting, she went away, and left her husband

still over his cards.

"Isn't it about your bedtime?" he said presently to Edith.

She got up slowly, unwilling to go, yet not daring to stay. Oh!

if she were but wise enough to know the best thing that could be

said--something which would strengthen his resolution, and keep him

in. It was not yet too late for him to go out; for, when every safe

and pitiful door is closed, and slumber seals all merciful eyes, the

beacon of the grog-shop shines on through the night, and tells that

the way to perdition still is open, and the eyes of the rum-seller

yet on the watch.

"How glad I shall be when Dick comes home!" she said. "Then I hope we

can all go away from here, and wipe out, and begin over."

She could not have said better, but, if she had known, she could have

done better. What he needed was not an appeal to his sentiments, but

physical help. Words make but little impression on a man while the

torments of a burning, infernal thirst are gnawing at his vitals. The

drunkard's body, already singed by the near flames of the bottomless

pit, needed attending to at once; his soul was crushed and helpless

under the ruins of it. If an older, wiser head and hand had been

there, started up the failing fire, and made some strong, bitter

draught for him to drink, it might have done good. But the child did

not know, and the sole help she could give was an appeal to his heart.

It is as true of the finest and loftiest natures, as of the

perverted, that they cannot always conquer the evil one by spiritual

means alone. Only spirits can do that. And often the tempter must

laugh to see the physical needs, which were made to play about our

feet like children, unnoticed when the soul speaks, starved till they

become demons whose clamorous voices drown the spirit's fainting

cries.

But this man's demon was indulgence, and not denial. He was not

hovering on the brink of ruin, he was at the bottom, and striving

to rise, and he could not endure that any eye should look upon his

struggles.

"D-- you! will you go to bed?" he cried out fiercely.

Edith started back, and, without another word, climbed the narrow

stair to her attic. Before closing the trap-door, she looked down

once, and saw Mr. Rowan tearing and twisting the cards he had been

playing with.

He stayed there the whole night, fighting desperately with such

weapons as he had--a will broken at the hilt, the memory of his son,

and the thought of that dear little girl's tender but ineffectual

pity. As for God, he no longer named him, save in imprecation. The

faith of his orphaned childhood had gone long ago. The glare of the

world had scorched it up before it had fairly taken root. That there

might be help and comfort in the church of his fathers never entered

his mind. "Drink! drink!" that was his sole thought. "If I only had

some opium!" he muttered, "or a cup of strong black coffee! I wonder

if I could get either of 'em anywhere?"

The day was faintly dawning when he staggered to the window, tore

down the paper curtain, and looked out for some sign of life. At the

wharf opposite lay a vessel that had come up the evening before, and

he knew by the smoke that the cook was getting breakfast there.

"I'll go over and see if I can get some coffee or opium," he

muttered, and pulled his hat on as he went out the door.

"I'll ask for nothing but coffee or opium," he protested to himself,

as he shut the door softly after him.

Alas! alas!

CHAPTER II.

WIPING OUT, AND BEGINNING ANEW.

The next morning was a gloomy one for the two who had nursed that

trembling hope overnight, but they did not say much about it.

Mrs. Rowan's face showed the lassitude of long endurance. Edith's

disappointment was poignant. She was no longer a looker-on merely,

but an actor. The man had confided in her, had tacitly asked her

sympathy, and his failure gave her a pang. She cast about in her

thoughts what she should do, having a mind to put her own young

shoulder to the wheel. Should she go in search of him, and give him

one of those scoldings which he had acknowledged his need of? Should

she lead him home, and protect him from abuse?

"Hadn't I better go up to the post-office?" she asked, after

breakfast. "I haven't been there this good while, and there might be

a letter from Dick."

Mrs. Rowan hesitated: "Well, yes." She disliked being left alone, and

she had no expectation of a letter. But it seemed like slighting her

son to make any other reply to such a request. Besides, the village

boys might be hooting her husband through the streets, and, if they

were, she would like to know it. So Edith prepared herself, and went

out.

The ship-yard was full of business at this hour, and two men were

at work close to the road, shaving a piece of timber. Edith looked

at them, and hesitated. "I've a good mind to," she thought. She had

never gone into the ship-yard when the men were there, and had never

asked any one a question concerning Mr. Rowan. But now all was

changed, and she felt responsible. "Have you seen Mr. Rowan anywhere,

this morning?" she asked, going up to the man nearest her.

He drew the shave slowly to him, slipped off a long curl of

amber-colored wood from the blade, then looked up to see who spoke.

"Mr. Rowan!" he repeated, as if he had never heard the name before.

"Oh! Dick, you mean. No, I haven't seen him, this morning. He may be

lying round behind the timbers somewhere."

The child's eyes sparkled. Child though she was, she knew that the

drunkard was more worthy of the title of gentleman than this man was,

for he was rude and harsh only when he suffered.

"Little girl," the other called out as she turned away, "your father

is over there on board of the _Annie Laurie_. I saw him lying there

half an hour ago, and I guess he hasn't stirred since."

"He isn't my father!" she flashed out.

The two burst into a rude laugh, which effectually checked the thanks

she would have given for their information. She turned hastily away,

and went up the road to the village.

Mrs. Rowan finished her work, and sat down in the west window to

watch. She was too anxious and discouraged to knit, even, and so did

not discover the tight little strip of work around the stocking-heel.

It was employment enough to look out for Edith; not that she expected

a letter, but because she wanted company. She was conscious of some

strength in the child, on which she leaned at times. As for Dick,

she had little hope of good news from him, if any. She had no part

in Edith's rose-colored expectations. Dick in peril from storm, foe,

or sin; Dick dying untended in foreign lands; Dick sinking down in

cold, salt seas--these were the mother's fancies.

After half an hour, a small figure appeared over the hills between

the house and the village. Mrs. Rowan watched it absently, and with

a slight sense of relief. But soon she noticed that the child was

running. It was not like Edith to run. She was noticeably quiet, and

even dignified in her manners. Could she have seen or heard anything

of Mr. Rowan at the village? The heart of the wife began to flutter

feebly. Was he lying in the street? or engaged in a drunken quarrel?

She leaned back in her chair, feeling sick, and tried to gather

strength for whatever might come to her.

Edith was near the house, now running a few steps, then walking, to

gather breath, and she held her arm above her head, and swung it, and

in her hand was a letter!

Away went all thought of her husband. In two minutes Mrs. Rowan had

the letter in her hand, had torn it open, and she and Edith were both

bending over it, and reading it together. It had been lying in the

post-office a week. It came from New York, and in a week from the

date of it Dick would be at home! He was on board the ship _Halcyon_,

Captain Cary, and they were to come down to Seaton, and load with

lumber as soon as their East Indian freight should be disposed of. He

had met Captain Cary in Calcutta, Dick wrote, and, having done him a

service there, had been taken on board his ship, and now was second

mate. Next voyage he would sail as first mate. The captain was his

friend, would do anything for him, and owned half the ship, Major

Cleaveland owning the other half; so Dick's fortune was made. But,

he added, they must get out of that town. He had a month to spare,

and should take them all away. Let them be ready to start on short

notice.

Having read this joyful letter through once, they began at the

first word and read it all through again, dwelling here and there

with exclamations of delight, stopped every minute by a large tear

that splashed down from Mrs. Rowan's eyes, or a yellow avalanche of

Edith's troublesome hair tumbling down as she bent eagerly over the

letter. How many times they read that letter would be hard to say;

still harder to say how many times they might have read it, had there

been no interruption.

A crowd of men were approaching their door--close upon them, and

darkening the light before they looked up. "Had Dick come, and were

the neighbors welcoming him?" was the first thought.

In her haste, Edith had left the outer door ajar, and now heavy feet

came tramping in without any leave being asked; the inner door was

pushed open, and--not Dick, but Dick's father was brought in and laid

on the floor. This was not the first time he had been brought home,

but never before had he come with such a retinue and in such silence,

and never before had these men taken off their hats to Mrs. Rowan.

"We've sent for the doctor, ma'am," one of them said; "but I guess

it's no use."

"I wouldn't have ordered him off, if I hadn't thought he was steady

enough to go," said another, who looked very pale. "The captain was

expected on board every minute, and it would be as much as my life is

worth if he found a man drunk there."

"He slipped on a plank, and fell," some one explained.

Their talk was, to the bewildered woman, like sounds heard in a

dream. So were Edith's passionate words as she ordered the men away.

The one who had refused the dead man any better title than "Dick" was

just coming in at the door, staring right and left, not too pitiful

even then to be curious regarding the place he was in. "Go out!" she

said, pushing the door in his face.

Some way, still in a dream, they were got rid of, all but two. Then

the doctor came, and looked, and nodded his decision--"All over!"

A dream! a dream!

The bedroom was set in order, the silent sleeper laid out there,

every stranger sent out of the house and locked out, and then Mrs.

Rowan woke up. It was a terrible awakening.

Madame Swetchine comments upon the fact that the thought of death is

more terrible in an arid existence than in the extremes of joy and

sorrow. It is true not only of those who die, but of the survivors.

We go out more willingly on a difficult journey when we have been

warmed and fed; we send our loved ones out with less pain when they

have been thus fortified. It is the same, in a greater degree, when

the journey is that one from which the traveller never returns. It

adds a terrible pang to bereavement when we think that our lost one

has never been happy; how much more terrible if he has never been

honored!

Of her husband's future Mrs. Rowan refused to think or to hear,

though she must have trembled in the shadow of it. It might be that

which made her so wild. She would allow no one to come near or speak

to her save Edith. Those who came with offers of help and sympathy

she ordered away. "Go!" she cried. "I want nothing of you! I and mine

have been a byword to you for years. Your help comes too late!"

She locked them out and pulled the curtains close, and, though

people continued to come to the door through the whole day, no one

gained admittance or saw a sign of life about the house. Inside sat

the widow and the child, scarcely aware of the passage of time. They

only knew that it was still day by the rays of sunlight that came in

through holes in the paper curtains, and pointed across the rooms

like long fingers. When there was a knock at the door, they started,

lifted their faces, and listened nervously till the knocking ceased,

as if afraid that some one might force an entrance. One would have

fancied, from their expression, that savages or wild beasts were

seeking to enter. They never once looked out, nor knew who came.

Still less were they aware of Major Cleaveland standing in his

cupola, spy-glass in hand, looking down the bay to see if that cloud

of canvas coming up over the horizon was the good ship _Halcyon_

coming home after her first voyage. Down-stairs he came again, three

stairs at a jump, as joyful as a boy, in spite of his forty years,

gave directions for the best dinner that the town would afford,

ordered his carriage, and drove off down the river-road.

The _Halcyon_ was the largest vessel that had ever been built at

Seaton, and as its launching had been an event in the town, so its

first arrival was an incident to take note of. When Major Cleaveland

drove down to the wharf where Mr. Rowan had that morning lost his

life, more than a hundred persons were assembled there waiting for

the ship, and others were coming. He stepped over to the Rowans'

door, and knocked twice, once with his knuckles, and again with his

whip-handle, but received no answer. "I would force the door, but

that Dick is coming," he said. "It is a shame to let the poor soul

shut herself up alone."

Soon, while the crowd watched, around the near curve of the river,

where a wooded point pushed out, appeared the tip, then the whole of

a bowsprit garlanded with green wreaths, then the leaning lady in her

gilded robes, with a bird just escaping from her hand, then the ship

rode gracefully into sight on the incoming tide.

A ringing shout welcomed her, and a shout from all hands on board

answered back.

Foremost of the little group on the deck stood a man of gigantic

stature. His hair was coarse and black, he wore an enormous black

beard, and his face, though scarcely middle-aged, was rough and

scarred by the weather. Everybody knew Captain Cary, a sailor worthy

of the old days of the Vikings, broad-shouldered, as strong as a

lion, with a laugh that made the glasses ring when he sat at table.

He was a plain, simple man, but grand in his simplicity. By his side

stood a youth of twenty, who looked slight in comparison, though

he was really manly and well grown. He had sea-blue eyes, quick,

long-lashed, and as bright as diamonds; his face was finely moulded,

ruddy, and spirited; his hair, that glistened in the sunlight, was

chestnut-brown. A gallant lad he was, the very ideal sailor-boy. But

his expression was defiant, rather than placid, and he did not join

in the hurrahs. The welcoming applause was not for him, he well knew.

They were no friends of his who crowded the wharf. He had some bitter

recollections of slight or injury connected with nearly every one of

them. But he was no longer in their power, and that gave him freedom

and ease in meeting them. The time had gone by when he could look

upon these country folks as final judges in any matter whatever, or

as of any great consequence to him. He had seen the world, had won

friends, had proved that he could do something, that he was somebody.

He was not ashamed of himself by any means, was young Dick Rowan.

Still, it was no pleasure to him to see them, for it brought back the

memory of sufferings which had not yet lost their sting.

All this shouting and rejoicing was as the idle wind to the mourners

across the way. Their fears of intrusion set at rest, since no one

had attempted to force an entrance to the house, they no longer took

notice even of the knocking at the door. Both had fallen into a sort

of stupor, induced by the exhaustion of long weeping, the silence

and semi-darkness of their rooms, and the removal of what had been

the daily tormenting fear of their lives. There was no longer any

need to tremble when a step approached, lest some one should come in

frenzied with drink, and terrify them with his ravings and violence.

Mrs. Rowan sat by her husband's side, leaning back in her chair, with

closed eyes and clasped hands, only half-alive. Edith lay on the

kitchen-floor, where she had thrown herself in a passion of weeping,

her arms above her head, her face hidden, and her long hair veiling

her. The weeping was over, and she lay silent and motionless. Neither

that shouting over on the wharf, nor Major Cleaveland's loud knocking

with his whip-handle, had made the slightest impression on her.

But at sunset came one who would not be denied. He tried the lock,

and, finding it fastened, knocked gently. There was no answer. He

knocked loudly, and still there was no reply. Then he set his knee

against the rickety panel, took the knob in a strong grasp, and

wrenched the door open. Stepping quickly into the little entry, he

looked to right and left, saw the girl lying, face down, on the

floor, and the woman sitting beside her dead, both as still as the

dead.

Something like a dream came into the half-swoon, half-sleep in which

Edith Yorke lay. She heard a slight cry, then a stifled sob, and

words hurriedly spoken in a low voice. Then there was a step that

paused near her. She put her hair back with one hand, and turned her

face listlessly. The curtain had been raised to let in the light, and

there stood a young man looking down at her. His face was pale with

the sudden shock of grief and distress, but a faint indication of a

smile shone through as she looked up at him.

Her first glance was a blank one, her second flashed with delight.

She sprang up as if electrified. "O Dick! O Dick! How glad I am!"

The world moved rightly at last! Order was coming out of chaos; for

Dick had come home!

He shook hands with her rather awkwardly, somewhat embarrassed by the

warmth of her welcome. "We're to go right off," he said. "Captain

Cary will help us."

"Yes, Dick!" she replied, and asked no questions. He knew what was

right. With him had come all help, and strength, and hope.

The next morning, long before dawn, they started. A boat was ready at

the wharf, and Captain Cary and Dick carried out the dead in a rude

coffin that had been privately made on board the _Halcyon_. "They

shall not stare at our poor funeral, captain," Dick had said; "and I

will not ask them for a coffin or a grave."

"All right!" his friend had answered heartily. "I'm your man.

Whatever you want to do, I'll help you about."

So the watch on the _Halcyon_ was conveniently deaf and blind, the

boat was ready in the dark of morning, the coffin carried out to it,

and Mrs. Rowan and Edith helped in after. When they were in their

places, and the captain seated, oars in hand, Dick went back to the

house, and stayed there a little while. No questions were asked of

him when he came away, bringing nothing with him, and he offered no

explanation, only took the oars, and silently guided their boat out

into the channel. The banks on either side were a solid blackness,

and the sky was opaque and low, so that their forms were scarcely

visible to each other as they sat there, Mrs. Rowan in the bows near

her son, Edith beside Captain Cary, who loomed above her like a

mountain of help.

Presently, as they floated around the point that stood between the

village and the bay, a faint blush of light warmed the darkness

through, and grew till the low-hung clouds sucked it up like a sponge

and showed a crimson drapery over their heads. It was too early for

morning light, too fierce, and, moreover, it came from the wrong

direction. The east was before them; this sanguinary aurora followed

in their wake. It shone angrily through the strip of woods, and sent

a long, swift beam quivering over the water. This fiery messenger

shot like an arrow into the boat, and reddened Mrs. Rowan's hands,

clasped on the edge of the coffin. By the light of it, Dick saw all

their faces turned toward him.

"The house was mine!" he said defiantly.

The captain nodded approval, and Edith leaned forward to whisper,

"Yes, Dick!" But Mrs. Rowan said not a word, only sat looking

steadily backward, the light in her face.

"I'm glad of it!" sighed Edith to herself. She had been thinking

since they left the house how people would come and wander through

it, and peer at everything, and know just how wretchedly they had

lived. Now they could not, for it would all be burnt up. She sat and

fancied the fire catching here and there in their poor little rooms,

how the clock would tick till the last minute, even when its face

was scorched and its glass shivered, and then fall with a sudden

crash; how the flames would catch at the bed on which the dead man

had lain, the mean paper curtains, the chair she had sat in, Mrs.

Rowan's little rocking-chair, at the table where they had sat through

so many dreary meals. The checker-board would go, and the cards with

which Mr. Rowan had played the night before, and the knitting-work

with the puckered heel, and her apron that the drunkard had wiped his

ghastly face with. The shelves in the little closet would heat, and

blacken, and redden, and flame, and down would come their miserable

store of dishes, rattling into the yawning cellar. Fire would gnaw at

the ceiling, bite its way into the attic, burn up her books, creep

to the bed where she had lain and seen rainbow colors in the dark,

spread a sheet of flame over the whole, rise, and burst through the

roof. She saw it all. She even fancied that each long-used article of

their scanty plenishing, worn away by human touch, constantly in the

sight of human eyes, would perish with some human feeling, and send

out a sharp cry after them. The crackling of flames was to her the

cries of burning wood. But she was glad of it, for they were going to

wipe out and begin anew. There seemed to her something very grand and

exceedingly proper in it all.

When their boat glided from the river into the bay, others besides

themselves became aware of the conflagration, and the village bells

rang out a tardy alarm. Dick laughed bitterly at the sound, but said

nothing.

"They were sorry for you, Dick," the captain said. "I heard a good

many speak of it. They would have been glad to do your family any

kindness. I don't blame you for coming off; but you mustn't think

there was no kind feeling for you among the folks there."

"Kindness may come too late, captain," the young man answered. "I

would have thanked them for it years ago, when I had nowhere to turn

to, and hadn't a friend in the world; now I don't thank them, and I

don't want their kindness. Even if I would take it at last, neither

they nor you have any right to expect that I will run to take the

hand that has struck me so many blows the first time it is held out.

I don't trust 'em. I want proofs of good-will when I've had proofs of

ill-will."

"Dick is right, captain," his mother interposed in a weary tone. "You

can't judge of such things if you haven't felt them. It's easier to

hurt a sore heart than a sound one."

Within an hour they reached one of those desolate little sandy

islands with which the bay was studded; and now the faint spring dawn

was breaking, and the heavy masses of cloud lifting and contracting,

pale reaches of sky visible between. By the cold glimmer they scooped

out a grave, and placed the coffin in it. The water washed the shore,

and a chilly, sighing wind came up from the east.

As the first shovelful of earth fell on the coffin, Mrs. Rowan

caught back the captain's arm. "Don't cover him out of sight without

some word spoken over him!" she implored. "He was once young, and

ambitious, and kind, like you. He would have been a man if he hadn't

had bad luck, and then got into bad company. He was more wretched

than we were. O sir! don't cover him out of sight as if he were a

dog."

The sailor looked both pained and embarrassed. "I'm not much used

to praying, ma'am," he said. "I'm a Methodist, but I'm not a

church-member. If there was a Bible here, I would read a chapter;

but--there isn't."

Dick walked off a little way, turned his back, and stood looking at

the water. Mrs. Rowan, kneeling on the sand-heap beside the grave,

wept loudly. "His father was a Catholic," she cried. "I don't think

much of Catholics; but, if poor Dick had stood by his religion, he

could have had a priest to say some word over him. I wouldn't have

minded having a priest here. He'd be better than nobody."

Captain Cary was a strict Methodist, and he felt that it would never

answer to have the absence of a Catholic priest regretted. Something

must be done. "I could sing a hymn, ma'am," he said hesitatingly;

and, as no one objected, he straightened himself, dropped his spade,

and sang, to the tune of the "Dead March in Saul,"

"Unveil thy bosom, faithful tomb,

Take this new treasure to thy trust,

And give these sacred relics room

To slumber in the silent dust,"

singing the hymn through.

In a confined place the sailor's voice would have been too powerful,

and, perhaps, would have sounded rough; but in open air, with no wall

nearer than the distant hills, no ceiling but the sky, and with the

complex low harmony of the ocean bearing it up and running through

all its pauses, it was magnificent. He sang slowly and solemnly, his

arms folded, his face devoutly raised, and the clouds seemed to part

before his voice.

When the hymn was ended, he remained a moment without motion or

change of face, then stooped for his shovel, and began to fill in the

grave.

While listening to him, Edith Yorke had stood in a solemn trance,

looking far off seaward; but at sound of the dropping gravel, her

quiet broke up, like ice in spring. She threw her arm, and her loose

hair with it, up over her head, and sobbed behind that veil. But her

tears were not for Mr. Rowan. Her soul had taken a wider range, and,

without herself being aware of it, she was mourning for all the dead

that ever had died or ever should die.

The first sunbeam that glanced across the water showed a feather of

smoke from a steamer that came up through the Narrows into the bay,

and the row-boat, a lessening speck, making for the wharf. Twice a

week, passengers and freight were taken and left at this wharf, three

miles below the town.

TO BE CONTINUED.

SAUNTERING.

Saunterer (from _Sainte Terre_), a pilgrim to holy lands or

places.--THOREAU.

"They who never go to the Holy Land in their walks are indeed mere

idlers and vagabonds; but they who do go there are saunterers in the

good sense, such as I mean," says Thoreau. I found the Holy Land in

Paris, the city of fashion and gaiety, and where _le suprême bonheur_

is said to be amusement. Every church is a station of the divine

Passion, and to every votary therein could I say:

"I behold in thee

An image of him who died on the tree.

Thou also hast had thy crown of thorns."

Before these churches, consecrated to some sweet mystery of the

Gospel or bearing the hallowed names of those who had put on the

sacred stole of Christ's sufferings, I always stopped. I was like

Duke Richard, in the _Roman du Rau_:

"Whene'er an open church he found,

He entered in with fervent means

To offer up his orisons;

And if the doors were closed each one,

He knelt upon the threshold stone."

And one might well kneel upon the threshold stone of these ancient

churches, feeding mind and soul with sacred legends of the past

embodying holy truths which are depicted on the outer walls, as at

the north door of Notre Dame de Paris, the arch of which contains

in many compartments representations of a diabolic pact and of a

deliverance effected by our potent Lady, which is related in a

metrical romance composed by Ruteboef, in the time of St. Louis.

Saladin, a magician, wears a cap of pyramidal form. And what a mine

of legendary and biblical lore all over these venerable walls!

Sermons in stones come down to us from the stonen saints in their

niches and the bas-reliefs which speak louder than human tongues. The

first stone of this edifice was laid by Charlemagne, and the last

by Philip Augustus. How much this fact alone tells! And there is

the Porte Rouge, an exquisite specimen of the Gothic style of the

fifteenth century, the expiatory monument of Jean-sans-Peur after the

assassination of the Duke of Orleans. In the arch are the Duke and

Duchess of Burgundy, in the attitude of supplication, one on each

side of our Saviour and the Blessed Virgin. It is an eternal _Libera

me de sanguinibus, Deus_.

And then the Portail du Milieu, with the last judgment in the ogive,

the angels sounding the last trump, the dead issuing forth from their

graves, the separation of the righteous from the wicked, the great

Judge with the emblems of the crucifixion, the Virgin and the loved

apostle John, and, finally, a glimpse of the joys of heaven and the

horrors of hell. Yes, one could linger here for days before this

_Biblia pauperum_, were there no more powerful attractions within.

And this is not the only church the very exterior of which is full of

instruction.

In the porch of St. Germain de l'Auxerrois is the statue of a maiden

holding in one hand a breviary and in the other a lighted taper. By

her is a demon with a pair of bellows, vainly trying to blow out the

light--symbol of faith and prayer. This is the statue of one who

deserves to be ranked in history with Joan of Arc on account of her

heroism, for twice she saved Paris by her courage and her prayers.

Would that she might once more have intervened to save the capital

of fair France from the invader! St. Genevieve is placed thus at the

entrance of the church of St. Germain to remind us of his connection

with her history.

When St. Germain, Bishop of Auxerre, and St. Lupus, the learned

Bishop of Troyes and the intimate friend of Sidonius Apollinaris,

were on their way to Britain to combat the heresy of Pelagianism,

they passed through the village now called Nanterre, about two

leagues from Paris. All the inhabitants of the place poured forth

to meet them and obtain their benediction. St. Germain noticed in

the crowd a little girl with a face as radiant as an angel's. His

prophetic instinct told him she was destined to be a chosen vessel

of God's grace, and, when she expressed a wish to be the spouse of

Christ, he led her with him to the church, holding his apostolic

hands upon her head during the chanting of the vesper service. He

afterward suspended a bronze medal, on which was a cross, from

her neck, in remembrance of her consecration to God, bidding her

henceforth give up all ornaments of silver and gold. "Let them who

live for this world have these," said he. "Do thou, who art become

the spouse of Christ, desire only spiritual adorning." Dr. Newman

says it was a custom, even among the early Christians, to wear

on the neck some token of the mysteries of their religion. Long

after, in memory of this event, the Canons of St. Genevieve, at

Paris, distributed upon her festival a _pain bénit_ on which was an

impression of this coin.

Eighteen years after, St. Germain again passed through Nanterre, once

more on his way to Britain. He had not forgotten Genevieve. At the

age of fifteen, she had received the virgin's veil from the hands of

the Bishop of Paris. Her parents dying, she went to Paris to reside

with her godmother. Here she suffered that persecution so often the

lot of those who live godly lives. Those who outstrip their fellows

even on the path of piety are objects of envy, and they who leave

the beaten track of everyday religion are derided. St. Genevieve

was visited at Paris by the holy Bishop of Auxerre, who saluted her

with respect as a temple in which the divine Presence was manifest.

Her life was one of prayer and penance. She used to water her couch

with her tears, and when the adversary of our souls extinguished the

taper that lighted her vigils she rekindled it with her prayers.

When Attila, king of the Huns, threatened Paris, she besought the

inhabitants not to leave their homes, declaring that Heaven would

intervene to save them. The barbarians, in effect, were dispersed by

a storm, and betook themselves toward Orleans. In the church of St.

Germain there is a chapel dedicated to St. Genevieve, with a painting

representing her haranguing the inhabitants of Paris.

When Childeric besieged Paris, and sickness and famine were carrying

off the inhabitants, St. Genevieve laid aside her religious dress,

took command of the boats that went up the Seine for succor, and

brought back a supply of provisions. And when the city had to

surrender, the conquerer treated her with marked respect, and Clovis

loved to grant her petitions. The remains of paganism were rooted

out of Paris through her influence over him and Clotilda, and the

first church built on the spot that now bears her name, but then

dedicated under the invocation of Sts. Peter and Paul. In that

church was the shepherdess of Nanterre buried beside Clovis and

Clotilda. St. Eloi wrought a magnificent shrine for her remains,

but it was destroyed at the Revolution, and the contents publicly

burned. A portion of her relics is now enshrined at the Pantheon.

I found lights burning there, and flowers and wreaths, and votive

offerings, and the sweet-smelling incense of prayer rising from a

group of people praying around. But the magnificence of the Pantheon

is miserably depressing, as Faber says. How much more I delighted in

the interesting church of St. Etienne du Mont, where is the curious

old tomb of St. Genevieve! There too were lights and ex-votos, and an

old woman sat near the tomb to dispense tapers to those who wished to

leave a little gleam of love and prayer behind them. Once what lights

and jewels blazed around such shrines, and what crowds of devout

pilgrims! Now, a few dim tapers, a few prayerful hearts, light up the

place.

"Now it is much if here and there

One dreamer, by thy genial glare,

Trace the dim Past, and slowly climb

The steep of Faith's triumphant prime."

Now the world seems to begrudge the temple of the Most High the

silver and the gold that belong to him. And jewels are not to be

thought of. Such wealth must be kept in circulation, that is, on

Prince Esterhazy's coat, I suppose, and by ladies of fashion. The

world nowadays is like Julian the Apostate, who was displeased at

the magnificence of the chalices used in the Christian churches. For

me, I love these offerings from time to eternity, as Madame de Staël

says. Let all that is most precious be poured out at the feet of the

Saviour, and let no one murmur if such offerings are crystallized. I

took pleasure in looking at some splendid vessels of the sanctuary at

Notre Dame, and thought:

"Never was gold or silver graced thus

Before.

To bring this body and this blood to us

Is more

Than to crown kings,

Or be made rings

For star-like diamonds to glitter in.

When the great King offers to come to me

As food,

Shall I suppose his carriages can be

Too good?

No! stars to gold

Turned never could

Be rich enough to be employed so.

If I might wish, then, I would have this bread,

This wine,

Vesselled in what the sun might blush to shed

His shine

When he should see--

But till that be,

I'll rest contented with it as it is."

In my saunterings I frequently lingered before the tower of St.

Jacques de la Boucherie, the highest in Paris, and the most perfect

specimen of Gothic architecture. The remainder of the church was

demolished at the Revolution. The tower was saved by the artifice

of an architect, who besought the crowd to imitate the enlightened

English revolutionists, who destroyed their churches, but preserved

the towers to be converted into shot-houses! In this church crowds

used to assemble to hear Bourdaloue thunder, as Madame de Sévigné

expresses it. I fancy I can hear that uncompromising preacher ringing

out like a trump in the presence of the Great Monarch, "Thou art

the man!" This exclamation should have appealed to the heart of the

people, and saved the church he loved from profanation.

This church was built by the alms of pious people. Nicholas Flamel

built the portal in 1388, which he covered with devout images and

devices, which were regarded, even by the antiquaries of the last

century, as symbols of alchemy. This Flamel was a benefactor to many

churches and hospitals of Paris, which he took pleasure in adorning

with carvings in which he made all things tributary, as it were, to

the worship of God. At first a simple scrivener, he became painter,

architect, chemist, philosopher, and poet. He certainly had the

fancy of a poet, and wrote in durable materials. He left by his will

nineteen chalices of silver gilt to as many churches.

These churches and religious houses are all connected with the

history of the city. Paris owed its extension on the north side of

the Seine to the school in the Abbey of St. Germain de l'Auxerrois,

which was famous at an early age. There were four great abbeys around

Paris in the time of the third dynasty--St. Lawrence, St. Genevieve,

St. Germain de l'Auxerrois, and St. Germain des Près. These were

surrounded by their dependencies, forming villages which gradually

extended till they united to enclose the city, then chiefly confined

to the island. The poor loved to live near these abbeys. St. Germain

des Près, besides providing for the poor in general, used privately

to support several destitute families who were ashamed of their

poverty. The old abbots of this monastery were both lords spiritual

and temporal in the suburbs on that side of the city. This abbey

was a monument of repentance. Digby says when it was rebuilt in the

year 1000 the great tower and the portals were left as before. The

statues of eight kings stood at the entrance, four on the right hand

and four on the left. One of them held a scroll on which was written

the tragical name of Clodomir. And another, with no beatific circle

around his head, held an open tablet on which were the first and last

letters of the name Clotaire. These were the statues of the murderer

and his victim.

The square tower of the monastery, built in the time of Charlemagne,

contributed greatly to the defence of the house against the Normans.

A stout old monk, Abbon, conducted the defence, and proved himself

on this occasion a valiant defender of the walls of Zion. Perhaps it

was his skilful hand that wrote an Homeric poem on the siege of Paris

by the Normans in the year 885. If not by him, it was by a monk of a

similar name.

The Pré aux Clercs, now the Faubourg St. Germain, took its name from

being a place of recreation for the students of this abbey. One of

the scholars, Sylvester de Sacy, so learned in the Semitic languages,

ascribed the bent of his mind to the aid and encouragement given him

by one of the monks who took his constitutional in the abbey gardens

at the same time as the boy, then only twelve years old.

The library belonging to this abbey was celebrated in the middle

ages, and there were monks of literary eminence in the house.

Dacherius was the librarian when he composed his _Spicilegium_.

Usuard compiled a martyrology. They had a printing press set up

immediately after the invention of printing, which gives one a

favorable idea of their mental activity. Most of these old monastic

libraries were accessible to all; that of the Abbey of St. Victor

was open to the public three days in the week; and there were public

libraries attached to some of the parish churches. In the time of

Charles V., rightly named the Wise, he ordered the Royal Library

of Paris to be illuminated with thirty portable lamps, and that a

silver one should be suspended in the centre for the benefit of those

students who prolonged their researches into the night. The numerous

collections of books in Paris made that city very attractive to

certain minds even in the middle ages. Richard de Bury, Bishop of

Durham, in England, who established the first public library in that

country, used to resort to Paris for fresh supplies. "O blessed God

of gods in Sion!" he exclaims, "what a flood of pleasure rejoices our

heart whenever we are at liberty to visit Paris, that paradise of the

world, where the days always seem too short and too few through the

immensity of our love! There are libraries more redolent of delight

than all the shops of aromatics; there are the flowering meadows of

all volumes that can be found anywhere. There, indeed, untying our

purse-strings, and opening our treasures, we disperse money with

a joyful heart (evidently the truth, for he paid the Abbot of St.

Albans fifty pounds weight of silver for thirty or forty volumes),

and ransom with dirt books that are beyond all price. But lo! how

good and pleasant a thing it is to gather together in one place the

arms of clerical warfare, that there may be a supply of them for us

to use in the wars against heretics, should they ever rise up against

us!"

What would this book-loving prelate have done had he foreseen that

the church would one day be accused of being a foe to progress

and to the diffusion of knowledge! This bishop, who lived in the

thirteenth century, was the Chancellor and High Treasurer of England,

and celebrated for his love and encouragement of literature. He had

libraries in all his palaces, and the apartment he commonly occupied

was so crammed with books that he was almost inaccessible. He was

said to breathe books, so fond was he of being among them. None but a

genuine lover of books would give such amusing directions for their

preservation. "Not only do we serve God," says he, "by preparing new

books, but also by preserving and treating with great care those we

have already. Truly, after the vestments and vessels dedicated to our

Lord's body, sacred books deserve to be treated with most reverence

by clerks. In opening and shutting books, they should avoid all

abruptness, not too hastily loosing the clasps, nor failing to shut

them when they have finished reading, for it is far more important to

preserve a book than a shoe." He then goes on to speak of soiling

books; of marking passages with the finger-nails, "like those of

a giant;" of swelling the junctures of the binding with straws or

flowers; and of eating over them, leaving the fragments in the book,

as if the reader had no bag for alms. Waxing warm over the idea, he

wishes such persons might have to sit over leather with a shoemaker!

And then there are impudent youths, who presume to fill up the broad

margins with their unchastened pens, noting down whatever frivolous

thing occurs to their imagination! And "there are some thieves, too,

who cut out leaves or letters, which kind of sacrilege ought to be

prohibited under the penalty of anathema." The bishop had evidently

had some sad experience with his cherished tomes. His testimony

respecting the appreciation of books by the monks of his time is

valuable. Remember the age, reader--that period of deepest darkness

just before the dawn! "The monks who are so venerable," says he in

his _Philobiblion_, "are accustomed to be solicitous in regard to

books, and to be delighted in their company, as with all riches, and

thence it is that we find in most monasteries such splendid treasures

of erudition, giving a delectable light to the path of laics. Oh!

that devout labor of their hands in writing books; how preferable

to all georgic care! All things else fail with time. Saturn ceases

not to devour his offspring, for oblivion covereth the glory of the

world. But God hath provided a remedy for us in books, without which

all that was ever great would have been without memory. Without shame

we may lay bare to books the poverty of human ignorance. They are

the masters who instruct us without rods, without anger, and without

_money_. (The bishop had evidently forgotten those fifty pounds of

silver, and many more besides!) O books! alone liberal and making

liberal, who give to all, and seek to emancipate all who serve you.

You are the tree of life and the river of Paradise, with which the

human intelligence is irrigated and made fruitful."

But I did not always linger at the doors of churches, studying the

walls and pondering on their history. The true Catholic knows that

these magnificent churches are only vast shrines enclosing the great

Object of his adoration and love. M. Olier, when travelling, never

saw the spire of a church in the distance without calling upon all

with him to repeat the Tantum Ergo. He used to say: "When I see

a place where my Master reposes, I have a feeling of unutterable

joy." This feeling comes over every one at the first glimpse of that

undying lamp before the tabernacle, "that small flame which rises and

falls like a dying pulse, flickering up and down, emblematic of our

lives, which even now thus wastes and wanes."

The very first act on stepping into a church completely changes the

current of one's thoughts. The holy water, the sign of the cross,

dispel the remembrance of material things and recall devout thoughts

of the Passion.

"Whene'er across this sinful flesh of mine

I draw the holy sign,

All good thoughts stir within me, and collect

Their slumbering strength divine."

The _bénitiers_ at St. Sulpice are two immense shells, given to

Francis the First by the Republic of Venice; but for all that, the

_eau bénite_ seemed just as holy, and I made the sign of the cross

just as devoutly.

For devotion, I prefer the largest churches, because the seclusion

is more perfect, as at Notre Dame. Behind some pillar or in the

depths of some dim chapel, one can find perfect solitude where he

can be alone with God. Alone with God! that in itself is prayer. The

world-weary soul finds it good simply to sit or kneel with clasped

hands in the divine Presence.

"My spirit I love to compose,

In humble trust my eyelids close

With reverential resignation,

No wish conceived, no thought expressed,

Only a sense of supplication."

Joubert says the best prayers are those that have nothing distinct,

and which thus partake of simple adoration; and Hawthorne asks:

"Could I bring my heart in unison with those praying in yonder church

with a fervor of supplication but no distinct request, would not

that be the safest kind of prayer?" Surely every devout soul feels

that "prayer is not necessarily petition," and what is technically

known as the prayer of contemplation is the very inspiration of such

churches. In this temple of silence, man seems to be brought back to

his primeval relations with his Creator.

What mute eloquence in these walls! What an appeal to the imagination

in the calmness! Earthly voices die away on the threshold, and

peace, dovelike, broods over the very entrance. A daily visit to

such a temple gives life a certain elevation. The very poor who come

here to pray must acquire a certain dignity of character. How many

generations have worshipped beneath these arches! The saints have

passed over the very pavement I tread. I recall St. Louis, who, out

of respect to our Lord, had laid off his shoes and divested himself

of his royal robes, bearing solemnly into this church the holy Crown

of Thorns. And great sinners, too, are in this long procession of the

past. There is Count Raymond of Toulouse, barefoot, and clad only in

the white tunic of a penitent, coming to receive absolution from the

papal legate before the grand altar.

