the Falk laws, which were good enough for Catholics, and right in
themselves so long as the orthodox Protestants did not feel them pinch.
They see at last that such laws strike at all religion; that a
generation brought up under them would have no religion at all; and
that if they would retain the congregations who are so rapidly slipping
from their grasp and melting away, they must strike out those laws from
the calendar.
The persecution of the Catholics goes on unrelentingly, but we have no
doubt that better times are in store. The Catholics, as we pointed out,
are gaining in the Parliament. The administration is weakening in unity
and in the confidence of the country. Poverty is pressing upon the
people. The emperor, in his speech from the throne early in the year,
was compelled to allude to the continued depression of trade and
industry. He might very easily have given one great reason for a large
share of that depression in the vast armaments which he finds it
necessary to maintain at a ruinous cost of men, money, and labor to the
country. As recently as last November the London _Times_, which is
certainly a friendly critic, in treating of “Prussian Finance,” took
occasion to say: “The exaction of the five milliards was thought to
crush for ever the growing wealth of France, and to be almost a
superfluous addition to the abundant exchequer of Germany.... At least
the state was rich for a generation to come. Five years have not yet
passed since this huge mass of wealth was transferred, and already we
find bankruptcy almost the rule among German traders, and hear cries
rising on all sides of the hardness of the times and the impossibility
of bearing much longer the crushing weight of taxation. In the hands of
the government the French milliards seem for the most part to have
melted away and left budgets which vary only in the shifts by which
expenses are coaxed into an equality with receipts.”
The conclusion at which the writer arrives is a very suggestive one,
and one that it would be well for Germany to take to heart:
“It would be better that Germany should be content to remain for a year
or two not quite prepared to meet the world in arms rather than that
her citizens should find that the country so impregnably fortified
offers them no life worth living. A man does not buy Chubb’s locks for
his stable-door when his steed is starving.”
Granting that the general peace of Europe is preserved during the next
year, it would not surprise us at all to see a complete change of
administration in Germany, and a consequent relaxation in the laws
against Catholics. We do hope for this. Even Prince Bismarck must now
see that the persecution of the Catholics was, in its lowest aspect, a
political blunder. He miscalculated the faith of these German
Catholics. The beating of his iron hammer has only welded and proved
and tempered that faith, while the world resounded with his blows and
all men saw that they were ineffectual. Thus has the very cradle of the
Protestant Reformation borne noblest witness in our unbelieving age to
the greatness, the strength, the invincibility of the faith and the
church that Luther dreamed he had destroyed, out of Germany at least.
Here is the result, as pictured by an adversary of the Catholic faith,
within the past year: “It pleased Prince Bismarck—whether, as he
himself alleged, in consequence of the council or not—to undertake a
crusade against the Roman Catholic bishops and clergy which, to the
vast body of their co-religionists all the world over, and to many
others also, had all the look of downright persecution. They were
challenged, not for submitting to the Vatican dogma, but for
maintaining what they had always been accustomed to regard, before just
as well as after the council, as the inalienable rights and liberties
of their church. Only one course was open to them as ecclesiastics or
as men of honor—to resist and take the consequences. Some half-dozen
bishops have accordingly been fined, imprisoned, or deprived; and
several hundred—we believe over a thousand—priests have incurred
similar penalties. Whether the policy embodied in the Falk laws was or
was not a wise and a just policy in itself is not the point. If we
assume for argument’s sake that it has all the justification which its
promoters claim for it, the fact remains equally certain that no
greater service could well have been rendered to the cause of
Vaticanism than this opportune rehabilitation of the German bishops.
The bitterness of the antagonism provoked by the Falk legislation may
be measured by the startling news recently given in the German papers,
that an alliance, offensive and defensive, is being formed between the
Catholics and democratic socialists, who can have hardly a single idea
in common beyond hostility to the existing state.”—_Saturday Review_,
February 24, 1877.
THE CATHOLIC OUTLOOK.
Of other states there is little that calls for special attention here.
