CHAPTER XIII.

“OUR LADY OF SNOW.”

“To-morrow comes the flower of the festivals,” the Signora said on the

morning of the 4th of August. “It is our beautiful basilica’s birthday,

and the loveliest of birthdays, too—just a sweet little poem.”

“Let us give ourselves up to it entirely,” Isabel proposed, “and see if

we cannot imagine ourselves back in the middle of the fourth century. I

really do not like to look at all these things as an outsider.”

“We must, then, shut the world out for two days,” the Signora replied.

“I would like it, if you are agreed. I have found, indeed, that it is

impossible to enter into the spirit of these beautiful beliefs of the

old time while one is having much social intercourse with people about,

even goodish people. It reminds me of seed scattered on good but shallow

ground, which the fowls come and pick up. You think, you meditate, you

pray, you begin to find yourself impressed; glimmers of light steal in,

and your soul is on the point of being enriched; when in comes some

friend, who means no harm, who has, perhaps, a faith like a dry branch

with one green leaf at the end, and immediately all is discord. If you

utter what is in your mind, it is like pearls before swine; if you

listen in silence, and with sufficient attention to enable you to answer

intelligently, it is more than likely that the religious impression you

have received will be much weakened, if not entirely effaced. One

understands, in such a case, the profound wisdom of the philosophy of

silence, which even the pagans knew, and recollects the admonition of

our Lord: “Let your speech be yea, yea; no, no.”

“Still, I should think,” Bianca observed dreamily, “that one might be so

settled in that way of feeling and thinking as to influence others,

instead of being influenced by them.”

“Very true, you dear little visionary!” replied the Signora, pinching

the pretty ear so near her, from which hung a pink coral fuchsia. “If

one were a great saint, and never touched earthly things except with

conspicuous recollection; or a great egotist, constantly impressing on

everybody that one is a very exceptional being and cannot possibly be

approached in the ordinary manner; or some one, like a clergyman or a

nun, who by their very profession impress those who approach them with

the consciousness of different and loftier interests. But we common

mortals are overrun by the many. You have seen the breakwater of a

bridge, have you not, built of stone, and thrusting a sharp point up the

stream to part the waters, that they may not rush against the broad side

of the piers and sweep them away? Well, for one person to keep a firm

stand against the influence of many, it is necessary to put forward, and

keep forward, a very hard angle of the character. However, I will not

preach any more about it, my dear friends. I will simply say that till

the day after to-morrow we are in retreat. We will go up now to the

church, and refresh our minds in relation to the legend, and look at

some of the treasures there, if you like. Then we can read the whole

over here at our leisure. I have a kind friend there—my patron with St.

Nicholas—who has a superb illustrated description of the church, which

he has offered me any time I may wish for it. I will ask for it to-day.

By this means we shall be ready to assist intelligently to-morrow at the

_festa_ of Our Lady of Snow. And, by the way, what a charmingly fresh

thought for the season is that of snow! I call for the yeas and nays.”

An unanimous yea was the reply, and they prepared themselves immediately

to go to the church.

They had, of course, seen already all its more evident beauties; but

such a temple can be studied for years without exhausting its

attractions, and there were several of its more celebrated gems which

they had quite passed over. After having heard Mass, then, they went

first into the Sistine Chapel to see the Tamar. This beautiful figure is

painted in one of the pendentives of the cupola—a space shaped like an

inverted pear. She sits with her twin boys standing on the seat at

either side of her, their lovely heads filling the rounded-out space.

The most exquisite charm of the figure is the transparent veil which

floats about the head and shoulders, and through which her face, with

its large, drooping eyelids, is perfectly visible.

From there they visited the grand _loggia_ to look once more at the

mosaic story of the miraculous snow. This grand mosaic, made in the

fourteenth century by the order of two Colonna cardinals, was once on

the open façade of the church; but Benedict XIV., in the eighteenth

century, building the new façade, enclosed them in the grand _loggia_

from which the popes gave benediction, and of which they form the lower

side. In the centre of the upper half of the picture the Saviour sits

enthroned, the right hand giving benediction, the left holding a book

open at the words, “I am the light of the world.” At either hand above

an angel swings a censer, at either side below an angel adores. Four

figures—the Blessed Virgin and saints—stand at right and left, the

symbols of the four evangelists over their heads. The lower half,

separated by the large, round window that lights the eastern end of the

church, has, on the left, two pictures—one the sleeping Pope Liberius,

the other the sleeping Giovanni—over both of whom hovers the same vision

of the Madonna directing them to build her a church where the snow shall

fall the next day. On the right side is Giovanni telling his dream to

the pope in one picture, and beside it the pope, in grand procession,

coming to the hill-top where, from above, the Saviour and Virgin send

down the snow. So quaint, so full of faith, so exquisite in meaning,

this visible story is one of the most eloquent sermons ever preached.

Opposite the mosaic picture, and seen through the graceful arches of the

portico, was that living picture of St. John Lateran looking down the

long street, the blue mountains melting far away, the nearer palm-tree,

and the piazza with its beautiful column and statue.

“I have a little special treat for you this morning,” the Signora said

as they went down into the church again. “It has no special connection

with the Madonna delle Neve, but it will not disturb your visions of

her. Here, however,” pointing to an altar near the sacristy door, “is

the story again, and here is buried that Giovanni Patrizio who was found

buried under, or in front of, the grand altar.”