When one recalls the popes, cardinals, and other dignitaries of the

church, the kings and queens and knights of the olden time who have

been here, one almost shrinks from entering such a throng of the

mighty ones of the earth. It seems as if he were elbowing the Great

Monarch or the gallant Henry of Navarre.

On the galleries around the nave were formerly suspended the

flags and standards taken in war, and it was in allusion to this

custom that the Prince of Conti, after the victories of Fleurus,

Steinkerque, and La Marsaille, made an opening in the crowd around

the door of the church for the Marechal de Luxembourg, whom he held

by the hand, by crying: "Place, place, messieurs, au tapissier de

Notre Dame!"--"Room, room, gentlemen, for the upholsterer of Notre

Dame!"

It is charming to see the birds flying about in the arches of this

church, as if nature had taken its venerable walls to her bosom. It

made me think of the old hermits of the middle ages, living with

the sea-birds in their ocean caves. Like St. Francis, the canons of

Notre Dame say the divine office with their "little sisters, the

birds;" and the bird is the symbol of the soul rising heavenward on

the wings of prayer. We, like the birds, build our nests here for a

few days. Blessed are we if they are built within the influences of

the sanctuary which temper the storms and severities of life. It is

only in the clefts of the rocks that wall in the mystic garden of the

church that there is safety for the dovelike soul.

In the transept is the altar of Our Lady, starry with lamps.

Above her statue is one of her titles, appealing to every

heart--Consolatrix afflictorum! To this church M. Olier came, in

all his troubles, to the altar of Mary. There is also a fine statue

of her over the grand altar, formerly at the Carmes. No church is

complete without an altar of the Blessed Virgin. Wherever there is a

cross, Mary must be at its foot, as at Calvary, directing our eyes,

our thoughts, our hearts, to him who hangs thereon.

"O that silent, ceaseless mourning!

O those dim eyes! never turning

From that wondrous, suffering Son!

"Virgin holiest, virgin purest,

Of that anguish thou endurest

Make me bear with thee my part."

In traversing Paris, one passes many private residences of interest

which have a certain consecration--the consecration of wit and

genius. I cannot say I ever went so far as Horace Walpole, who never

passed the Hôtel de Carnavalet, the residence of Madame de Sévigné,

without saying his Ave before it, much as I admire her _esprit_,

and though she was the granddaughter of St. Jane de Chantal, the

foundress of the Nuns of the Visitation. Walpole thought the house

had a foreign-looking air, and said it looked like an ex-voto raised

in her honor by some of her foreign votaries. It was once an elegant

residence, with its sculptured gateway and Ionic pilasters, and

its court adorned with statues. In the day of the _spirituelle_

letter-writer, it was the resort of the learned and the refined;

now, O tempora! it is a boarding-school, and the _salon_ of Madame

de Sévigné (the temple of "Notre Dame de Livry," to quote Walpole

again, if it be not profanity) is converted into a dormitory. Truly,

as Bishop de Bury says, "all things pass away with time," but the wit

and genius she embodied in her charming letters are eternal.

In one of the upper stories of a house in the Rue St. Honoré lived

Joubert, the Coleridge of France. His keeping-room was flooded with

the light he loved, and from it, as he said, he saw a great deal of

sky and very little earth. There he passed his days among the books

he had collected. He rigorously excluded from his library all the

books he disapproved of; unwilling, as he said, to admit an unworthy

friend to his constant companionship. To this room he attracted

a brilliant circle of conspicuous authors and statesmen by his

conversational talents, and there he wrote his immortal _Pensées_. He

said he left Paris unwillingly, because then he had to part from his

friends; and he left the country unwillingly, because he had to part

from himself. Writing from that sunny room, he says: "In many things,

I am like the butterfly; like him, I love the light; like him, I

there consume my life; like him, I need, in order to spread my wings,

that there be fair weather around me in society, and that my mind

feel itself surrounded and as if penetrated by the mild temperature

of indulgence." But he wrote graver and more profound things there.

One of his friends said of him that he seemed to be a soul that by

accident had met with a body, and was trying to make the best of it.

And he, ever indulgent to the faults of others, said of his friends,

"When they are blind of one eye, I look at them in profile."

The Abbaye aux Bois is interesting from its association with Madame

Récamier and her circle. Her rooms were in the third story and

paved with tiles, and they overlooked the pleasant garden of the

monastery, and, when lit up with wit and genius, they needed no other

attraction. Among her visitors there were Sir Humphry Davy, Maria

Edgeworth, Humboldt, Lamartine, Delphine Gay, Chateaubriand, etc.

They must have been like the gods, speaking from peak to peak all

around Olympus. Lamartine read his _Méditations_ there before they

were given to the public. Chateaubriand thus speaks of the room:

"The windows overlooked the garden of the abbey, under the verdant

shade of which the nuns paced up and down, and the pupils played. The

top of an acacia was on a level with the eye, sharp spires pierced

the sky, and in the distance rose the hills of Sèvres. The rays of

the setting sun threw a golden light over the landscape and came in

through the open windows. Some birds were settling themselves for

the night on the top of the window-blinds. Here I found silence and

solitude, far above the tumult and turmoil of a great city."

To the church of the abbey, a plain, unpretending structure, Eugénie

de Guérin went every day to Mass during her first visit to Paris.

There, too, were the bans of her brother Maurice published, and there

he was married.

The house of Madame Swetchine, in the Rue St. Dominique, must be

regarded with veneration. There was no austerity about the _salon_

of this remarkable woman. It was adorned with pictures, bronzes, and

flowers, and in the evening it was illuminated with a profusion of

lamps and candles, giving it a festive air. And then the great lights

of the church, always diffusing their radiance and aroma in that

favored room, Lacordaire, De Ravignan, Dupanloup, De la Bouillerie,

etc. To have found one's self among them must have seemed like being

among the prophets on Mount Carmel. They all loved to officiate and

preach in her beautiful private chapel, which was adorned with a

multitude of precious stones from the Russian mines, gleaming around

the ineffable presence of the Divinity. Mary, too, was there. On the

base of her silver statue was her monogram in diamonds, which Madame

Swetchine had worn as maid of honor to the Empress Mary of Russia.

These circles, and many others I could recall, are now broken up for

ever. We have all heard and read so much of those who composed them

that they seem like personal friends. We linger around the places to

which they imparted a certain sacredness, and follow them in thought

to the world of mystery and eternal reunion, thanking God that the

great gulf from the finite to the infinite has been bridged over by

the Incarnation.

One morning, I went to the church of the Carmelites. A tablet on the

wall points out the spot where the heart of Monseigneur Affre was

deposited--the heart of him who gave his life for his flock. Around

it were suspended some wreaths. On one, of immortelles, was painted,

in black letters, _A mon Père_, the offering of one of his spiritual

children. Wishing to have some objects of devotion blessed, I went

into the sacristy (I remembered Eugénie de Guérin speaks of going

into that sacristy), where I found one of the monks prostrate in

prayer, making his thanksgiving after Mass. Enveloped in his habit,

his bald head covered by a cowl, he looked like a ghost from the dark

ages. Not venturing to approach the ghostly father, I made known my

errand to a good-natured-looking lay brother, who conveyed it to that

part of the cowl where the right ear of the monk might reasonably be

supposed to be, which brought back the holy man to earth, causing me

some compunction of conscience. The brother spread out my articles,

brought the ritual and the stole, and the father, throwing back

his cowl, murmured over them the prayers of holy church, and then

disappeared into the monastery. Presently I heard the voices of the

monks saying the office, which they do, like nuns, in choir and

behind a curtained grate, so they are not seen from the church.

This monastery may be compared to the Roman amphitheatre where the

early Christians were thrown to the wild beasts. Here indeed was

fought the good fight, and the victors rose to heaven with palms in

their hands. I know of nothing more sublime and thrilling in the

annals of the church than the massacre of about two hundred priests

that took place here on the second of September, 1792. I cannot

refrain from giving a condensed account of it by one of the writers

of the day: "For some weeks there had been assembled and heaped

together two hundred priests, who had refused to take the schismatic

oath, or had nobly recanted it. During the first day of their

incarceration, these loyal priests had been inhumanly imprisoned

in the church. The guards in their midst watched to prevent their

having the consolation of even speaking to each other. Their only

nourishment was bread and water. The stone floor was their bed. It

was only later that a few were permitted to have straw beds. These

priests, whom martyrdom was to render immortal, had at their head

three prelates whose virtues recall the primitive days of the church.

Their chief was the Archbishop of Arles, Monseigneur du Lau. He had

been deputed to the states-general; his piety equalled his knowledge;

and his humility even surpassed his merit. The day after the

memorable 10th of August he had been sent to the Carmelite monastery

(then converted into a prison) with sixty-two other priests.

Notwithstanding his age (he was over eighty) and his infirmities,

he refused all indulgences that were not also extended to his

brother-captives. For several days a wooden arm-chair was his bed as

well as his pontifical throne. Thence his persuasive words instilled

into those around him the sentiments of ineffable charity that filled

his own heart, and when his exhausted voice could no longer make

itself heard, his very appearance expressed a sublime resignation.

"Two other bishops, brothers, bearing the name of De la

Rochefoucauld, one the Bishop of Beauvais, and the other of Saintes,

also encouraged their companions in misfortune by their words and

by their example. The Bishop of Saintes had not been arrested, but,

wishing to join his brother, he made himself a prisoner. There were

members of every rank in the ecclesiastical hierarchy: M. Hébert, the

confessor of the king who wrote to him at the beginning of August,

'I expect nothing more from man, bring me therefore the consolations

of heaven;' the general of the Benedictines, the Abbé de Lubusac,

several of the curés of Paris, Mr. Gros, called the modern Vincent

of Paul, and priests brought from various places, holy victims whom

the God of Calvary had chosen to associate with his sufferings, and

judged worthy of the most glorious of all deaths--that of martyrdom.

"For more than two days, the wretches who hovered around their

enclosure had filled the air with cries of blood, and predicting that

the sacrifice was about to take place. One said to the Archbishop of

Arles: 'My lord, on the morrow your grace is to be killed.' These

derisive insults recalled to the holy captives the judgment-hall

of their divine Master, and like him they bore them in silence,

forgiving and praying for their enemies.

"On the second of September they could no longer doubt that their

last hour had arrived. The hurried movements of the troops, the cries

in the neighboring streets, and the alarm-guns they heard made them

somewhat aware of the sinister events that were passing without.

At the dawn of day they had gathered together in the church. They

made their confessions to each other, they blessed one another, and

partook of the Holy Eucharist. They were singing the Benediction

together at about five in the evening when the ominous cries came

nearer. Then two holy hymns succeeded the prayers for the dying.

All at once the jailers entered, and began calling the roll, which

already had been done three times that day. The prisoners were then

ordered into the garden, which they found occupied by guards armed

with pikes and wearing the _bonnet rouge_. The murderers filled

the courts, the halls, and the church, making the venerable arches

re-echo to the noise of their weapons and their blasphemies. The

priests, one hundred and eighty-five in number, were divided into

two groups. About thirty, among whom were the bishops, rushed toward

a little oratory at the extremity of the garden, where they threw

themselves upon their knees, recommending themselves to God. They

embraced each other for the last time, and began saying the vespers

for the dead, when suddenly the gates were flung open, and the

assassins rushed in from various directions.

"The sight of these holy priests upon their knees arrested their

fury for an instant. The first who fell under their blows was Father

Gerault, who was reciting his breviary regardless of their cries.

That breviary, pierced with a ball and stained with blood, was

discovered on the spot at the restoration of the Carmelites, and

it is preserved as a precious relic. Then the Archbishop of Arles

was demanded. While they were seeking him through the alleys, he

was exhorting his companions to offer to God the sacrifice of their

lives. Hearing his name called, he knelt down, and asked the most

aged of the priests to give him absolution; then, rising, he advanced

to meet the assassins. With his arms crossed upon his breast and

his eyes raised toward heaven, he uttered in a calm voice the same

words his divine Master addressed to his enemies: "I am he whom

you seek." The first stroke of the sword was upon his forehead,

but the venerable man remained standing; a second made the blood

flow in torrents, but still he did not fall; the fifth laid him on

the ground, when a pike was driven through his heart. Then he was

trampled under the feet of the assassins, who exclaimed, 'Vive la

nation!'

"The general massacre then ensued. While the unfortunate priests,

with the instinct of self-preservation, were flying at random through

the garden, some screening themselves behind the hedges and others

climbing the trees, the murderers fired at them, and, when one of

them fell, they would rush upon his body, prolong his agony, and

exult over his sufferings. About forty perished in this manner. Some

of the younger priests succeeded in scaling the walls and hiding

themselves; but, remembering they were flying from martyrdom and that

their escape might excite greater fury against their companions,

they retraced their steps and received their reward! The Bishop of

Beauvais and his brother were in the garden oratory with thirty

priests. A grating separated them from the murderers, who fired upon

them, killing the greater number. The Bishop of Beauvais was not

touched, but his brother had a leg broken by a ball.

"For an instant this horrid butchery was suspended. One of the

leaders ordered all the priests into the church, whither they were

driven--even the wounded and dying--at the sword's point. There

they gathered around the altar, offering anew to their Saviour the

sacrifice of their lives, whilst their executioners, calling them out

two by two, finished their butchery more promptly and completely. To

each one life was offered on condition of taking the revolutionary

oath. They all refused, and not one escaped. Whilst these assassins

added blasphemous shouts to their murderous strokes, whilst they

demolished the crosses and the tabernacles, the holy phalanx of

priests, which death was every moment lessening, kept praying for

their murderers and their country. The two bishops were among the

last executed. When it came to the turn of the Bishop of Beauvais, he

left the altar upon which he had been leaning, and calmly advanced to

meet his death. His brother, whose wound prevented his walking, asked

for assistance, and was carried out to his execution. It was eight

in the evening when the last execution took place. Over four hundred

priests were massacred in different parts of Paris at this period,

besides many isolated murders."

The constancy of these martyrs has made many do more than exclaim

with Horace Walpole: "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Catholic!" He

says, in a letter dated October 14, 1792: "For the French priests, I

own I honor them. They preferred beggary to perjury, and have died or

fled to preserve the integrity of their consciences. It certainly

was not the French clergy but the philosophers that have trained up

their countrymen to be the most bloody men upon earth."

In 1854, this monastery, where flowed the blood of martyrs and which

had echoed with their dying groans, resounded with the strains of _O

Salutaris Hostia!_ on the festival of Corpus Christi, and priests

bore the divine Host through the alleys of the garden where, sixty

years before, had rushed those who were swift to shed blood. An altar

had been erected under the yew-tree where the Archbishop of Arles

fell. Children scattered flowers over the place once covered with

blood. Well might the pale-lipped clergy tearfully chant in such a

spot:

"THE WHITE-ROBED ARMY OF MARTYRS PRAISE THEE!"

Every age has its martyrs. They are the glory of the church, and

their blood is its seed. The church must ever suffer with its divine

spouse. Sometimes its head--the Vicar of Christ-is crowned with

thorns; sometimes its heart bleeds from a thrust in the very house

of its friends; and, again, its feet and hands are nailed in the

extremities of the earth.

And every follower of Christ crucified has his martyrdom--a martyrdom

of the soul, if not of the body. The sacred stigmata are imprinted

on every soul, that embraces the cross, and no one can look upon him

who hangs thereon, with the eyes of faith, without catching something

of his resemblance. Suffering is now, as when he was on earth, the

glorious penalty of those who approach the nearest to his Divine

Person.

"Three saints of old their lips upon the Incarnate Saviour laid,

And each with death or agony for the high rapture paid.

His mother's holy kisses of the coming sword gave sign,

And Simeon's hymn full closely did with his last breath entwine;

And Magdalen's first tearful touch prepared her but to greet

With homage of a broken heart his pierced and lifeless feet.

The crown of thorns, the heavy cross, the nails and bleeding brows,

The pale and dying lips, are the portion of the spouse."

SOR JUANA INES DE LA CRUZ.

So little is known of Spanish American literature that any fresh

report from its pages seems to have the nature of a revelation.

Our acquaintance with Heredia, Placido, Milanes, Mendive, Carpio,

Pesado, Galvan, Calderon, is slight or naught; yet these poets are

most interesting on account of the countries, peoples, and causes

for which they speak eloquently, even if we deny that they add

greatly to the genuine substance of our literary possession. Less

question, however, can be entertained of the importance of some older

names whose fame made for itself a refuge in the Spanish churches

and cloisters of the New World long before revolutionists took to

shooting the Muses on the wing. In the seventeenth century lived

and wrought Cabrera, Siguenza, and Sor or Sister Juana Ines. They

belonged to a country which claimed for awhile as its scholars,

though not as its natives, Doctor Valbuena, author of the very

well-known epical fantasy called _The Bernardo_, and Mateo Alaman,

who wrote the famous story of _Guzman de Alfarache_. Juan Ruiz

de Alarcon, one of the most remarkable dramatic poets of a great

dramatic age, was a native of that same country, Mexico. Siguenza, as

mathematician, historian, antiquary, and poet, has been well esteemed

by Humboldt and the scholars of his own race. It is much to say that

the land which produced an artist as great as Cabrera also gave birth

to a scholar and poet as renowned in her day and as appreciable in

ours as Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz. Among all these celebrities, who

would have been eminent in any time among any people, this Mexican

nun of the seventeenth century holds a place of her own. Looking back

upon the past with all our modern light, we cannot but regard her as

one of the most admirable characters of the New World.

Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz was born at San Miguel de Nepantla, twelve

leagues from the city of Mexico, in the year 1651, and died at the

age of forty-four. When but three years old, she was able to read,

write, and "cipher," and at eight she wrote a prologue for the feast

of the Holy Sacrament. Once she cut her hair, and would not allow it

to grow till she had acquired the learning she proposed to herself,

seeing no reason why a head should be covered with hair that was

denuded of knowledge, its best ornament. After twenty lessons, it was

said, she knew Latin, and so great was her desire to learn that she

importuned her parents to send her to the University of Mexico in

boy's clothes. When seventeen years of age, and a cherished inmate

of the Viceroy Mancera's family, she amazed a large company of

the professors and scholars of the capital by tests of her various

erudition and abilities. Notwithstanding her beauty and fortune, her

rank and accomplishments, and the life of a gallant and brilliant

court, she determined at that early age to retire to a cloister, and

in a few years became known as Sor Juana of San Geronimo, a convent

of the city of Mexico. After this appeared her poems, _The Crisis_

and _The Dream_, in the latter of which she writes much of mythology,

physics, medicine, and history, according to the scholastic manner

of her time. With these and her subsequent poetic writings, such as

her sonnets, loas, romances, and autos, she had rare fame, and won

from some of her admirers the enthusiastic titles of "The Phœnix of

Mexico," "Tenth Muse," and "Poetess of America." The writer has an

old volume before him bearing literally this title-page: "Fama, y

Obras Posthumas del Fenix de Mexico, y Dezima Musa, Poetisa de la

America, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, Religiosa Professa en el Convento

de San Geronimo, de la Imperial Ciudad de Mexico. Recogidas y dadas a

luz por el Doctor Don Juan Ignacio de Castorena y Ursua, Capellan de

Honor de su Magestad, y Prebendado de la Santa Iglesia Metropolitana

de Mexico. En Barcelona: Por Rafael Figuero. Año de MDCCI. Con todas

las licencias necessarias." Thus it appears we owe to the Prebendary

Castorena the edition of the posthumous works of Sor Juana given to

the light in 1701, six years after her death.

But, whether as the sister or the mother of a convent, Juana Ines de

la Cruz was more than a mistress of vain learning or unprofitable

science. Her daily assiduous exercise was charity, which at last so

controlled her life and thoughts that she gave all her musical and

mathematical instruments, all the rich presents which her talents

had attracted from illustrious people, and all her books, excepting

those she left to her sisters, to be sold for the benefit of the

poor. Though she had evidently prized science as the handmaid of

religion, the time came when her verses upon the vanity of learning

reflected a mind more and more withdrawn from the affairs of this

world to the contemplation of the next. When an epidemic visited the

Convent of San Geronimo, and but two out of every ten invalids were

saved, the good, brave soul of Madre Juana shone transcendently.

Spite of warnings and petitions, and though all the city prayed for

her life, Madre Juana perished at her vigil of charity--the good

angel as well as muse of Mexico.

Of the enthusiasm created by her genius, we have abundant and

curious proofs. Don Alonzo Muxica, "perpetual Recorder of the City

of Salamanca," wrote a sonnet upon her having learned to read at the

age of three, when "what for all is but the break of morn in her was

as the middle of the day." Excelentissimo Sir Felix Fernandez de

Cordova Cordona y Aragon, Duke of Seffa, of Væna and Soma, Count of

Cabra, Palomas, and Olivitas, and Grand Admiral and Captain-General

of Naples, speaks of her in a lofty poetic encomium as for the third

time applauded by two admiring worlds of readers, and praises her

persuasive voice as that of a sweet siren of thought. Don Garcia

Ribadeneyra, with the grandiose wit of his day, says in a decima

that this extraordinary woman surpassed the sun, for her glorious

genius rose where the sun set, that is to say, in the West; and Don

Pedro Alfonso Moreno argues piously that St. John the Baptist's three

crowns of Virgin, Martyr, and Doctor were in measure those of Madre

Juana, who was from early years chaste, poor in spirit, and obedient,

according to the vow of religious women. Don Luis Verdejo declares

that she transferred the lyceums of the Muses to Mexico, and that

the light of her genius is poured upon two worlds. Padre Cabrera,

chaplain of the Most Excellent Duke of Arcos, asserts that the

Eternal Knowledge enlightened Juana in all learning. "Only her fame

can define her," writes one of her own sex; and when the Poetess of

the Cloister wrote with her own blood a protestation of faith, it was

said of this "Swan of erudite plume" that she wrote like the martyr

to whose ink of blood the earth was as paper. Her gift of books to

be sold in order to relieve the poor inspired Señora Catalina de

Fernandez de Cordova, nun in the Convent of the Holy Ghost in Alcara,

to say thus thoughtfully:

"Without her books did Juana grow more wise,

As for their loss she studied deep content.

Know, then, that in this human school of ours,

He only is wise who knows to love his God."

At thought of her death, Don Luis Muñoz Venegas, of Granada, wonders

that the sun shines, that ships sail, that earth is fair, that all

things do not grieve her loss, whose happy soul in its beatitudes

enjoys the riches of which death has robbed the world--sweetness,

purity, felicity. Fray Juan de Rueda, professor of theology in the

college of San Pablo; Licentiate Villalobos of San Ildefonso, and

Señor Guerra, fellow of the same college; Advocate Pimienta, of the

Royal Audience, and Bachelor Olivas, a presbyter; Syndic Torres,

Catedratico or Professor Aviles, Cavalier Ulloa, have all something

to say in Spanish or Latin on the death of our poetess. Doctor Aviles

imagines the death of Sor Juana to be like that of the rose, which,

having acquired in a brief age all its perfection, needed not to live

longer. Don Diego Martinez suggests beautifully that the profit which

other excellent minds will derive from the posthumous writings of the

poetess will be like the clearness which the stars gain by the death

of the sun. Mingled with these honest tributes of admiration is much

extravagance of comparison; but they prove at least that Sor Juana

was regarded by the learned of her day as a woman of astonishing

powers.

Amid all her studies and labors, we read that Sister Juana was

constant in her religious devotions, and faithful to the least rules

of her order. But her conscientious spirit, moved by a letter of

Bishop Fernandez of Puebla, determined her at length to renounce the

exercise of her talents for the strictest and purest ascetism. Hence,

one of her Mexican critics is led to say that we have only the echoes

of her songs, only the shades of her images, inasmuch as her sex

and state, and the reigning scholasticism, were not convenient for

the true expression of her thoughts. The noble, ascetic literature

of Spain, respecting which it is with reason boasted that the world

contains nothing of the kind more valuable, discredits in good part

this supposition. Moreover, the recognition of Sor Juana's work and

genius was, as we have seen, not inconsiderable. The world is still

in its infancy as regards religious ideality, and, spite of the

highest evidences, often refuses to believe that thoughts fed from

the divine source can fulfil the true poem of life, be it written

or acted. What the thoughts of Sor Juana were like in her ordinary

religious life we understand partly from a number of daily exercises

and meditations which have come down to us. Here are specimens of

these compositions:

EXERCISE.

On this day, at seeing the light come forth, bless

its Author who made it so beautiful a creation, and

praise him with a submissive heart; not only because

he created it for our good, but because he made it a

vassal to his mother and our mediatrix. Go to Mass with

all possible devotion, and those who can, let them fast

and give thanks to God. Thou shalt sing the canticle

_Benedicite omnia opera Domini Domino_ and the verse

_Benedicite lux_. Understand that not only the just

ought to praise God, who are themselves as light, but

the sinners who are as darkness. Consider yourselves

such, every one of you, and mourn for having added to

the original transgression, darkness upon darkness,

sins upon sins. Resolve to correct thyself; and that

Mary's purest light may reach you, recite a _Salve_,

and nine times the _Magnificat_, face to the ground,

and fly from all sin this day, even the shadow thereof.

Abstain from all impatience, murmurings, repinings, and

suffer with meekness those evils which are a repugnance

to our nature. If it be a day of discipline of the

community, that is enough, but if not, it shall be

especially made so. Those who do not know how to read

Latin shall recite nine _Salves_ mouth to the ground,

and shall fast if they are able, and if not, they shall

make an act of contrition, so that the Lord may give

them light for his timely service, even as he gave them

material light by which to live.

MEDITATION.

If we look at the properties of the firmament, what

more assimilates to the miraculous constancy of Mary,

whom neither those steeped in original sin could make

fall, nor the combats of temptation make stumble!

But still, amid the torrents and tempests of human

miseries, between the troubles of her life, and the

painful passion and death of her most holy Son and our

most beloved Saviour; amid the waves of incredulity in

the doubts of his disciples; among the hidden rocks

of the perfidy of Judas, and the uncertainty of so

many timid souls--ever was her constancy preserved.

Not only was she firm, but beautiful as the firmament,

which (according to the mathematicians) hath this other

excellence, that it is bordered by innumerable stars,

but has only seven planets which are fixed and never

move. Thus, holiest Mary was not only most pure in her

conception, transparent and translucent, but afterwards

the Lord adorned her with innumerable virtues which

she acquired, even as the stars which border that most

beautiful firmament; and she not only had them all,

but had them fixed, all immovable, all in order and

admirable concert: but if in the other children of

Adam we see some virtues, they are errant--to-day we

have them, to-morrow they are gone--to-day is light,

to-morrow darkness. We will rejoice in her prerogative,

and say unto her:

OFFERING.

Honored Lady, and crown of our human being, divine

firmament where the stars of virtue are fixed, give

their benign influence to us, thy devoted ones, that

by thy favor we may cure ourselves and acquire them;

and that light which thou dost partake of the Sun of

Righteousness, communicate it to our souls, and fix in

them thy virtues, the love of thy precious Son, and

thy sweetest and tenderest devotion, and of thy happy

husband, our patron and advocate, St. Joseph.

These compositions doubtless give us a better idea of the interior

thought of Mexican monasticism than some yellow-covered speculations.

In that life grew the finest genius, the greatest woman, perhaps the

most remarkable character in all respects that Mexico ever produced.

Considering the time and place in which she wrote, the New World

has scarcely produced her superior among women of genius. Up to the

nineteenth century America had, doubtless, no, literary product

comparable to the poems of Sor Juana Ines. What Cabrera, was to the

art, Sor Juana seems to have been to the literature of her country;

and both these workers of genius gave their powers to the service of

religion. It is here worthy of remark that not only were the greatest

painter and poet of Mexico studious servants of the church, but that

its most celebrated scientist was the Jesuit Siguenza y Gongora,

author of a funeral eulogy of Sor Juana Ines, whom he knew and

appreciated, for he, too, was a poet. Without social helps, without

emulation, such as is ordinarily understood, such proofs of her high

intelligence as we possess have come to light. Perplexed as it was

with the mannered erudition of the schools, her poetry nevertheless

reveals noble sensibility and thought in superior forms. Thus she

sings in her verses entitled "Sentiments of Absence:"

"Hear me with eyes,

Now that so distant are thine ears;

Of absence my laments;

In echoes from my pen the groans;

And as can reach thee not my voice so rude,

Hear thou me deaf, since dumbly I complain."

This is like a voice of the Elizabethan age; but what _woman_ even of

that day has left us so rare a record of poetry and piety combined as

the nun of San Geronimo, she who lived in 1670 in far-off, outlandish

Mexico? What chapter of literature would seem too good to entertain

this Tenth Muse, to whom we owe such sonnets as these:

TO A PAINTER OF OUR LADY, OF MOST EXCELLENT PENCIL.

If pencil, although grand in human wise,

Could make a picture thus most beautiful,

Where even clearest vision not refines

Thy light, O admirable--yet in vain:

How did the author of thy sovereign soul

Proportion space to his creation fair!

What grace he painted, and what loveliness!

The scope more ample, greater was the hand.

Was found within the sphere of purest light

The pencil, schooled within the morning-star,

When thou wert dawned, Aurora most divine?

Yea, thus indeed it was; but verily

The sky has not paid back thy cost to him

Who spent in thee more light than it has now.

THE LOVERS.

Feliciano loves me, and I hate him;

Lizardo hates me, and I do adore him;

For him who does not want me, do I cry,

And him who yearns for me, I not desire.

To him who me disdains, my soul I offer,

And him who is my victim, I disdain.

Him I despise who would enrich my honor,

And him who doth contemn me, I'd enrich.

If with offence the first I have displeased,

The other doth displease by me offended--

And thus I come to suffer every way;

For both are but as torments to my feelings--

This one with asking that which I have not,

And that in not having what I'd ask.

THE ROSE.

Celia beheld a rose that in the walk

Flourished in pride of springtime loveliness,

And whose bright hues of carmine or of red

Bathed joyfully its delicate countenance--

And said: Enjoy without the fear of fate

The fleeting course of thy luxuriant age,

Since will not death be able on the morrow.

To take from thee what thou to-day enjoyest;

And though he come within a little while,

Still grieve thou not to die so young and fair:

Hear what experience may counsel thee--

That fortunate 'tis to die being beautiful,

And not to see the woe of being old.

THE DECEPTION.

This that thou seest, a deception painted,

Which of art's excellence makes display,

With curious counterfeit of coloring,

Is an insidious cheating of the sense.

This, wherewithin has flattery pretended

To excuse the grim deformity of age,

And vanquishing the rigor hard of time

To triumph o'er oblivion and decay;

Is but the shallow artifice of care,

Is as a fragile flower within the wind;

It is a useless guard 'gainst destiny;

It is a foolish and an erring toil;

'Tis labor imbecile, and, rightly scanned,

Is death, is dust, is shadow, and is naught.

These rude translations give but a poor idea of the poet's

expression, but they allow the height and quality of her intellect to

be understood. In one of her most thoughtful poems, the _Romance on

the Vanity of Science_, she argues against self-seeking knowledge,

and the perils to which genius exposes itself by too much seeking its

own devices. This poem is so representative and remarkable that we

must give it entire quotation:

ROMANCE.

Finjamos que soy feliz,

Triste pensamiento un rato;

Quizá podreis persuadirme,

Aunque yo sé lo contrario.

Feign we that I am happy,

Sad thought, a little while,

For, though 'twere but dissembling,

Would thou couldst me beguile!

Que, pues solo en la aprension

Dicen que estriban los daños;

Si os imaginais dichoso.

No sereis tan desdichado.

Yet since but in our terrors

They say our miseries grow,

If joy we can imagine,

The less will seem our woe.

Sirvame el entendimiento

Alguna vez de descanso;

Y no siempre esté el ingenio

Con el provecho encontrado.

Must our intelligences

Some time of quiet find;

Not always may our genius

With profit rule the mind.

Todo el mundo es opiniones,

De paraceres tan varios,

Que lo que el uno, que es negro,

El otro prueba que es blanco.

The world's full of opinions,

And these so different quite.

That what to one black seemeth

Another proves is white.

A unos sirve de atractivo

Lo que otro concibe enfado;

Y lo que este por alivio

Aquel tiene por trabajo.

To some appears attractive

What many deem a bore;

And that which thee delighted

Thy fellow labors o'er.

El que está triste, censura

Al alegre de liviano;

Y el que está alegre, se burla,

De ver al triste penando.

He who is sad condemneth

The gay one's gleeful tones;

He who is merry jesteth

Whene'er the sad one groans.

Los dos filosofos griegos

Bien esta verdad probaron,

Pues, lo que en el uno risa,

Causaba, en el otro llanto.

By two old Greek wiseacres

This truth well proved appears;

Since what in one caused laughter,

The other moved to tears.

Célebre su oposicion

Ha sido, por siglos tantos,

Sin que cúal acertó, esté

Hasta agora averiguado.

Renowned has been this contest

For ages, without fruit,

And what one age asserted

Till now is in dispute.

Antes en sus dos banderas

El mundo todo alistado,

Conforme el humor le dicta,

Sigue cada cúal su bando.

Into two lists divided

The world's opinions stand.

And as his humor leads him

Follows each one his band.

Uno dice, que de risa

Solo es digno el mundo vario;

Y otro, que sus infortunios

Son solo para llorarlos.

One says the world is worthy

Only of merriment;

Another, its distresses

Call for our loud lament.

Para todo se halla prueba

Y razon en que fundarlo;

Y no hay razon para nada,

De haber razon para tanto.

For all opinions various

Some proof or reason's brought,

And for so much there's reason

That reason is for naught.

Todos son iguales jueces

Y siendo iguales, y varios.

No hay quien pueda decidir

Cúal es lo mas acertado.

All, all are equal judges,

And all of different view,

And none can make decision

Of what is best or true.

¿Pues sino hay quien lo sentencie,

Por qué pensais vos, errado,

Que os cometió Dios á vos

La decision de los casos?

Then since can none determine,

Think'st thou, whose reason strays,

To thee hath God committed

The judgment of the case?

¿O por que, contra vos mismo,

Severamente inhumano,

Entre lo amargo, y lo dulce

Quereis elegir lo amargo?

O why, to thyself cruel,

Dost thou thy peace reject?

Between the sweet and bitter,

The bitter dost elect?

¿Si es mio mi entendimiento,

Por qué siempre he de encontrarlo

Tan torpe para el alivio,

Tan agudo para el daño?

If 'tis mine my understanding,

Why always must it be

So dull and slow to pleasure,

So keen for injury?

El discurso es un acero

Que sirve por ambos cabos;

De dar muerte por la punta,

Por el pomo de resguardo.

A sharp blade is our learning

Which serves us at both ends:

Death by the point it giveth,

By the handle, it defends.

¿Si vos sabiendo el peligro

Quereis por la punta usarlo,

Que culpa tiene el acero

Del mal uso de la mano?

And if, aware of peril,

Its point thou wilt demand,

How canst thou blame the weapon

For the folly of thy hand?

No es saber, saber hacer

Discursos sutiles, vanos,

Que el saber consiste solo

En elegir lo mas sano.

Not is true wisdom knowing

Most subtle speech and vain;

Best knowledge is in choosing

That which is safe and sane.

Especular las desdichas,

Y examinar los presagios,

Solo sirve de que el mal

Crezca con anticiparlo.

To speculate disaster,

To seek for presages,

Serves to increase affliction,

Anticipates distress.

En los trabajos futuros

La atencion sutilizando.

Mas formidable que el riesgo

Suele fingir el amago.

In the troubles of the future

The anxious mind is lost,

And more than any danger

Doth danger's menace cost.

¡Que feliz es la ignorancia

Del que indoctamente sabio,

Halla de lo que podece

En lo que ignora sagrado!

Of him the unschooled wise man

How happy is the chance!

He finds from suffering refuge

In simple ignorance.

No siempre suben seguros

Vuelos del ingenio osados,

Que buscan trono en el fuego,

Y hallan sepulcro en el llanto.

_Not always safe aspire

The wings that genius bears,

Which seek a throne in fire,

And find a grave in tears._

Tambien es vicio el saber

Que si no se va atajando,

Cuanto menos se conoce

Es mas nocivo el estrago.

And vicious is the knowledge

That seeking swift its end

Is all the more unwary

Of the woe that doth impend.

Y si vuelo no le abaten

En sutilezas cebado,

Por cuidar de lo curioso

Olvida lo necesario.

And if its flight it stops not

In pampered, strange deceits,

Then for the curious searching

The needful it defeats.

Si culta mano no impide

Crecer al arbol copado,

Quitan la sustancia al fruto

La locura de los ramos.

If culture's hand not pruneth

The leafage of the tree,

Takes from the fruit's sustainment

The rank, wild greenery.

¿Si andar a nave ligera,

No estorba lastre pesado;

Sirve el vuelo de que sea

El precipicio mas alto?

If all its ballast heavy

Yon light ship not prevents,

Will it help the flight of pinions

From nature's battlements?

En amenidad inutil,

Que importa al florido campo.

Si no halla fruto el otoño

Que ostente flores el mayo.

In verdant beauty useless,

What profits the fair field

If the blooming growths of springtime

No autumn fruitage yield?

¿De que le sirve al ingenio

El producir muchos partos,

Si a la multitud le sigue

El malogro de abortarlo?

And of what use is genius

With all its work of might,

If are its toils rewarded

By failure and despite?

Yá esta desdicha, por fuerza

Ha de seguirle el fracaso

De quedar el que produce.

Si no muerto, lastimado.

And perforce to this misfortune

Must that despair succeed,

Which, if its arrow kills not,

Must make the bosom bleed.

El ingenio es como el fuego,

Que con la materia ingrato,

Tanto la consume mas,

Cuanto el se ostenta mas claro.

Like to a fire doth genius

In thankless matter grow;

The more that it consumeth,

It boasts the brighter glow.

Es de su proprio señor

Tan rebelado vasallo,

Que convierte en sus ofensas

Las armas de su resguardo.

It is of its own master

So rebellious a slave,

That to offence it turneth

The weapons that should save.

Este pesimo ejercicio,

Este duro afan pesado,

A los hijos de los hombres

Dió Dios para ejercitarlos.

Such exercise distressful,

Such hard anxiety,

To all the sad world's children

God gave their souls to try.

¿Que loca ambicion nos lleva

De nosotros olvidados,

Si es para vivir tan poco,

De que sirve saber tanto?

What mad ambition takes us

From self-forgetful state,

If 'tis to live so little

We make our knowledge great?

Oh! si como hay de saber,

Hubiera algun seminario,

O escuela, donde á ignorar

Se enseñara los trabajos!

Oh! if we must have knowledge,

I would there were some school

Wherein to teach not knowing

Life's woes, should be the rule.

¡Que felizmente viviera,

El que flotamente cauto;

Burlara las amenazas

Del influjo de los astros!

Happy shall be his living

Whose life no rashness mars;

He shall laugh at all the threatenings

Of the magic of the stars!

Aprendamos á ignorar

Pensamientos, pues hallamos,

Que cuanto añado al discurso,

Tanto le usurpo á los años.

Learn we the wise unknowing,

Since it so well appears

That what to learning's added

Is taken from our years.