Italy is linked with Germany, but Italy can scarcely be regarded as a
very strong ally. Its alliance, however, is useful and necessary to the
leader of the conspiracy against the Catholic Church—the conspiracy of
the kings, into which some have entered in a half-hearted way like the
Emperor of Austria, others with the most determined resolve like Prince
Bismarck and the German emperor. These powerful men are doing all they
can to destroy the Catholic Church; and undoubtedly they impede her
growth, and harry and harass her in a thousand ways. It is easy to say
that this is the best thing that could possibly happen to the church;
that persecution is her very soul; that suffering begets repentance,
and chastisement purity of life. That is all very well and true, but
there is another aspect to the matter. Catholics have worldly rights as
well as heavenly. They are here to live in this world, and to live
happily and freely, and to do their work in it. No prince or government
introduced them into life; no prince or government escorts them out of
life. No prince, or government, or state can absolutely claim human
life as theirs. Life is a free gift of God, to be used freely.
Government is not divine, save in so far as it conforms to the
divinity. Men are not chattels and tools to be used as things of no
volition. The government of a people is only a human institution
erected for the people, by the people, and of the people. It cannot lay
claim to superhuman power, and where it does it is an infamous
assumption. The _numen imperatorum_ is more than a myth; it is a devil.
The “divine Cæsar” is but a man, and generally a very disreputable man.
The assumptions of many modern states to absolute rule over man—states
that for the wickedness of those ruling them have been turned
topsy-turvy time and again by the subjects whom they absolutely
ruled—is a return to paganism, and a very artful return. Obey us, it
says, and we will set you free—free from the Christian God and the laws
that go against your nature. Obey us, and you need bow the knee to no
God; you need have no religious belief or practice; we will abolish sin
for you; you shall marry and unmarry as you please, and as often as you
please; you shall do what you like and have no one to gainsay you. Fall
down and worship us, and all the kingdoms of the world are yours.
This is only a true reading of the pet measures of modern governments:
of the divorce court, of civil marriage, of civil baptism, of schools
into which everything but God may enter. And this is the drifting of
the age: the Gambetta party in France, the revolutionary party in
Italy, of which Victor Emanuel is the regal tool and ornament; the
Bismarckian and Falk party in Germany; the Josephism of Austria; the
“free” thought of all lands. It is this that is in conflict, eternal
conflict, with the Catholic Church. It calls itself liberalism; it is
the tyranny of paganism. It does not threaten the Catholic Church
alone. It only threatens that openly, because it feels it its necessary
foe; it threatens the world and carries in its right hand the social
and moral ruin of nations. There is no possible _modus vivendi_ between
it and men who believe in Christ; and men who believe in Christ form
the bulk of all civilized peoples. There will be no peace in the world,
no peace among nations, until religion is free to assert itself. While
the creeds of Christendom are still divided there must be freedom for
all—freedom to adjust their differences and come back once again to the
lost unity for which all honest men sigh. Politics are the affairs of a
day; religion an affair of Eternity to be settled in Time. It must have
freedom to work; and the attempt to restrict and restrain that freedom
is the secret of more than half the troubles that afflict mankind.
This freedom is all that the head of the Catholic Church demands. He
has no other quarrels with princes than this. He blesses and loves
Protestant England, for it recognizes this freedom; he blesses and
loves this country, for it also recognizes this freedom. The wonderful
reign of Pius IX. will, in after-time, be most memorable for this: that
in a deafening and confused time, in a time when all things were called
in question and all rights invaded, his voice and vision were for ever
clear in upholding the most sacred rights of man, in detecting and
exposing what threatened them, and in maintaining the truth by which
the world lives, at all hazard and in the face of all sacrifice. The
truth of which he is the oracle is the faith in God that makes men
free—faith in the undying church founded by the Son of God, in its work
and its mission among men, in the present and the future of a human
society spreading over the world and built upon that faith. And the
world has recognized this. It recognizes in the Pope, not because he is
Pius the Ninth, but because he is Pope and head of the Church Catholic,
the centre of this society, the head of Christendom; for Christendom is
wider than nations; it embraces them in its arms; they are children of
it, and the Pope is their spiritual father. Is not this truth plain?