We may dispute, in some respects, the drift of Sister Juana's

philosophy; but we cannot question the poetic wisdom of many of her

reflections. How true it is that in a multitude of reasons one finds

no reason at all; that the rank overgrowth of knowledge does not

bear the best fruit; that genius, allied with base substance, grows

brighter, by a kind of self-consuming; that wisdom can sometimes

find refuge in ignorance! No one, be his fame what it may, has

stated a grand and touching truth with better force than appears in

Sor Juana's grave misgiving with regard to the genius "which seeks

a throne in fire, and finds a sepulchre in tears." Is not this the

history, at once sublime and pathetic, of so many failures of the

restless intellect? Sor Juana knew how to preach from such a text,

for she was a rare scholar, and mistress of verse, and religious

woman. The variety of her literary employments was considerable, in

comparison with the bulk of Mexican verse and prose, notwithstanding

the old-fashioned manners of her cloistered muse. She wrote, in

addition to sonnets and romances, the dramatic religious pieces

called loas and autos, among which we find dialogues and acts

entitled "The Sceptre of St. Joseph," "San Hermengildo," and "The

Divine Narciso." Her poetic moods were not, it appears, limited to

hymns and to blank-verse; indeed, she had the qualities of a ripe

poet--humor, fancy, imagination, able thought, and, if anything else

should be added, doubtless the reader will find it in the ideality of

a sonnet so superb as the one in praise of Our Lady. Of her religious

tenderness we have a fine example in the following lines from "El

Divino Narciso," which have been compared by a Mexican critic to

the best mystical songs of St. John of the Cross and other Spanish

ascetics. They convey the appeal which the Shepherd of Souls makes to

a soul which has strayed from the flock:

O my lost lamb,

Thy master all forgetting,

Whither dost erring go?

Behold how now divided

From me, thou partest from thy life!

In my tender kindness,

Thou seest how always loving

I guard thee watchfully,

I free thee of all danger,

And that I give my life for thee.

Behold how that my beauty

Is of all things beloved,

And is of all things sought,

And by all creatures praised.

Still dost thou choose from me to go astray.

I go to seek thee yet,

Although thou art as lost;

But for thee now my life

I cannot still lay down

That once I wished to lose to find my sheep.

Do worthier than thou

Ask these my benefits,

The rivers flowing fair,

The pastures and green glades

Wherein my loving-kindness feedeth thee.

Within a barren field,

In desert land afar,

I found thee, ere the wolf

Had all thy life despoiled,

And prized thee as the apple of mine eye.

I led thee to the verdure

Of my most peaceful ways,

Where thou hast fed at will

Upon the honey sweet

And oil that flowed to thee from out the rock.

With generous crops of grain,

With marrowy substances,

I have sustained thy life,

Made thee most savory food,

And given to thee the juice of fragrant grapes.

Thou seekest other fields

With them that did not know

Thy fathers, honored not

Thy elders, and in this

Thou dost excite my own displeasure grave.

And for that thou hast sinned

I'll hide from thee my face,

Before whose light the sun

Its feeble glory pales;

From thee, ingrate, perverse, and most unfaithful one.

Shall my displeasure's scourge

Thy verdant fields destroy,

The herb that gives thee food;

And shall my fires lay waste,

Even from the top of highest mountains old.

My lightning arrows shall

Be drawn, and hunger sharp

Shall cut the threads of life,

And evil birds of prey

And fiercest beasts shall lie in wait for thee.

Shall grovelling serpents show

The venom of their rage,

By different ways of death

My rigors shall be wrought;

Without thee by the sword, within thee by thy fears.

Behold I am thy Sovereign,

And there is none more strong;

That I am life and death,

That I can slay and save,

And nothing can escape from out my hand.

Our last quotation from Sister Juana's poems will be one of those

tributes which, in verse or prose, she so often paid to the Blessed

Virgin. It is a song taken from her villancicos, or rhymes for

festivals. The literary manners of her time seem to have obscured

the native excellence of her thought, but the buoyant style of the

following lines meets with little objection from her modern Mexican

critic:

To her who in triumph, the beautiful queen,

Descends from the airs of the region serene;

To her who illumines its vaguest confine

With auroras of gold, and of pearl and carmine;

To her whom a myriad of voices confessed

The lady of angels, the queen of the blest:

Whose tresses celestial are lightly outborne

And goldenly float in the glory of morn,

And waving and rising would seek to o'erwhelm

Like the gulfs of the Tibar an ivory realm:

From whose graces the sunlight may learn how to shine,

And the stars of the night take a brilliance divine,

We sing thee rejoicing while praises ascend,

O sinless, O stainless! live, live without end.

The scarcity of the poems of Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, even in

her native land, is cause for wonder, but not if we first remark

that still greater marvel--the long-continued discomposure of

Mexican society. It is one hundred and seventy years since the

parchment-bound book, from which we have drawn a number of facts

in the life of the _Poetisa_, was published. Our impression of the

rarity and age of her printed works, as derived from acquaintance

with educated Mexicans in their own country, tempts us to doubt

whether they have been issued in any complete shape during the

present century. For a good portion of the extracts we have presented

we are indebted to an intelligent and scholarly review prepared in

Mexico, two years ago, by Don Francisco Prinentel, the author of a

number of books on the races and languages of Mexico. Outside of the

monastic or rich private libraries of that country, it is doubtless

a task of much difficulty to find the poems of Sor Juana. For this

reason we are disposed to excuse the able American historian of

Spanish literature for omitting everything in relation to her except

the mere mention of her name as a lyrical writer. It is hoped,

however, that this notice of her life and works, probably the first

which has appeared in the United States, will supply the omission

of what should be a chief fact in any American notice of Spanish

literature. The claim which we make for Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz,

as regards the literature of the New World, is not short of the very

highest.

DION AND THE SIBYLS.

A CLASSIC, CHRISTIAN NOVEL.

BY MILES GERALD KEON, COLONIAL SECRETARY, BERMUDA, AUTHOR OF "HARDING

THE MONEY-SPINNER," ETC.

CHAPTER XXIV.

At the golden gate of the Temple courtyard, a Roman legionary soldier

(detailed as body-servant to the General Paulus) met him. The soldier

was leading a small, wiry Tauric (or really Tartar) horse. Paulus,

twisting a lock of the animal's mane in his left hand, and taking

up with the little finger thereof the loop of the bridle, sprang

into the ephippia. The soldier smiled, as the still handsome and

youthful-looking legatus settled himself on the back of his steed.

"Why are you smiling, my man?" quoth Paulus good-humoredly.

"It was like the spring I saw you take years ago at Formiæ, when

I was a boy, upon the back of the horse Sejanus, which no man, my

general, ever rode save you," replied the soldier.

"Ah!" said Paulus, smiling sadly; "were you there? I fear I am not so

agile now. We are all passing away."

"Just as agile still, my general," returned the legionary, in a

cordial tone; "but about twice as strong."

"Away! begone!" cried Paulus, laughing; "I am growing old." And

shaking the reins, he waved a salute to Longinus, turned his pony

round, and rode away again into the valley westward, while the

centurion entered the city by the golden gate, and repaired under the

walls of the Temple to Fort Antonio, where he was detailed as officer

of Pilate's guard that night.

Paulus, meanwhile, rode slowly on his way, between the Kedron Brook

and the walls of Jerusalem, till he came to the Pool of Siloam.

There, he turned south, galloped to a fort which was near, turned

back again to his right, or northward, followed the valley of Hinnom

at a walking pace, looking up at the white and dazzling buildings on

Mount Zion.

As he slowly passed them, he speculated which could have been David's

palace. He saw Herod's plainly enough. On his right he noticed the

aqueduct from Solomon's Pool, and followed its course as far as the

Tower of Hippicus northward. There he entered the city by the Gate of

Gennath, and followed the valley of the Cheesemongers (or Tyropæon

hollow) until he came to Ophal.

In the middle of a very narrow street in this low and crowded

quarter, where the Romans afterward under Titus were repulsed,

he met a file of people, some mounted, some on foot, led by a

richly-dressed, haughty-looking, burly man, riding a mule.

So narrow was the street that either Paulus would have had to go

back as far as the Tower of Marianne, or the richly-dressed and

haughty-looking man about one-quarter of the distance, to the

bridge between the street of the Cheesemongers and the court of the

Gentiles. Paulus, always full of courtesy, amenity, and sweetness,

was in the very act of turning his small Tauric horse, when the burly

man in rich dress, who led the opposing file, called out, "Back! low

people! Back, and let Caiaphas go by!"

"And who is Caiaphas?" demanded Paulus, instantly facing round again

and barring the way.

"The high-priest of Jerusalem," was the answer, thundered forth in

rude and minatory tones.

"I respect," said Paulus, "and even revere that holy appellation;

but he who uses it at this moment, for some present purpose, has

flung against me, who am a Roman general, the mandate of _Back, low

people_. Where are the low people? I do not believe that I am a low

person. Where, then, are the low people?"

"Come on," cried the imperious voice of Caiaphas.

He himself, being the file leader, began then to move forward, till

he came immediately in front of the traveller who had so courteously

spoken to him.

"If you want," said Paulus, "to pass me at once, I must get into the

ditch, or throw you into it; which do you prefer?"

"I prefer," quoth Caiaphas, "that you should throw me into the

ditch, if you either dare or can."

"Sir," says Paulus, "I am sorry for the sentiment you express, or at

least imply. But I will stand up against your challenge of throwing

you into the ditch, because I both could do it, and dare do it, as

a Roman soldier, only that there is ONE among you who has come to

settle all our disputes, and who has a divine right to do so. For

his sake I would rather be thrown into that drain by you--soldier,

officer, general, and Roman as I am--than throw you into it."

"Let me pass," cried Caiaphas, purple with rage.

Paulus, whose behavior at Lake Benacus against the Germans, and

previously at Formiæ, and afterward in the terrible Calpurnian House

on the Viminal Hill, the reader remembers, made no answer, but,

riding back to the Tower of Marianne, allowed the high-priest and

his followers there to pass him; which they did with every token of

scorn and act of contumely that the brief and sudden circumstances

allowed. Caiaphas thus passed on to his country-house at the

southwest-by-south of Jerusalem, where he usually spent the night.

Paulus then put his pony into a gallop, and soon reached the bridge

across the Tyropæon into the courtyard of the Temple, commonly called

the courtyard of the Gentiles. Such was the nervous excitement caused

by his recent act of purely voluntary, gratuitous, and deliberate

self-humiliation, that he laughed aloud as he rode through the Temple

yard, coasting the western "cloisters," and so reaching Fort Antonio.

There his servant, the Roman legionary, who had before met him at the

golden gate, and whose name was Marcus, was awaiting him.

CHAPTER XXV.

That night the palace of Herod the tetrarch resounded with music,

and all the persons of rank or distinction in Jerusalem were among

the guests. The entertainment would have been remembered for years

on account of its brilliancy; it was destined to be remembered for

all ages, even till the day of doom, on account of its catastrophe,

chronicled in the books of God, and graven in the horror of men.

Paulus, unusually grave, because experiencing unwonted sensations,

and anxious calmly to analyze them, was assailed for the first time

in his life by a feeling of nervous irritability, which originated

(though he knew it not) in his having suppressed the natural desire

to chastise the insolence of Caiaphas that morning. He sat abstracted

and silent, not far from the semi-royal chair of Herod the tetrarch.

His magnificent dress, well-earned military fame, and manly and grave

beauty (never seen to greater advantage than at that period of life,

though the gloss of youth was past) had drawn toward him during the

evening an unusual amount of attention, of which he was unconscious,

and to which he would have been indifferent.

The "beauty of the evening," as she was called (for in those days

they used terms like those which we moderns use, to express our

infatuation for the gleams of prettiness which are quenched almost

as soon as they are seen), had repeatedly endeavored to attract his

attention. She was royal; she was an unrivalled dancer. Herod, who

began to feel dull, begged her to favor the company with a dance,

_sola_. Thereupon the daughter of Herodias looked at Paulus, to whom

her previous blandishments had been addressed in vain (he was well

known to be unmarried), and heaved a fiery sigh. The mere noise of

it ought to have awakened his notice, and yet failed to accomplish

even that small result. Had it succeeded, he was exactly the person

to have regarded this woman with a feeling akin to that which, some

two-and-twenty years before, she herself (or was it Herodias? they

age fast in the East) had waked in the bosom of his sister under the

veranda in the bower of Crispus's inn, leading out of the fine old

Latian garden near the banks of the Liris.

She proceeded to execute her _ballet_, her _pas seul_, her dance of

immortal shame and fatal infamy. Cries of delight arose. The creature

grew frantic. The court of Herod fell into two parties. One party

proclaimed the performance a perfection of elegance and spirit. The

other party said not a word, but glances of painful feeling passed

among them. The clamorous eulogists formed the large majority. In the

silent minority was numbered Paulus, who never in his life had felt

such grave disgust or such settled indignation. He thought of his

pure and innocent Esther--alas, _not_ his! He thought that, had it

been his sister Agatha who thus outraged every rudimentary principle

of the tacit social compact, he could almost find it in his heart to

relieve the earth of her.

Thus pondering, his glance fell upon Herod the tetrarch. The tetrarch

seemed to have become delirious. He was laughing, and crying, and

slobbering, and clapping his hands, and rolling his head, and

rocking his body on the great state cushion under the canopy, where

he "sat at table." While Paulus was contemplating him in wonder and

shame, the wretched dancer came to an end of her bounds. Indecency,

scientifically accidental, had been the one simple principle of the

exhibition. Herod called the practised female before him, and, in the

hearing of several, bade her demand from him any reward she pleased,

and declared upon oath that he would grant her demand. Paulus heard

the answer. After consulting apart with her mother, she reapproached

the tetrarch, and, with a flushed face, said that she desired the

head of a prisoner upon a dish.

"What prisoner?"

"John," said she.

Paulus gazed at the miserable tetrarch, "the quarter of a king," not

from the height of his rank as a Roman general, but from the still

greater height which God had given him as one of the first, one of

the earliest of European gentlemen. He knew not then who John was.

But that any fellow-creature in prison, not otherwise to be put to

death, should have his head hewn off and placed upon a dish, because

a woman had tossed her limbs to and fro in a style which pleased a

tetrarch while it disgraced human society, appeared to Paulus to be

less than reasonable. What he had said, the tetrarch had said upon

oath.

A little confusion, a slight murmuring and whispering ensued, but

the courtly music soon recommenced. Paulus could not afterward tell

how long it was before the most awful scene he had ever witnessed

occurred.

A menial entered, bearing, on a large dish, a freshly-severed human

head, bleeding at the neck.

"It was not a jest, then," said Paulus, in a low voice to his next

neighbor, a very old man, whose face he remembered, but whose name he

had all the evening been trying in vain to recall--"it was not a base

jest, dictated by the hideous taste of worse than barbarians!"

"Truly," replied the aged man, "these Jews are worse than any

barbarians I ever saw, and I have seen most of them."

Paulus recognized at these words the geographer Strabo, formerly his

companion at the court of Augustus.

At a sign from Herod, the menial carrying the dish now approached the

daughter of Herodias, and presented to her the bleeding and sacred

head. She, in turn, took the dish and offered it to Herodias, who

herself bore it out of the room with a kind of snorting laugh.

Paulus rose slowly and deliberately from his place near the tetrarch,

at whom he steadily looked.

"This, then," said he, "is the entertainment to which you have

invited a Roman legatus. You are vexed, people say, that Pilate,

the Roman governor of this city, could not honor your birthday by

his presence in your palace. Pilate's local authority is of course

greater than mine, for I have none at all; but his real, permanent

rank, and your own real, permanent importance, are contemptible by

the side of those which a Roman soldier of such a family as the

Æmilian has gained on the field of battle; and it was a high honor to

yourself to succeed in bringing me hither. And now, while disgracing

your own house, you have insulted your guests. What is the name of

the man you have murdered because a woman dances like a goat? What is

his name?"

The tetrarch, astonished and over-awed, replied with a bewildered

look:

"What authority to rebuke me, because I took my brother's wife, had

John?"

"John who?" asked Paulus, who from the outset had been struck by the

name.

"He who was styled John the Baptist," said the tetrarch.

The words of another John rang in Paulus's memory; and he exclaimed:

"What! John the Baptist? John the Baptist, yea, and more than a

prophet--John the Angel of God! Is this he whom you have slain?"

"What had he to say to my marriage?" answered Herod, through whose

purple face a livid under-color was penetrating to the surface.

"Why," exclaimed Paulus, "the holy books of your own nation forbade

such a marriage, and John could not hear of it without rebuking you.

I, although a Gentile, honor those books. Out upon you, impious

assassin! I ask not, where was your mercy, or where your justice; but

where has been your sense of common decency, this evening? I shall

never cease to lament that I once stood under your roof. My presence

was meant as an honor to you; but it has proved a disgrace to myself."

Taking his scarlet cloak, he flung it over his shoulders, and left

the hall amid profound silence--a silence which continued after he

had quitted the courtyard, and begun to descend from Mount Zion

to the labyrinth of streets branching downward to the Tyropæon

Valley. In one of these, under a bright moonlight, he met again that

same beautiful youth whom he had seen in the morning when he was

descending the Mount of Olives.

"Stay!" cried Paulus, suddenly stopping in his own rapid walk. "Said

you not, this morning, that he who was called 'John the Baptist' was

more than a prophet? Herod has this moment slain him, to please a

vile woman. The tyrant has sent the holy prophet out of life."

"Nay; into life," replied the other John; "but, brave and noble

Roman--for I see you are both--the Master, who knows all things, and

rejoices that John has begun to live, grieves as well."

"Why grieves?" inquired Paulus, musing.

"Because," replied the other John, "the Master is verily man, no less

than _He is Who is_."

"What, then, is he?" asked Paulus, with a look of awe.

"He is the Christ, whom John the Prophet, now a witness unto death,

had announced."

Hereupon the two went their several ways, Paulus muttering: "_The

second name in the acrostic._"

But, really, he had ceased to care for minor coincidences in a huge

mass of convergent proofs all gaining possession of his soul, and

taking alike his will and his understanding captive--captive to the

irresistible truth and the equally irresistible beauty of the message

which had come. The immortality of which he was an heir, the reader

has seen him long since believing; and long since also rejecting both

the pantheism of the philosophers and the polytheism of the vulgar.

And here was a great new doctrine authoritatively establishing all

that the genius of Dionysius had guessed, and infinitely more;

truths awful and mysterious, which offered immediate peace to that

stupendous universe that is within a man, while assuring him of

power, joy, and honor to begin some day, and nevermore to end.

He had not been in Jerusalem long before he learnt much of the new

teaching. He had secured for his mother, close to the Fortress

Antonio, where he himself lodged, a small house belonging to a widow

who, since her husband's death, had fallen into comparative poverty.

The Lady Aglais, attended still by her old freedwoman, Melena, was

allowed the best and coolest part of this house entirely to herself,

with a staircase of their own leading to the flat roof. There they

passed much of their evenings after the sun had set, looking at the

thickly-built opposite hills, the mansions on Zion, or down into

the Tyropæon from which the hum of a great multitude came, mellowed

by the distance, and disposing the mind to contemplation. Many

wonderful things, from time to time, they heard of him who was now

teaching--things some of which, nay, the greater part of which, as

one of the sacred writers expressly declares, never were recorded,

and the whole of which could not be contained in the libraries of

the world. It may well, then, be imagined in what a situation Paulus

and his mother were--having no interest in disbelieving, no chair

of Moses to abdicate, no doctorial authority or pharisaic prestige

inciting them to impugn the known truth--in what a situation they

were, for accepting or declining what was then offered.

After twenty years of separation, a trace of Esther had been

recovered by Paulus. One evening, his mother was on the flat roof of

her residence awaiting his customary visit, when her son appeared and

alarmed her by his pallor. He had seen Esther on foot in a group of

women at the Gate of Gennath, going forth into the country, as he was

entering the city on horseback. Aglais smiled sadly, saying: "Alas!

dear son, is that all? I long since knew that she still lived; but I

would not disturb your mind by the useless intelligence."

"Scarcely altered," murmured Paulus abstractedly, "while I am quite

old. Yes, she must now be past thirty; yes, near thirty-five."

"As to that," said the mother, "you are thirty-eight, and scarcely

seem twenty-nine. Old Rebecca, the mistress of this house, who lives

still in the ground-story, as you are aware, has told me much about

Esther."

"She is married, I suppose," said Paulus, with a look of anxiety.

"No," replied Aglais. "She has had innumerable offers (spite of her

comparative poverty), and has declined them all."

"But what boots it?" exclaimed Paulus.

"Old Josiah Maccabeus is dead," said Aglais. And here mother and son

dropped the subject by mutual consent.

The dreadful days, closed by the most awful day the world has

known--closed by the ever-memorable and tremendous Friday--came and

went. On the Saturday, Paulus met Longinus, who said he had been

on Mount Calvary that afternoon, and that he, Longinus, was now

and ever henceforth a disciple of him who had been crucified. The

Sunday came, and brought with it a prodigious rumor, which, instead

of dying out, found additional believers every day. The disciples,

most of whom had shown themselves as timid as they were known to be

ignorant, now seemed transformed into new characters, who loudly

affirmed that their Master had risen from the dead by his own power;

and they were ready to face every torment and all terrors calmly in

the maintenance of this fact, which they predicted would be received

and acknowledged by the whole world. And, indeed, it was no longer

a rumor, but a truth, attested by the only witnesses who could by

possibility know anything about it, either for or against; and whose

earthly interests it would have been to deny it, even while they knew

it to be true--witnesses who, if they knew it to be false--and they

certainly knew whether it were true or false (this much was granted,

_and is still granted_, by all their opponents)--could have had no

motive, either earthly or unearthly, for feigning that they believed

it.

So pregnant is this simple reasoning, that a man might ponder it

and study it for a whole month, and yet find fresh strength and an

ever-increasing weight in the considerations which it suggests; not

even find a flaw if he made the one month twelve. Paulus's mind

was determined, and so was his mother's. The son sought that same

beautiful youth whom he had seen twice before; told him the new

desire, the new belief, which had made his mother's and his own heart

glad; and by him they were baptized as Christians, disciples of him

that had been crucified--by that fair youth, I say, who was to be

known for ever among men as "Saint John the Evangelist."

"After all, mother," said Paulus, when they were returning together

to her dwelling, "it is not so very mysterious; I mean that

difficulty about the lowliness of our divine Teacher's chosen place

among men. Because, see you, if the builder of those glorious stars

and that sublime firmament was to come at all amongst us, he would

be certain to take the lowest and smallest lot, lest we should deem

there was any difference as before him. We are all low and small

together--the earth itself, I am told, being but a sort of Bethlehem

among the stars; but, anyhow, we are but mites and emmets on a blade

of grass in his sight, and had he taken a great relative place amidst

us, it might countenance the lie and the delusion of our silly pride.

That part of it is to me not so mysterious, although I don't wonder

at the Jewish notion that their Messiah was to have been a great

conquering prince--that is probably what the Antichrist will be. It

would suit the blindness of vanity better."

As he spoke the words, they heard a quick footstep behind, and

were overtaken by Longinus, who, saying he had just heard of their

reception, greeted them with every demonstration of rapturous

affection.

"Now," pursued he, walking by their side, "good for evil to Master

Paulus's family. Forgive the apparent intrusion, dear general, if I

mention that I happen to know the story of your youthful love, as all

the world have witnessed your fidelity to an unavailing attachment.

But learn from poor Longinus that Esther Maccabeus is now a disciple;

and the Christian maiden can wed, under a still holier law, the brave

Gentile whom the Jewess was bound to refuse."

With this he turned into an alley under the court of the Gentiles,

and disappeared.

CHAPTER XXVI.

One still and sultry evening, the decline of a brooding day in

spring, two persons were sitting on the flat roof of a house in

Jerusalem. They were the Athenian Lady Aglais and her son, the

comparatively youthful Roman General Paulus--he who has so largely

figured, even from his gallant boyhood, in the events and affairs we

have been recording.

It was the 30th of March, and a Wednesday--the first of all

Easter-Wednesdays--the first in that new and perpetual calendar by

which, throughout the fairest regions of earth, among all enlightened

nations and civilized races, till the crash of doom, time was for

evermore to be measured.

A servant, carrying a skin-cask slung over his shoulders, was

watering the flowers, faint with thirst; and these, arranged in

fanciful vases, which made an artificial garden of the housetop,

shook their drooping heads under the fresh and grateful shower, and

seemed to answer it with smiles of a thousand blooms and rays. As

the man stole softly to and fro about the roof, now approaching the

lady and her son, now receding, he seemed, in spite of the foreign

language in which they spoke, and in spite of the low and hushed tone

they observed, to follow, with intense and breathless though stealthy

excitement, the tenor of their conversation; while his figure, in the

last evening rays, cast a long, shifting shadow that streaked with

black the yellow flood to its farthest limit, climbed the parapet,

broke upon its grail-work of balusters, and then was beheaded, for it

flung off its head out of sight into empty space, leaving the calm

bright air unblotted above the stone guard-wall.

An occurrence took place of which (that Wednesday evening) Paulus

and his mother were witnesses--an occurrence in dumb show, the

significance of which they were destined, only after several

years, to learn; yet the incident was so singular, so strange, so

impressive--it was such a picture in such a quarter--that when,

long subsequently, the explanation came, they seemed to be still

actually assisting in person at the scene which, while they beheld

it, they had no means of understanding. We are going, in one moment,

to relate that occurrence; and we must here request the reader to

grant us his full belief and his confidence when we remark that, in

comparison of his amusement, his profit, and that mental gallery of

pictures to be his henceforth (which we try to give to all who honor

these pages with a perusal), we feel the sincerest contempt for any

mere display of scholarship or learning. For this reason, and this

reason alone, and certainly from no scantiness, and still less from

any lack of authorities, we shall almost disencumber our narrative

of references to the ancient writers and recondite documents (such

as the _Astronomic Formula of Philip Aridæus_) which establish as

positive historical facts the more striking of the occurrences still

to be mentioned. In one instance the intelligent reader will discern

that the most sacred of all evidence supports what we have to record.

But if we were to show with what nicety of precision much profane,

yet respectable and even venerable, testimony accords with the

passage here meant in the Acts of the Apostles, and how abundantly

such testimony corroborates and supplements the inspired account,

this book would cease to be what it aims at being, and would become a

historical treatise of the German criticism school.[3]

Satisfied, therefore, with the footnotes below (at which the reader

will oblige us by just glancing, and which are appended, in perfect

good faith and simple honesty, as implying no more than we could

make good), we will avoid boring those who have a right to, and who

expect, the conclusion of a straightforward story at our hands.[4]

Paulus and his mother were conversing, as has been described,

in Greek, while the serving-man, despite his ignorance of that

language, had the air of half-following the drift of what they said,

and of catching the main purport of it with wonder and awe. There

was, indeed, at that moment, only one topic in all Jerusalem. He

who, less than a week ago, had been crucified, and with the time

of whose coming (as much as with all the particulars of his life,

teaching, works, and death) the old prophecies were found more and

more startlingly, circumstantially, unmistakably, the more they were

studied, questioned, and canvassed, to agree, point by point, down

to what would seem even trivial details (indicated as if merely to

emphasize the incommunicable identity of the Messiah)--he had himself

stated, distinctly and publicly, that, by his own power, he would

rise from the dead in three days; that, in three days after, he

should be "lifted up" and be made "a spectacle for men and angels;"

in three days after they should have destroyed it, he would rebuild

the holy temple of his body. And now these rumors--these minute,

these positive accounts--had he, then, really reappeared, according

to his word and promise? Was it possible? Was it the fact?

Many had, on the previous Friday night, stated that, of a verity,

they had seen their deceased parents and relatives. Again, on the

Saturday, many declared, amid awe-stricken groups of listeners, that

the unknown land had sent them its visitants, in various places,

under various aspects, to startle the guilty city; which, after

killing the King's messenger-servants, had just killed the King's

Son, who had come, as had been a thousand times announced, in the

very fulness, the exact maturity of days, to deliver the final

embassy to men.

On that Wednesday evening, there was, in truth, but one theme of

conversation, one subject of thought, all through Jerusalem, and

already far beyond Jerusalem; among poor and rich, high and low,

natives and strangers, the robbers of the Syrian hills and Arabian

deserts, the dwellers in the city, the travellers on the roads and at

the inns, among Sadducees, Pharisees, Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, and

barbarians.

No wonder, then, if the humble serving-man, as he watered the

flowers, penetrated the drift of the mother's and the son's

discussion. For him and such as he was the message. The poor Syrian

had once, for a while, rendered occasional out-door service to the

family of Lazarus; and he had known Lazarus in three states--had

known him living, dead, again alive. After days of death in that

fierce climate, where inanimate flesh putrefies fast, he had beheld

Lazarus, at the call of one upon whose lineaments he gazed, at the

time, with unconscious adoration, come forth, not merely from death,

but from incipient decomposition, back into balmy life--back to the

"vita serena."

Now, was he who, in that instance, had allowed it to be perceived and

felt that he was really the Lord of life, whom death and rottenness

were manifestly unable to disobey--was he himself, as his disciples

declared he was, living again among them, since the morning of

the last Sunday (the _feria prima_), according to his own public

prediction and distinct promise? Was he not? Was he?

Aglais and Paulus had heard more than one circumstantial account of

this, his reappearance, according to that, his promise. By this one

and by the other he had been met. They had gazed upon him, spoken

to him, heard him in reply, touched him, in such a place, on that

bridge, that road, in such a garden. He had walked conversing with

them, had sat with them at meat, had broken bread with them, as was

his wont, had then vanished.

Where was his body, over which the Pharisees had set their guard

of soldiers? Not in the grave. No; but where? Had the Pharisees

accounted for it? Could they tell what had become of it? Could the

soldiers? The disciples could, and they did.

"Mother," said Paulus, "do you know what those soldiers say? One of

them once served in a legion which I commanded. Do you know what they

say?"

"You mean," replied Aglais, "about their inability to hinder the

abstraction. What?"

"That an act to which they are the only witnesses could not be

stopped by them, because of it they were not witnesses, being buried

in sleep."

"Consistent," said the Greek lady. "Yes; but a much weightier fact

is that expectation of the disciples, to prevent the realization of

which the Pharisees set their guard."

"What expectation? And why weightier? What can be weightier?" asked

the general.

"That their Master would keep his word, and fulfil his prediction of

rising from the tomb on the third day. If they saw him again alive

within the promised time, they and the people would worship him as

God; but, if the Pharisees could show the body on the third day, or

could even account for it, that belief would die."

"Clearly," answered Paulus, "the disciples expected to see him again

on and after the third day, waiting for his word to be fulfilled."

"Now, Paulus," pursued Aglais, "suppose this expectation of theirs

not fulfilled; suppose that not one of those waiting for his word was

conscious of any reason for believing it to have been realized--"

Paulus interrupted his mother.

"There is only one possible way in which they could be induced to

believe it realized--namely, that he should be seen again alive."

"Quite so," she resumed. "But suppose that he has not been seen;

suppose that not one of those who expected to see him again has thus

seen him. How would they then feel on this Wednesday morning?"

"They would feel that the expectation which he had solemnly and

publicly authorized them to depend upon was idle and vain; they would

not and could not by any possibility feel that they had, in this

great particular, reason to consider his word to have been kept. They

would be discouraged to the very last degree. They would, of course,

hide themselves. I would do so myself, and I believe I am no coward.

In short, they would feel no reason to hope in his protection, or to

expect that his other and still mightier promises concerning their

own future eternal life would by him be realized. They would not

incur any inconvenience, or brave any danger, or take any trouble, or

risk any loss--"

It was Aglais's turn to interrupt.

"Now, is this their attitude?" she inquired.

"The reverse, the opposite, the contradictory of their attitude."

The lady continued in a low tone: "If, expecting, upon his own

assurance, that some among them should see him," she asked, "not one

of them had seen him, would they, at this moment, have any motive

for bringing upon themselves the tortures, insults, shame, and death

which he underwent, and all this in order to induce others to believe

apparitions and a resurrection which in their own hearts they did

not themselves believe, and for believing which they were, moreover,

conscious that they possessed no ground, no reason, no pretext?"

A sweet, ringing, vibrant voice at their side here said:

"And in order by deliberate circumstantial lying, of an awful and

blasphemous kind, to please the God of truth; and to compensate

themselves by his protection above, in a future life, for the

present and immediate destruction which they are incurring among the

Pharisees and the men of power here below!"

Looking round, they beheld Esther of the Maccabees.

Never had she seemed to Paulus so beautiful; but there was a marked

change; for, however intellectual had always been the translucent

purity of that oval brow, through which, as through a lamp of

alabaster, shone the vivid mind within, there was now the mysterious

effluence of "that Essence increate" who had come to abide in, and

had strangely transfigured the appearance of, the faithful-souled

Hebrew maiden. And when Paulus, after she had embraced his mother,

abstractedly took her hand, his heart was lifted upward with a

species of wonder; and, without adverting to it, he was asking

himself to what marvellous kingdom she had become heiress, in what

supernal court of everlasting joy and unassailable prerogatives

was this beautiful creature destined to live, loving and beloved,

adorning almost the glories which she reflected, dispensed, and

multiplied, as if from some holy, mysterious, and spiritual mirror.

"O dear Lady Aglais! and O legatus!" she said, with a gesture amazing

in its expressiveness and pathetic fervor (she had brought the

finger-tips of both hands together under the chin, and then lowered

them with the palms outward toward her hearers, and so she stood

in an attitude of the utmost grace and dignity combined, like one

appealing to the candor and good faith of others)--"O dear friends!

I was just now passing through my own garden on my way hither, when,

under the fig-tree (where he used to sit poring over the holy books

of our people), I beheld my dead father, but standing, and not in

his old accustomed wicker-chair; and he gazed upon me with large,

earnest eyes; and as he stood, his head almost touched the leaves

of that hollow, embowering fig-tree; and he was pale, so extremely

pale as he was never during life; and he called me: 'Esther,' he

said, and his voice sounded far away. Ah! my God, from what a huge

distance it seemed to come! And lo! lady, and thou, legatus, he said

these words to me: 'I have been in the vast, dim house, and have seen

our Father Abraham; and I have seen our great Lawgiver, and all our

prophets, excepting only two, Elias and Enoch; and I asked, Where

were they? And in all the dim, vast house none answered me, but the

forefinger was pressed to the silent lips of those who there waited.

And, suddenly, there was the noise of innumerable armies coming

swiftly from afar--but your ears are mortal and your eyes veiled,

and were I even permitted to tell you that which shook, beyond this

little world, the large world and its eternal thrones, your mind

would not at present understand my words. Enough, Esther, that I have

been allowed to renew to you, in my own behalf, and that of others

among our people who have been called before you to the vast, dim,

silent city, the exhortation which our ancestor Judas Maccabeus

sent with offerings to the high-priest; namely, that you will pray

for our spirits. Our innumerable company has just been thinned; the

glorious Judas Maccabeus, our ancestor, and that holy mother of the

Maccabees, and almost all who were waiting with me in the dim, vast

kingdom of expectation, have gone for ever; and I, and a few, have

been commanded to expect yet a little time; until the incense of holy

prayer shall have further gone up in the presence of the Great White

Throne.'"

Esther paused, her eyes dilated, and stood a moment with the hands

again brought together; and so perfect a figure of truthfulness,

and such an impersonation of sincerity, she looked, that the

Jewish servant, who understood not a word of the tongue in which

she addressed the Greek lady and her son, gazed at her; his work

suspended, his cask held high in air, with all the marks of one who

heard and accepted some sacred and unquestionable revelation.

"Go on, dear child," said Aglais. "What passed further?"

"I asked the pale image what this meant, that he should term the

condition in which he is waiting and has yet to wait a little

time--that vast, dim condition--'a house,' 'a city,' and 'a kingdom.'

'The dwellers,' he replied, 'are watched in that kingdom by silent

protectors, mighty and beautiful, whose faces, full of a severe, sad

love, are the torches and the only light those dwellers ever see; and

the vast, dim city has a sunless and a starless sky for its roof,

under which they wait; and that sky is the ceiling which echoes the

sighs of their pain; and thus to them it has been a kingdom, and a

city, and a house; and, until the ninth hour of last Friday, they

were numerous as the nations of men!' 'And at the ninth hour of that

day, I asked, 'O my father! what occurred when so many departed, and

you and a small number were left still to wait?' And he gazed at me

for an instant with a wan and wistful look; then, lo! I saw nothing

where he had been standing under the fig-tree.

"But it was at the ninth hour of the last Friday the Master had

expired by the side of the penitent who was that very day to be with

him in paradise!" cried Aglais.

At Esther's arrival, Paulus and Aglais had both risen from a kind of

semicircular wicker settle which occupied one of the corners of the

roof; and they now, all three, when Esther had finished her strange,

brief narrative, leaned silent and musing against the parapet;

where, under the shade of a clustering rhododendron, they had a view

westward (drawn, as people are who ponder, toward whatever object is

most luminous) of the towers and palaces and pinnacles of the Holy

City, then reddening in the sunset. One word respecting the spot

where the little group was thus collected, and (among modern, and

especially western, nations) concerning its peculiar scenic effects.

The roof was an irregular parallelogram, protected on all sides

by a low, thick parapet, at two opposite corners of which, in the

diagonals, were two doors of masonry, bolted with massive round bars

of iron, or left open; thus excluding or admitting communication with

the contiguous houses. The writer, many years ago, saw such parapet

doors on the house-tops of modern Algiers; nor was the arrangement

unknown in the more famous Eastern cities of antiquity, where the

roofs glowed with plants in vases. When, on some public occasion,

the passages were opened, the richer inhabitants, far above the

noise, dust, squalor, sultriness, and comparative darkness of the

narrow and noisome streets, could stroll and lounge for miles, in

mid-air, among flowers; could cross even flying and embowered bridges

(of which a privileged number possessed the keys, like those who have

keys to the gardens of our squares); and so Dives, unseen of Lazarus,

but seeing far down all things little and supine, could wander

through parterres of bloom, and perfumed alleys, and shrubberies of

enchantment, with effects of sunlight sprinkled, so to speak, with

coolness and with shadows, soothed out of the noonday fierceness

into tints various and tender; unsoiled of the stains and pains that

stained and pained the poor sordid world below; until the hearts

of those who thus promenaded amid circumstances of such delicious

refinement and luxury, bearing and hearing news, and exchanging

civilities, were "lifted up," and became even like to the heart of

Nabuchodonosor the king. Sometimes the pecten-beaten dulcimer, or

the fingered lyre of six strings, made long-forgotten airs of music

beguile the declining day, and linger for hours longer, ravishing the

night under the stars of the Syrian sky. Such the scene.

But none of the roof-doors were open that Wednesday evening.

Something ailed the Holy City. Out of the hushed heavens, mysteries

and a stern doom were brooding over Jerusalem. Already the fermenting

germ of those dreadful factions which were to tear to pieces, with

intestine rage, the whole Jewish body, while the city was writhing

in the vain death-struggle against Titus, a few years later, had

begun to make itself sensible to the observant. A fierce hatred of

the Romans and an insane eagerness to re-establish the old Jewish

independence had taken possession of certain youthful fanatics; and

"possessed" indeed they seemed. On the one side, the Roman officers

of the garrison, from Pilate down, had received anonymous warnings,

in the wildest style, requiring them to withdraw from Jerusalem

within a given time, or they should be all executed in the streets,

as opportunity might occur; on the other, the prefect of Syria had

been earnestly requested by Pilate to strengthen the garrison; while

in the city itself the soldiers were strictly admonished to keep

to their quarters, to avoid late hours, and to hold no intercourse

when off duty with the inhabitants. Leaves of absence were stopped.