Whither have the eyes of the world been turned during the year? Less to
the bloody battle-fields of the East, less to the hearts of European
nations and the courts and cabinets of kings, than to the sick bed in
the Vatican. The gaze of many has been that of brutal intensity; the
gaze of many more, and those not all Catholics, has been one of
affectionate and tender regard. Speculations as to the future are not
in place here. The Pope, of course, will die some day. He has stood the
brunt of the battle. He has lived a great life, given a great example,
and done great things for the church of God. Not a stain, not a breath
or whisper of reproach, mars that long career of mingled triumph and
suffering. He has witnessed strange events. He has seen the church
discarded by all the powers that were once her faithful children. He
has seen the sacred territory of the church invaded and torn from his
grasp. He sees himself in his old age and at the close of a stormy life
imprisoned in his own palace. He has seen the world and the princes of
the world do their worst against the church of which he is the earthly
guardian. And yet he sees the church spreading abroad, growing in
numbers and in virtue, borne on the wings of commerce and carrying its
message of peace and good-will to all lands. There is no faltering in
the faith. His eyes have been gladdened, even if saddened, by as noble
confessors, of all grades, rising up to testify to it as the church in
her history of nineteen centuries has ever known. When he obeys the
last call of the Master he has served so well, there will pass from
this world the greatest figure of the age, and as holy a man as the
ages ever knew. But his work will not pass with him. That will remain,
and the lesson of his life will remain to the successor, on whom we
believe that brighter times will dawn—a brightness won out of the
darkness, and the sacrifice, and the storm braved by the good and
gentle man who so resolutely bore Christ’s cross to the very hill of
Calvary and lay down on it and died there.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
NEW PUBLICATIONS.
MONOTHEISM. The Primitive Religion of Rome. By Rev. Henry Formby. 1
vol. 8vo. London: Williams & Norgate; New York: Scribner, Welford &
Co. 1877.
This is a very interesting and, in some respects, a learned work; but
we are fain to confess that we have been disappointed in it. If the
author, instead of attempting to show that the worship of the one true
God was the early religion of Rome, had contented himself with proving
it to have been professed by the primitive Gentile nations in general,
we should agree with him, and thank him for unfolding in our English
language the incontrovertible truth that polytheism and idolatry are
but corruptions of great primeval traditions collected, preserved, and
handed down by Noe, and that heathen mythology can be made to bear
witness to the original idea of the unity and spirituality of God. This
view of the religious errors of the ancients has been held up by
several eminent writers, and particularly by two who deserve to be
rescued from an unjust oblivion—by Monsignor Bianchini (1697) in _La
Storia Universale provata con Monumenti e figurata con Simboli
Antichi_; and by Abbé Bergier (1773) in his _Origine des Dieux du
Paganisme_. While we do not accuse our reverend author of a want of
modesty precisely in stating his prime opinion about the monotheism of
the second king of Rome, we do think that he writes a little too
dogmatically and as though he had discovered some historical
treasure-trove wherewith to enrich his arguments; whereas no new
documents or monuments whatever have been brought to light to throw a
different or brighter ray upon the character of Numa Pompilius, in
connection with whom, moreover, he seems to us to confound idolatry and
polytheism. We confidently believe that the _Cœleste Numen_ of Numa, on
which so great stress is laid, like the _Deus Optimus Maximus_ of
Tully, or the _Divûm pater atque hominum rex_ of Virgil, was nothing
more than another form of man’s continual, almost involuntary, protest
against the falling away of the human race from the worship of the
Creator, but practically did not betoken more than a recognition of one
among many greater than his fellow-gods. While Numa forbade the worship
of _idols_ in Rome, and consequently professed a less corrupt error
than did many contemporary rulers, he never asserted the unity or, we
prefer to say, the _oneness_ of God. He was a prolific polytheist,
multiplying divinities and introducing new superstitions among his
people. Father Formby has brought up nothing in his favor unknown to
Arnobius, Orosius, St. Augustine, and Tertullian. This last writer,
although he absolves Numa from the crime of idolatry, distinctly
charges upon him a many-parted god: “Nam a Numa concepta est curiositas
superstitiosa” (_Apol._ xxv.)
Our author’s present work is an amplification of a smaller one
published in pamphlet form two years ago, in which he shows the “city
of ancient Rome” to have been “the divinely-sent pioneer of the way for
the Catholic Church.” On this subject we cannot too closely agree with
him, or sufficiently thank him for turning towards our students and
illustrating for them a side of Roman history which is so important.
Our own studies have always pointed in the same direction, and we
cannot better conclude this notice of Father Formby’s work and show our
sympathy with him than by a brief extract from our commonplace book,
made up many years ago in Rome itself:
“The celebrated Gallo-Roman poet and statesman, Rutilius Numatianus,
was much attached to the false ancient divinities of Rome and no small
help to the political party of Symmachus, which so stubbornly fought
St. Ambrose and the Christians. The following lines from his
_Itinerarium_ (i. 62 _et seq._) are truly beautiful and express a grand
idea, but one that is still grander in another sense than his; for if a
heathen understood it to be a blessing in disguise upon the conquered
peoples of the earth to be brought under the domination of Rome on
account of the prosperity and civilization that accompanied her rule,
how shall not a Christian admire the action of divine Providence,
preparing the world for the New Law, and applaud those triumphs that
brought so many countries through the Roman Empire into the Church of
Christ. Of Christian less than of pagan Rome we shall interpret the
poet’s sentiment:
“‘Fecisti patriam diversis gentibus unam;
Profuit invitis, te dominante, capi;
Dumque offers victis patrii consortia juris
Urbem fecisti quod prius orbis erat.’”
THE ILLUSTRATED CATHOLIC FAMILY ALMANAC for 1878. New York: The
Catholic Publication Society Co.
This annual, neat, compact, and perfect in all its mechanical
arrangements—the labor of many busy and well-stored minds condensed
into a portable form—has just been issued. To say that it equals its
predecessors, which have found so much favor with the public, would be
doing it great injustice. In every respect it is far superior, and
shows palpable evidence that its conductors, appreciating the growth in
public taste as well as the increasing desire for reliable information
on important Catholic subjects, have left no effort untried to satisfy
the wishes of their readers. This is particularly noticeable in the
illustrations, which we consider to be not only good pictures but
genuine works of art. The portraits of Archbishop Bayley, Bishops Von
Ketteler and De St. Palais, and the venerable Jesuit Father McElroy are
not only excellent likenesses of those deceased prelates, but the best
specimens of wood-cut portraiture we have yet seen on this side of the
Atlantic. The other engravings, of which there are about a dozen, are
alike creditable to the artist and suitable for the pages of such a
publication. The reading matter, however, will probably most attract
the attention of the majority of purchasers, many of whom will
doubtless wonder where a great portion of it could possibly have been
discovered. Thus, in addition to the lives of the ecclesiastics above
mentioned, and biographical sketches of the venerable Sister Mary
Margaret Bourgeois, Frederic Ozanam, Columbus, and others, we have an
elaborate History of Printing, a description (with fac-similes) of “The
Earliest Irish Madonna,” accounts of the Libraries of the Bollandists
and of the Eremites of York; an archæological sketch of the oldest
churches of the world, an explanation of the antique Cross of St.
Zachary, a _résumé_ of the labors of the Franciscans in California, and
a well-digested mass of astronomical, chronological, and statistical
information which cannot help proving of incalculable value as matters
of reference.
EVIDENCES OF RELIGION. By Louis Jouin, S.J. New York: P. O’Shea. 1877.