A few legionaries had been already murdered in the neighborhood

of wine-shops, in the small winding alleys, and in places of evil

repute, and no efforts succeeded in identifying the perpetrators.

But these were only the feeble and evanescent symptoms, destined to

disappear and reappear, of a political and social phase which was not

to become the predominant situation until another situation should

have exhausted its first fury. This, the first, was to be the war

of the Synagogue against the disciples of the Messiah, whom those

disciples went about declaring to have risen from the tomb, according

to his distinct promise; whom they went about declaring to have been

already seen, and heard, and touched by themselves, again and again.

No wonder, then, if Aglais and Paulus and Esther had discussed in

hushed tones and in Greek the wonders and various portents attendant

upon the supreme and central fact--that Resurrection of the Master

which absorbed their whole hearts and minds, leaving no room for

any other interest therein at this tremendous epoch--the grand

turning-point of human destinies and of our whole planet's history.

From the parapet against which they were leaning, they now gazed in

silence upon the splendid scenes below and opposite. Across a maze of

narrow streets they saw the mansions, the pinnacles, the towers, and

that great supernal "Temple of God," all so soon to perish violently,

in a general, a complete, and an irreversible destruction. They saw

the play of light and shadow upon one long tree-lined side of Herod's

proud palace; they saw the ripple of quivering leaves reflected

upon the white colonnades (and their tessellated, shady floors) of

Pilate's fatal house; and, while revolving thoughts and questions of

unspeakable importance and solemnity, they all three suddenly beheld

an acted picture, a passing scene, voiceless to them, yet impressive,

which blent itself into their recollection of other scenes, never to

be effaced from the memory of mankind, which, not a week before, had

been under those very colonnades enacted.

A woman in the attire of a Roman matron came quickly forth upon the

first-story balcony in the house of Pontius Pilate, and, leaning over

the rail, waved her hand with an imperative gesture to some one below.

She was followed into the balcony more slowly by a man wearing the

grand costume of an ancient Roman military governor, who held in his

hand a sealed and folded letter, tied with the usual silk string.

The man was evidently Pilate himself. He looked long and gloomily at

the letter, and seemed to be plunged in thought. He even let what he

carried fall at his feet, and did not appear to be aware of this

for some moments. It was the woman who picked up the letter, and

gave it back into his hand. Then Pilate leaned over the balustrade,

in his turn, and spoke to a man below in military costume, who was

mounted on a powerful horse, and seemed to be equipped for travel.

The soldier saluted, looking up, when he was addressed, and saluted

again when his superior had ceased speaking; whereupon Pilate dropped

the letter (a large and heavy dispatch), which the soldier caught and

secured under his belt, inside the tunic, or "sagum," immediately

afterward riding away at a canter. Our three friends saw Pilate, his

head bent and his eyes on the ground, slowly and ponderingly re-enter

the house by a screen-door, the same through which he had come out

upon the balcony; but the lady, clasping her hands a little in front

of her forehead, gazed into the heavens with a face ashy pale, and

with eyes from which tears were streaming.

It is a well-known and for centuries universally received tradition,

besides being a fact recorded by one most respectable and trustworthy

author (who, besides, was not a Christian, but a Jew)--a fact

without which the allusions to it in various ancient authorities,

together with Phlegon the Chronologer's subsequent recital of

Tiberius's extraordinary conduct, would be unintelligible and

unaccountable--that Pontius Pilate, harassed by the unappeasable

reproaches of his wife, and stung by something within his own bosom

which allowed him peace no more, until (sleepless, and unable again,

unable for ever, to sleep) he bequeathed, some years afterward, by

an awful death, whether intentional or not, his name to a great

Alpine hill, a hill not thenceforth named, or to be named, while

time and mountains last, by any name but "Pilate's" among distant

and then barbarous nations--it is well known, I say, that Pilate

sent to Tiberius Cæsar a long and minute relation concerning the

life, the death, and the disappearance from the tomb of him whom

he had scourged, and whom the Jews had crucified, together with a

notice of the supernatural wonders wrought by him; his previous

notorious announcement of his own intended resurrection; the directly

consequent and equally notorious precautions taken to hinder it;

the disappearance, in spite of this, of the body; the testimony of

the soldiers that they were witnesses _to_ the abstraction, which

they were unable to stop, because they alleged that they were not

witnesses _of_ it (being buried in sleep); that, in fact, their

testimony proved nothing save the body's disappearance from the

massively-sealed tomb (which would have stood a small siege); the

failure of the Synagogue to account for the body; the account of it

by the disciples; and, finally, the admissions of the Pharisees that

all their prophets had become unexplainable if this was not their

Messiah, yet that such a conclusion was to them impossible, because

he was to have been their king, and a conquering king, and to have

founded an empire extending through all nations and tongues; their

stern and ever-growing disaffection to the Roman rule; the universal

amazement, excitement, and anxiety arising from the circumstance

that, while neither the Synagogue nor the soldiers could throw any

light upon what had become of the body, the disciples of him who

had predicted his own resurrection explained the event openly and

fearlessly by stating that they had again and again met him since the

previous _feria prima_; that they cared for no protection except his

alone; that the dead was once more among them--living, and henceforth

immortal--their Master and God; the ultimate Judge of this world, and

the foretold Founder of an everlasting kingdom! Pilate added several

strange and astounding particulars.

This, in a general way, is known; and it is likewise known that

Tiberius Cæsar was so deeply impressed by the dispatch of the

Jerusalem governor, arriving in his hands about the same moment, as

we shall find in the next chapter, when a strange incident (_narrated

by Plutarch_) took place, that he suddenly convened the senate in a

formal indiction, _and proposed to them to raise a temple to Christ,

and to rank him solemnly among the gods of the empire_! But not such

nor of such acknowledgments was to be the kingdom of the "jealous"

and the only God.

Aglais, Paulus, and Esther had assisted at a memorable pantomime.

They had beheld the mounted soldier who rode with a memorable letter

to the sea-coast; they had seen the vain effort of him who had

offered the people a choice between Barabbas and "the desired of

nations," to call the great of the earth into his perplexities, to

quiet his awakened conscience, to turn aside from the dread warnings

whispered to his soul, to lull--by futile means--an all too late

remorse.

CHAPTER XXVII.

In our last chapter, Paulus and his Athenian mother had obtained,

through Esther's recital of her waking dream or vision, one little

glimpse at that prison, that place of detention, which she had termed

(as she herself had heard it termed) "the dim, vast house," "the

vast, dim city," and the "dim, vast kingdom."

The vague notion she could give of that scene of immurement cannot

be expected to prove interesting to so large a number, as Mr.

Pickwick has cause to feel an interest in his glimpses of the "Fleet

Prison," once famous in London. But such interest as the former

house of detention commands is of a different kind, and those who

may experience it are a different class. Plato (as a great critic

observes) has been translated from age to age into some dozen great

modern languages, in order that he might be read by about a score of

persons in each generation. But that score are the little fountains

of the large rivers that bear to the sea the business of the world.

Few are directly taught by Kant, Sir William Hamilton, John Stuart

Mill, Cousin, or Balmez; but the millions are taught and think

through those whom _they_ have taught to think. Between the good and

evil originators or conservators of ideas, and the huge masses who

do all their mental processes at third hand, stand the interpreters;

and these listen with bent heads, while they hold trumpets which are

heard at the extremities of the earth.

Paulus lingered in Jerusalem. Weeks flew by. Spring passed into

summer; summer was passing into autumn; and still, from time to time,

as, in the evenings, mother and son sat among the flowers on the flat

roof, Esther would join them.

One night, she had hardly appeared, when Longinus the centurion

followed her, bearing a letter for Paulus, which, he said, had

just arrived at Fort Antonio, by the hands of an orderly, from the

governor. The letter was from Dionysius of Athens, now _l'un des

quarante_, a member of that great Areopagus of which the French

Academy is partly a modern image; and it was written immediately

after his return from a tour in Egypt, and a cruise through the

Ægean Sea, among the famous and beautiful Greek Islands, to resume

his duties as a teacher of philosophy and a professor of the higher

literature at Athens.

Paulus, after a word with his mother and Esther, desired Longinus

to favor them with his company. Sherbets and other refreshments

were brought. They all sat down on the semicircular wicker settle

at the corner of the roof, under the bower-like branches of the

large rhododendron; a small lamp was held for Paulus by the Jewish

serving-man, and Paulus read the letter aloud to that sympathetic

group. Extracts we will give, in the substance, concerning two

occurrences. The first, as the reader sees, the listening circle

learned from Dionysius; but _we_ have it in reality from Plutarch,

upon whose narrative Eusebius and many other weighty authorities and

grave historians have commented.

The captain and owner (for he was both) of the vessel in which Dion

sailed back from Egypt to Athens was an Egyptian of the name of

Thramnus (some call him Thamus). He said that a very weird thing had

happened to him in his immediately previous trip, which had been from

Greece to Italy. Dion was at the time at Heliopolis, in Egypt, with

his friend, the celebrated philosopher Apollophanes, who, though

(like Dion himself) only between twenty and thirty, had already (in

this also resembling Dion) obtained an almost world-wide fame for

eloquence, astronomical science, and general learning. When Thramnus

had neared the Echinades Islands, the wind fell, a sudden calm came,

and they had to drop anchor near Paxos. The night was sultry; every

one was on deck. Suddenly, from the lonely shore, a loud, strange

voice hailed the captain: "Thramnus!" it cried. None answered. Again,

louder than human, came the cry, "Thramnus!" Still none answered. For

the third time, "Thramnus!" was thundered from the lonely coast. Then

Thramnus himself called out: "Who hails? What is it?" Shrill and far

louder than before was the voice in reply: "When you reach the Lagoon

of Palus, announce then that the Great Pan is dead."

Thereupon, everything became silent, save the sluggish wash of the

waves under the vessel's side. A sort of council was at once held on

board; and first they took a note of the exact date and the hour.

They found that it was exactly the ninth hour of the sixth _jeria_,

or day, in the month of March, in the fourth year (according with

Phlegon's corrected and checked astronomical chronology) of the two

hundred and second Olympiad: in other words, this, being translated

into modern reckoning, means, six in the afternoon of Friday, the

25th of March, in the thirty-third year of our Lord.

Dion breaks off in his letter here to remark: "You will learn

presently what happened to me and to Apollophanes, and to the whole

renowned city of Heliopolis, at the same hour exactly of that same

day; and it is the coincidence between the two occurrences which has

fixed them so deeply in my mind."

Well; he proceeds to say that Thramnus, having asked his passengers,

who happened to be unusually numerous, whether they considered he

ought to obey this mysterious mandate, and having suggested himself

that, if, on their reaching Palus, or Pelodes, the wind held fair,

they should not lose time by stopping, but if the wind were there

to fail, and they were forced to halt at that place, then it might

be no harm to pay attention to the injunction, and see what came

of it, they were all unanimously of his opinion. Thereupon, as

though by some design, in the midst of a calm the breeze sprang up

freshly again, and they proceeded on their way. When they came to the

indicated spot, all were again on deck, unable to forget the strange

incident at Paxos; and, on a sudden, the wind fell, and they were

becalmed.

Thramnus, accordingly, after a pause, leaned over the ship's side,

and, as loudly as he could, shouted that _the great Pan was dead_. No

sooner had the words been pronounced than all round the vessel were

heard a world of sighs issuing from the deep and in the air, with

groans, and moanings, and long, wild, bitter wailings innumerable, as

though from vast unseen multitudes and a host of creatures plunged in

dismay and despair. Those on board were stricken with amazement and

terror. When they arrived in Rome, and were recounting the adventures

of their voyage, this wild story sent its rumor far and near, and

made such an impression that it reached the ears of Tiberius Cæsar,

who was then in the capital. He sent for Thramnus and several of the

passengers, as Plutarch records for us, particularly one, Epitherses,

who afterward, at Athens, with his son Æmilianus, and the traveller

Philip, used often to tell the story till his death. Tiberius, after

ascertaining the facts, summoned all the learned men who chanced then

to be in Rome, and requested their opinion.

Their opinion, which is extant, matters little. The holy fathers

who have investigated this occurrence are divided in their views.

It must be remembered that Plutarch relates another truly wonderful

fact universal in its range, as being notoriously simultaneous

with the singular local adventure above described--the sudden

silence of Delphi, and all the other famous pagan oracles, from the

8th day before the Kalends of April, in the 202d Olympiad, at six

P.M. At that hour, on that day (March 25, Friday, Anno Domini 33),

those oracles were stricken dumb, and nevermore returned answers

to their votaries. Coupling these phenomena together, in presence

of a thousand other portents, the holy fathers think, one party of

them, that the enemy of man and of God, and that enemy's legions,

were grieving and wailing, at the hour which Plutarch specifies

(the time of evening, and on the very day, when our Lord died), at

the redemption just then consummated; others, that the Almighty

permitted nature "to sigh through all her works," in sympathy with

the voluntary sufferings of her expiring Lord.

"Now, hearken," proceeded Dion in his letter, "to how I was occupied,

hundreds of miles away, in Heliopolis, at the time, the very hour of

the very day, when so wild and weird a response came from the powers

of the air and the recesses of the deep to those who shouted forth,

amid a calm on the silent breast of the Ægean Sea, that the great Pan

('the great All,' 'the universal Lord,' as you, my friends, are aware

it means in Greek) had died!

"I had gone out, shortly before the sixth hour on this sixth day,

to take a stroll in the tree-shaded suburbs of Heliopolis, with

my friend Apollophanes. Suddenly, the sun, in a horrible manner,

withdrew its light so effectually that we saw the stars. It was

the time of the Hebrew Pasch, and the season of the month when the

moon is at the full, and the period of an eclipse, or of the moon's

apparent conjunction with the sun, was well known not to be then;

independently of which, two unexampled and unnatural portents,

contrary to the laws of the heavenly bodies, occurred: first, the

moon entered the sun's disc _from the east_; secondly, when she

had covered the disc and touched the opposite diameter, instead of

passing onward, _she receded_, and resumed her former position in the

sky. All the astronomers will tell you that these two facts, and also

the time of the eclipse itself, are equally in positive deviation

from the otherwise everlasting laws of the sidereal or planetary

movements. I felt that either this universal frame was perishing or

the Lord and Pilot of nature was himself suffering; and I turned to

Apollophanes, and, 'O light of philosophy, glass of science!' I said,

'explain to me what this means.'

"Before answering me, he required that we should together apply the

astronomical rule, or formula, of Philip Aridæus; after doing which

with the utmost care, he said: 'These changes are supernatural; there

is some stupendous revolution or catastrophe occurring in divine

affairs, affecting the whole of the Supreme Being's creation.'

"You may be sure, my friends, that we both took a careful note of

the hour, the day, the week, month, year; and I intend to inquire

everywhere whether in other lands any similar phenomena have

appeared; and what overwhelming, unexampled event can have taken

place on this little planet of ours to bring the heavens themselves

into confusion, and coerce all the powers of nature into so awful a

manifestation of sympathy or of horror."

He ended by conveying to Aglais and Paulus the loving remembrance of

the Lady Damarais.

Aglais and her son and Esther were spell-bound with amazement when

this letter had been read; and Paulus exclaimed:

"What will Dion say when he hears that we also saw this very darkness

at the same moment; that the veil of the Temple here has been rent in

twain; and that he who expired amid these and so many other portents,

Esther, and in the full culmination of the prophecies, is again

living, speaking, acting, the Conqueror of death, as he was the Lord

of life?"

"Let us go to Athens; let us bring our friends, the Lady Damarais and

our dear Dion, to learn and understand what we have ourselves been

mercifully taught."

So spoke Aglais, offering at the same time to Esther a mother's

protection and love along the journey. Paulus was silent, but gazed

pleadingly at Esther.

It was agreed. But in the political dangers of that reign, Paulus,

owing to his fame itself, had to take so many precautions that much

time was unavoidably lost.

Meanwhile, he had again asked the Jewish maiden to become his wife.

Need we say that this time his suit was successful? Paulus and Esther

were married.

Christianity in the interim grew from month to month and from year

to year, and our wanderers had but just arrived at last in Athens in

time to hear, near the statue of "the unknown God," while Damarais,

the friend of Aglais, and Dion, the friend of them all, stood

near, a majestic stranger, a Roman citizen, him who had sat at the

feet of Gamaliel, the glorious Apostle of the Gentiles, who had

been "faithful to the heavenly Vision," though he had not seen the

Resurrection, explain to the Athenians "him whom they had ignorantly

worshipped." And when the sublime messenger of glad tidings related

the circumstances of the Passion, the scenes which had been enacted

in Pilate's house (so well remembered by them), the next day's dread

event, and when he touched upon the preternatural accompaniments

of that final catastrophe, and described the darkness which had

overspread the earth from the sixth hour of that day, Dionysius,

turning pale, drew out the tablets which he carried habitually,

examined the date of which, at Heliopolis, he and Apollophanes had

jointly made note, and showed symptoms of an emotion such as he had

never before experienced.

He and Damarais, as is well known, were among the converts of Saint

Paul on that great occasion. How our other characters felt we need

not describe.

Yielding to the entreaties of their beloved Dionysius, they actually

loitered in Greece for a few years, during which Christianity had

outstripped them and penetrated to Rome, where it was soon welcomed

with fire and sword, and where "the blood of martyrs became the seed

of Christians." Esther shuddered as she heard names dear to her in

the murmured accounts of dreadful torments.

Resuming their westward course, how Paulus rejoiced that he had in

time sold everything in Italy, and was armed with opulence in the

midst of new and strange trials! They gave Italy a wide offing,

and passing round by the south of Germany, with an armed escort

which Thellus (who had also become a Christian, and had, while they

were in Greece, sent for Prudentia) commanded, they never ceased

their travels till they reached the banks of the Seine; and there,

undiscernible to the vision of Roman tyranny in the distance, they

obtained, by means of the treasures they had brought, hundreds of

stout Gaulish hands to do their bidding, and soon founded a peaceful

home amid a happy colony. Hence they sent letters to Agatha and

Paterculus.

Two arrivals from the realms of civilization waked into excitement

the peaceful tenor of their days. Paulus himself, hearing of the

death of Paterculus, ventured quickly back to Italy, in the horrible,

short reign of Caligula, and fetched his sister Agatha, now a widow,

to live with them. Later still, they were surprised to behold arrive

among them one whom they had often mourned as lost to them for ever.

It was Dionysius. He came to found Christianity in Gaul, and settled,

amidst the friends of his youth, on the banks of the Seine. Often

they reverted, with a clear light, to the favorite themes of their

boyhood; and often the principal personages who throughout this story

have, we hope, interested the reader, gathered around that same

Dionysius (who is, indeed, the St. Denis of France), and listened,

near the place where Notre Dame now towers, to the first Bishop

of Paris, correcting the theories which he had propounded to the

Areopagus of Athens as the last of the great Greek philosophers.[5]

One other arrival greeted, indeed, the expatriated but happy

settlement. Longinus found his way among them; and as the proud

ideas of a social system upon which they had turned their back no

longer tyrannized over Aglais or Paulus, the brave man, biding his

time and watching opportunities, found no insurmountable obstacles

in obtaining a fair reward for twenty years and more of patient and

unalterable love. He and Agatha were married.

THE END.

FOOTNOTES:

[3] If any one should feel astonished at our insisting not only upon

the exact day, but the very hour, when certain things occurred,

let him or her remember that the calculation of eclipses, passing

backward from one to another (as though ascending the steps of a

staircase), reaches and fixes the date--yes, the precise minute of

day--when incidents took place between which and us the broad haze of

twice a thousand years is interposed.

[4] For the rest, in support of the matters we have too briefly to

recount, we could burden these pages with voluminous, and some of

them most interesting and beautiful, extracts from both heathen

and Christian works of classic fame and standard authority; with

passages of direct and indirect evidence from Josephus, Phlegon,

Plutarch, Saint Dionysius (our own true hero, the Areopagite of

Greece, the St. Denis of France) [_ad Apollophanem_, epis. xi., and

_ad Polycarpum Antistidem_, vii.]; Tertullian (_Cont. Jud._, c. 8);

St. Augustine (_Civ. Dei_, lib. 14); St. Chrysostom (_Hom. de Joanne

Baptista_); the Bollandists, Baronius, Eusebius, Tillemont, Huet, and

a host of others.... But our statements will not need such detailed

"stabilitation," because the facts, being notorious among scholars,

will be impugned by no really educated man or thoroughly competent

critic.

[5] The Roman Breviary thus speaks of St. Dionysius:

"Dionysius of Athens, one of the judges of the Areopagus, was versed

in every kind of learning. It is said that, while yet in the errors

of paganism, having noticed on the day on which Christ the Lord was

crucified that the sun was eclipsed out of the regular course, he

exclaimed: 'Either the God of nature is suffering, or the universe

is on the point of dissolution.' When afterward the Apostle Paul

came to Athens, and, being led to the Areopagus, explained the

doctrine which he preached, teaching that Christ the Lord had risen,

and that the dead would all return to life, Dionysius believed with

many others. He was then baptized by the apostle and placed over the

church in Athens. He afterward came to Rome, whence he was sent to

Gaul by Pope Clement to preach the Gospel. Rusticus, a priest, and

Eleutherius, a deacon, followed him to Paris. Here he was scourged,

together with his companions, by the Prefect Fescennius, because he

had converted many to Christianity; and, as he continued with the

greatest constancy to preach the faith, he was afterward stretched

upon a gridiron over a fire, and tortured in many other ways; as

were likewise his companions. After bearing all these sufferings

courageously and gladly, on the ninth of October, Dionysius, now more

than a hundred years of age, together with the others, was beheaded.

There is a tradition that he took up his head after it had been cut

off, and walked with it in his hands a distance of two Roman miles.

He wrote admirable and most beautiful books on the divine names, on

the heavenly and ecclesiastical hierarchy, on mystical theology; and

a number of others."

The Abbé Darras has published a work on the question of the

identity of Dionysius of Athens with Dionysius, first Bishop of

Paris, sustaining, with great strength and cogency of argument, the

affirmative side. The authenticity of the works which pass under his

name, although denied by nearly all modern critics, has been defended

by Mgr. Darboy, Archbishop of Paris.--ED. C. W.

EUROPE'S FUTURE.

FROM THE GERMAN.

To be able to form a correct judgment regarding the future of Europe,

there are several points and theories which must be previously

considered. First on the list comes--

I.

THE RACE THEORY.

"The key to the success of the Prussian arms in the contest with

France is found in the decadence of the Latin and the virility

of the German race. The Latin peoples are corrupt; their star is

waning; their moral vigor is gone; while the German nations are still

young and fresh. German culture, German ideas, German muscle and

energy, are taking the place of the decrepit French civilization.

The German victories are but the outward expression of this

historical process. We are on the threshold of a new epoch in the

history of civilization--of a new period which we can appropriately

call the German era." Such is the theory which now possesses the

German mind, and is expressed in the newspapers, pamphlets, on the

railroads, and in the inns all through Germany, with great national

self-complacency. Even many Sclavonians and Italians adopt this

view. The conquest of the Latin by the Germanic races; the downfall

of the former; the world-wide sovereignty of the latter--these are

high-sounding phrases which have a dramatic effect and are popular in

Germany. But do they express a truth? Are they philosophically and

historically correct in view of the actual condition of political and

social life? In the first place, what and where are the Latin races

about which we have been hearing so much during the past ten years?

The southern inhabitants of the Italian peninsula can lay no claim

to Latin origin; for it is well known that they were anciently Greek

colonies, which have since intermarried with Romans, Spaniards, and

Normans. The Lombards of the north of Italy are mostly of Celtic and

not of Latin origin, since they inhabit the ancient Gallia Cisalpina.

The old Iberians of Spain were not Latins; and they are now mixed

with Gothic, Moorish, Celtic, and Basque blood. As for France, its

very name imports that the Latins gave a very small contingent

towards forming a nation which is certainly of Celtic and German

origin, and many of whose provinces are purely of German race, as

Alsace and Lorraine. Where, then, shall we find the Latin races?

There are none properly so-called. Looking at the origin of

languages, we may, indeed, speak of Latin, or, rather, of Roman

nations. In this regard, we may class the Italians, Spaniards,

Portuguese, and French together, on account of the Roman element

prevailing in their tongues, in opposition to the Scalavonic-German,

the Celtic-Anglo-Saxon-Danish-Norman forming the world-wide English,

the Scandinavian, and the pure Sclavonic families. Does this theory

mean that nations of the same tongue should all be politically and

socially united, flourish for a period, and then perish together?

Understood in this way, the race theory would have few defenders.

It may be true that nations, like individuals, must live a definite

period--rise, flourish, and decay. It is true, historically, that

every nation has an era of prosperity and an era of decadence. But

when we come to the question of universal sovereignty, we may ask,

When did the Roman nations ever exercise it? Each of them has had

its golden age of literature, art, science, and material prosperity;

but none of them has had, for any length of time, the sovereignty of

Europe. Not Italy, for instance, unless we go back to the days of

old Rome, and then we have not an Italian but a specifically Roman

supremacy. Not Spain, for although she exercised great power beyond

the ocean, and for a time possessed a preponderating influence in

Europe, from the reign of Charles V. to the first successor of Philip

II., yet who could call the accidental union of so many crowns on the

head of a Hapsburg prince a universal sovereignty for Spain? Lastly,

France had her age of glory during the reign of Louis XIV., whose

influence, or that of the Napoleonic era, cannot be denied. Yet what

gaps separate the reign of the great King from that of the great

Emperor! Great as was France under Louis XIV. and Bonaparte, she

fell to the second rank of nations during the Restoration and under

the July dynasty. As leader in the Revolutionary movement, she has

always controlled Europe, even in her periods of political weakness,

from the days of the encyclopædists to the present time. Even Germany

acknowledges the sway of French literature, politeness, and taste.

Victorious Berlin copies the fashions and manners of conquered

France, as ancient Rome, after conquering Athens, became the slave of

Athenian civilization.

Germany, too, must have already passed the period of her maturity,

according to the race theory; for, under the Saxon Othos, under the

Hohenstaufens, and Charles V., until the Thirty Years' War broke

the strength of the empire, she was superior even to France. Does

not German genius in its peculiar walks rule the world now? German

science, German music? Does not England, usually considered as

belonging to the German race, rule the commerce of the world? And

was not her political influence on the Continent until recently

all-powerful?

No! political sovereignty can be explained by no race theory. From

the fall of the first Napoleon until 1848, England with the powers

of the "Holy Alliance," or rather with Austria and Russia, held the

first place in European politics. From the beginning of 1848 until

the Crimean war, England and Russia were in the foreground; after

that war it was France and England; now it is Prussia. These are but

examples of the political fluctuations which follow each other in

continual change, and are seldom of long duration.

And do not the champions of the German race theory see that there

is a laughing heir behind them in the Sclavonic supremacy? Once

admitting the race theory, we must confess that the Panslavist argues

well when he says: "The Roman nations are dead; the German are on the

point of dying. They once conquered the world; their present effort

is the last flicker of the expiring light which points out the road

to us. After them comes our race, with fresh vigor on the world's

scene. Europe's future is Panslavism."

The whole theory is radically false. There are no more primitive

races to take the place of the old ones. The Germans are as old as

the Romans; or, rather, the Romans were simply Germans civilized

before their brethren. Russia alone is young in Europe, but she has

nothing new to give us; and physical force, without a new social or

moral system accompanying it to establish a conquest, never prevails

long. We cannot, therefore, judge of Europe's future by this theory

of races.

The power of regeneration must be sought for elsewhere.

II.

LIBERALISM.

One would have thought that the sanguinary war of 1870 should have

dispelled the illusions of liberalism for ever. By liberalism, we

mean that party which believes in the principles of 1789, whose ideal

is to have the middle classes, or _bourgeoisie_, the ruling power,

to have society equally divided, to have an atheistical state, and

to obtain eternal peace through unlimited material progress, which

would identify the interests of nations. Liberalism, rationalism, and

materialism are different names for the same system. A state without

God, sovereignty of capital, dissolution of society into individuals,

united by no other bond than the force of a liberal parliament

majority under the control of wealth; material prosperity of the

middle classes, founded on gain and pleasure, with the removal of all

historical traditions, all ecclesiastical precepts--such is the dream

of this "shopkeepers' system." Has not the present war dispelled the

dream of happiness arising from mere material prosperity? We doubt

it. Notwithstanding the many hard lessons which the liberal school

has received since the days of Mirabeau and the Girondins, from the

lawyers of the July dynasty to Ollivier, it never seems to grow

wiser. It is superficial, never looks into the essence of things. It

is in vain to charge the present misfortunes of two great nations on

the illiberalism of Napoleon and Bismarck, and thus exalt the merits

of liberalism; for liberalism or mere material prosperity was at

the bottom of all their plans. From 1789 to 1870, France, with few

exceptions, was governed by liberalism; and the revolutions begat

the natural consequences of this system in anarchy and military

despotism. France during this period has made the most wonderful

material progress.

We read lately in a liberal journal that the only remedy for the

rejuvenation of states was "the inviolability of the individual,

and respect for the popular will." Always the same emptiness of

phraseology with these impracticable dabblers in philosophy. What

will you do if the infallible "popular will" refuses to recognize

the inviolability of individuals? Cannot these gentlemen see that

their system merely opens the door for socialism? They take away

religion, and teach the epicurean theory of enjoyment; they destroy

constitutional forms of government, and base authority on the

ever-shifting popular whim. Socialism comes after them, and says,

"You say there is no God, and I must have pleasure. I have counted

myself, and find that I am the majority; therefore, I make a law

against capital and property. You must be satisfied, for you are my

teacher, and I merely follow out your principles to their logical

consequences."

III.

SOCIALISM.

A new era is dawning. Not a mere political period, but a complete

social change, for the actual order of things is disorder, a compound

of injustice and abuses. We must have fraternity and equality.

Away with the nobles; away with the wealthy classes; away with

property; all things must be in common. The happiness of Europe

will never be realized until socialism reigns supreme. Such is the

socialistic theory. But does not every one see that its realization

is impossible, and brings us back to barbarism? The right of property

is essential to society. It is contrary to nature to expect that

mankind will give up this right to please a whim of drones--a system

according to which the lazy and indolent would have as much right

to property as the industrious and hard-working. If all is to be

common property, who will work, who will strive to acquire, whose

ambition will be aroused, whose interest excited for the attainment

of something in which he will have no right or title? And in fact,

both liberals and socialists use words which they do not mean; they

are far more despotic when they get power than those whom they are

continually attacking. At the Berne Congress of 1868, a socialist

orator said: "We cannot admit that each man shall choose his own

faith; man has not the right to choose error; liberty of conscience

is our weapon, but not one of our principles!" By error he meant

Christianity. In fact, ultra-radicalism is simply ultra-despotism.

Men blamed the despotism of Napoleon III.; but look at the despotism

of Gambetta, and remember the despotism of Robespierre and the "Reign

of Terror." Destroy religion, and you have nothing left but egotism.

Man becomes to his brother-man either a wolf or a fox.

Socialism may indeed have its day in Europe's future. The logic of

liberalism leads to it; but it will be a fearful day of disorder

and revolution; a sad day for the wealthier classes; but still only

a day. Earthquakes are possible, and sometimes they engulf cities;

but they pass away, and quiet returns. New vegetation springs up on

the ruins. If socialism ever gains Europe, it will vanish in virtue

of the _reductio ad absurdum_; therefore its mastery can never be

permanent.

IV.

THE INTERNATIONAL POLICY OF EUROPEAN STATES SINCE 1789.

Since neither the race theory, nor liberalism, nor socialism, can

enable us to solve the problem of Europe's future, let us pass to

other considerations, glance rapidly over the past, study the present

external and internal condition of the continent, in order to be able

to form a judgment on the subject which we are discussing.

The French Revolution of 1789 had its effects all over Europe.

In France since that date, liberalism, anarchy, and Byzantinism

have held alternate sway. The Bonaparte invasions carried through

the rest of Europe the liberal principle of secularization

with the _Code Napoléon_. The writings of the philosophers and

encyclopædists, and Josephism, had prepared the way. The reaction of

1815 was based on Masonic theories of philanthropism and religious

indifferentism. The Emperor Alexander and the Holy Alliance were

infected with these views. The revolutionary movement in Germany,

Italy, and Spain has since been simply against office-holders and

the police. The influence of religion has been ignored. Palmerston

was the _coryphæus_ of the liberals, and during his time English

diplomacy played into the hands of all the irreligious and

revolutionary elements in Europe. This unprincipled system was

finally represented by Napoleon III., in whose diplomacy the theory

of "non-intervention," of "nationalities," of "sovereignty of the

people," were put forward as the types of the perfection of modern

society. In point of fact, they are mere words used as a cloak to

cover up Macchiavellism.

The "balance of power" theory, of purely material import, ruled in

1815, but it soon gave way before the influences of the "liberal"

doctrines of humanitarianism and the race system. Religious

convictions and Christian institutions were ignored in politics,

and a system of police substituted in their place. Greece received

its king in consequence of this system which has prevailed in the

external relations of Europe since 1830. In 1848, the revolutions

and insurrections in Europe were merely premature appearances

of the socialistic element in liberalism. Napoleon III., by his

Macchiavellian policy, which Guizot has happily termed "moderation

in evil-doing," coerced them. He gave all the sanction of French

power to the principles of the liberal school which he was supposed

to represent. On the principle of "non-intervention," he prevented

the interference of Austria and Spain in favor of the Holy See. He

protected the seizure of Naples and Sicily; approved the invasion of

the Papal States, and substituted, in the place of dynastic right

and popular right, the colossal delusion of the _plébiscite_. On the

nationality theory, he allowed Austrian power to be destroyed, and

founded, in opposition to all French interests, Italian and German

unity.

Although very defective since it ignored the full claims of religion,

still there was a fixed public law in Europe from 1815 to 1859.

Respect for the minor powers; the sentiment of the solidarity of

thrones against the efforts of Carbonarism and the cosmopolitan

revolutionary party; and regard for treaties, characterize that

period. The traditions of the people were respected; and treaties

repressed avarice or ambition; and there was real peace in

Europe--the peace of order, according to the beautiful expression of

St. Augustine. It is true, far-seeing minds saw the threatening cloud

on the horizon of the future, and knew that the system of 1815 did

not rest on the right foundations. Still, even mere external forms

are a protection.

But since 1859 law or treaties no longer seem to bind. There seems

to be nothing fixed in the public law of Europe. All is whim; might

instead of right, sentiment instead of principle. Powers can no

longer unite, for they cannot trust each other. Instead of all being

united to protect the individual state, now all are hostile to each

other. Italy insists on unification in spite of law and right, and

to gain her purpose depends to-day on Prussia; yesterday, it was

on France. She hates Austria, and Austria acts as if she did not

perceive the hatred, and will not interfere lest she might offend

the liberals. Vienna is in dread of Berlin and St. Petersburg; St.

Petersburg is in dread of Berlin. England looks jealously at Russia,

who, meanwhile, is arming in grim silence, and with occasional

manifestations of her old predilections. France counts now for

nothing. Prussia, which fifteen years ago was allowed merely by the

favor of Austria to sit in the congress of the great powers, is now

the only great military power in Europe. We say military, for it

is not the real, the hidden power. As in the Greek mythology grim,

inexorable fate ruled above all the gods, so the head lodge of the

secret societies makes of the Prussian leaders its blind tools;

Italy obeys it; Napoleon was its slave; Austria, its sacrifice; and

now Prussia also must bend the knee. Such is Europe ten years after

the Franco-Austrian war: the Europe of Metternich, Nesselrode, and

Wellington.

V.

THE INTERNAL POLICY OF THE EUROPEAN STATES SINCE 1789.

The revolution has changed the internal policy of states as well as

their external relations. Forty years ago, Donoso Cortes remarked

that England was endeavoring to introduce its constitution into

the Continent; and that the Continent would try to introduce its

different governmental systems into England. We are now witnesses of

the truth of this observation. Democratic ideas are gaining ground

in Great Britain; and bureaucracy, with its centralizing tendencies,

is replacing the English theory of self-government. Military

conscriptions, along with universal suffrage, will come next. Owing

to the extension of the franchise, the House of Commons is losing its

aristocratic character, and the House of Lords its influence. England

will go the way of France.

We see what the liberal system begotten of the revolution has caused

in France. An enervated, un-self-reliant, disunited generation,

without traditions, organization, consistency, faith, or true

patriotism, is its result. The decrees of the _Code Napoléon_

concerning inheritances have broken up families; the departmental

system has destroyed the provincial peculiarities in which lies

the people's strength; the system of common lodging-houses for the

laboring classes has destroyed respect for authority, and afforded

ready material for the purposes of despotism or secret societies.

In Italy and Spain, we see the same spectacle. The French, led

into Italy by the first Napoleon, brought thither the principle of

centralization and a revolutionary code. After Napoleon's downfall,

the restored princes allowed too much of his system to remain. This

arose from a want of judgment. The ancient municipalities were

destroyed, even to some extent in the States of the Church; Piedmont

receiving most of the poison, and thus becoming the hearth of the

revolution. Constitutionalism, anarchy, and military governments in

Spain prove the working of revolutionary doctrines. The old freedom

of that Catholic country, the growth of centuries, gives way before a

nominal liberty, but a real despotism.

In Germany, too, centralization carries the day. This country had the

good fortune to be composed of several independent states, without

any great central power, and the provincial spirit consequently

remained strong. But now two un-German words, "unification" and

"uniformity," expressing un-German tendencies, are carrying the

Germans into despotism. Germany will be Prussianized, and Prussia

Germanized, say the unificators; but all will, in the end, be

compelled to give way before the republicans and socialists. The high

schools of Germany are all infected with the revolutionary doctrines

and Masonic ideas.

What shall we say of Austria? Thanks to "liberalism," it

has disappeared, and is now a dualism in its government and

tri-parliamentary in its system.

The licentiousness of the press helps to destroy everything stable in

governments. Journals without principle, honor, or religion, filled

with scandals, edited by adventurers, whose only object is to make

money and serve faithfully their owners, issue their thousands of

copies daily to corrupt the public mind. Evil spreads more rapidly

than good, and consequently the influence of the religious press is

weak compared to that of the revolutionary papers, subsidized by the

agents of secret societies or by the unprincipled men of wealth, who

readily purchase the aid of corrupted minds to help on their ambition.

VI.

THE POSITION OF THE CHURCH UNDER THE LIBERAL SYSTEM.

Governments have therefore ceased to be Christian, and have become

"liberal," that is, infidel. According to liberalism, religion is the

private affair of each individual. Civil society should recognize

no dogma, no worship, no God. We know well that this principle,

from its very intrinsic absurdity, cannot be practically carried

out. For instance, God will be recognized when it is necessary to

swear fidelity to a constitution, and the external forms of religion

will be invoked at the opening of a new railroad or a session of

parliament. But in principle the liberal state ignores all positive

religious belief. Its only dogma is that a law passed by a majority

of voters remains a law until the next majority abrogates it. This

system is called "separation of church and state," or "a free church

in a free state." Then follow broken concordats--in France and

Bavaria, broken by organic articles; in Baden, Piedmont, Austria, and

Spain, destroyed by the will of the prince and cabinet ministers.