There is nothing more gratifying to Catholics who watch the progress of
their religion in this country than to find that the church in the
United States is beginning to supply her own literature, and more
especially her polemical literature, which she needs most of all.
Within the last few years several controversial works and books of
instruction have been written in this country which are far better
adapted to our people than the standard works of foreign authors; and
the time, we trust, is not far distant when we shall be fully supplied
with a well-adapted course of polemics of our own, and be no longer
dependent on the writings of men in lands which are often more or less
out of harmony with the American mind. _The Evidences of Religion_ is
one of the books of which we stood most in need, and the wonder is that
it was not written long before. Perhaps, however, it is as well that no
one attempted it before Father Jouin; for we doubt if any other attempt
could have been so entirely successful.
The book is a marvel of condensed matter and thought and argument. In
its 380 octavo pages are summed up the philosophical treatise _De
Certitudine_ and theological tract _De Locis Theologicis_; and it
contains in addition a refutation, short, sharp, and decisive, of the
latest errors in philosophy, politics, and religion.
Christianity rests on facts, not on mere theories. The science of the
day pretends to deal with facts, and in every case to accept them, so
that in our controversies with the pseudo-science of the times there is
nothing more important than to bring out clearly and strongly the facts
on which the certainty of the Christian faith rests. This Father Jouin
has done, and in his book we have the whole groundwork on which
Christianity is based spread out before us in perspective; the outline
is complete, though of course, in the limited space which he allowed
himself, he has not been able to bring out each detail in full. Yet he
assures us in his preface that nothing essential has been left out, and
we have verified his assertion. Altogether this is just the sort of
book, in our opinion, that is needed to combat the errors of the age,
and to serve as an antidote to the poison of rank infidelity and
materialism with which the very atmosphere around us is charged.
The author tells us that he designs the work more especially as a
text-book for students in the higher classes of our Catholic colleges,
and we sincerely hope that it may be adopted in every Catholic college
throughout the country. Our Catholic instructors fully realize the
importance of giving their students a thorough grounding in the
evidences of their religion, and Father Jouin’s book in the hands of a
good professor can be made the basis of a thorough course of such
instruction.
Not alone to students in colleges do we recommend the study of this
work, but to every intelligent educated Catholic, who should
investigate the reasons on which his religion is founded, and be able
to answer for the faith that is in him. Let our Catholic lawyers and
doctors and business men take it up, and they will find in it
sufficient to convince them of the reasonableness of their creed. It
will furnish them, moreover, with conclusive arguments against the
absurd theories and false views of religion which are being advanced
every day in their hearing.
The greatest enemy that the Catholic Church has to contend with, both
without and within, at the present day, is ignorance of her true
position and teaching, and we eagerly invite and encourage every study
and investigation that may in any way help to dispel it.
It is to be regretted that so valuable a work has not been brought out
in a worthy manner. It is neither well printed nor well put together.
THE NEW VESPER HYMN-BOOK: A companion to _The New Vesper Psalter_;
containing a collection of all the hymns sung at Vespers throughout
the year (classified according to metre), set to music, either for
unison or four voices, with accompaniment, and including the best of
the plain chant melodies, together with the words in full, and the
versicles and responses proper to each hymn. The whole compiled and
edited by Charles Lewis, Director of the Cathedral Choir, Boston,
Mass. Boston: Thos. B. Noonan & Co.
At the present stage of the revival of Gregorian Chant, the true song
of the church, we can commend this little work as one which will
doubtless be found useful in many churches whose organists are unable
to harmonize the chant or the singers to read its proper notation. We
wish, however, that the editor had given all the hymns as found in the
_Vesperale_, as the musical airs which are substituted are not worthy
to supplant the original melodies. The style of notation is that
usually adopted in translations from the old form of four lines and
square notes. Could not the editor have done better, so as to give to
those unaccustomed to plain chant some idea of its movement and
expression? There is no mark given to designate accented from
unaccented notes, and, lacking this, we defy any one who is not
familiar with the traditional movement of a phrase to give its true
expression.