Then follows a usurped educational system, in which the rights of

the family and church are disregarded. In all of these states, more

or less, there is a public persecution of the church; a repression

of her rights; enthrallment of her ministers; invasion of her

privileges. God is in heaven, consequently the church should confine

herself to the sanctuary; that is to say, God does not trouble

himself about the conduct of nations, politics, legislation, or

science. These are all neutral affairs, over which his authority does

not extend, and therefore the church has nothing to do with public

life. So say the liberals. They take from God and give it to Cæsar,

the modern civil divinity, all that is his, except one thing which

it is impossible for them to take from him, and that is conscience.

They endeavor to estrange conscience from God more and more by

education, by the press, and by public opinion manufactured by the

leaders of the secret societies. Hence all the talk about "liberty of

conscience." For the same end, they talk of toleration, but they mean

simply indifference, which hence becomes the shibboleth of the party

which the church unceasingly opposes.

This is, in a few words, the actual condition of the church in

European society. It is an unnatural condition. Even Macchiavelli

says: "Princes and republics which would remain sound must, before

all things, guard the ceremonies of religion and keep them ever in

honor. Therefore, there is no surer sign of the decay of a state than

when it sees the worship of the Most High disregarded." Macchiavelli

spoke from the lessons of experience and as a mere utilitarian. Our

modern utilitarian politicians have not his capacity or penetration.

They are mere superficial observers of fact, and cannot see that the

_summum utile_ is the _summum jus_. This fault lies in ignoring the

assistance of the supernatural order--in their erroneous opinion

that there is no absolute truth. The church is not a hospital for

diseased souls; Christianity is not a mere specific for individual

maladies; but as our Lord has taught us to pray, "Thy kingdom come

... on earth as it is in heaven," so must revealed truth pervade the

earth; percolate through civil society, not merely in its individual

members, but in all its natural relations, family, municipal, and

state. This is what the church has taught Europe, and only by

conforming with this teaching can Europe stand. Since Christianity

came into the world, the Christian state is the normal condition of

political governments, and not an ideal impossible of realization.

Undoubtedly, human weakness will always cause many aberrations from

the rule. But the question is not regarding this point, but as to the

recognition of the rule. The sin against the Holy Ghost is the most

grievous of all sins. Our Lord, always so mild and forbearing toward

human passions, is unflinchingly stern against malicious resistance

to truth, and this has been precisely the great evil of our time ever

since 1789. In the early ages, individuals and nations fell into many

errors, but they never touched the sacred principles of religion.

Liberalism and Freemasonry have caused the denial of truth itself.

"Must we, then, fall back into the darkness of the middle ages?"

Such a question, while it shows little knowledge of the middle ages,

exhibits likewise a spirit of unfairness in discussion. For our

purpose, it suffices to show the latter. What would we think of a man

who, on being told that our faith should be childlike, should say to

the priest, "Must I, then, become a child again?" Plainly, we would

say to him: Good friend, you talk nonsense; for you know well that

you cannot get again your infant body, nor blot out the knowledge

and experience acquired in a life of thirty years. But was not the

sun the same four years ago as it is now? Do not two and two make

four now as long ago? Did you not eat and drink when you were a child

as you do now? Some things are always true in all places and times;

and therefore we do not want to bring you back into the middle ages

merely because we want to give the church that position which God has

assigned to her.

"Then you want to saddle a theocracy on the back of the nineteenth

century?" Let us understand each other. In a certain sense, a

theocracy must be the aim of every rational being. God has appointed

two orders to govern men: they are church and state, neither of which

must absorb the other. Theocracy is not a government of priests, as

those imagine who have before their eyes the Hindoo civil systems.

Let us for a moment forget these catchwords, "middle ages" and

"theocracy," and go to the marrow of the subject.

The church is the guide of consciences; not the arbitrary teacher of

men, but the interpreter of revelation for them. St. Thomas likens

the office of the Vicar of Christ to that of the flag-ship of a

fleet, which the other vessels, that is, the secular governments

must follow on the open sea in order to reach the common haven of

safety. Each vessel has its own sails moves in its own way, and

is managed by its own mariners. The church never interferes in the

appropriate sphere of the secular power. But she warns; she advises;

she corrects all civil authority when it deviates from the truth

and opposes the revealed order. Her authority over the state is not

direct, but indirect; she teaches, but she cannot coerce; she _must_

teach, for political and social questions necessarily have relations

with dogmatic and moral subjects. The church must condemn wrongs, no

matter by whom perpetrated, whether by states or individuals. This is

all the theocratic power the church claims. A Christian state will

respectfully hear her warning voice, and thus avoid the danger; while

a pagan state shuts its ears, despises the church's admonitions, and

plunges into the abyss.

Modern paganism in civil governments has brought Europe into her

present miserable condition. Can she get out of it, or is European

society hopelessly lost?

VII.

EUROPE'S FUTURE.

The Franco-Prussian war of 1870 is one of the most important events

in the history of Europe. The prostration of France is no indication

that she will never rise again, for in 1807 Prussia was in a worse

condition than France is now. In 1815, and until the past few years,

Prussia was last in the list of the great powers, though now she is

the first. France, then, in a few years may rise again to her full

power. There are no more fresh, uncivilized races to come into Europe

to take the place of those which are now said to be decaying. We have

shown that liberalism has reached its acme, been found wanting, and

is dying. Its efforts in Italy, Spain, Germany, Vienna, and Pesth are

but the last convulsions of an expiring system. The natural child of

liberalism--socialism--must also disappear before the common sense of

mankind. What remains? Will there be in Europe the alternate anarchy

and despotism of the Central American republics without any end? Must

we despair of Europe's future? No, a thousand times no! We look to

the future with hope and consolation.

Common sense and religion will win the day; Christianity has still

the regenerating power which she showed in civilizing the barbarians.

Christianity has been the principle of national life since the

Redeemer established it as a world religion. The spiritual life

must be renovated by truth and morality. Christianity is both. We

Christians hope, therefore, for the conversion of the popular mind;

we begin even now to perceive signs of regeneration, renovation,

renewed energy, and vigor in mental convictions and civic virtues.

God's punishments are proofs of his mercy. He chastises to convert.

The first punishment of France, in 1789, was not enough to teach her

to repent. Louis XVIII. came to the throne a free-thinker instead of

a Christian. The prostrate armies of Metz and Sedan are the result

of corrupting and enervating infidelity. God chastises ambition and

pride in nations as well as in individuals. The Republic has shown

itself incapable, because it possessed neither honor, principle, nor

religion. The victories of Prussia are a blessing of God for France.

The Prussian army is but the instrument which God has used to punish

a culprit nation--a revolutionary, irreligious, and frivolous system

of government. Victorious Germany, too, will be taught to reflect

when it sees the blood of its thousands of slaughtered sons, and the

miseries which the war has entailed on its once happy families. Wars

teach unruly nations to reflect. Will the present war suffice to

humble Europe, and cause her to reflect? We know not; but God will

send other chastisements if this one avails nothing. Dark clouds are

already rising in the East, which may soon burst over Austria and

Germany. The rod of God's anger will be felt by Austria again, for

her lessons of 1859 and 1866 have been forgotten. They have only made

her throw herself more fondly into the arms of the devil. In Italy,

the secret societies will yet avenge on the house of Savoy the blood

of the defenders of the Vicar of Christ.

But the German empire has been re-established under a Prussian

emperor. Yes, but this is only an episode in the actual crisis of the

world. A Protestant emperor of Germany is entirely different from

a German emperor. The old German emperors represented the idea of

the Christian monarchy; the Protestant emperor in Berlin represents

modern Cæsarism. His empire cannot last long, for history tells

us that empires of sudden and accidental growth lose rapidly the

power which they as rapidly acquired. But is not Prussia's triumph

the triumph of Protestantism in Europe? Such a question is easily

answered: Protestantism as a positive religion no longer exists

in Prussia or elsewhere; and Protestantism as a negation exists

everywhere, perhaps more in some Catholic lands than in Prussia.

On the battle-fields of Wörth and Gravelotte, the Catholic Church

was not represented by France, and Lutheranism by Prussia. Catholic

Bavarians, Westphalians, and Rhinelanders fought for Prussia, and

would be astounded to hear that they were fighting for heresy.

Priests and Sisters of Charity accompanied them to battle. Who,

on the other hand, would call the Turcos Catholics? Or the French

officers, who never heard Mass, and who curtailed the number of

Catholic chaplains to the minimum? Were the French soldiers, who

drilled on Sundays instead of going to church, on whose barracks,

in some cases, was written, "No admission for policemen, dogs, or

priests"--were they the Catholic champions? No; the Christian soldier

in France first appeared, in this war, with Charette and Cathelineau

in the Loire army, demoralized and destroyed, however, by the mad-cap

radical, Gambetta, and his infidel associates. In fact, the Prussian

army was more Catholic than the French. The latter must be won

back to religion from the enervating influences of Freemasonry and

Voltairianism before it can regain its prestige. The only hope for

France is in her zealous clergy, in the vigor of the old Catholic

provinces, and in her humiliations, which ought to bring repentance.

The rustling of Catholic renovation is heard all over Europe. The

rising generation will bring Italy back to the church. The spirit

of the Tyrol and of Westphalia is spreading through Germany. The

Ultramontanes in Saxony, Bohemia, Steyermark, show the energy of

this renovation. The peasantry of Austria and of a large portion of

Germany are still uncorrupted. Hungary is steadfast in the faith.

The seizure of Rome by the Sardinian robbers has roused the Catholic

heart of the world and helped on the cause of regeneration. Where the

Catholic faith was supposed to be crushed, lo! it has raised its head

defiantly.

The deceived nations want peace, freedom, order, and authority.

These blessings infidelity and liberalism have taken away. The people

are beginning to see that the old yet ever young Apostolic Church

alone can guarantee them. They will turn to Rome, where lives the

Vicar of Him who said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life;" to

Rome freed again from the barbarians; to Rome become Roman again

when it has ceased to be Sardinian; to Rome will the people look for

peace and order. It is Rome that tells men that Christ is Lord of

the world; that he conquers; that he governs. The social dominion

of Christ will again be established. We shall see again Christian

states founded on Christian principles and traditions, with Christian

laws and rulers. Whether these rulers will be kings or presidents

we know not; but they will in either case consider themselves as

mere delegates of Jesus Christ, and of his people, not as Byzantine

despots or representatives of mob tyranny. They will understand

that statesmanship does not consist in giving license to the

wicked[6] and forging chains for the good. We shall have Christian

schools, Christian universities, Christian statesmen. Ye liberals

in name, well may ye grow pale! The future of the world belongs to

the principles of the Syllabus, and this future is not far off. We

conclude with the words of Count de Maistre: "In the year 1789, the

rights of man were proclaimed; in the year 1889, man will proclaim

the rights of God!"

FOOTNOTE:

[6] "The art of governing men does not consist in giving them license

to do evil."--_Père Lacordaire._

BISHOP TIMON.[7]

We hope the day may come before many years when historians will see

in the records of the struggles, misfortunes, and triumphs of the

church a theme for the employment of brilliant pens as tempting as

they now find in the clash of armies and the intrigues of statesmen.

Scholars have devoted to our records the patient investigation of

years; the general history of the church has been summarized for

popular reading in most of the principal modern languages; and

for the use of theologians and students there are elaborate and

costly collections. Individual biographies of saints and preachers

innumerable have been written for the edification of the devout.

Sketches of local church history, more or less complete, have

occasionally appeared--sketches, for instance, like _The Catholic

Church in the United States_, by De Courcy and Shea; Shea's _History

of the Catholic Missions_ among the Indian tribes of America, and

Bishop Bayley's little volume on the history of the church in New

York. But a work of a different kind, broader in its design than

some of these excellent and useful publications, more limited in

scope than the dry and costly general histories, still awaits the

hand of a polished and enthusiastic man of letters. Why should not

the same eloquence and learning be devoted to the religious history

of the great countries of the globe that Macaulay, and Motley, and

Froude have expended upon the political revolutions of states and

the intricate dramas of diplomacy? Why should not some glowing pen

do for the pioneers of the cross what Prescott did for the pioneers

of Spanish conquest in the new hemisphere? Properly told, the church

history of almost any country of the world, of almost any period

in Christian times, would be a narrative not only of religious

significance, but of thrilling interest. No men ever passed through

more extraordinary adventures, considered even from a human point

of view, than the missionaries who penetrated into unknown lands or

first went among unbelieving nations. No contest between hostile

kingdoms or rival dynasties ever offered a more tempting theme for

dramatic narrative and glowing description than the contest which

has raged for eighteen centuries and a half, between the powers of

light and the powers of darkness, in all the different quarters of

the civilized world. Think what a brilliant writer might make of such

a subject as the church history of Germany! Think what has yet to be

done for the churches of England and Ireland and France, when the

coming historian rescues their chronicles from the dusty archives of

state and the gloom of monastic libraries, and causes the old stories

to glow with a new light, such as Gibbon threw upon the records of

the declining empire!

We doubt not the literary alchemist _will_ come in time, and melt

down the dull metals in his crucible, and pour out from it the

shining compound which shall possess a popular value a hundredfold

beyond that of the untransmuted materials. Nowhere, perhaps, will

the labor be more amply repaid than in America. Nowhere will

the collection of materials be less arduous and the result more

brilliant. Our church history begins just when that of Europe is

most perplexing, and to an investigator with time, patience, and a

moderate revenue at his command, it offers no appalling difficulties.

In a great part of America, the introduction of the Catholic religion

is an event within the memory of men still living. The pioneers

of many of the states are still at work. The first missionaries

of some of the most important sees are but just passing to their

reward. There are no monumental slanders upon our history to be

removed; no Protestant writers have seriously encumbered the field

with misrepresentations. Industrious students of our own faith have

already prepared the way; scattered chapters have been written with

more or less literary skill; the store-houses of information have

been discovered and partly explored; and every year the facilities

for the historian are multiplied. And certainly the theme is rich in

romantic interest and variety. From the time of the monks and friars

who came over with the first discoverers of the country down to the

present year of our Lord, when missionaries are perilling their lives

among the Indians of the great West, and priests are fighting for

the faith against the cultivated Protestants of the Atlantic cities,

the Catholic history of the United States has been a series of bold

adventures, startling incidents, and contests of the most dramatic

character. In the whole story there is not a really dull chapter. The

Catholic annals of America abound also with that variety which the

historian needs to render his pages really attractive; and among the

great men who would naturally be the central figures of such a work,

there is the widest difference of character, the most picturesque

divergence of pursuits and personal peculiarities. Group together

the most distinguished of the Christian heroes who have illustrated

our chronicles, and you have what an artist might call a wonderfully

rich variety of coloring. There are the simple-minded, enthusiastic

Spanish Franciscans, following the armies of Cortez and Pizarro,

and exploring the strange realms of the Aztecs and the Incas. There

is the French Jesuit, building up his Christian empire among the

Indians of the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes. There is the gentle

Marquette, floating in his bark canoe down the mighty river with

whose discovery his name will ever be associated, and breathing his

last in the midst of the primeval wilderness. There are Jogues and

Brebœuf, suffering unheard-of torments among the Iroquois; Cheverus,

the polished and fascinating cardinal, winning the affection of

the New England Puritans; England, conciliating the Huguenots and

Anglicans of the South. The saintly Bruté, most amiable of scholars,

most devout of _savans_, is a quaint but beautiful character around

whom cluster some of our most touching associations. Bishop Dubois,

the "Little Bonaparte" of the Mountain; Gallitzin, the Russian

prince who hid the lustre of his rank among the log-cabins of the

Alleghanies; Hughes, the great fighting archbishop, swinging his

battle-axe over the heads of the parsons; De Smet, the mild-mannered

but indomitable missionary of the Rocky Mountains--these are

specimens of our leaders whose place in history has yet to be

described by the true literary artist. Several have been made the

subject of special biographies, but none have yet appeared in their

true light as the central figures of an American church history.

The book which suggests these remarks is a contribution of materials

for the future historian, and as such we give it a cordial welcome.

Mr. Deuther, it is true, is not a practised writer, and is not

entirely at his ease in the use of our language. But he has shown

great industry in the collection of facts, and has rescued from

oblivion many interesting particulars of the early career of Bishop

Timon in a part of the United States whose missionary history is

very imperfectly known. Thus he has rendered an important service to

Catholic literature, and earned full forgiveness for the literary

offences which impair the value of his book as a biography. The

episcopacy of the estimable man whose life is here told was not

an especially eventful one, and except in one instance attracted

comparatively little public notice. The most conspicuous men,

however, are not always the most useful. Bishop Timon had a great

work to perform in the organization and settlement of his new

diocese, and he did it none the less efficiently because he labored

quietly. The best known incident of his official life--the lamentable

contest with the trustees of the Church of St. Louis in Buffalo--is

not one which Catholics can take any satisfaction in recalling; but

it had a serious bearing upon the future of the American Church, and

its lessons even now may be reviewed with profit. Bishop Kenrick in

Philadelphia, Bishop Hughes in New York, and Bishop Timon in Buffalo

have between them the honor, if not of destroying a system which

had done the church incalculable injury, at least of extracting its

evil principle. Mr. Deuther gives the history of this warfare at

considerable length, and with an affluence of documents which, though

not very entertaining to read, will be found convenient some time or

another for reference. We presume that most people will be interested

rather in the earlier chapters of the biography, and to these we

shall consequently give our principal attention.

John Timon was of American birth but Irish parentage. His father,

James, emigrated from the county Cavan in the latter part of 1796

or the beginning of 1797, and settled at Conewago,[8] in Adams

County, Pennsylvania, where, in a rude log-house, the subject of

this biography was born on the 12th of February, 1797, the second

of a family of ten children. The father and mother seem to have

been remarkably devout people, and from an anecdote related by Mr.

Deuther we can fancy that the lavish beneficence which characterized

the bishop was an hereditary virtue in the family. Mr. James Timon

called, one day, upon a priest whom he had known in Ireland, and,

taking it for granted that the reverend gentleman must be in want of

money, he slipped into his hand at parting a $100 bill, and hurried

away. The priest, supposing Mr. Timon had made a mistake, ran after

him, and overtook him in the street. "My dear friend," said the

generous Irishman, "it was no mistake. I intended it for you." "But,"

said the clergyman, "I assure you I am not in want; I do not need

it." "Never mind; there are many who do. If you have no use for the

money yourself, give it to the poor." The Timon family removed to

Baltimore in 1802, and there John received his school education,

such as it was. As soon as he was old enough, he became a clerk in

a dry-goods shop kept by his father; and Mr. Deuther prints a very

foolish story to the effect that he was so much liked by everybody

that by the time he was nineteen "he had become a toast for all

aged mothers with marriageable daughters," and had refused "many

eligible and grand offers of marriage," which we take the liberty of

doubting. From Baltimore the family removed, in 1818, to Louisville,

and thence in the following spring to St. Louis. Here prosperity at

last rewarded Mr. Timon's industry, and he accumulated a considerable

fortune, only to lose it, however, in the commercial crisis of 1823.

In the midst of these pecuniary misfortunes, John Timon suffered

a still heavier loss in the death of a young lady to whom he was

engaged to be married. Mr. Deuther's apology for mentioning this

incident--which he strangely characterizes as an "undeveloped

frivolity" in the life of a bishop of the church--is entirely

superfluous; he would have been a faithless biographer if he had not

mentioned it. We may look upon it as a manifestation of the kindness

of divine Providence, which called the young man to a higher and

more useful life, and designed first to break off his attachment to

all the things of this world. He heard and obeyed the call, and, in

the month of April, 1823, became a student of the Lazarists at their

preparatory seminary of St. Mary's of the Barrens, in Perry County,

Missouri, about eighty miles below St. Louis.

The Lazarists, or Priests of the Mission, had been introduced into

the United States only six years before, and their institutions,

founded, with great difficulty, in the midst of a poor and scattered

population, were still struggling with debt and discouragement. The

little establishment at the Barrens was for many years in a pitiable

condition of destitution. When Mr. Timon entered as a candidate not

only for the priesthood, but for admission to the congregation, it

was governed by the Rev. Joseph Rosati, who became, a year later,

the first Bishop of St. Louis. The buildings consisted of a few

log-houses. The largest of them, a one-story cabin, contained in

one corner the theological department, in another the schools of

philosophy and general literature, in a third the tailor's shop,

and in the fourth the shoemaker's. The refectory was a detached

log-house; and, in very bad weather, the seminarians often went to

bed supperless rather than make the journey thither in search of

their very scanty fare. It was no uncommon thing for them, of a

winter's morning, to rise from their mattresses, spread upon the

floor, and find over their blankets a covering of snow which had

drifted through the crevices of the logs. The system upon which

the seminary was supported was the same that prevails at Mount St.

Mary's. For three hours in the day the students of divinity were

expected to teach in the secular college connected with the seminary,

and for out-of-door exercise they cut fuel and worked on the farm.

Mr. Timon, in spite of these labors, made such rapid progress in

his studies that, in 1824, he was ordained sub-deacon, and began to

accompany his superiors occasionally in their missionary excursions.

They lived in the midst of spiritual destitution. The French pioneers

of the Western country had planted the faith at St. Louis and some

other prominent points, but they had left few or no traces in the

vast tracts of territory surrounding the earlier settlements, and to

most of the country people the Roman Catholic Church was no better

than a sort of aggravated pagan imposture. Protestant preachers used

to show themselves at the very doors of the churches and challenge

the priests to come out and be confuted. Wherever the Lazarists

travelled, they were looked at with the most intense curiosity. Very

few of the settlers had ever seen a priest before. The Catholics,

scattered here and there, had generally been deprived, for years, of

Mass and the sacraments, and their children were growing up utterly

ignorant of religion. Mr. Timon was accustomed to make a regular

missionary circuit of fifteen or twenty miles around the Barrens

in company with Father Odin, afterward Archbishop of New Orleans.

The duty of the sub-deacon was to preach, catechise, and instruct.

Sometimes they had no other shelter than the woods, and no other food

than wild berries. At a settlement called Apple Creek, they made a

chapel out of a large pig-pen, cleaning it out with their own hands,

building an altar, and so decorating the poor little place with

fresh boughs that it became the wonder of the neighborhood. In 1824,

Messrs. Odin and Timon made a long missionary tour on horseback. Mr.

Deuther says they went to "New Madrid, _Texas_," and thence as far

as "the Port of Arkansas." New Madrid, of course, is in Missouri,

and the Port of Arkansas undoubtedly means Arkansas Post, in the

State of Arkansas, which could not very well be reached by the way of

Texas. Along the route they travelled--where they had to swim rivers,

flounder through morasses, and sleep in the swamps--no priest had

been seen for more than thirty-five years. Their zeal, intelligence,

graceful and impassioned speech, and modest manners, seem to have

made a great impression on the settlers. They had the satisfaction of

disarming much prejudice, receiving some converts, and administering

the sacraments; and, after an interesting visit to an Indian tribe

on the Arkansas River, they returned to the Barrens. About this time

(in 1825), Mr. Timon was promoted to the priesthood and appointed a

professor at the seminary. His missionary labors were now greatly

increased. Mr. Deuther tells some interesting anecdotes of his tours,

which curiously illustrate the state of religion at that time in

the West. One day, Father Timon was summoned to Jackson, Missouri,

to visit a murderer under sentence of death. With some difficulty

he got admission to the jail, but a crowd of men, led by a Baptist

minister named Green, who was also editor of the village newspaper,

entered with him. The prisoner was found lying on a heap of straw and

chained to a post. The hostile mob refused to leave the priest alone

with him; but, in spite of their interference, Father Timon succeeded

in touching the man's heart and preparing him for the sacraments.

While they were repeating the Apostles' Creed together, the minister

pushed forward and exclaimed, "Do not make the poor man lose his soul

by teaching him the commandments of men!" and this interruption was

followed by a violent invective against Romish corruptions.

"Mr. Green," said the priest, "not long ago, I refuted all these

charges before a public meeting in the court-house of this village,

and challenged anybody who could answer me to stand forth and do so.

You were present, but you made no answer. Surely this is no time for

you to interfere--when I am preparing a man for death!"

Mr. Green's only reply was a challenge to a public controversy next

day, which Father Timon immediately accepted. The minister then

insisted upon making a rancorous polemical prayer, in the course

of which he said: "O God of mercy! save this man from the fangs

of Antichrist, who now seeks to teach him idolatry and the vain

traditions of men."

"Gentlemen," exclaimed the priest to the crowd which now filled the

dungeon, "is it right that, in a prayer to the God of charity and

truth, this man should introduce a calumny against the majority of

Christians?"

How far the extraordinary discussion might have gone it would be

hard to guess, had not the sheriff turned everybody out and locked

the jail for the night. The next morning, the debate took place

according to agreement, the district judge being appointed moderator.

After about three or four hours' speaking, Mr. Green gave up the

battle and withdrew. Father Timon kept on for an hour and a half

longer, and the result is said to have been a great Catholic revival

in the community. The prisoner, who had steadily refused to accept

the ministrations of any but a Catholic clergyman, was baptized

immediately after the debate.

On another occasion, Father Timon carried on a debate with a

Protestant clergyman--apparently a Methodist--in the court-house at

Perryville. The Methodist was easily worsted, but there was soon to

be a conference meeting some eighteen miles off, and there he felt

sure the priest would meet his match.

"Do you mean this as a challenge?"

"No; I don't invite you. I only say you can go if you choose."

Father Timon refused to go under these circumstances; but, learning

afterward that a rumor was in circulation that he had pledged

himself to be on the ground, he changed his mind, and reached the

scene of the meeting--which was in the open air--just after one of

the preachers had finished a discourse on Transubstantiation and

the Real Presence. "There is a Romish priest present," this orator

had said, "and, if he dares to come forward, the error of his ways

will be pointed out to him." So Father Timon mounted a stump, and

announced that in a quarter of an hour he would begin a discourse on

the Real Presence. This was more than the ministers had bargained

for. They had been confident he would not attend. They surrounded

him, in considerable excitement, and declared that he should not

preach. Father Timon appealed to the people, and they decided that he

should be heard. He borrowed a Bible from one of his adversaries, and

with the aid of numerous texts explained and supported the Catholic

doctrine. The discussion was long and earnest. The preachers at last

were silenced, and Father Timon continued for some time to exhort the

crowd and urge them to return to the true church. Which was, to say

the least, a curious termination for a Methodist conference meeting.

One of the most serious difficulties which the pioneer missionaries

had to encounter was the want of opportunities of private converse

with people whose hearts had been stirred by the first motions of

divine grace. The log-dwellings of the settlers rarely contained

more than one room, and that often held a pretty large family. Many

anecdotes are told of confessions made among the cornstalks in the

garden, or under the shadow of the forest, or on horseback in the

lonely roads. On one occasion Father Timon had been summoned a long

distance to visit a dying man. The cabin consisted of a single room.

When all was over, the wife of the dead man knelt beside the body

and made her confession, the rest of the family and the neighbors,

meanwhile, standing out-doors in the rain. Then the widow was

baptized into the church, and, as the storm was violent and the hour

past midnight, Father Timon slept on the bed with the corpse, while

the rest of the company disposed themselves on the floor.

Ten years had been passed in labors of this kind, when, in 1835,

letters arrived from Paris, erecting the American mission of the

Lazarists into a province, and appointing Father Timon visitor.

He accepted the charge with great reluctance and only after long

hesitation. It was indeed a heavy burden. The affairs of the

congregation were far from prosperous. The institution at the Barrens

was deeply in debt. The revenues were uncertain. The relations

between the seminary and the bishop were not entirely harmonious.

Several priests had left the community, and were serving parishes

without the permission of their superiors. To restore discipline

would be an invidious task on many accounts. But, having undertaken

the office, Father Timon did not shrink. He saved the college and

seminary from threatened extinction; he brought back his truant

brethren; he revived the spirit of zeal and self-sacrifice; he

restored harmony; he greatly improved the finances. In a short time,

he made a visit to France, and returned with a small supply of money

and a company of priests. On Christmas Eve, in 1838, he sailed

for Galveston, in order to make a report to the Holy See upon the

condition of religion in the republic of Texas. He found the country

in a sad state of spiritual destitution. The only priests were two

Mexicans at San Antonio, who lived in open concubinage. There were no

churches. There were no sacraments. Even marriage was a rite about

which the settlers were not over-particular. Father Timon did what

little he could, on a hurried tour, to remedy these evils; but a year

or two later he came back as prefect apostolic, accompanied by M.

Odin, and now he was able to introduce great reforms. Congregations

were collected, churches begun in all the largest settlements, and

the scandals at San Antonio abated. Firm in correction, but gracious

in manner, untiring in labors, insensible to fear, making long

journeys with a single companion through dangerous Indian countries,

struggling through swamps, swimming broad rivers--the prefect and

his assistant, M. Odin, travelled, foot-sore, hungry, and in rags,

through this rude wilderness, and wherever they passed they planted

the good seed and made ready the soil for the husbandmen who were to

come after them. In the principal towns and settlements they were

invariably received with honor. The court-houses or other public

rooms were placed at their disposal for religious services, and the

educated Protestant inhabitants took pains to meet them socially and

learn from them something about the faith. We find in the account of

these tours no trace of the acrimonious polemical discussions which

used to enliven the labors of the missionaries at the Barrens. There

was little or no controversy, and the priests were invited to explain

religious truth rather over the dinner-table than on the rostrum. At

the request of Mr. Timon, M. Odin was soon afterward appointed vicar

apostolic of Texas, and sent to continue the work thus happily begun.

It was in 1847 that Mr. Timon was removed from the Western field

and consecrated first Bishop of Buffalo. When he had disposed all

his affairs and made ready for his departure, his worldly goods

consisted of a small trunk about half-full of scanty clothing. He had

to borrow money enough to pay his way to New York. But meanwhile some

friends, having heard of his poverty, replenished his wardrobe, and

made up a purse of $400 for his immediate needs. He was consecrated

in the cathedral of New York by Bishops Hughes, Walsh, and McCloskey,

on the 17th of October, and reached Buffalo five days afterward. It

was evening when he arrived. An immense crowd of people--it is said

as many as 10,000--were in waiting for him at the railway station.

There were bands of music, banners, and flambeaux, a four-horse

carriage for the bishop, and a long torchlight procession to escort

him home. It is reported--but the biographer gives the story with

some reserve--that, after the _cortége_ had gone some distance,

the humble bishop was discovered, valise in hand, trudging afoot

through the rain and mud, behind the coach in which he was supposed

to be riding. In after-times he must have sadly compared the cordial

greeting of his flock on this night with the trials, the insults, the

persecutions, which he had to bear from some of the very same people

during almost the whole of his episcopate. We shall not enlarge upon

the history of these sad years. The scandals which arose from the

factious and schismatical spirit of the trustees of the Church of

St. Louis in Buffalo are too recent to have been forgotten by our

readers. The troubles began while Bishop Timon was still a humble

missionary in Missouri. They had been quelled by the firmness of

Bishop Hughes, but they broke out again very soon after the creation

of the new diocese, and Bishop Timon suffered from them to the end

of his life. Having no cathedral and no house, he lodged when

he first arrived with the pastor of St. Louis's, but he had been

there only a few weeks when the trustees, in their mad jealousy of

possible invasion of their imaginary rights, requested him to find

a home somewhere else. This brutal behavior was the beginning of a

long warfare. Those who may care about studying it will find the

necessary documents in Mr. Deuther's book. Let us rather devote the

short space remaining at our disposal to a description of some of

the charming traits of character of the holy man who crowned a life

of incessant labor with an old age of suffering. From the moment of

his elevation to the episcopal dignity, the sacred simplicity of his

disposition seems to have daily increased. If the anecdote of his

behavior at the torchlight reception is not true, it is at any rate

consistent with his character. Bishop Hughes declared that the Bishop

of Buffalo was the humblest man he had ever known. Though he was

very neat and precise in everything relating to the service of the

sanctuary, rags of any kind seemed to him "good enough for the old

bishop," and it was only by stealth, so to speak, that his friends

could keep his wardrobe tolerably well supplied. In his visits to the

seminary it was his delight to talk familiarly with the young men.

At the orphan asylum the children used to ride on his back. Visiting

strange churches, he would kneel in the confessional like any other

penitent. In his private and official intercourse with his clergy, it

was not unusual for him to beg pardon with the utmost humility for

fancied acts of injustice. On one occasion he had slightly rebuked

a priest for some irregularity. Satisfied afterward that the rebuke

had not been deserved, he invited the priest to dinner, placed him

at the head of the table, treated him with marked distinction, and

afterward, taking him to his own room, in the presence of another

bishop, threw himself upon his knees and begged to be forgiven. In

the course of a visitation to a disturbed parish, a member of the

congregation he was addressing publicly spat in the bishop's face.

He took no notice of the occurrence, but went on with his remarks.

"Never shall I forget," wrote the late distinguished Jesuit, Father

Smarius, "the days of the missions for the laity and of the retreats

for the clergy which I had the pleasure to conduct in the cathedral

of Buffalo during the three or four years previous to his holy

demise. The first to rise in the morning and to ring the bell for

meditation and for prayer, he would totter from door to door along

the corridors of the episcopal residence, with a lighted candle in

his hand, to see whether all had responded to the call of the bell

and betaken themselves to the spot marked out for the performance of

that sacred and wholesome duty.... And then, that more than fatherly

heart, that forgiving kindness to repentant sinners, even such as had

again and again deservedly incurred his displeasure and the penalties

of ecclesiastical censures or excommunications. 'Father,' he would

say, 'I leave this case in your hands. I give you all power, only

save his soul.' And then, that simple, child-like humility, which

seemed wounded by even the performance of acts which the excellence

and dignity of the episcopacy naturally force from its subjects and

inferiors. How often have I seen him fall on his aged knees, face

to face with one or other of my clerical brethren, who had fallen

on theirs to receive his saintly blessing!" He took great pains to

cultivate the virtue of humility in his clergy. A proud priest he

had little hope for. To those who complained of the hardships of

the mission, he would answer, "Why did you become a priest? It was

to suffer, to be persecuted, according to the example laid down by

our Lord Jesus Christ." In the strictness with which he tried to

watch over the spiritual welfare of his clergy, and changed their

positions when he thought the good of their souls required it, his

rule was like that of the superior of a monastery rather than the

head of a diocese. He was filled to a remarkable decree with the

spirit of prayer. He began no labor, decided no question, without

long and fervent supplication for the divine assistance. On occasions

of festivity or ceremony, he loved to steal away to the quiet of

the sanctuary, and under the shadow of a column in the cathedral

to pass long hours in meditation. In travelling he was often seen

kneeling in his seat in the cars. His household was always ordered

like a religious community. The day began and ended with prayer and

meditation in common. The bishop rose at five, and in the evening

retired early to his room--not to sleep, but to pass most of the

night in devotion, study, and writing. Up to the very close of his

life he used to set out in the depth of winter to visit distant

parishes unannounced, starting from the house before any one else

was awake, and trudging painfully through the snow with his bag in

his hand. Religious communities, when they assembled for morning

devotions, were often surprised to find the bishop on his knees

waiting for them. By these sudden visits he was sometimes enabled to

correct irregularities, which he never suffered to pass unrebuked;

but he used to say that in dealing with others he would rather be too

lax than too severe, as he hoped to be judged mercifully by Almighty

God.

Mr. Deuther, in attempting to show that the bishop had to conquer

a naturally quick temper, has created an impression, we fear, that

this saintly man was irascible if not violent in his disposition.

It is most earnestly to be hoped that no one will conceive such an

utterly wrong idea. Mr. Deuther himself corrects his own unguarded

language, and it is only necessary to read the book carefully to see

that he does not mean what at first glance he seems not to say, but

to imply. Nobody who knew Bishop Timon will hesitate to call him one

of the kindest and most amiable of men; whatever faults he may have

had, nobody will think of mentioning a hot temper as one of them.

The sweetness of his disposition was in correspondence with the

tenderness of his heart. The patience with which he bore the sorrows

of his episcopate was equalled by the keenness with which he felt

them. Toward the close of his life several anonymous communications,

accusing him of cruelty, avarice, injustice, and many other

faults--of cruelty, this man whose heart was as soft as a woman's--of

avarice, this charitable soul, who gave away everything he had, and

left himself at times not even a change of linen--of injustice, this

bishop who pardoned every one but himself--were sent him in the form

of printed circulars. So deeply was he wounded that his biographer

is assured that the incident hastened his death; he never was the

same man afterward. At the end of the next diocesan synod he knelt

before his priests, and, in a voice broken by tears, asked pardon of

every one present whom he might have in any manner treated unjustly.

He died on the 16th of April, 1867, after a rapid but gradual decay

whose termination he himself was the first to foresee, and his last

hours were as beautiful and inspiring as his years of holy labor.

FOOTNOTES:

[7] _The Life and Times of the Right Rev. John Timon, D.D._, First

Roman Catholic Bishop of Buffalo. By Charles G. Deuther. Buffalo:

published by the Author.

[8] Mr. Deuther incorrectly calls this Conevago.

GUALBERTO'S VICTORY.

A mountain-pass, so narrow that a man

Riding that way to Florence, stooping, can

Touch with his hand the rocks on either side,

And pluck the flowers that in the crannies hide--

Here, on Good Friday, centuries ago,

Mounted and armed, John Gualbert met his foe,

Mounted and armed as well, but riding down

To the fair city from the woodland brown,

This way and that swinging his jewell'd whip,

A gay old love-song on his careless lip.

An accidental meeting--yet the sun

Burned on their brows as if it had been one

Of deep design, so deadly was the look

Of mutual hate their olive faces took,

As (knightly courtesy forgot in wrath)

Neither would yield his enemy the path.

"Back!" cried Gaulberto. "Never!" yelled his foe.

And on the instant, sword in hand, they throw

Them from their saddles, nothing loth,

And fall to fighting with a smothered oath.

A pair of shapely, stalwart cavaliers,

Well-matched in stature, weapons, weight, and years,

Theirs was a long, fierce struggle on the grass,

Thrusting and parrying up and down the pass,

Swaying from left to right, till blood-drops oozed

Upon the rocks, and head and hands were bruised;

But at its close, when Gualbert stopped to rest,

His heel was planted on his foeman's breast;

And, looking up, the fallen courtier sees,

As in a dream, gray rocks and waving trees

Before his glazing eyes begin to float,

While Gualbert's sabre glitters at his throat.

"Now die, base wretch!" the victor fiercely cries,

His heart of hate outflashing from his eyes.

"Never again, by the all-righteous Lord,

Shalt thou with life escape this trusty sword!

Revenge is sweet!" And upward flash'd the steel,

But e'er it fell--dear Lord! a silvery peal

Of voices, chanting in the town below,

Rose, like a fountain's spray, from spires of snow,

And chimed, and chimed, to die in echoes slow.

In the sweet silence following the sound,

Gualberto and the man upon the ground

Glared at each other with bewildered eyes.

And then the latter, struggling to rise,

Made one last effort, while his face grew dark

With pleading agony: "Gualberto! hark!

The chant--the hour--you know the olden fashion--

The monks below intone Our Lord's dear Passion.

Oh! by this cross"--and here he caught the hilt

Of Gualbert's sword--"and by the blood once spilt

Upon it for us both long years ago,

Forgive--forget--and spare your fallen foe!"

The face that bent above grew white and set,

The lips were drawn, the brow bedew'd with sweat,

But on the grass the harmless sword was flung,

And, stooping down, the generous hero wrung

The outstretched hand. Then, lest he lose control

Of the but half-tamed passions of his soul,

Fled up the pathway, tearing casque and coat,

To ease the throbbing tempest at his throat--

Fled up the crags, as if a fiend pursued,

Nor paused until he reached the chapel rude.

There, in the cool, dim stillness, on his knees,

Trembling, he flings himself, and, startled, sees

Set in the rock a crucifix antique,

From which the wounded Christ bends down to speak:

"_Thou hast done well, Gualberto. For my sake

Thou didst forgive thine enemy; now take

My gracious pardon for thy years of sin,

And from this day a better life begin._"

White flash'd the angels' wings above his head,

Rare subtile perfumes thro' the place were shed;

And golden harps and sweetest voices pour'd

Their glorious hosannas to the Lord,

Who, in that hour and in that chapel quaint,

Changed, by his power, by his sweet love's constraint,

Gualbert the sinner into John the saint.

OUR LADY OF LOURDES.

FROM THE FRENCH OF HENRI LASSERRE.

PART SIXTH.

I.

The enemies of "superstition" had lost a good deal of ground in

their desperate struggle against the events which for the last ten

or twelve weeks had scandalized their distressed philosophy. As it

had become impossible to deny the existence of the fountain whose

pure streams were flowing before the eyes of the amazed people, so it

was becoming impossible to continue denying the reality of the cures

which were being worked, continually and in many places, by the use

of this mysterious water.

At first the incredulous had shrugged their shoulders at the report

of these cures, taking the simple course of denying them out-and-out,

and refusing to make any examination. Then some skilful persons had

invented several false miracles, to enjoy an easy triumph in refuting

them. But they had very soon been confounded by the multiplicity of

these wonderful cures, of which a few have been mentioned. The facts

were evident. They became so numerous and so striking that it was

necessary, however painful it might be, either to acknowledge their

miraculous nature or find some natural explanation for them.

The free-thinkers, then, understood that, unless they were willing

either to surrender or to deny in the face of complete evidence, it

was absolutely necessary to take up some new line of tactics.

The most intelligent of the clique, indeed, saw that things had

already gone too far, and perceived the grave error which they

had committed at the outset in denying prematurely and without

examination facts which had afterward become patent and perfectly

well established, such as the appearance of the fountain, and the

cures of a great number of many who were notoriously incurable by

natural means, and who were now to be seen going about the streets

of the town in perfect health. What made the mistake worse and

almost irreparable was that these unfortunate denials of the most

well-attested events were authentically and officially recorded in

all the newspapers of the department.

II.

The greater part of the cures effected by the Massabielle water

had a character of rapidity, nay, even of instantaneousness, which

clearly showed the immediate action of sovereign power. There were

some, however, which did not present this evidently supernatural

appearance, being accomplished after baths or draughts repeated a few

or many times, and in a slow and gradual manner--resembling somewhat

in their mode the ordinary course of natural cures, though in reality

different.

In a village called Gez, near Lourdes, a little child of seven years

had been the subject of one of these cures, of a mixed character,

which, according to one's natural inclination, might be attributed

to a special grace of God or to the unaided forces of nature. This

child, named Lasbareilles, had been born entirely deformed, with a

double curvature of the back and breast-bone. His thin and almost

withered legs were useless from their extreme weakness; the poor

little boy had never been able to walk, but was always either sitting

or lying down. When he had to move, his mother carried him in her

arms. Sometimes, indeed, the child, resting on the edge of the table

or helped by his mother's hand, could manage to keep himself up and

to take a few steps; but it was at the cost of violent efforts and

immense fatigue. The physician of the place had professed himself

unable to cure him; and the disease being organic, no remedy had ever

been resorted to.

The parents of this unfortunate child, having heard of the miracles

of Lourdes, had procured some of the water from the grotto; and in

the course of a fortnight had applied it on three different occasions

to the body of the little fellow without obtaining any effect. But

their faith was not discouraged on that account; if hope was banished

from the world, it would still remain in the hearts of mothers. A

fourth application was made on Holy Thursday, the first of April,

1858. That day the child took several steps without assistance.

The bathings from that time became more and more efficacious, and the

health of the patient gradually improved. After three or four weeks,

he became strong enough to walk almost as well as other people. We

say "almost," for there was still in his gait a certain awkwardness,

which seemed like a reminiscence of his original infirmity. The

thinness of his legs had slowly disappeared together with their

weakness, and the deformity of his chest was almost entirely

gone. All the people of the village of Gez, knowing his previous

condition, said that it was a miracle. Were they right or wrong?

Whatever our own opinion may be, there is certainly much to be said

on both sides of the question.

Another child, Denys Bouchet, of the town of Lamarque, in the canton

of Ossun, had also been cured of a general paralysis in very much the

same way. A young man of twenty-seven years, Jean Louis Amaré, who

was subject to epileptic fits, had been completely though gradually

cured of his terrible malady solely by the use of the water of

Massabielle.

Some other similar cases had also occurred.[9]

III.

If we were not acquainted with the wonderfully varied forms which

supernatural cures have assumed since the Christian era, we might

perhaps be inclined to believe that Providence had thus disposed

things at this moment to cause proud human philosophy to catch

itself in its own nets, and to destroy itself with its own hands.

But let us not think that there was in this case such a snare on the

part of God. He lies in ambush for no one. But truth in its normal

and regular developments, the logic of which is unknown to human

philosophy, is of itself an eternal snare for error.

However this may be, the _savants_ and physicians of the country

hastened to find in these various cures, the cause of which was

doubtful, though their reality and progressive nature were well

ascertained, an admirable opportunity and an excellent pretext to

effect that change of base which the increasing evidence of facts

made absolutely necessary.

Ceasing, therefore, to ascribe these cures to such a commonplace

cause as imagination, they loudly attributed them to the natural

virtues which this remarkable water, which had been discovered by the

merest chance, undoubtedly possessed. To give this explanation was of

course equivalent to recognizing the cures.

Let the reader recall the beginning of this story, when a little

shepherdess, going out to gather some dead wood, claimed to have seen

a shining apparition. Let him remember the sneers of the great men of

Lourdes, the shrugging of shoulders at the club, the supreme contempt

with which these strong-minded individuals received this childish

nonsense; what progress the supernatural had made; and how much

incredulity, science, and philosophy had lost, since the first events

which had so suddenly occurred at the lonely grotto on the banks of

the Gave.

The miraculous had, if we may use such an expression, taken the

offensive. Free thought, lately so proud and confident in its

attacks, was now pursued by facts and obliged to defend itself.

The representatives of philosophy and science were none the less

positive, however, and showed as much disdain as ever for the popular

superstition.

"Well, be it so," said they, affecting a tone of good humor and the

air of good faith. "We acknowledge that the water of the grotto

cures certain maladies. What can be more simple? What need is

there of having recourse to miracles, supernatural graces, and

divine intervention to explain effects similar to, if not even

exactly the same as, those of the thousand springs which, from

Vichy or Baden-Baden to Luchon, act with such efficacy on the human

system? The Massabielle water has merely some very powerful mineral

qualities, like those which are found in the springs of Barèges or

Cauterets, a little higher up in the mountains. The grotto of Lourdes

has no connection with religion, but comes within the province of

medical science."

A letter, which we take at random from our documents, presents better

than we could the attitude of the _savants_ of the neighborhood

regarding the wonders worked by the Massabielle water. This letter,

written by an eminent physician of that region, Dr. Lary, who had

no faith whatever in the miraculous explanations of the cures, was

addressed by him to a member of the faculty:

"OSSUN, April 28, 1858.

"I hasten, my dear sir, to send you the details which

you ask of me in regard to the case of the woman Galop

of our commune.

"This woman, in consequence of rheumatism in the left

hand, had lost the power of holding anything with it.

Hence, if she wished to wash or carry a glass with this

hand, she was very apt to drop it, and she was obliged

to give up drawing water from the well, because this

hand was unable to hold the rope. For more than eight

months she had not made her bed and had not spun a

single skein of thread.

"Now, after a single journey to Lourdes, where she

made use of the water internally and externally, she

spins with ease, _makes her bed, draws water, washes

and carries the glasses and dishes, and, in short, uses

this hand as well as the other_.

"The movements of the left hand are not yet _quite_ as

free as before the illness, but 90 per cent. of the

power that had been lost before the use of the water

from the grotto at Lourdes has been restored. The woman

proposes, however, to go again to the grotto. I shall

ask her to pass your way that you may see her, and

convince yourself of all that I have said.

"You will find, in examining her case, an incomplete

anchylosis of the lower joint of the forefinger. If the

repeated use of the water of the grotto destroys this

morbid condition, it will be an additional proof of its

alkaline properties.[10]

"In conclusion, I beg you to believe me yours very

faithfully,

"LARY, M.D."

This explanation, once admitted and considered as certain in

advance, the doctors were less unwilling to accept the cures worked

by the water of the grotto; and from this period they set to work

to generalize their thesis, and to apply it almost without any

distinction to all cases, even to those which were marked by the

most amazing rapidity, which could by no means be ascribed to the

ordinary action of mineral waters. The learned personages of the

place got out of this difficulty by attributing to the water of the

grotto extremely powerful properties, such as had been previously

unknown. It mattered little that they discarded all the laws of

nature in their theories, provided that heaven got no profit thence.

They willingly admitted the preternatural in order to get rid of the

supernatural.

There were among the faithful some perverse and troublesome persons,

who by impertinent remarks interfered with the profound conclusions

of the scientific coterie.

"How," they said, "is it that this mineral spring, so extraordinarily

powerful that it works instantaneous cures, was found by Bernadette

when in a state of ecstasy, and came after her accounts of certain

celestial visions, and apparently in support of them? How did it

happen that the fountain sprang out precisely at the moment when

Bernadette believed herself to hear a heavenly voice telling her to

drink and bathe? And how is it that this fountain, which appeared

suddenly under the eyes of all the people in such very unusual

circumstances, yields not ordinary water, but a water which, as you

yourselves acknowledge, has already cured so many sick persons whose

cases had been abandoned as hopeless, and who have used it without

medical advice, and merely in the spirit of religious faith?"

These objections, repeated under many different forms, provoked the

free-thinkers, philosophers, and _savants_ exceedingly. They tried

to evade them by answers which were really so poor and miserable

that they ought, one would think, to have hardly presented a good

appearance even in their authors' eyes; but then, to find any others

was no doubt very difficult.

"Why not?" said they. "Coffee was discovered by a goat. A shepherd

found by chance the waters of Luchon. It was also by accident

that the ruins of Pompeii were brought to light by the pickaxe of

a laborer. Why should we be so much surprised that this little

girl, while amusing herself by digging in the ground during her

hallucination, should have come upon a spring, and that the water

of this spring should be mineral and alkaline? That she imagined

at the moment that the Blessed Virgin was before her, and that

she heard a voice directing her to the fountain, is merely a

coincidence, entirely accidental, but of which superstition tries to

make a miracle. On this occasion, as on the others, chance has done

everything, and has been the real discoverer."

The faithful were not, however, moved by this sort of argument.

They had the bad taste to think that to explain everything by

accidental coincidence was to do violence to reason under the

pretext of defending it. This irritated the free-thinkers, who,

though acknowledging at last the reality of the cures, deplored more

than ever the religious and supernatural character which the common

people insisted upon giving to these strange events; and, as was

natural under the circumstances, they were inclined to resort to

force to stop the popular movement. "If these waters are mineral,"

they began to say, "they belong to the state or to the municipality;

people should not use them except by the advice of a doctor; and an

establishment for baths should be built at the spot, not a chapel."

The science of Lourdes, forced to assent to the facts in this case,

had arrived at the state of mind just described when the measures of

the prefect, relative to the objects deposited in the grotto, and the

attempt to imprison Bernadette under the pretext of insanity, were

announced--this attempt, as we have seen, having been defeated by the

unexpected intervention of the curé, M. Peyramale.

IV.

A certain and official basis for all these theses of the desperate

adherents of the medical theory was still a desideratum. M. Massy

had already bethought himself of asking such a basis from one of the

most wonderful and indubitable sciences of the age--namely, that

of chemistry. With this view, he had applied, through the mayor of

Lourdes, to a chemist of some distinction in the department--M.

Latour de Trie.

To show, not in detail by the examination of each special case, but

once for all, that these cures which were rising up as formidable

objections were naturally explained by the chemical constitution

of the new spring, seemed to him a masterstroke; and he considered

that, in accomplishing it, he would lay science and philosophy under

obligation, not to mention also the administration, represented by

the minister, M. Rouland.

Seeing that it was impossible to have Bernadette arrested as insane,

he urged the analysis, which was to show officially the mineral

and healing qualities of the water. It was becoming imperatively

necessary to get rid of the intrusive supernatural power which,

after having produced the fountain, was now curing the sick people,

and threatening to pass all bounds. Though its abominable influence

should continue strong in many quarters, a really official analysis

might be of great service.

The chemist of the prefecture, therefore, set to work to make this

precious investigation of the water from Massabielle, and, with a

good conscience, if not with perfect science, he found at the bottom

of his crucibles a solution perfectly agreeing with the explanations

of the doctors, the reasonings of the philosophers, and the desires

of the prefect. But was truth also as well satisfied with it as the

prefecture, the philosophers, and the faculty? At first, perhaps,

this question was not proposed, but it lay in store for a future

occasion. But, not to consider this for the present, let us see

what was this analysis which M. Latour de Trie, chemist of the

administration, addressed officially, on the 6th of May, to the mayor

of Lourdes, and which the latter immediately forwarded to the Baron

Massy:

"CHEMICAL ANALYSIS.

"The water of the grotto of Lourdes is very clear,

without smell or decided taste. Its specific gravity is

very nearly that of distilled water. Its temperature at

the spring is 15° Cent. (59° Fahr.)

"It contains the following elements:

"1st. Chlorides of sodium, calcium and magnesium in

abundance.[11]

"2d. Carbonates of lime and of magnesia.

"3d. Silicates of lime and of alumina.

"4th. Oxide of iron.

"5th. Sulphate and carbonate of soda.

"6th. Phosphate (traces).

"7th. Organic matter--ulmine.

"The complete absence of sulphate of lime in this water

is also established by this analysis.

"This remarkable peculiarity is entirely to its

advantage, and entitles it to be considered as very

favorable to digestion, and as giving to the animal

economy a disposition favorable to the equilibrium of

the vital action.

"We do not think it imprudent to say, in consideration

of the number and quality of the substances which

compose it, that medical science will, perhaps, soon

recognize in it special curative properties which

will entitle it to be classed among the waters which

constitute the mineral wealth of our department.

"Be pleased to accept, etc.

"A. LATOUR DE TRIE."

The civil order is not so well disciplined as the military, and,

through misunderstanding, false steps are occasionally taken in

it. The prefect, in the multitude of his avocations, had omitted

to give his orders to the editors of the official newspaper of the

department, the _Ere Impériale_, so that, while the chemist of the

prefecture said white, its journalist said black; while the former

was recognizing in the spring at Lourdes one of the future medical

and mineral treasures of the Pyrenees, the latter was calling it

dirty water, and joking about the cures which had been obtained.

"It is needless to say," he wrote on the precise day on which M.

Latour de Trie sent in his report--that is, on the 6th of May--"that

the famous grotto turns out miracles in abundance, and that our

department is inundated with them. At every corner you will meet with

people who tell you of a thousand cures obtained by the use of some

dirty water.

"The doctors will soon have nothing to do, and the rheumatic and

consumptive people will have disappeared from the department," etc.

Notwithstanding these discrepancies, which might have been avoided,

it must be acknowledged that Baron Massy was, on the whole, attentive

to his business. On the 4th of May, at about noon, he had delivered

his address to the mayors of the canton of Lourdes, and given his

orders. On the 4th of May, in the evening, the grotto had been

stripped of the offerings and _ex-votos_. On the morning of the 5th,

he had ascertained the impossibility of having Bernadette arrested,

and had abandoned this measure. On the 6th, in the evening, he

received the analysis of his chemist. Fortified with this important

document, he waited the course of events.

What was about to take place at Lourdes? What would happen at the

grotto? What would be done by Bernadette, whose every movement was

watched by the Argus eyes of Jacomet and of his agents? Would not

the fountain at the grotto disappear in the coming hot weather,

and thus put an end to the whole business? What attitude would the

people assume? Such were the hopes and anxieties of the Baron Massy,

imperial prefect.

V.

At the grotto the miraculous fountain continued to flow, abundant and

clear, with that character of quiet perpetuity which is generally

found in springs coming from the rock.

The supernatural apparition did not cease to assert its existence,

and to prove it by benefits conferred.

The grace of God continued to descend visibly and invisibly upon the

people, sometimes quick as the lightning which flashes through the

clouds, sometimes gradual like the light of dawn.

We can only speak of those graces which were external and manifest.

At six or seven kilometres (four miles) from Lourdes, at Loubajac,

lived a good woman, a peasant, who had formerly been accustomed to

labor, but whom an accident had for eighteen months past reduced to

a most painful inaction. Her name was Catherine Latapie-Chouat. In

October, 1856, having climbed an oak to knock down some acorns, she

had lost her balance, and suffered a violent fall, which caused a

severe dislocation of the right arm and hand. The reduction--as is

stated in the report and the official statement, which are now before

us--though performed immediately by an able surgeon, and though

it nearly restored the arm to its normal state, had nevertheless

not prevented an extreme weakness in it. The most intelligent and

continuous treatment had been ineffectual in removing the stiffness

of the three most important fingers of the hand. The thumb and first

two fingers remained obstinately bent and paralyzed, so that it was

impossible either to straighten them or to enable them to move in the

least. The unfortunate peasant, still young enough for much labor,

for she was hardly thirty-eight, could not sew, spin, knit, or take

care of the house. The doctor, after having treated her case for a

long time without success, had told her that it was incurable, and

that she must resign herself to give up the use of that hand. This

sentence, from such a reliable authority, was for the poor woman the

announcement of an irreparable misfortune. The poor have no resource

but work; for them compulsory inaction is inevitable misery.

Catherine had become pregnant nine or ten months after the accident,

and her time was approaching at the date of our narrative. One

night she awaked with a sudden thought or inspiration. "An interior

spirit," to quote her own words to myself, "said to me as it were

with irresistible force, 'Go to the grotto! go to the grotto, and

you will be cured!'" Who this mysterious being was who spoke thus,

and whom this ignorant peasant--ignorant at least as far as human

knowledge is concerned--called a "spirit," is no doubt known by her

angel guardian.

It was three o'clock in the morning. Catherine called two of her

children who were large enough to accompany her.

"Do you remain to work," said she to her husband. "I am going to the

grotto."

"In your present condition it is impossible," replied he; "to go to

Lourdes and return is full three leagues."

"Nothing is impossible. I am going to get cured."

No objection had the least effect upon her, and she set out with her

two children. It was a fine moonlight night; but the awful silence,

occasionally broken by strange and mysterious sounds, the solitude of

the plains only dimly visible, and seemingly peopled by vague forms,

terrified the children. They trembled, and would have stopped at

every step had not Catherine reassured them. She had no fear, and

felt that she was going to the fountain of life.

She arrived at Lourdes at daybreak, and happened to meet Bernadette.

Some one telling her who it was, Catherine, without saying anything,

approached the child blessed by the Lord and beloved by Mary, and

touched her dress humbly. Then she continued her journey to the rocks

of Massabielle, where, in spite of the early hour, a great many

pilgrims were already assembled and were on their knees.

Catherine and her children also knelt and prayed. Then she rose, and

quietly bathed her hand in the marvellous water.

Her fingers immediately straightened, became flexible, and under her

control. The Blessed Virgin had cured the incurable.

What did Catherine do? She was not surprised. She did not utter a

cry, but again fell on her knees, and gave thanks to God and to Mary.

For the first time for eighteen months, she prayed with her hands

joined, and clasped the resuscitated fingers with the others.

She remained thus for a long time, absorbed in an act of

thanksgiving. Such moments are sweet; the soul is glad to forget

itself, and thinks that it is in Paradise.

But violent sufferings recalled Catherine to the earth--this earth of

sighs and tears, where the curse pronounced upon the guilty mother

of the human race has never ceased to be felt by her innumerable

posterity. We have said that Catherine was very near her confinement,

and as she was still upon her knees she found herself suddenly seized

by the terrible pains of childbirth. She shuddered, seeing that there

would be no time to go even to Lourdes, and that her delivery was

about to occur in the presence of the surrounding multitude. And for

a moment she looked around with terror and anguish.

But this terror did not last long.

Catherine returned to the Queen whom nature obeys.

"Good Mother," said she simply, "you have just shown me so great a

favor, I know you will spare me the shame of being delivered before

all these people, and at least grant that I may return home before

giving birth to my child."

Immediately all her pains ceased, and the interior spirit of whom she

spoke to us, and who, we believe, was her angel guardian, said to her:

"Do not be alarmed. Set out with confidence; you will arrive safely."

"Let us go home now," said Catherine to her two children.

Accordingly she took the road to Loubajac, holding them by the hand,

without intimating to any one her critical state, and without showing

any uneasiness, even to the midwife of her own village, who happened

to be there in the midst of the crowd of pilgrims. With inexpressible

happiness she quietly traversed the long and rough road which

separated her from home. The two children were not afraid of it now;

the sun was risen, and their mother was cured.

As soon as she returned, she wished still to pray; but immediately

her pains returned. In a quarter of an hour she was the mother of a

third son.[12]

At the same time, a woman of Lamarque, Marianne Garrot, had been

relieved in less than ten days, merely by lotions with the water

from the grotto, of a white eruption which had covered her whole

face, and which for two years had resisted all treatment. Dr.

Amadou, of Pontacq, her physician, was satisfied of the fact, and

was an incontestable witness of it subsequently before the episcopal

commission.[13]

At Bordères, near Nay, the widow Marie Lanou-Domengé, eighty years

old, had been for three years a sufferer from an incomplete paralysis

in the whole left side. She could not take a step without assistance,

and was unable to do any work.

Dr. Poueymiroo, of Mirepoix, after having ineffectually used some

remedies to restore life in the palsied parts, though continuing his

visits, had abandoned medical treatment of the case.

Hope, however, is with difficulty extinguished in the hearts of the

sick.

"When shall I get well?" the good woman would say to Dr. Poueymiroo,

every time that he came.

"You will get well when the good God sees fit," was the invariable

reply of the doctor, who was far from suspecting the prophetic nature

of his words.

"Why should I not believe what he says, and throw myself directly on

the divine goodness?" said the old peasant woman one day to herself,

when she heard people talking of the fountain of Massabielle.

Accordingly, she sent some one to Lourdes to get at the spring itself

a little of this healing water.

When it was brought to her, she was much excited.

"Take me out of bed," said she, "and hold me up."

They took her out, and dressed her hurriedly. Both the actors and

spectators in this scene were somewhat disturbed.

Two persons held her up, placing their hands under her shoulders.

A glass of water from the grotto was presented to her.

She extended her trembling hand toward the quickening water and

dipped her fingers in it. Then she made a great sign of the cross on

herself, raised the glass to her lips, and slowly drank the contents,

no doubt absorbed in fervent and silent prayer.

She became so pale that they thought for the moment that she was

going to faint.

But while they were exerting themselves to prevent her from falling,

she rose with a quick and joyful movement and looked around. Then she

cried out with a voice of triumph:

"Let me go--quick! I am cured."

Those who were holding her withdrew their arms partially and with

some hesitation. She immediately freed herself from them, and walked

with as much confidence as if she had never been ill.

Some one, however, who still had some fear of the result, offered her

a stick to lean on.

She looked at it with a smile; then took it and contemptuously threw

it far away, as a thing which was no longer of use. And from that

day, she employed herself as before in hard out-door work.

Some visitors, who came to see her and to convince themselves of the

fact, asked her to walk in their presence.

"Walk, did you say? I will run for you!" And, true to her word, she

began to run.

This occurred in the month of May. In the following July, the people

pointed out the vigorous octogenarian as a curiosity, as she mowed

the grain, and was by no means the last in the hard labors of the

harvest.

Her physician, the excellent Dr. Poueymiroo, praised God for this

evident miracle, and subsequently, with the examining commission,

signed the procès-verbal on the extraordinary events which we have

just related, in which he did not hesitate to recognize "the direct

and evident action of divine power."[14]

TO BE CONTINUED.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] We think it well to say that no one of these cures, except that

of Denys Bouchet, whom the physicians had pronounced absolutely and

constitutionally incurable, was declared to be miraculous by the

episcopal commission which will be mentioned further on. For these

cures, the 10th, 11th, and 16th _procès verbaux_ of the commission

may be consulted. Whatever the probability of divine intervention may

be in such cases, the church before proclaiming a miracle requires

_that no natural explanation of the fact should be possible_, and

sets aside, without affirming or denying, every case in which this

condition is not found. She is content to say _Nescio_.

We shall hereafter have occasion to speak of the work of the

commission.

[10] The patient was, in fact, entirely cured at the second visit to

Lourdes.

[11] The presence of chloride of sodium (common salt), to say nothing

of the others, _in abundance_, without a decided taste in the water,

is a little mysterious. The original reads: "Chlorures de soude, de

chaux et de magnésie: abondants."--NOTE BY TRANSLATOR.

[12] The reader will perhaps like to see the reports of the episcopal

commission on this case:

"Hardly had Catherine Latapie-Chouat plunged her hand into the water,

than she felt herself to be entirely cured; her fingers recovered

their natural suppleness and elasticity, so that she could quickly

open and shut them, and use them with as much ease as before the

accident of October, 1856.

"From that time she has had no more trouble with them.

"The deformity of the hand of Catherine Latapie, and the

impossibility of using it, being due to an anchylosis of the joints

of the fingers, and to a complete lesion of the nerves or the flexor

tendons, it is certain that the case was a very serious one; as also

by the uselessness of all the means of cure used during eighteen

months, and by the avowal of the physician, who had declared to this

woman that her condition was irremediable.

"Nevertheless, in spite of the failure of such long and repeated

attempts, the employment of various active healing agents, and

the statement of the physician, this severe lesion disappeared

immediately. Now, this sudden disappearance of the infirmity, and

restoration of the fingers to their original state, is evidently

beyond and above the usual course of nature, and of the laws which

govern the efficacy of its agents.

"The means by which this result has been brought about leave no

doubt in this respect, and establish this conclusion incontestably.

In fact, it has been averred(a) that the Massabielle water is of

an ordinary character, without the least curative properties. It

cannot, then, by its natural action, have straightened the fingers of

Catherine Latapie and restored their suppleness and agility, which

had not been accomplished by the scientific remedies which were so

various and used for so long a time. The wonderful result, then,

which the mere touch of this water immediately produced, cannot be

ascribed to it, but we must rise to a superior cause, and do homage

for it to a supernatural power, of which the water of Massabielle has

been, as it were, the veil and inert instrument.

"Besides, if ordinary water had been possessed of such a prodigious

power, Catherine Latapie would have experienced its effect long

before by the daily use which she made of it in washing herself and

her children; for she had daily employed for this purpose water

exactly similar to that at the grotto."--_Extract from the 15th

procès-verbal of the commission._

(a): This was, in fact, authentically averred, the administrative

analysis to the contrary notwithstanding, at the time of the

_procès-verbaux_ of the commission.

[13] We will also give the conclusions of the commission on this

point.

"An eruptive affection of this sort might not of itself have a

very grave character, nor threaten serious danger or disastrous

consequences. Still, that from which Marianne Garrot had suffered

would indicate by its duration, by its resistance to the treatment

which had been prescribed and faithfully followed, and by its

continual and progressive spreading, a very decidedly malignant

character, the inoculation, so to speak, of a deeply seated _virus_,

to expel which would require long and persevering attention, with a

patient continuance of the treatment already adopted or of some other

more appropriate and effectual one.

"The rapid though not instantaneous disappearance of the white

eruption from the face of the patient is very different from the

usual effect of chemical preparations; for the first lotion produced

a perceptible improvement or partial cure _instantaneously_, which

was advanced by the second, made four days afterward; and without the

aid of any other remedy, these two lotions accomplished a complete

restoration in a few days by a gradual and rapid progress.

"Now, the liquid the employment of which produced this speedy effect

was nothing but water, without any special properties, and without

any relation or appropriateness to the disease which it overcame;

and which, besides, if it had possessed any such qualities, would

long before have produced the effect through the daily use which the

patient made of it for drinking and washing.

"This cure cannot, then, be ascribed to the natural efficacy of

the Massabielle water, and all the circumstances, as it would

seem--namely, the tenacity and activity of the eruption, the

rapidity of the cure, and the inappropriateness of the element which

brought it about--concur to show in it a cause foreign and superior

to natural agents."--_Extract from the 15th procès-verbal of the

commission._

[14] Ninth procès-verbal of the commission.

OUR NORTHERN NEIGHBORS.

In the adjustment of differences to which conflicting interests or

a spirit of rivalry may give birth, governments, like individuals,

are prone to satisfy themselves with conventions limited to matters

immediately in dispute. They are like medical doctors, who treat

symptoms as the malady to be cured, and, satisfied with alleviating

present pain, leave its causes to war against mortal life, until

disease becomes chronic and incurable.

Whether the labors of the Joint High Commission, now sitting in

Washington, will be of this description, remains to be seen; but

such, it appears to us, has been the character of treaties or

conventions affecting commercial relations with our Canadian and

provincial neighbors. They seem not to have been founded upon any

intelligent consideration of the wants of contracting parties,

but, presupposing that there must be conflicting interests, are

devised to prevent rival industries from merging in unfriendliness

and strife. We ask, then, whether these rival interests have

legitimate existence. The answer to this question will be derived

from an examination of the statistics of the two countries--their

agricultural and other products--their climatic and social

conditions, and the commercial relations actually subsisting between

them, as well as those which both sustain to other countries and

peoples.

The productions of a country are properly classified according to the

sources whence they are derived.

We have, then, five distinct classes of products, namely: The

natural productions of the sea, the earth, the forest, and the

results of industry applied to agriculture and manufactures.

Let us now turn to the map of British America. Beginning at the east,

the waters of Newfoundland and the Gulf of St. Lawrence are rich

in fisheries. They yield salmon, mackerel, codfish, haddock, ling,

herring, and oysters, in great abundance. Newfoundland has not enough

of agriculture to save its own population from absolute suffering

when there is a failure in the catch of fish along its shores. It

possesses rich though undeveloped deposits of copper, iron, and other

ores. Prince Edward Island, in the centre of the mackerel fisheries,

is, perhaps, more favored by nature than the other maritime

provinces. Every acre of its surface may be reckoned as arable land.

Its agriculture, always limited to the growth of hay, oats, potatoes,

and turnips, is only partially developed, though even now yielding

a considerable surplus for export. Its forests are exhausted of

timber. And though, from habit, its people still continue to build

wooden ships to send "home" for sale, they are obliged to import

the material for their construction. The southern part of Nova

Scotia contains a considerable portion of good farm lands; yielding

the invariable crops of hay, oats, potatoes, and turnips. In some

districts, apples and pears, of excellent quality, are grown in

abundance. The eastern portion, especially the island of Cape Breton,

is rich in coal, lime, freestone, and marble; all so placed as to be

easily accessible to commerce. Even now, despite protective duties

on colonial products, the streets of some of our Atlantic cities are

lighted with gas from Nova Scotia coal.

Gold has been found in sufficient quantity to afford opportunity

for speculation, but not for profit. The yield for 1867 was 27,583

oz. = $413,745; for 1868, 20,541 oz. = $308,115. The same amount of

capital applied to the growing of potatoes would doubtless afford

a much larger return. Coal is the most important mineral product;

and its chief market is found in the United States. The net amount

mined in one year was 418,313 tons; sold for home consumption and

to neighboring colonies, 176,392 tons; sent to the United States,

241,921 tons.

New Brunswick offers the same agricultural products as the

neighboring provinces of Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia. A

great part of its territory, like the northern part of Maine, is

cold, rocky, and inarable. But its forests yield large quantities

of pine lumber, oak, beech, maple, and other valuable woods, and

bark for tanning leather. This source of wealth is, however, rapidly

failing. The forests begin to give evidence of exhaustion. St.

John already asks what shall be her resource when the lumber is

gone. Formerly, ship-building was a large interest in these lower

provinces. But from the growing scarcity of ship timber, as well as

from the more general use of iron vessels, it has been declining from

year to year.

We see, then, what these provinces can now contribute to commerce;

and we also see their prime deficiency. They cannot supply their

people with bread. That comes from Canada and the United States.

But Canada does not want their mackerel or other fish, their oats,

potatoes, turnips, or hay. She wants money; and for want of a nearer

market, the surplus oats must be sent upon a very doubtful venture

across the ocean, the mackerel to the United States, and the dried

fish to the West Indies and Brazil, to get money to pay for Canadian

bread. But time is money. It is more than money--it is life. And when

we take into account the loss of time in going to and fro across

the ocean, and the great expenditure of unproductive labor that is

required by this selling to Peter on one side of the world to pay

Paul on the other, we cannot help believing that the poor provincial

pays a high price for bread to eat and clothes to wear, as well

as for the various products of other lands which, from being only

conveniences, have become the necessaries of life.

We come now to the Province of Quebec--prior to the Dominion, called

Canada East. Nearly all her territory lies north of the forty-sixth

parallel of latitude. Need we say that agriculture, save for the few

and slender productions of cold climates, is here impossible? For

nearly seven months of the year the greater part of her rivers and

harbors are closed to commerce by bars of impenetrable ice. The soil,

and every industry relating to it, is under the dominion of frost.

The forests of timber may be accessible despite the snows of

winter, and in the early spring her people may hunt seals along the

coasts of Labrador; but during the long period of actual winter,

her agriculturists, nearly her whole industrial population, must

be employed upon indoor labor, or be left to hibernate in positive

idleness. It is simply impossible that agriculture can ever be a

successful industry in so rigorous a climate as that of Quebec.

Going westward through what was once called Canada West, now the

Province of Ontario, we find a peninsula bounded by the St. Lawrence

River, Lake Ontario, and Lake Erie, on the south and east; and by

Lakes St. Clair and Huron, with their connecting straits, on the

west. This peninsula, south of 45° N., comprises the wheat-growing

lands of Canada east of Lake Winnipeg. Its area is something less

than that of the State of New York. It produces good crops of wheat

and other cereals, and nearly all vegetables and fruits grown

in our northern and northwestern states. Farther west, we have

the valleys of the Saskatchewan and its tributaries, capable of

producing cereals, grasses, potatoes, and other vegetables. But our

information, derived from missionaries and others long resident in

that region, induces the belief that it is mere folly to regard a

country in whose streams the fish lie torpid, and where the snow-fall

is not enough to protect the land from killing frosts, in winter, as

suited to the growth of cereals for export, or as capable of giving

bread to any considerable population.

Much has been said and written concerning the territory lying on the

Pacific coast. We believe it is well ascertained that the climate

of British Columbia west of the mountains--we might well add the

southeast coast of Alaska--is as mild as that of the state of New

York. Unfortunately, it is very much more moist; so much more that

it never can become a good agricultural country. The reason is so

obvious that one is hardly disposed to question the assertion. The

vast accumulations of ice and snow in and immediately north of

Behring Strait, and on the high mountain range lying on the east side

of this territory, must produce intense cold when the wind blows from

the north and east. When the warm air comes from the southwest,

the whole atmosphere must resemble a vapor-bath. Seeds may readily

germinate, but can they produce ripe crops?

We have recently discussed this subject with a friend who has had

intimate personal acquaintance with this coast for more than ten

years, and we but reiterate his assertion in saying that, north of

Oregon, agriculture is not a safe reliance for the support of a

colony. We do not doubt that hay, oats, and potatoes will grow there.

It is well known that they may grow where the sub-soil is everlasting

ice. But we know that agriculture cannot be profitable either there

or where the heats of summer last just long enough to melt the snows

on adjacent mountains and convert the soil to mud. There must always

be an excess of moisture to contend with in maturing crops. Our

information as to the fact is positive. But suppose that, in process

of time, by the clearing of forest lands, and other causes incident

to the peopling and cultivation of the soil, these difficulties were

overcome. Does any one believe that the products of the land could

be carried by rail and inland waters through a distance of three

thousand miles, and two or three thousand more by sea, and, after

successive reshipments, at last pay the producer--save in cumulation

of expenses added to the original cost of goods received in return?

If, then, this far western country should ever have an excess of food

or other commodities, they must find a readier market than either the

far-off country of eastern Canada or more distant lands can afford.

Its trade must be with the neighboring states of Washington, Oregon,

and California. Will the people, on either side, long consent to pay

tribute to government officials for the privilege of exchanging the

fruits of their toil?

Were they really of different races--distinct in language, manners,

and customs beyond the degree that always makes the dwellers in one

village imagine its "excellent society" a little superior to that of

the neighboring hamlet--we might say, yes! But knowing, as we do,

that they are by race, by conditions of soil and climate, and by

reason of mutual interests, but one people, we do not believe it.

Let us now glance at the map of the United States. Leaving out Maine,

northern New Hampshire, and Vermont, in the northeast; the narrow

belt north of the 48th parallel, between Lake Superior and the

Pacific Ocean, in the northwest; Florida, Louisiana, and Southern

Texas in the south; the whole vast area between the 32d and 46th

parallels of latitude, from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean--in

extent equivalent to three-fourths of all Europe--is suited to the

production of wheat, rye, barley, Indian corn, oats, hay, potatoes,

and every fruit found in temperate climates. There are no frosts

to render agriculture a mere speculative enterprise; no bonds of

ice to close the ports to commerce. Seed-time and harvest may be

counted upon as certainly as the succession of seasons. Can there

be a doubt that here the material interest forming the basis of all

others is agriculture? We have no exact data for a comparison of the

several products of the United States and British America; but for

our immediate purpose it is quite unnecessary to present tables of

statistics. We refer only to chief products. First--of those common

to both countries, the productions of the United States are to the

productions of Canada and the Lower Provinces as 13 to 1. The whole

agricultural products of the United States, excluding those of

orchards, vineyards, and gardens--which would present a still wider

difference--are to those of Canada as 15 to 1. The annual yield of

Indian corn in the United States is worth upwards of $800,000,000,

or about five times the entire value of the agricultural product

of British America. If we include in the comparison the values of

animals and animal products, orchards, vineyards, and gardens, the

proportion is something nearer 30 to 1, while the breadth of improved

land is not as 10 to 1. And this while the breadth of our improved

land is not more than one-thirteenth of our territory--though double

the whole area of Great Britain and Ireland--and while any great

expansion of agriculture in Canada is forbidden by the conditions

of soil and climate. Are not these considerations sufficient to

show the absurdity of persistence in the development of _rivalry_

in agricultural and commercial interests? Do we not see that in the

United States agriculture is legitimately the greatest industrial

interest, and that in Canada it is not? And we may well ask why the

industrial population of Canada should not be employed in utilizing

its timber and other products of the forest and the mine, or,

where material is more readily found in the neighboring country,

using the forces so abundantly provided by their inland waters and

mines of coal, as well as by the muscle half-wasted for want of

use, in supplying fabrics which they now import, and pay for by

the scanty labors of just half the time that God has given them?

These considerations are in some degree applicable to New England.

The difference is, that New England knows it, and acts upon the

knowledge.

Manufacturing is the appropriate industry of cold climates. When this

is acknowledged, hibernation ceases. The people are no longer forced

to eke out a meagre existence in winter upon the slender profits

of toil spent in contention with chilling winds and frosts. True,

Canada--a small part of it--produces bread for export. We know it:

and we also know that every loaf costs twice as much, in human toil,

as the better loaf yielded by the more generous soils and genial suns

of Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, New York, Ohio, Maryland, Virginia, and

California. Canada produces good beef, mutton, pork, and, of course,

the raw materials for manufactures incident to these products. But

the herdsmen on the plains of Illinois, Iowa, Florida, and Texas

would grow rich in selling beeves, swine, and sheep for the cost of

their keeping through a Canadian winter!

On the other hand, we see, in some parts of our own country, whole

communities of people engaged in mechanical industries, while the

earth calls for tillage. Even in our more populous territories,

enough of what should be fruitful lands to yield subsistence to a

larger population than Canada will ever contain, lies fallow and

neglected. But our commercial relations are adverse to the proper

adjustment of industrial pursuits.

The Canadians dare not rely upon their neighbors for bread to eat,

any more than those neighbors would venture to build their workshops

and factories in Canada. The more venturesome try to obviate the

difficulty, to some extent, by illicit trade; but all the obstacles

to legitimate commerce--to the conveniences of living--remain; and

they must remain as long as the American and Canadian producers have

to pay tribute to Cæsar on exchanging the fruits of their labors.

Reciprocity treaties may modify, but they cannot remove, this great

obstacle to prosperous trade.

Treaties regulating trade cannot so change the industries of the

two countries as to confine large agricultural enterprises to the

soil and climate that would insure success, nor send the artisan,

now living on rich uncultivated lands, to till the earth. What means

the extraordinary emigration from Canada to the States? And how can

we account for the sudden expansion of manufacturing industries in

Montreal and other Canadian towns? It means that, while governments

are discussing treaties for reciprocal trade, their people are

practising reciprocal emigration--but with a difference. The Canadian

becomes an American citizen--the American very rarely a British

subject. We recollect two incidents in our own experience apropos to

the matter under consideration.

Some two years ago we passed a summer in the "Lower Provinces."

In the parlor of our hotel, we fell into conversation with an

intelligent man of business who proved to be a commercial traveller

from Canada. His specialty was boots and shoes. On mentioning that

Lynn, in Massachusetts, was the great shoe factory of "the States,"

his reply was, "Yes! the head of our firm is from Lynn." Lynn had

gone to Montreal to employ Canadian hands in turning Canadian

leather into boots and shoes to supply colonial markets. "The head

of our firm," like other heads of firms, had solved the problem of

appropriate industry as far as he was concerned. He had learned where

material, and hands to work it, were cheapest, and he was utilizing

them. He had emigrated to employ the cheap labor that could not

emigrate. At another time, we met a well-dressed mechanic who was not

at _home_. His home was in "the States." He was only visiting his

birthplace and kindred. In reply to the remark that the high wages

which had enticed him to the States were only high in sound, since

greenbacks were at a great discount, and food, clothing, and rent at

inflated prices, his reply evinced a perfect understanding of the

whole question, as it affected him and the class to which he belonged.

"True," said he, "I am paid in greenbacks; but I have a better house,

better food, and better clothes than I ever had before. And at the

end of the year, my surplus greenbacks are worth more, _in gold_,

than I could get for a year's labor in this colony."

Here are two parties whose interests are reciprocal, whose social

conditions are essentially the same, who live in juxtaposition to

each other, but with broad ocean between them and other countries

and peoples, frittering away material interests, wasting revenues

that of right should be employed for their advancement in social

life, to gratify a spirit of antagonism where even rivalry should

be deemed insane. But is there no remedy for these disorders in our

political economy? We think there is a very obvious one; and if we

may not say, "What God has joined together, let not man put asunder,"

because the parties are not agreed, we can and do say, the sooner

they are agreed, the better for both. We would say to Canada, do not

waste your time and strength in trying to effect impossibilities.

Let us see your many rivers alive with the artisans who can send to

the market something else than ship-timber and deals. Let us see

the smoke of the forge and the foundry rise in proximity to your

mines of coal. We want all that you can make, and have no fear that

you will in any degree impair the prosperity of our own industrial

people. And we will pay you in bread, better and cheaper than you can

get from your colder and less fruitful lands. And when your coarser

materials are wrought into shape for export, we have skilled labor,

nearer than Britain, to receive your surplus products and fashion

them into the thousand fabrics which only skilled labor can supply.

We have no desire to see your wheat-fields fail or to decry their

products in the market. We only say that they are too limited for

dangerous competition with ours. And we further say, that if you

will but develop other and more legitimate industries, so that your

wheat-growing districts cannot feed your people, we will be sure to

have bread enough and to spare. And you may be also sure that all

your efforts will not so overstock the markets we can offer as to

make trade languish, when the thousands now peopling this continent

shall become millions, though the Old World should want nothing that

you can give. And, then, you have but a doubtful road to the markets

of the Old World. For half the year your highway to the ocean and

to other lands must be across our territory. Intercolonial railways

through unsettled and unproductive countries will not answer the

demands of commerce. They will not pay; and, if they would, the

interests served ought not to be so burdened where access may be had

to readier and cheaper lines of communication.

Does all this imply annexation? Call it what you will. As one of your

Canadian statesmen said to the people of a lesser province, "If you

do not want us to annex you, we are willing that you should annex

us." If you are more conservative than we are, a little conservatism

will do us no harm; and the interests you would conserve would be

quite as safe under the eagle's beak as under the lion's paw. If one

be a bird, the other is surely a beast of prey; and we believe that

harmless folk have less to apprehend from one alone than from the

jealous rivalries of both.

Of one thing we feel assured: the time is not far distant when

the people of this northern half of America will have to adopt a

policy so distinct from that of the older nations of Europe that

self-preservation will demand a union of power where there is now an

evident identity of interests.

It were well that this union should be preceded by such guarantees

of existing rights and privileges as might, without specific and

just conventions, be open to subsequent question and dispute. And it

were also well for governments to direct the march which necessity

compels their people to make, rather than incur the risk of finding

themselves at variance with those for whose greater good civil

government is designed. We do not purpose to discuss the origin

or foundation of civil government. It is enough for us to know

that man requires and God wills it; and that, in the absence of

other and higher sanctions, the best evidence of his will is found

in the intelligent, honest consent of the governed. Does any one

doubt what the more intelligent and honest people of Canada and the

United States require? We do not ask what may be the _rôle_ of the

political adventurer, the office-seeker, the government speculator

or tuft-hunter. We always know that the end of all their loyalty or

patriotism is self. But we ask what is needed for the greater good

of the people. Not alone the people of to-day or to-morrow, but of

the future as well. How the people of to-day esteem the policy of

their lawgivers, may be known by their conduct under it. And the

army of government revenue officers and detectives on either side

along the frontiers of Canada and "the States" offers sufficient

evidence of the esteem in which the laws of trade are held. We know

not which is the more corrupt--the law-breakers or the agents of

the law; but we do know, from the notoriety of the fact, that the

commercial relations now existing between the Canadas and the States

are, in effect, so demoralizing, to commercial people and commercial

interests, that the laws which propose to govern them were better

abrogated than left to offer a premium to chicanery and fraud.

We are neither alarmists nor political propagandists. We have no

greedy desire for our neighbor's goods, no fanatical wish to impose

our political dogmas or theories upon the people of other states. We

but behold and see what is before and around us--and, seeing it, we

only give utterance to belief that has grown and strengthened, until

scarcely a doubt remains, when we say that we believe the ultimate

union of the United States and British America to be inevitable. The

time may be more or less distant, the occasion and the means may be

as yet undreamed of; but the event seems as certain as the coming of

the morrow's sun while the shades of evening gather over and around

us. If, unfortunately, war should take the place of peaceful union,

the calamity would hardly be less to us than to Canada.

By peaceful union, existing rights of the weaker party are made

secure. By war, they are jeopardized and may be lost. But to us, as

well as to them, war would be a calamity of such fearful magnitude,

that we are constrained to look with hope to the time when the

conflicting interests of the Old World shall have no power to disturb

the peaceful relations that should always exist between ourselves and

our neighbors.

ON THE HIGHER EDUCATION.

SECOND ARTICLE.

The whole scope of the subject properly comprised under the title

"Higher Education" obviously includes all that belongs to every kind

of institute of learning above common schools. We have selected

this title in order to leave freedom to ourselves to discourse upon

any part of the subject we might think proper, although in our

first article we limited our remarks to a class of schools intended

for that which is more strictly to be designated as intermediate

education. We have a few additional remarks to offer upon the same

part of our subject, after which we will proceed to throw out a few

suggestions upon some of its remaining and still more important

portions. We are not attempting to treat these topics fully and

minutely, and our observations will be, therefore, brief and

desultory.

In regard to the course of studies to be pursued in intermediate

schools, it is a question of great practical moment how to arrange

the several branches to be taught to the pupils in such a way as to

prepare them most efficiently for the future occupations of their

lives. The course common to all ought to be made up of those studies

which are alike necessary or important to all. In addition to these

common studies, certain special branches should be taught, or the

distinct branches of the common course more extensively carried

out, for distinct classes of pupils, varying these optional studies

according to the different occupations for which they are preparing.

For instance, a moderate quantity of mathematics and a rudimental,

general course of instruction in physical sciences are sufficient for

all, except those who will need greater knowledge and practice in

them for use in their profession. It is useless to attempt, in these

days, education on the encyclopædic principle. The common and solid

basis of all education once laid, the more specific it becomes, the

better; and for want of good sense and skill in selecting studies,

apportioning the relative time and labor given to them, and directing

them to a definite end, very great waste and loss are incurred in

education.

One other most important point, which we merely notice, is the

propriety of providing the most thorough instruction in the modern

languages, especially the French, which can more easily be done, as

we suppose, in the schools of which we are speaking, that no time

whatever, or at most but a moderate amount, is given to the ancient

languages. Without going further into details, it is obvious that

schools of the intermediate class have an unlimited sphere in which

they can give any kind and degree of instruction belonging to the

most extensive and liberal education, deducting the classics, and

stopping short of the university, properly so called. Nor is there

any reason why, if we had universities in the highest sense of the

term, the pupils of these schools should not afterward enjoy all the

privileges they offer which do not require a knowledge of the ancient

languages. We will not say anything on the vexed classical question.

Did it seem to be practicable, we should strongly favor making the

study of Latin a part of the education of all who go beyond the

common rudiments, as well girls as boys, to such an extent that they

could understand the divine offices of the church. For all other uses

or advantages, we are inclined to think that many pupils who occupy

a great deal of time in gaining a very imperfect smattering of Latin

and Greek, might better spare it for other studies.[15]

However the question may be eventually settled in regard to the

classics as a part of general education, it is certain that they must

retain their place in the education of the clergy, and of at least a

select portion of those who are destined for other learned pursuits

and professions. We shall speak more fully about this part of the

subject a little further on. Before leaving the topic of English

education, however, we have one or two supplementary observations to

make, suggested by the remarks of other writers which we have come

across since we began writing the present article.

F. Dalgairns, in an article which he has published in the

_Contemporary Review_, has expressed himself in a manner quite

similar to our own respecting the necessity of a return to the

scholastic philosophy. His remarks have given us great pleasure,

and they furnish one more proof of the tendency toward unity in

philosophical doctrine among Catholics which is daily spreading and

gaining strength. One observation of his on this head is specially

worthy of attention. He says that it is necessary, if we desire to

teach the scholastic philosophy to those who have received or are

receiving a modern or English education, to translate and explain

its terms in the best and most intelligible English. A mere literal

translation from Latin text-books will not answer the purpose.

This is very true, and we cannot refrain from expressing the wish

that the health and occupations of F. Dalgairns may permit him to

write an entire series of philosophical essays, like the one he

has just published on the _Soul_, to which we have just referred.

Indeed, we know of no one better fitted by intellectual aptitude for

metaphysical reasoning and mastery of the requisite art as a writer,

to prepare a manual of philosophy for English students.

The _Dublin Review_ has repeated and sanctioned the observations of

F. Dalgairns, and has added something to them equally worthy to be

noticed--to wit, that our Catholic text-books of logic need to be

improved by incorporating into them the results of the more careful

and thorough analysis of the laws of logic which has been made by

several English writers. It is very true that, although the English

metaphysic is a sorry affair, there have been several very acute

logicians among modern English thinkers; as, for instance, Mr. Mill,

Mr. De Morgan, and Sir William Hamilton. We suppose that the _Dublin

Review_ intends to designate the doctrine of what is technically

called the "quantification of the predicate" made known by the two

authors last mentioned, simultaneously and independently of each

other, as a real discovery in logical science, and an addition to

Aristotle's laws. We hope the matter will be further discussed,

and that not only English and American writers interested in the

subject of philosophical teaching will give it their attention, but

Continental scholars also. For our own part, our _rôle_ at present

is the modest one of giving hints and provoking discussion, and we

therefore abstain from going any deeper than a mere scratch of the

rich soil we hope to see well dug and planted before long.

From another and very different quarter, we have found within a day

or two a corroboration of several opinions we expressed in our first

article. Prof. Seeley, of the University of Cambridge, England, in a

little volume of essays, noticed by us in another place, advocates

the teaching of logic in English schools, dwells on the importance of

teaching history after a better method, and sketches out a plan of

improving the instruction given in medium schools and universities,

which is well worthy of being read and thought over by those who have

the direction of education.

But we will turn now to another and still higher department of

education, which embraces the courses of study proper to the

university and the schools which are preparatory to it. Beginning

with that branch of study which must undoubtedly still continue to

form an essential and principal branch of the strictly collegiate

education, the classics, we do not hesitate to say that this branch,

instead of being less, ought to be more thoroughly and completely

cultivated. In so far as Latin is concerned, it is evident that those

who aim at anything more than the degree of knowledge requisite for

understanding better the modern languages, and the terms which are in

common use derived from Latin, or, perhaps, for a more intelligent

appreciation of church offices, ought to master the language fully,

together with its classical literature. The reasons which prove this

statement apply with tenfold force to ecclesiastics, for whom Latin

ought to be a second mother-tongue. It is not necessary to give these

reasons, for they are well known and fully appreciated by all who are

concerned with the collegiate or ecclesiastical education of Catholic

youth.

The question of Greek is a distinct one. For those who study the

classics for the sake of their intrinsic value as works of art, Greek

has the precedence of Latin in importance. It is evident, therefore,

that a most thorough and extensive course of Greek is necessary for

students of this class. Whether such a course ought to be made a

part of the obligatory collegiate curriculum of studies, or merely

provided for a select class who may choose to enter upon it, we leave

to the discretion and judgment of the learned. Undoubtedly, we ought

to have a certain number of accomplished Grecians among our men of

letters. It is necessary in the interests of ecclesiastical learning

that we should have thorough Greek scholars among our clergy. For

all useful purposes, however, the value of the amount of Greek

actually learned by the majority is exceedingly small, and not to

be compared with the practical utility of a knowledge of any one of

several modern languages, for example, the German. A clergyman,

for instance, who does not aspire to become a learned philologist,

but only to make himself acquainted with the labors of the best

commentators on the Scripture, will not find it very necessary to

be able to read the Septuagint or the Greek New Testament. As for

Hebrew, whatever can be learned by a short and superficial course

will be almost useless. If he desires to read Aristotle, Plato, or

the Greek fathers, for the sake of their sense and ideas, he can do

so in the Latin translations without any fear of being led into any

erroneous interpretation. The point we are driving at is, that the

thorough study of Latin is the most essential thing to be secured in

a _classical_ course. Philosophy; a moderate course of mathematics;

the English language and literature; the physical sciences, and the

modern languages, especially the French, are the other essentials

of a complete collegiate course. Whatever time remains will be most

usefully employed in the study of history and of modern political

and social questions, branches which are certainly essential to

a complete liberal education, though for many, or perhaps most,

students their thorough cultivation may have to be postponed until

after their college course is finished. The improvement of the

collegiate education in all these branches, requires, of course,

a corresponding improvement in the preparatory schools, since the

school and college depend on each other. It is our opinion, in which

we are sure that the men most experienced in these matters concur,

that those who begin their schooling at the earliest suitable age

need to be well trained in an excellent preparatory school until

the age of seventeen, before they are fit to profit fully by a high

collegiate course. Those who begin later must enter college at a

more advanced age, unless they can make up by diligence for lost

time, or be content with a shorter course of study. The raising of

the conditions for entering college, which can be done gradually,

must improve the preparatory schools, and the improvement of these

schools will in turn benefit the colleges, by furnishing them with

subjects fitted for a higher course of studies.

In saying this, we beg to disavow any intention of undervaluing or

finding fault with the colleges and schools at present existing,

or the learned and laborious corps of teachers employed in them.

They deserve the highest meed of praise and gratitude, and we may

well congratulate ourselves on the truly vast work which has been

accomplished, at great cost and by dint of great efforts, in the

cause of Catholic education in this country. But our motto should

ever be, like that of the past generations of laborers in this great

cause, "Upward and onward!" We trust, therefore, that all we may say

in favor of improvement will be taken as an encouragement and not as

a fault-finding criticism--as a friendly suggestion, and not as a

presumptuous attempt at dictation.

We have now reached the proper place for speaking of the great

necessity of a Catholic University in the United States. A

well-conducted college for undergraduates is not a university,

though it is often dignified with that name; but is merely one of

the principal constituent parts of a university. In regard to the

proper constitution, nature, and conduct of a university, much has

been written, of late, both in Europe and America. In Europe, those

who write on the subject either consider the subject of improvement

or reform in universities already existing, or the demands existing

in various quarters for the foundation of new ones. These last are

chiefly among Catholics, who are extremely alive to this necessity

in several countries, but especially in Germany and England. The

foundation of a great Catholic University for Germany at the spot

which is most appropriate for such a grand undertaking, on account

of its hallowed and scholastic memories, Fulda, has been determined.

We hope that the efforts to make the Catholic University of Dublin

completely successful, and to found another in England, may speedily

produce their desired result. In this country, the heads of the

older Protestant colleges are considering what measures can be taken

to raise these institutions to the level of the universities of

Europe. Among the papers which we have read from different quarters

on this subject, those of Professor Seeley, of Cambridge, and of one

or two professors of Yale College, writing in the _New Englander_,

have especially attracted our attention; and we may have occasion

to reproduce some of their remarks or suggestions in the present

article. Among the Catholics of the United States, the Germans have

manifested what looks like the most serious disposition which has

yet shown itself for taking the actual initiative in the movement.

We rejoice to see it, and hope they may go on. They are a most

respectable body; their energy, wealth, and power of organized

action are great. Germany is full of young ecclesiastics of the best

education, who are sighing for employment, and competent to fill

chairs in all the departments except that of English literature.

We have but one precaution to suggest, in case this enterprise

is undertaken, which is: that proper care be taken to secure the

entire subordination of the corps of governors and teachers to the

hierarchy and the Holy See, and to ascertain the strict orthodoxy

of the persons called to fill the professorial chairs. We want no

followers of Hermes, Döllinger, or any other leader of a German sect

in philosophy or theology; and persons of that class whose _rôle_ is

played out at home, might be the very first to look out for a new

field in which to practise their manœuvres, in a German University

in the United States, if they saw a chance of securing in it the

desirable position of professors--a position which has special

attractions for the German mind.

The _Advocate_ of Louisville has recently spoken out very strongly on

the need of a Catholic University in this country; and the topic is

frequently broached in conversation, as, indeed, it has been for the

last fifteen years. Let the Germans go forward and take the lead if

they are able and willing; but this will not lessen the necessity of

the same action on the part of the other Catholics of the country,

who, we may hope, will be stimulated by the example of a body of men

so much smaller in number than themselves. When the time comes for

action in this matter, the direction of it will be in higher hands

than ours; but, meanwhile, we will indulge ourselves in the at least

harmless amusement of sketching an ideal plan of the university as it

lies in our own imagination, and of the possible method of making it

a reality.

A university is a corporation of learned and studious men who are

devoted to the acquisition and communication of science and art

in all their higher branches. It may be more or less complete and

extensive. In its greatest extension it ought to comprise one or

more colleges for undergraduates, schools of all the special

professional studies, and a school of the higher and more profound

studies in every department of literature and science. It must have

a permanent body of learned men residing within its precincts, whose

lives are entirely devoted to study and instruction. It must have

a vast library; museums of science and antiquities; a gallery of

painting, sculpture, and all kinds of artistic works; a complete

scientific apparatus, a botanical garden, magnificent buildings,

beautiful chapels, and a grand collegiate church, with its chapter

of clergymen and perfectly trained choir. It should have, also, a

great publishing-house, and issue regularly its periodical reviews

and magazines, as well as books, of the first class of excellence

in the several distinct departments of science and letters. It must

be richly endowed, and well governed, under the supreme control

and direction of the hierarchy and the Holy See. A plan combining

the chief distinctive features of the Roman University, Oxford,

Louvain, and the best universities of France and Germany, with some

improvements, would represent the full and complete idea we have in

our mind.

When we come to the practical question. What could be done now, at

once, toward the beginning of such a colossal undertaking? it is by

no means so easy to solve it as it is to sketch the plan of our ideal

university. We do not fancy, of course, that such a grand institution

as this we have described, or even one similar to the best existing

European universities, can be created in a hurry by any speedy or

summary process. But if it is commenced now, can it not be brought

to completion by the beginning of the twentieth century? It seems to

us that in the year 1900 or 1925 we shall need not one only, but

three grand Catholic universities in the United States. That we can

and ought to begin the work of founding one without delay, we have

no doubt. The difficulty is, however, in pointing out a sensible

and feasible method of doing well what many or most of us are ready

to acknowledge ought to be done quickly. Let us suppose that the

requisite authority and the necessary funds are confided to the hands

of the proper commission, who are to lay the first stones in the

foundation of a university. How should they proceed, and what should

they first undertake? As these high powers exist only potentially and

in our own imagination, we can be certain that they will not take

offence if we presume to offer them our opinion and advice.

What is the first and most obvious want which we seek to satisfy

by founding a university? It is the want of a collegiate system of

education and discipline superior to the one already existing in

our colleges, and equal to any existing elsewhere. The first thing

to be done, then, is to select some already existing college, or to

establish a new one, as the nucleus of the future university. We will

suppose that some one of our best colleges can be found which has the

requisite advantages of location, etc., making it an eligible place

for a great university. Let measures be taken to place the grade of

education and instruction in this college at the highest mark. The

first of these measures must be to give it a corps of professors

and tutors fully equal to their task, and to make the position of

these professors a dignified, honorable, and permanent one. Another

measure of immediate necessity would be the total separation of the

college from the grammar-school, and the establishment of a system

of discipline suitable not for boys but for young men. The mere

announcement by sufficiently high authority that such a system would

be inaugurated in a college, would draw at once within its walls

students enough eager to begin a thorough course of study, to secure

the success of the experiment. At first, the course of study already

in vogue might be carried on, merely adding to it such branches as

would not presuppose a previous preparation not actually possessed

by the students. For admission to the class of the next year to

come, the conditions might be raised one grade higher, and thus by

successive changes, previously made known, the maximum standard

might be reached without inconvenience or injustice to any; and the

grammar-schools would be enabled and obliged to prepare their pupils

expressly for the examination they would have to pass for admittance

into the college. The college thus properly planted and cultivated

would grow of itself in due time to maturity and perfection. Nothing

more is wanted than a good system, fit men to administer it, plenty

of money, and a body of youth fit and desirous to be instructed and

educated in the best manner. The library, the scientific cabinets,

the philosophical apparatus, the buildings, grounds, and other

exterior means and appliances, should be provided for as speedily and

amply as circumstances would permit.

The second great want, in our opinion, is the provision for

ecclesiastical students of the advantages for education which can

only be completely furnished by a university, and which cannot,

therefore, be fully enjoyed at separate ecclesiastical seminaries.

The Little Seminary is only a superior kind of grammar-school, even

though it gives instruction in the ancient languages and some other

branches to the same extent with a college. The Grand Seminary is,

strictly speaking, a college for instruction in theology, although

it includes a year or two of that study of philosophy which is only

introductory to the theological course. A thorough university course,

in which all the instruction preparatory to theology should be

finished, would give a more complete and thorough education to young

ecclesiastics, fit them much better for their professional studies,

and prepare them much more efficaciously for the high position

which belongs, by all divine and human right, to the priesthood.

This is the way in which the clergy, both secular and regular, were

trained during the Middle Ages. The system of separate training

came in afterward, and has been kept up by a sort of necessity,

chiefly because the universities have become so secularized as to be

dangerous places. We have touched, in these last words, the tender

spot, which we well know must be handled delicately. The great

argument for secluding young ecclesiastics in seminaries entirely

separate from secular colleges is, that their morals, their piety,

their vocation, are otherwise endangered. We reply to this by a

suggestion intended to do away with the objection to a university

life, and at the same time to show how its advantages may be secured.

Let both systems be combined. Let there be a college exclusively

intended for young ecclesiastics, in which they shall be kept under

the discipline of the Little Seminary, at the university. The Little

Seminary will then take its place as a separate grammar-school for

boys who are intended for the ecclesiastical state. From this school

they can pass, not before their seventeenth year, to the college at

the university, and they will have seven years still remaining in

which to finish their education, before they arrive at the canonical

age for ordination to the priesthood. It seems to us that the

separate college is a sufficient security for the morals, piety, and

vocation of any young man above seventeen years of age who is fit

to be a priest in this country outside of the walls of a monastery.

Moreover, we are speaking about a model Catholic university, which,

we should hope, would not be so extremely dangerous a place for young

men. We have never heard that Louvain is considered in that light

by the clergy of Belgium, and the glimpse we had of a large body of

the Louvain students at Malines during the session of the Congress

of 1867, gave us the most favorable impression of their virtuous

character.

The university should also be the seat of the principal Grand

Seminary, and of a school of Higher Theology. The reasons for

locating the place of education for ecclesiastics at a university

apply to all the grades of their distinct schools above that of the

grammar-school with nearly equal force, and they are very weighty in

their nature. They concern in part the professors and in part the

students. So far as the former are concerned, it is evident that

they would derive the greatest advantage from the facilities for

study and intercourse with learned men afforded by the university,

and would exercise the most salutary influence over the professors

in the departments of philosophy and secular science. One great end

of the university is to collect together a great body of learned men

devoted to the pursuit of universal science; and it is obvious that

this cannot be successfully accomplished unless the ecclesiastical

colleges are included within the corporation.

In regard to the students, it seems plain enough that all that

part of their course which precedes theology can be much more

thoroughly carried on at a university of the highest class than at

a Little Seminary, especially if these seminaries are numerous and

therefore necessarily limited in numbers and all kinds of means for

improvement. A concentration of the endowments, the instructors,

and the pupils in one grand institution, makes it possible to give

a much better and higher kind of education, and saves a great deal

of labor besides. It is especially, however, in relation to the

lectures on physical science, and the cultivation of other general

branches distinct from the routine of class recitations, that the

university has the advantage over the seminary. The students of

theology, moreover, can receive great benefit from lectures of this

kind, and from the libraries, museums, cabinets, etc., which a

great university will possess, as well as from the greater ability

and learning which men chosen to fill the chairs of sacred science

in such an institution are likely to have, in comparison with

those who can be made available for giving instruction in many of

the smaller seminaries. Over and above all these advantages for

actually gaining a greater amount of knowledge, there is the immense

advantage to be gained of bringing up together and binding into one

intellectual brotherhood our most highly educated Catholic youth.

There is something in the atmosphere and the surroundings of a

great university which quickens and enlarges the intellectual life;

brightens the faculties; trains the mind for its future career, and

fits it to act in society and upon men. The alma mater is a centre

of influences and associations lasting through life. The learned

men residing there, and their pupils in all professions, are bound

together by sacred ties, which are not only a cause of pleasure to

them in future years, but of great power for good in the community.

Such a university as we have described would in twenty-five years

produce a body of alumni who would intellectually exert a great

influence over the Catholic community throughout the United States,

and make themselves respected by all classes of educated men. The

clergy ought to retain the first place and a commanding influence

among this body of educated Catholics. For this purpose, it seems to

us that they ought to be educated with them, and look to the same

university as their alma mater.

We see no reason, moreover, why the religious orders and

congregations should not share and co-operate in the labors and

advantages of this great enterprise. The smaller congregations find

the suitable education of their postulants a difficult task. One or

more colleges at a university, where these students could reside

by themselves, under their own rule and superior, but receiving

their instruction from the university professors, would solve this

difficulty. The older and more numerous religious societies have

greater facilities for educating their students, and are governed

by their own old and peculiar traditions. We will not presume so

far as to give them any suggestions from our modern brain in regard

to matters in which they have the experience of from one to six

centuries. It strikes us, however, as a very pleasing and quite

mediæval idea, that our proposed grand university, which we may as

well make as splendid as possible while it remains purely ideal,

should have its Dominican, Jesuit, Sulpician, and Lazarist colleges.

There is no reason why such colleges should not make constituent

parts of the university, each one having its own laws and regulating

its own internal affairs according to its own standards.

We will say nothing about the law, medical, scientific, and artistic

schools which a university ought to have to make it complete.

We have only attempted to show how a university might be started

on its career. Once really alive and in motion, the rest would be

more easily provided for. Undoubtedly, a vast sum of money would

be requisite for such an undertaking. Our wealthy Catholics would

have to exercise a princely liberality, and the whole mass of the

people would be obliged to contribute generously for many years in

succession. We must admire the remarkable instances of princely

liberality in the cause of general education recently given by Mr.

Peabody, Mr. Cornell, and a considerable number of other wealthy

gentlemen in the United States, whose benefactions to colleges and

schools have been frequent and munificent. Let us have one-twentieth

part of the money expended on education by other religious or learned

societies, and we will show again what we did in former ages, when we

founded Oxford, Cambridge, St. Gall, Bec, Paris, Salamanca, Fulda,

Louvain, Cologne, Pavia, Padua, Bologna, and the other famous schools

of the middle ages. What more important or more glorious work can

be proposed to the Catholics of the United States than this? We

know what our Catholic youth are, for we have spent much time in

giving them both scholastic and religious instruction. What can be

more ingenuous, bright, and promising than their character--more

capable of being moulded and formed to everything that is virtuous

and noble? They contain the material which only needs the proper

formation to produce a new and better age, which we fervently hope

is already beginning to dawn. As the Alcuins, Lanfrancs, and other

illustrious fathers of education in former times were among the

principal agents in producing epochs of new life, so those who take

up their work now in our own country, and throughout Christendom,

will be among the principal benefactors of the church and the human

race, and deserve for themselves a most honorable crown.

Our topic in the present article has led us to present almost

exclusively and in strong light the advantages to be derived from a

university and from university education, in relation both to the

ecclesiastical state and secular professions. To prevent mistake,

we add in conclusion, that we do not desire or anticipate the

suppression or merging into one institution of all our colleges and

seminaries. It is scarcely possible that all the students of this

vast country should be educated in one place. The necessity for other

colleges and seminaries will of itself create or continue them.

The university will give them an example and model to follow, will

furnish those not already amply provided for from the bosom of old

and learned religious orders with professors, will give those who

desire it a chance to complete their studies after leaving college

by residing for a time within its walls, and will reign as a queen

among lesser institutions, giving tone, character, and uniformity

to the scientific and literary community of Catholic scholars

throughout the country. There are doubtless certain respects in

which the universities of Europe must always have an advantage over

any institution we can hope to found in this new country. Some,

or even many, will always have a longing for a residence abroad

in these ancient seats of learning, which they may and ought to

gratify, when it lies in their power to do so. Above all other

places, Rome must ever draw to her those who desire to drink faith,

piety, and knowledge from their fountain-head. And, if a better age

is really coming, not only will the Pope necessarily be secured in

a more tranquil and firm possession of his temporal kingdom in all

the extent which he justly claims, that he may govern the church

with all the plenitude of his supremacy, but also that the wealth

and prosperity of the Roman Church may give to her institutions

of learning an amplitude and splendor which they have never yet

attained. Planets are nevertheless necessary as well as a sun in a

system, and so also are satellites. However ample and extensive the

provisions made at Rome may be for educating a select portion of

the clergy of all countries, they can never make it unnecessary to

provide also in every country for the best and highest education of

its own clergy. So far as we can see, every reason and consideration

cries out imperatively for the speedy foundation of a Catholic

University in the United States.

FOOTNOTE:

[15] Prof. Seeley advocates the plan of devoting a part of the time

during the last two years at English schools to Latin. The proper

study of English must also include in it an analysis of the Latin

element, and an explanation of the derivation of words of Latin

origin.

THE WARNING.

Ye nations of earth, give ear, give ear,

From Holy Writ comes the warning true,

The voice of the ancient captive seer

Through the dim-aisled centuries reaches you.

Thus saith the seer: "Ye have lifted high

Against his altar your impious hand;

From the Lord's spoiled house is heard the cry,

'Destruction swift to this guilty land.'"

But a deeper than Belshazzar's wrong

Veils the light of these mournful years,

And many an eye in the saintly throng

Turns from the earth bedimmed with tears.

The Holy City by promise given,

A precious dower to the spotless bride,

Is trodden by feet outlawed, unshriven,

And her streets with martyrs' blood are dyed.

The crown that ever has fallen as light

On holy brows, from the Hand above,

Has been torn away by sinful might

From him whose rule was a father's love.

The deed was by one; the sin by all;

By ay, or by silence, ye gave assent;

Ye saw the shrine to the spoiler fall,

Nor hand ye lifted, nor aid ye lent.

O nations of earth! give ear, give ear,

From Holy Writ comes the warning true,

The voice of the ancient captive seer,

From the far-off ages, speaks to you!

WRITING MATERIALS OF THE ANCIENTS.

It is curious to remark the various and apparently incongruous

substances which men, in their efforts to preserve knowledge

or transmit ideas, have used as writing materials. The animal,

vegetable, and mineral kingdoms have each and all been laid under

contribution. In every land and in every age, stone and marble have

been employed to perpetuate the remembrance of the great deeds of

history. Inscriptions cut in jasper, cornelian, and agate are to

be met with in every collection of antiquities. A cone of basalt

covered with cuneiform characters was found some years since in the

river Euphrates, and is now preserved in the Imperial Library of

Paris, side by side with the sun-baked bricks on which the Babylonian

astronomers were wont during seven centuries to inscribe their

observations on the starry heavens.

The Romans made books of bronze, in which they engraved the

concessions granted to their colonies; and they preserved on tablets

and pillars of the same durable material the decrees and treaties of

the senate, and sometimes, even, the speeches of their emperors.

"The Bœotians," says the learned Greek geographer Pausanias, "showed

me a roll of lead on which was inscribed the whole work of Hesiod,

but in characters that time had nearly effaced."

"Who will grant me," cries Job, "that my words may be written? who

will grant me that they may be marked down in a book? With an iron

pen and in a plate of lead, or else be graven with an instrument in

flintstone?" (xix. 23 24.)

Tanned skins were likewise employed for writing purposes by the

Asiatics, the Greeks, the Romans, and the Celts. In the Brussels

library there is to be seen a manuscript of the Pentateuch, believed

to be anterior to the ninth century, written on fifty-seven skins

sewed together, and forming a roll more than thirty-six yards long.

The custom of writing on leathern garments appears to have been

prevalent during the middle ages. The great Italian poet, Petrarch,

used to wear a leathern vest, on which, while sitting or sauntering

near the shaded margin of the fountain of Vaucluse, he would note

each passing thought, each poetic fancy. This precious relic, covered

with erasures, still existed in 1527.

We read, too, of a certain abbot who strictly enjoined his monks, if

they happened to meet with any of the works of St. Athanasius, to

transcribe the precious volumes on their clothes, should paper be

unattainable.

The use of prepared sheep-skin, that is, parchment, dates from

about a hundred and fifty years before the Christian era; its Latin

name, _pergamena_, is very evidently derived from Pergamos, but

whether because invented there, or because it was more perfectly

prepared in that city than elsewhere, is a question not yet decided.

Besides white and yellow parchment, the ancients employed purple,

blue, and violet. These dark shades were intended to be written on

with gold and silver ink. Several very beautiful manuscripts of

this description are to be seen in the Imperial Library of Paris.

Parchment manuscripts were sometimes of great size; thus, the roll

containing the inquiry concerning the Knights Templars, which is

still preserved in the archives of France, is full twenty-three yards

long.

Parchment became very scarce during the invasions of the barbarians,

and this scarcity gave rise to the custom of effacing the characters

of ancient manuscripts in order to write a second time on the skin.

This unfortunate practice, most prevalent among the Romans, and

which was continued until the invention of rag paper, has occasioned

the loss of many literary and scientific treasures. The primitive

characters of some few of these doubly-written manuscripts, or

palimpsests, as they are called, have been restored by chemical

science, and several valuable works recovered; among others, for

instance, Cicero's admirable treatise on the Republic.

Even the intestines of animals have been used as writing material.

The magnificent library of Constantinople, burnt under the Emperor

of the East, Basiliscus, is said to have contained, among its other

curiosities, the Iliad and the Odyssey, traced in letters of gold on

the intestine of a serpent. This rare specimen of caligraphy measured

one hundred and twenty feet.

The most ancient inscribed characters we possess are upon wood. A

sycamore tablet containing an engraved inscription was discovered,

about thirty years since, in one of the Memphis pyramids; the

learned Egyptologist who deciphered it pronounced it to have been in

existence some five thousand nine hundred years! The Chinese, also,

before they invented paper two thousand years ago, wrote upon wood

and bamboo. Many oriental nations still make books of palm-leaves, on

which the characters are scratched with a sharp-pointed instrument.

The Syracusans of bygone times used to write their votes on an

olive-leaf. The modern Maldivians trace their hopes, fears, and

wishes on the gigantic foliage of their favorite tree, the makareko,

of which each leaf is a yard long and half a yard wide. The Imperial

Library of Paris, rich in all that is rare and interesting, possesses

several ancient leaf manuscripts, some beautifully varnished and gilt.

In Rome, before the use of bronze tables and columns, the laws were

engraven on oak boards. "The annals of the pagan high-priests," says

a French writer, "which related day by day the principal events of

the year, were probably written with black ink on an _album_, that

is, a wooden plank whitened with white-lead. These annals ceased a

hundred and twenty years before Christ, but the use of the _album_

was kept up some time longer." The Romans also wrote their wills on

wood.

Linen cloth covered with writing has been found in most of the

mummy-cases that have been opened. The Egyptian Museum in the Louvre

contains several rituals on cloth. The Sibylline Oracles were traced

on cloth. The first copy of the Emperor Aurelian's journal that was

made after his death was written on cloth, and is still preserved in

the Library of the Vatican. On cloth were written also some of the

edicts of the first Christian emperors.

No certain epoch can be ascribed to the fabrication of paper from

the papyrus reed. The celebrated French _savant_, Champollion the

younger, discovered during his travels in Egypt several contracts

written on papyrus, which by their date must have been drawn up

seventeen hundred years B.C.

Egypt appears to have kept the monopoly of the papyrus paper trade.

The principal manufactories of it were situated at Alexandria, and

so important an article of commerce did it become that a dearth of

papyrus was the cause of several popular disturbances in some of

the great cities of Italy and Greece. Under the Emperor Tiberius, a

scarcity in the supply produced so formidable a riot in Rome, that

the senate was compelled to take measures similar to those necessary

in years of famine, and actually had to name commissaries, whose duty

it was to distribute to each citizen the quantity of writing-paper he

absolutely required.

The papyrus reed seems indeed to have been ancient Egypt's greatest

material blessing, for not only was it the principal article of

foreign commerce and source of immense wealth in the form of paper,

but it was also of the most extraordinary utility to the poorer

classes. Household utensils of every description were fabricated from

its roots; boats were constructed of its stem; roofing, sail-cloth,

ropes, and clothes were made of its bark; and from the appellation

of "eaters of papyrus," often applied to the Egyptians by the

Greeks, some have thought that it was a common article of food. How

extraordinary does it then seem that a plant of such inestimable

value should ever have disappeared from a land which derived such

benefits from it. Nevertheless, it is a singular fact that the

papyrus is no longer to be found in Egypt; recent travellers assure

us that not a stalk is to be seen at the present day in the Delta.

Sicily alone now possesses the beautiful reed.

We are ignorant of the exact period of the introduction of the

papyrus paper into Greece and Italy, but Pliny has left us copious

details concerning the manipulations it underwent among the

Romans. Sizing was then, as it is now, one of the most important

operations in paper-making. The membranous covering of the stem of

the papyrus reed was far from being of a firm, compact texture, and

the Alexandrian factories probably sent it forth very imperfectly

prepared. The best quality of paper was made by gluing together,

with starch and vinegar, two sheets of papyrus, one transversely

to the other, and then sizing them. These sheets were sometimes of

considerable dimensions; documents have been discovered written on

paper three yards in length.

Those true lovers of literature, art, and science, the Athenians,

raised a statue to Philtatius--to him who first taught them the

secret of sizing paper!

It is a curious fact that, about thirty years since, the vegetable

size used by the ancient Egyptians was introduced, with some slight

improvement, as a new discovery, into the paper manufactories of

France, and has now almost entirely abolished the use of animal size

in that country for all purposes connected with the fabrication of

paper.

About the fourth century, the Arabs made Europe acquainted with

cotton paper, just then invented in Damascus, thereby causing a

great diminution in the papyrus trade. A long struggle ensued

between the rival productions, which was only put an end to at the

commencement of the twelfth century, by the invention of paper

manufactured from flaxen and hempen refuse. The papyrus disappeared

at once and completely; soon forgotten by commerce, but immortal in

the remembrance of poets and sages--immortal as the pages of Cicero

and Virgil, whose sweet and eloquent thoughts were first traced on

Egypt's reed.

Until the present time, this flaxen and hempen rag paper has

been produced in sufficient quantities for the necessities of our

civilization, but as civilization increases, and as education becomes

more general, especially among the masses of Europe, it is evident

that the supply of rags will be inadequate to the demand, and wood

will most probably again be brought into requisition, as in the age

of Pericles.

Not, however, in the form of the ancient tablets, but transformed

by mechanical and chemical science into sheets of white and pliant

paper; or the numerous fibrous plants of Algeria, Cuba, and other

tropical countries will be turned to account, and no longer permitted

to waste their usefulness on the desert air. Even now, in France,

among the Vosges Mountains, there is a paper manufactory where wood

is manipulated with the most complete success. And some few years

since, a newspaper paragraph informed the civilized world that a

process of making paper from marble had been discovered by a canny

Scotchman of Glasgow! It is not, indeed, impossible that the marble

painfully hewn and engraven by our forefathers to perpetuate the

memory of a bloody struggle or of some vain triumph, may in time to

come, by the magic power of modern science, become a sheet of snowy

tissue, whereon the fair, slight hand of beauty shall trace the

dainty nothings of fashionable life!

The tablets so continually mentioned by ancient writers must be

noted. They were made of parchment, thin boards, ivory, or metal,

prepared to receive ink, or coated with wax and written on with a

stylus, or sharp-pointed pencil. In the Fourth Book of Kings we read:

"I will efface Jerusalem as tables are wont to be effaced, and I

will erase and turn it, and draw the pencil over the face thereof."

Herodotus and Demosthenes speak of their tablets. In Rome, they were

used not only as note-books and journals, but also for correspondence

in the city and its environs, while the papyrus served for letters

intended to be sent to a distance. The receiver of one of these notes

not unfrequently returned his answer on the same tablet. Made of

African cypress and highly ornamented and inlaid, they were given

as presents, precisely as portfolios, souvenirs, and note-books are

nowadays. On the wax-covered tablets was generally traced the first

rough copy of any document, to be afterward neatly written out either

on papyrus or parchment. These wax-covered tablets were used in

France until the beginning of the last century.

Two-leaved tablets were called diptychs, and were sometimes of

extraordinary cost and beauty. The Roman consuls and high magistrates

were accustomed, on their first appointment to office, to present

their friends with ivory diptychs, exquisitely engraved and carved,

and ornamented with gold.

Ancient ink was composed of lamp-black and gum-water. Pliny says that

the addition of a little vinegar rendered it ineffaceable, and that

a little wormwood infused in it preserved the manuscript from mice.

This ink was used until the twelfth century, when our present common

ink was invented.

Not only black, but also red, blue, green, and yellow inks were

employed in antiquity. Sepia ink and Indian ink are mentioned by

Pliny. Red ink, made from a murex, was especially esteemed, and

reserved for the emperor's exclusive use, under pain of death to all

infringers of the privilege. Gold and silver inks, principally used

from the eighth to the tenth centuries, were also prized; writers

in gold, termed chrysographers, formed a class apart among writers

in general. The Imperial Library of Paris possesses several Greek

Gospels, and the _Livre des Heures_ of Charles the Bold, entirely

written in gold. Few manuscripts are extant written in silver; the

most celebrated are the Gospels, preserved in the Upsal Library.

The stylus, a dangerous weapon when made in iron, and proscribed

by Roman law, which required it to be of bone; the painting brush,

used still by the Chinese; the reed, which was cut and shaped like

our modern pen, and with which some oriental nations write even now;

and the feather pen, which is mentioned by an anonymous writer of

the fifth century, were the general writing implements of antiquity

and the middle ages. Metallic pens are also supposed to have been

known; the Patriarchs of Constantinople were accustomed to sign their

official acts with a silver reed, probably of the form of a pen.

Some paintings found in Herculaneum give evidence that the ancients

were accustomed to make use of most, if not of all the various

conveniences with which modern writers surround themselves. The

writing-desk, the inkstand, the penknife, the eraser, the hone,

and the powder-box were well-known. They do not seem, however, to

have had the habit of sitting up to a table to write, but rested

their tablet or paper on their knee, or on their left hand, as the

orientals do at the present day.

DOÑA FORTUNA AND DON DINERO.[16]

FROM THE SPANISH OF FERNAN CABALLERO.

Well, sirs, Doña Fortuna and Don Dinero were so in love that you

never saw one without the other. The bucket follows the rope, and Don

Dinero followed Doña Fortuna till folks began to talk scandal. Then

they made up their minds to get married.

Don Dinero was a big swollen fellow, with a head of Peruvian gold, a

belly of Mexican silver, legs of the copper of Segovia, and shoes of

paper from the great factory of Madrid.[17]

Doña Fortuna was a mad-cap, without faith or law, very slippery,

uncertain, and queer, and blinder than a mole.

The pair were at cross purposes before they had finished the

wedding-cake. The woman wanted to take the command, but this did not

suit Don Dinero, who was of an overbearing and haughty disposition.

Why, sirs! my father (may glory be his rest!) used to say that if the

sea were to get married he would lose his fierceness. But Don Dinero

was more proud than the sea and did not lose his presumption.

As both wished to be first and best, and neither would consent to be

last or least, they determined to decide by a trial which of the two

had the more power.

"Look," said the wife to the husband, "do you see, down there in

the hollow of that olive-tree, that poor man so discouraged and

chop-fallen? Let's try whether you or I can do more for him."

The husband agreed, and they went right away, he croaking, and she

with a jump, and took up their quarters by the tree.

The man, who was a wretch that had never in his whole life seen

either of them, opened eyes like a pair of great olives when the two

appeared suddenly in front of him.

"God be with you!" said Don Dinero.

"And with his grace's worship also," replied the poor man.

"Don't you know me?"

"I only know his highness to serve him."

"You have never seen my face?"

"Never since God made me."

"How is that--have you nothing?"

"Yes, sir; I have six children as naked as colts, with throats

like old stocking-legs; but, as to property, I have only _grab and

swallow_, and often not that."

"Why don't you work?"

"Why? Because I can't find work, and I'm so unlucky that everything I

undertake turns out as crooked as a goat's horn. Since I married, it

appears as though a frost had fallen on me. I'm the fag of ill-hap.

Now, here--a master set us to dig him a well for a price, promising

doubloons when it should be finished, but giving not a single

_maravedi_[18] beforehand."

"The master was wise," remarked Don Dinero. "'Money taken, arms

broken,' is a good saying. Go on, my man."

"I put my soul in the work; for, notwithstanding your worship sees me

looking so forlorn, I am a man, sir."

"Yes," said Don Dinero, "I had perceived that."

"But there are four kinds of men, señor. There are men that are men;

there are good-for-naughts; and contemptible monkeys; and men that

are below monkeys, and not worth the water they drink. But, as I was

telling you, the deeper we dug, the lower down we went, but the fewer

signs we found of water. It appeared as if the centre of the world

had been dried. Lastly, and finally, we found nothing, señor, but a

cobbler."

"In the bowels of the earth!" exclaimed Don Dinero, indignant at

hearing that his ancestral palace was so meanly inhabited.

"No, señor!" said the man deprecatingly; "not in the bowels; further

on, in the country of the other tribe."

"What tribe, man?"

"The antipodes, señor."

"My friend, I am going to do you a favor," said Don Dinero pompously;

and he put a dollar in the man's hand.

The man hardly credited his eyes; joy lent wings to his feet, he was

not long in arriving at a baker's shop and buying bread, but, when he

went to take out his money, he found nothing in his pocket but the

hole through which his dollar had gone without saying good-by.

The poor fellow was in despair; he looked for it, but when did one

of his sort ever find anything? No; St. Anthony guards the pig that

is destined for the wolf. After the money he lost time, and after

time patience, and, that lost, he fell to casting after his bad luck

every curse that ever opened lips.

Doña Fortuna strained herself with laughing. Don Dinero's face turned

yellower with bile, but he had no remedy except to put his hand in

his pocket and bring out an _onza_[19] to give the man.

The poor fellow was so full of joy that it leaped out of his eyes.

He did not go for bread this time, but hurried to a dry-goods store

to buy a few clothes for his wife and children. When he handed the

_onza_ to pay for what he had bought, the dealer said, and stuck to

it, that the piece was bad; that no doubt its owner was a coiner of

false money, and that he was going to give him up to justice. On

hearing this, the poor man was confounded, and his face became so hot

that you might have toasted beans on it; but he took to his heels

and ran to tell Don Dinero what had happened, weeping the while with

shame and disappointment.

Doña Fortuna nearly burst herself with laughing, and Don Dinero felt

the mustard rising in his nose.[20] "Here," said he to the poor man,

"take these two thousand reals; your luck is truly bad; but if I

don't mend it, my power is less than I think."

The man set off so delighted that he saw nothing until he flattened

his nose against some robbers. They left him as his mother brought

him into the world.

When his wife chucked him under the chin and said it was her turn,

and it would soon be seen which had the more power, the petticoats or

the breeches, Don Dinero looked more shame-faced than a clown.

She then went to the poor man, who had thrown himself on the ground

and was tearing his hair, and blew on him. At the instant the lost

dollar lay under his hand. "Something is something," he said to

himself; "I'll buy bread for my children, for they have gone three

days on half a ration, and their stomachs must be as empty as a

charity-box."

As he passed before the shop where he had bought the clothes, the

dealer called him in, and begged of him to overlook his previous

rudeness; said that he had really believed the _onza_ to be a bad

one, but that the assayer, who happened to stop as he passed that

way, had assured him that it was one of the very best, rather over

than under weight, in fact. He asked leave to return the piece, and

the clothes besides, which he begged him to accept as an expression

of sorrow for the annoyance he had caused him.

The poor man declared himself satisfied, loaded his arms with the

things; and, if you will believe me, as he was crossing the plaza,

some soldiers of the civil guard were bringing in the highwaymen that

had robbed him. Immediately, the judge, who was one of the judges

God sends, made them restore the two thousand reals without costs

or waste. The poor man, in partnership with a neighbor of his, put

his money in a mine. Before they had dug down six feet they struck a

vein of gold, another of lead, and another of iron. Right away people

began to call him Don, then "You Sir," then Your Excellency. Since

that time Doña Fortuna has had her husband humbled and shut up in her

shoe, and she, more addle-pated and indiscriminating than ever, goes

on distributing her favors without rhyme or reason, without judgment

or discretion--madly, foolishly, generously, hit or miss, like the

blows of the blind stick; and one of them will reach the writer, if

the reader is pleased with the tale.

FOOTNOTES:

[16] Madame Fortune and Sir Money.

[17] The Bank of Madrid.

[18] Less than a farthing.

[19] A gold piece valued at sixteen dollars.

[20] Was becoming angry.

ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI.

My brothers, ye are sad, and my sisters, ye are poor,

But once was holy poverty the cloak that angels wore;

My fathers, ye are lame, and my children, pale ye be,

But in every face, by his dear grace, that blessed Lord I see

Who brother is and father is, and all things, unto me.

In the sigh of sick men's prayers, in the woeful leper's eye,

In the pangs of wicked men, in the groans of them that die,

Thy voice I hear, thine eye I see, thy thought doth hedge me in.

Oh! may thy sinner bear thy stripes for them that toil in sin,

And with thy ransomed suffering ones find me my choicest kin.

For, whether down to pious rest on these bare stones I lie,

Or if at last upon thy cross triumphantly I die,

The joy of thee, the praise of thee, is more than all reward;

For holy misery doth most with heavenly bliss accord:

All ways are sweet, all wounds are dear, to them that seek the Lord.

I made a harp to praise the Lord with ever-glorious strain;

I tuned a harp to praise my God, and all its strings were pain:

Its song was like to fire, but sweet its keenest agony,

And thus in every tune and tear its burden seemed to be,

"So great is the joy that I expect, all pain is joy to me."

Through all the weary world do I an exiled orphan roam,

Yet for thy sake were desert cave a palace and a home;

And birds, and flowers, and stars are lights to read thy Scripture

by,

And earth is but a comment rude unto thy wondrous sky,

The which to reach, my soul must teach earth's body how to die.

With thy wayfaring ones my crust I've broken by the brooks,

When flowers were as our children fair, our comrades were the oaks,

And wildest forests for thy praise were churches, choirs, and

clarks--

Such house and kindred doth he find who to thy wisdom harks.

Praise ye the Lord, ye spirits small--my sisters sweet, the larks!

The untented air is home for me who in thy promise sleep,

Or wake to find thee ever nigh, and still my sins to weep;

And holy poverty's disguise is pleasant to thine eye;

Yea, richer garb was never worn, that treasures may not buy,

Since thou hast clad me with thy love, and clothed me with the sky.

Oh! could I for one moment's light thy heavenly body see,

All joy were pain, all pain were joy, all toil were bliss to me.

I would give mine eyes for weeping, and my blood should flow like

wine,

To purchase in that sight of bliss one blessed look of thine,

Who hath ransomed with a crown of pain this sinful soul of mine!

My brethren, ye are poor, but as children ye are wise,

Who wander through the wilderness in quest of paradise.

O little children! seek the Lord, wherever he may be,

Whose blessed face by his dear grace on every side I see,

Who brother is, who father is, and all things, unto ye.

LETTER FROM ROME.

ROME, Jan. 21, 1871.

Four months have gone by since the Italian troops entered Rome

through the breach made by the cannon of Cadorna, four months since

a new light dawned upon the Eternal City, and its regenerators set

about the accomplishment of their aspirations. What has been the

development of this third life of Rome--_la terza vita_, as Terenzio

Mamiani has been pleased to style it--in this its primal stage? The

child is father to the man--the seed produces the tree and its fruit.

So, too, do the beginnings of a political state give an index of its

future, fix the causes that are to produce the results of the future.

The history of these four months, then, must be looked on with

interest, and pondered with care.

The present century is universally considered an age of progress, and

it was in the name of progress that the forces of Victor Emmanuel

entered the capital of Christianity. Progress implies motion from one

state or condition to another more perfect: the simplicity of this

statement cannot be gainsaid, and we shall assume it as uncontested.

The party of progress took possession of Rome in the interest of

progress. Has Rome progressed during these months since the 20th of

September? Has she gone from her past state to one more perfect?

Facts must speak; and facts we give. One thing at a time.

Abundance and cheapness of food are the first essentials in the

well-being of a state, and necessarily connected with this is the

facility of obtaining it. We cannot say that food is scarce in

Rome; but the absolute and the relative cheapness have undergone a

decided change, to the disadvantage of the poorer as well as the

wealthier classes, since the 20th of September. The _mocinato_,

or so-called grist-tax, extending even to the grinding of dried

vegetables, chestnuts, and acorns, has sent up the price of bread.

Salt has risen at least a cent per pound. The further application

of the system of heavy taxation is not likely to make other

articles of prime necessity cheaper. And while this state of things

exists, the facility of obtaining food has become much less for the

poorer classes. The causes of this are to be sought in the want of

employers. It is the universal complaint that there is no work.

Before the coming of the present rulers, the army of the Pope,

composed in great part of young men of some means, spent a great deal

among the people. This source of gain ceased with the disbandment of

the Papal troops, for it is notorious _lippis et tonsoribus_, that

the men of the present contingent have barely enough daily allowance

to keep body and soul together. Besides this, ecclesiastics spent

their revenues, fixed by law and sure, with a liberal hand. Now, when

they find difficulty in getting even what they cannot be deprived of;

now that confiscation hangs over their heads with menacing aspect;

now that religious orders are called on to make immense outlays

to send their young men to places of safety--in one case to the

extent of six thousand dollars--it would be foolish to expect them

to sacrifice what is necessary for themselves; though, to do them

justice, they are always willing to share their little with the poor.

Dearth of foreign ecclesiastics, and of foreigners in general, is

another source of distress, and this is directly a consequence of

the invasion. The result of all this is that there is more misery in

the city of Rome than has been seen for many a day--beggars are more

numerous in the streets, and needy families, ashamed to beg, suffer

in silence or pour their tale of woe into the ear of the clergy, who

always are honored with the confidence of the poor and afflicted.

Surely this state of things is not an improvement on the plenty which

characterized the rule of the pontiffs. We cannot say Rome in this

respect has moved into a better sphere--that she has progressed.

Security of person and property is another essential object of the

attention of every state. No state that cannot guarantee this is

deserving of the name of having a good government. Under the Papal

rule, it is well known that not only in Rome did good order prevail,

as the immense multitude present at the Œcumenical Council can

attest, but that also on the frontiers of the territories governed

by the Pope, after the withdrawal of the French troops from Veroli

and Anagni, the energy displayed by the Roman delegate was such as

to liberate completely the provinces from the bands sprung from the

civil strifes of southern Italy. The city of Rome itself was a model

of good order and of personal safety. Now things are changed. Only

a few days ago, a "guardia di pubblica sicurezza" was stopped in

the streets and robbed of his watch and _revolver_. There is not a

day that has not in the daily papers its record of thefts and acts

of personal violence. Only a few days ago, there was a sacrilegious

robbery in the Church of St. Andrea della Valle. On the 8th of

December there was rioting with bloodshed in Rome. A band of young

students under the charge of a religious were stoned on Sunday,

January 15. On the 16th, the Very Rev. Rector of the "Ospizio degli

Orfanelli" was struck with a stone. It would be easy to multiply

examples, but those we have given are quite enough to show that

progress in security of person and property has not been attained

since the 20th of September, 1870.

Then public morality in the centre of Christianity could not fail

to be at a far higher standard, now that the regeneration of the

city of Rome has been accomplished. What bitter illusions fortune

delights in dispensing to those that trust her! Before the entrance

of Italian statesmen into Rome, vice and immorality did not dare

raise their heads--they could not flaunt themselves on the public

ways. Now there is a change, and the moral order of Italy has entered

through the breach at the Porta Pia. We say no more, the subject is a

delicate one, and we therefore refrain from penning facts notorious

in Rome. Surely, none who has received even an elementary training

in virtue will deem this state of things progress--an elevation to a

higher and more perfect state.

But the King of Italy came to Rome to protect the independence of the

Sovereign Pontiff, to save him from the bondage of foreign hordes.

Now, as the Pope is principally a spiritual sovereign, it is his

spiritual power that most needs protection; consequently, the King of

Italy and his faithful servants have been most zealous in preventing

acts or publications that would tend to diminish the respect due to

the Holy Father.

Incomprehensible, but true--the very opposite has taken place! We

have at hand the satirical paper, the _Don Pirlone Figlio_, of

January 19. On its first page is a ridiculous adaptation of the

heading used by the cardinal vicar in his official notifications to

the faithful. The same page has an article grossly disrespectful

to the Sovereign Pontiff, and insulting to the Belgian deputation,

who have just come on to present the protest of their countrymen,

and their contributions. The Holy Father is styled Giovanni Mastai

detto Colui ex-disponibile anche lui; the members of the deputation

are given ridiculous names; and the contributors of Peter Pence are

blackbirds caught in a cage; finally, a ridiculous discourse is

put in the mouth of the Pope, concluding with a benediction. The

illustration represents Pius IX. with a boot in his hand, in the act

of giving it to the Emperor of Germany, who figures as a cobbler.

Such are the illustrations and articles one sees exposed to the

public day by day. When we who have seen Rome under far different

circumstances witness these things, is it at all strange that we

refuse to see "the general respect shown to ecclesiastics in the

exercise of their sacred functions," even though on the faith of a

Lamarmora it be asserted to exist? Can we be blamed for thinking that

anything but progress in veneration of religion has been the result

of the taking of Rome?

After this, any of the advantages arising from the occupation of Rome

can have no weight sufficient to warrant much attention--for they

must be, as they are, material and of a low order--chiefly regarding

facility of communication and despatch in business matters, things

desirable in themselves, but, it would seem, purchased at a fearful

sacrifice.

Is this state of things to continue? Is the Italian kingdom on such

a permanent basis that the Papacy has no hope of a change that may

give it back its possessions? Or can the kingdom of Italy be brought

to make restitution of what it has seized, without itself undergoing

destruction? A word in reply to each of these queries. And first, is

this state of things to continue?

When we consider who the Sovereign Pontiff is, and consult the

opinions of men famed for their foresight and statesmanship, it

is difficult to deny that the restoration of the Pontiff to his

rights is very possible. Napoleon Bonaparte, although he afterwards

made Pius VII. his prisoner, left recorded his opinion that it was

impossible that the Pope should be the subject of any one sovereign,

and that it was providential the head of the church had been

given the possession of a small state to secure his independence.

M. Thiers, in commendation of whom we need say nothing, as his

reputation is world-wide, has clearly and forcibly proclaimed this

very opinion. In the debates on the temporal power in the French

Senate, in 1867, his voice was heard calling on France to protect

Rome, and it was his energy forced from the hypocritical government

of his country the famous word, uttered by Rouher, that struck

terror into Italy--"_Jamais_." One would imagine that now Rome has

fallen, and France is reduced to the verge of desperation, no man

of "liberal" political views would be foolhardy enough to risk his

reputation by reiterating an opinion like this. Yet, strange to

say, there is one who has been willing to run the risk, and that in

the very Chamber of Deputies at Florence. Only a few weeks ago, the

Deputy Toscanelli, a liberal, and, we learn, a free-thinker, with

a courage, a strength of argument, and flow of wit that gained the

respect and attention of the house, almost in the words of M. Thiers

gave the same opinion. In the days of the last of the Medici, said

the distinguished deputy, there was a court-jester riding a spirited

horse down the Via Calzaioli, in Florence. The horse got the better

of his rider, and started off at full speed. "Ho! Sor Fagioli," cried

out one of the crowd, "where are you going to fall?" "No one knows or

can know," was the jester's answer, as he held on with both hands.

Just so is it with the government; it has mounted a policy that is

running away with it, and neither it nor any one else knows where it

is going to fall. The government has gone to Rome, and in Rome it

cannot stay; it cannot hold its own face to face with the Pope. "I

give you, then, this advice: leave Rome, declare it a free city under

the protection of the kingdom of Italy." So much for the opinions of

political men of eminence; we will examine the question for a moment

on its intrinsic merits.

We know the Sovereign Pontiff in his official capacity of teacher of

the whole church is infallible in declarations regarding faith or

morals. But in other matters of policy, of fact, he has no guarantee

against error beyond what is afforded him by the use of the means

which he has at hand, the information of his advisers, and especially

of the Sacred College of Cardinals. Suppose for a moment this

means of information is done away with, or made a vehicle of untrue

statements. Suppose unworthy men are artfully intruded on the Pope,

and act in accordance with instructions received from the rulers of

Italy. Imagine Italy at war or on bad terms with the United States

or England. A crafty statesman sees an opportunity of putting in a

position to aid him in one or the other country an able man, through

the influence of some high ecclesiastic, whose good opinion will

have great weight with men of standing or with the people. The whole

matter is artfully carried out. There is an understanding between

the Italian statesman and his American or English friend; both act

cautiously and avoid alarming susceptibilities. The affair works

well. Persons around the Pope are made to drop a word incidentally in

praise of the virtue and ability of the one whom it is intended to

raise to power. The Pope in his relations with the bishops of foreign

countries, speaking of the prospects of the church in good faith,

speaks also to the ecclesiastic of whom we have made mention, and

in favorable terms, of the person in question. Who that knows human

nature can fail to see the thorough nature of the influence thus

used? The crafty originators are the ones to blame, and the harm done

is effected in perfect good faith by the unconscious instruments of

their design. To show we are not building on our fancy, we turn to

the pages of a man whose name all revere--Cardinal Wiseman. In his

_Recollections of the Last Four Popes_, he speaks of the character of

Pius VII.:

"When no longer a monarch, but a captive--when bereft

of all advice and sympathy, but pressed on close by

those who, themselves probably deceived, thoroughly

deceived him, he committed the one error of his life

and pontificate, in 1813. For there came to him men

'of the seed of Aaron,' who could not be expected to

mislead him, themselves free and moving in the busiest

of the world, who showed him, through the loopholes

of his prison, that world from which he was shut out,

as though agitated on its surface, and to its lowest

depths, through his unbendingness; the church torn to

schism, and religion weakened to destruction, from what

they termed his obstinacy. He who had but prayed and

bent his neck to suffering was made to appear in his

own eyes a harsh and cruel master, who would rather

see all perish than loose his grasp on unrelenting but

impotent jurisdiction.

"He yielded for a moment of conscientious alarm; he

consented, though conditionally, under false but

virtuous impressions, to the terms proposed to him for

a new concordat. But no sooner had his upright mind

discovered the error, than it nobly and successfully

repaired it." (Chap. IV.)

Such are the words of a man writing after years of intercourse with

the first men of Europe. They are instructive words--for human nature

is ever the same. There are men still in Italy who follow out closely

the principles of Macchiavelli--to whom everything sacred or profane,

no matter what veneration may have surrounded it, is but the means

to self-aggrandizement and the satisfaction of ambition. It is for

the nations of the world to say whether they are willing to allow the

existence of the permanent danger to themselves, arising from the

subjection of the spiritual head of the church to any crowned head or

even republic whatsoever. Perhaps, of the two, the latter would be

the more to be dreaded. The Roman mobs that drove Eugenius IV. from

Rome, and pelted him as he went down the Tiber, or made many another

Pope seek safety in flight, could be easily gotten together again, as

the present residents of the Eternal City know only too well.

We answer, then, our first query, and say that this state of things

cannot last. Time, the great remedy of human ills, will solve this

question, and establish the See of Peter on a perfectly independent

basis--independent of all sovereign control, even if this be not done

shortly through the armed interference of European powers.

It is hardly necessary to inquire whether the Italian kingdom is so

firmly constituted that no hope of restoration of the Pope is to be

seen. For ourselves, we think there are indications that point to a

speedy dissolution of this state on the first breaking out of a war

between Italy and any great power. Her policy is to avoid entangling

alliances, and this she is following out, striving to propitiate the

Emperor of Germany for her leaning towards France. The first army

that will enter the peninsula to aid the Pope will shiver Italy to

fragments. The southern provinces have too lively a recollection of

the days of plenty under their kings, and too painful an impression

of heavy taxation and proconsular domination of the Piedmontese race,

to hesitate between submission to them and the regaining their own

autonomy, which will make Naples again one of the queenly capitals of

the world.

One index of the general discontent or indifference is the small

number of those who vote at the elections in proportion to those

who are inscribed on the electoral lists. The motto proposed by the

_Unità Cattolica_, the foremost Catholic journal of Italy--"_Neither

elected nor electors_"--has been adopted and acted upon by very many

throughout the country. We feel no difficulty in saying that the

majority of the Italians are not with the House of Savoy, nor are

they in favor of United Italy. The ruling power has the government

and the command of the army, a fact that quite accounts for the

existing state of things.

Our third question, whether the kingdom of Italy can be brought to

make restitution of the territories it has seized, without itself

undergoing destruction, remains to be answered. We believe it cannot,

unless half-measures--always more or less dangerous--be adopted. The

late spoliation is not more criminal than the first, and no amount of

_plébiscite_ can make it legitimate, no more than--to use the words

of the able editor of the _Unità Cattolica_--the popular approbation

of the condemnation of Jesus Christ legitimized the crucifixion.

The claim, then, to restitution extends to the whole of the former

provinces, justly held by the Popes to supply them with the revenue

needed to make them independent of the precarious contributions of

the Peter Pence, and which was none too large for that purpose.

Whatever may come, we know the future of the church is in the hands

of One in whose holding are the hearts of princes and peoples. What

we have to do is to pray earnestly for our spiritual head, aid him

by our means, console him with our sympathy, and give him whatever

support, moral or other, it be in our power to offer. And while we

do so, it is a joy to us to know we have lessened the grief of his

hardships by what we have done hitherto, even gladdened the hours of

his captivity. A few days ago, speaking to the Belgian deputation,

Pius IX. said: "Belgium gives me very often proofs of her fidelity.

Continue in the way in which you are walking; do not allow your

courage to fail. What is happening to-day is only a trial, and the

church came into existence in the midst of trials, lived always

amid them, and amid them she will end her earthly career. It is our

duty to battle and stand firm in the face of danger.... We have an

Italian proverb which says: It is one thing to talk of dying; quite

another to die. People speak very resignedly of persecutions, but

sometimes it is hard to bear them. The world offers to-day a very

sad spectacle, and particularly this our city of Rome, in which we

see things to which our eyes have not been accustomed. Let us all

pray together that God may soon deliver his church, and re-establish

public order, so deeply shaken. Your efforts, your prayers, your

pious pilgrimages, all tend to this end, and I therefore bless them

with all my heart." May the words of the Holy Father find an echo

in our hearts; let us not lose courage, but keep up our efforts, so

happily begun, and never rest till wrong be righted, until we see the

most sublime dignity and power on earth freed from the surroundings

that would seek to make it as little as themselves.

NEW PUBLICATIONS.

MECHANISM IN THOUGHT AND MORALS. An Address

delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of

Harvard University, June 29, 1870. With Notes and

Afterthoughts. By Oliver Wendell Holmes. Boston: James

R. Osgood & Co. 1871.

Dr. Holmes is a Benvenuto Cellini in literature, and everything he

produces is of precious metal, skilfully enchased, and adorned with

gems of art. The present address is no exception to the general

rule, but rather an unusually good illustration of it. It is a

remarkably curious piece of work, containing many interesting facts

and speculations derived from the author's scientific studies on the

mechanism of the brain. There is nothing in it positively affirmed

which is necessarily materialistic, as far as we can see; rather, we

should say that its doctrine stands on one side of both materialism

and spiritualism, and can be reconciled with either. It can be

explained, if we have understood it correctly, in conformity with

the Aristotelian and scholastic philosophy, in such a way as not

to prejudice the truth of the distinct and spiritual nature of the

soul. The author, indeed, appears more inclined to that belief than

the opposite, although we are sorry to find him expressing himself

in so hesitating and dubious a manner. When he passes from thought

to morals, he gets out of his element, and displays a flippancy and

levity which may pass very well in humorous poetry, but are out of

place in treating of graver topics. His remarks on some points of

Catholic doctrine are so completely at fault as to show his entire

incompetency to meddle with the subject at all. His language in

regard to the Council of the Vatican and Pius IX. is more like that

of a pert and vulgar student of Calvinistic divinity than that of

an elegant and refined Cambridge professor. "But political freedom

inevitably generates a new type of religious character, as _the

conclave that contemplates endowing a dotard with infallibility_

has found out, we trust, before this time" (p. 95). Dr. Holmes has

apparently profited by his close observations among that class of

the female population of Boston who are wont to thrust their bodies

half out of their windows, and "exhaust the vocabulary, to each

other's detriment." We congratulate him, and the learned Society of

Phi Beta Kappa, on the choice sentence we have quoted above. We trust

those Catholics who are disposed to think that we can make use of

Harvard University as a place of education for our youth, will take

note of this sample of the language they may expect to hear in that

and similar institutions, and open their eyes to the necessity of

providing some better instruction for their sons than can be had at

such sources. Notwithstanding our high appreciation of Dr. Holmes's

genius, and the great pleasure we have derived from his works, we

regret to say that we must consider his influence on young people

grievously detrimental. In virtue of a reaction from Calvinism, he

has swung into an extreme of rationalism the effect of which is

checked in his own person by the influence of an unusually good heart

and an early religious education, but in itself is sure to overthrow

all reverence, faith, and moral principle. The whole effect of this

address on the minds of young men tends to a most pernicious result,

and encourages them, with a kind of thoughtless gaiety, to rush

forward in a career of mental and moral lawlessness.

JESUS AND JERUSALEM; OR, THE WAY HOME. Books for

Spiritual Reading. First Series. Boston: Patrick

Donahoe. 1871.

Here we have a plain, practical, but very attractively and charmingly

written book of spiritual reading for everybody. It emanates from

the Convent of Poor Clares, Kenmare, County Kerry, Ireland, who

are anything but poor in intellectual gifts and religious zeal. We

suppose it is from the pen of the gifted authoress of the _History

of Ireland_ and several other works of the highest literary merit.

The idea of the volume is apparently taken from the "Parable of a

Pilgrim" in F. Baker's _Sancta Sophia_, of which it is a minute

paraphrase and commentary. Its minuteness, diffuseness, and fluency

of style are, in our opinion, great merits, considering the end and

object of the book. It is easy reading, explains and enlarges on each

topic at length and in detail with great tact and discretion, and is

eminently fitted to help a person in the acquisition and practice of

the homely, everyday Christian virtues. Its bread is of fine quality,

broken up fine. It is eminently adapted for the young and simple,

timid beginners, and persons living an everyday busy life, and also

for the sick, the suffering, and the afflicted. At the same time,

a professor of theology, or even a bishop, may read it with great

profit and satisfaction. We recommend this book with more than usual

earnestness, and we trust the good Sisters of Kenmare will keep on

with their series, which must certainly produce an extraordinary

amount of good.

ELIA; OR, SPAIN FIFTY YEARS AGO. Translated from

the Spanish of Fernan Caballero. New York: Catholic

Publication Society.

Fernan Caballero is the _nom de plume_ of Madame de Baer, who is now

an aged lady, though still in the full possession of her intellectual

powers. We admire the old Spanish character, customs, faith, and

chivalry. Mme. de Baer is their champion, and the enemy of the

revolution which has desolated that grand old Catholic country. This

is one of her stories written to that point, and we trust it will

find even here many a reader who will sympathize with the author,

and help to neutralize the poison, too widely spread, of modern

liberalism--the deadly epidemic of Spain and all Europe. It is a

very suitable book for school premiums, and ought to be in every

library. Other persons, also, will find it a lively and entertaining

book, with a strong dash of the peculiar quaintness usually found in

Spanish stories.

ROMAN IMPERIALISM, AND OTHER LECTURES AND ESSAYS. By

J. R. Seelye, M.D., Professor of Modern History in

the University of Cambridge. (Author of "Ecce Homo.")

Boston: Roberts Brothers. 1871.

These essays are cleverly and agreeably written. Their topics are

very miscellaneous, but all of them important and interesting. Those

on "Liberal Education in Universities," "English in Schools," "The

Church as a Teacher of Morality," and the "Teaching of Politics," are

especially worthy of attention. Some of the writers of the "Broad

Church," to which Prof. Seelye belongs, are quite remarkable for

their honorable candor, largeness of mind, originality of thought,

and, in certain respects, approximation to Catholic views. We like to

read them better than most other Protestant writers, and often find

their writings instructive. We have seldom seen a book written by a

Protestant in which a Catholic can find so many things to approve of

and be pleased with, and so few in which he is obliged to differ from

the author, as the present volume.

LIFE AND SELECT WRITINGS OF THE VEN. LOUIS MARIE

GRIGNON DE MONTFORT. Translated from the French by a

Secular Priest. London: Richardson. 1870.

The Ven. Grignon de Montfort was a priest of noble birth, who lived

and labored in France as a missionary, and became the founder of two

religious congregations, during the eighteenth century. He was a

person of great individuality of character and many peculiar gifts

and traits, which made his life quite a salient one, if we may be

allowed the expression. His talents for poetry, music, and the arts

of design, and a marked poetic fervor in his temperament, gave a

certain zest and raciness to his career as a missionary, and were a

great help to his success. His character was chivalrous and daring,

and his sanctity shows a kind of exaltation, a sort of gay mockery

of danger, contempt, privation, and suffering, which it almost takes

one's breath away to contemplate. His life was very short, but his

labors, persecutions, and services were very great. He is best

known in modern times by his extraordinary devotion to the Blessed

Virgin. It is altogether probable that ere long the process of his

canonization will be completed, and a decree of the Vicar of Christ

enroll his name among the saints. Those who are capable of profiting

by an example, and by writings of such sublime spirituality, will

find something in this book seldom to be met with even in the Lives

of Saints.

A TEXT-BOOK OF ELEMENTARY CHEMISTRY, THEORETICAL AND

INORGANIC. By George F. Barker, M.D., Professor of

Physiological Chemistry in Yale College, New Haven,

Conn. Charles C. Chatfield & Co. 1870.

Chemical science, as Prof. Barker remarks in his preface, has indeed

undergone a remarkable revolution in the last few years; and the

text-books which were excellent not long ago are now almost useless,

as far as the theoretical part of the subject is concerned. And

though, in all probability, more brilliant discoveries as to the

internal constitution of matter, the formation of molecules, and the

nature of the chemical adhesion of atoms are in store than any yet

made, still the conclusions recently attained on these points maybe

considered as well established, and can by no means be considered

as crude speculations, to be overthrown to-morrow by others of no

greater weight. Chemistry seems, at present, to promise better than

ever before to solve the problem of the arrangement of the ultimate

material elements, though, perhaps, the laws of the forces which

connect them, and the nature of the molecular movements, will be