It was the chapel of Santa Maria delle Neve, with a painting over the

altar where the Virgin appears to Giovanni and his wife, and points them

to a snow-capped hill.

Then they went into the sacristy, where one of the canons joined them,

and had some precious vestments brought out for them to see; among them

a cope of stuff such as one does not find any more, thick, rich, and

dim, and threaded with gold, with the short fringe of mingled crimson

and gold so thick as to round up almost like a cord—the cope given and

worn by St. Pius V. Almost more precious, if one could choose, was the

chasuble given and worn by St. Charles Borromeo—long, and with a slight,

graceful point in the back. It had been proposed, the sacristan told

them, to have this made a model for chasubles now on account of its

graceful form, but no change had yet been made.

“This is worn on the _festa_ of San Carlo, though it is crimson,” he

added, “because it was his. Sometimes strangers exclaim, when they see

it, that San Carlo was not a martyr.”

They touched reverently the sacred relics, and kissed the fastenings

that those saintly hands had touched; then, with a more human

admiration, examined a marvellous flounce of lace given the church three

hundred years ago by the Prince Colonna of that time—a web of such

fineness that the spiders might have woven the thread, and of such

beauty of design that only an artist could have imagined it.

Before leaving the church they paused in front of the closed _cancella_

of the Borghese Chapel to look at the bas-relief over the altar, wherein

Our Lady of Snow again repeats her story. All was still in the church.

Choir and High Mass were over, and only here and there lingered some

_custode_, or assistant, putting the finishing touches to the

preparations for the _festa_ which would begin with first Vespers that

afternoon. The pavements shone newly polished, the candlesticks were

like gold, the gilt bronze angels that hold the great painted candles

stood on the marble rail of the confession, the draperies were all up.

In the chapel itself the benches of the choir were prepared, the altar

glittering with its most precious ornaments, the two great hanging lamps

at either side swinging faintly, as if impatient for the music to begin.

All was peaceful; and a tender shade and coolness in the air veiled the

glittering richness of the place.

“I cannot tell you how mysterious that picture seems to me,” Bianca

whispered, pointing to the square veiled case bordered with jewels, and

supported by gilt angels in the middle space over the altar. “The two

veils that are to be removed in order to see it, and then the depth at

which it is set, and the mere dark outline that is all one can see

inside the golden border—it all impresses me with a sense of mystery and

awfulness. I wonder what the face really looks like, and if any one has

seen it.”

“Why, you have seen my engraving of it, my dear,” the Signora said; “and

I presume that is a faithful copy, taken when the features were more

distinguishable. That has a noble, serious look which impresses me. And

no wonder you look with awe at this. If it were not painted by St. Luke

even, it is embalmed by memories not less sacred. Twelve hundred years

ago St. Gregory the Great carried this very picture in procession

through the city, in a time of terrible pestilence, and set it on the

altar of St. Peter’s. It was on the open façade of this church till Paul

V. built this chapel to contain it. Ampère says that angels have been

heard chanting litanies about it. It is held by all here in the most

tender veneration. I have never heard any one describe it, and do not

know who has seen it near. I have heard somewhere that only the chapter

of the basilica and the Borghese family have the privilege of going up

to it. _Madonna mia_, what a privilege it would be!” she sighed, looking

up at the closed jasper gates.

They stayed a little longer, then started to go home; but as they were

going out a boy came to tell the Signora that Monsignore M—— begged to

speak with her. The others went on, but she turned back, well content;

for a call from Monsignore M—— always meant something pleasant. This

prelate was no less distinguished for position than for his virtues;

and, finding the Signora a stranger and somewhat lonely when she first

came to Rome, he had done her many kindnesses—was, in fact, her Santa

Claus.

“Do you guess what little devotion I want you to make on the eve of our

_festa_?” he asked, meeting her with the confident smile of one who

knows he is going to confer a great pleasure.

“I know it is something delightful, _Monsignore mio_,” she replied, “but

I cannot say just what.”

“Well, I want you to visit the antique Madonna,” he said.

She looked at him, uncomprehending.

He pointed to the veiled shrine in the Borghese Chapel, near which they

stood. “Don Francesco will be here in a moment with a candle,” he said.

“I prepared all, because I knew you would want to go. I could not invite

a party, you know; but you belong to the church and have a special

devotion to our Madonna.”

The Signora could not reply. Such a swift fulfilment of her wish moved

her too deeply for words. She kissed the hand of her kind friend, and

looked across the church to the tabernacle of the Blessed Sacrament with

the almost spoken thought: “I am going to see your Mother.” To visit

that sacred shrine was to her as near to seeing the Mother of God face

to face as one could come on earth, without a miracle.

Presently appeared the custodian, bearing a lighted candle and a bunch

of keys; he opened a small door beside the chapel. They ascended a

narrow, winding stair, without any light except the one they carried,

and passed a long, arched corridor where the walls almost touched their

elbows at either side, and the vault just cleared their heads above.

This corridor was between the side wall of the chapel and the wall of

the adjoining sacristy. Another door opened, and they entered a cross

corridor leading to one of the balconies of the chapel—one of those

beautiful gilded balconies the Signora had so many times wished to get

into. She stepped into this now, and looked down through the chapel, out

into the church, and across to the Sistine Chapel, the columns,

pictures, and gilded arches of the basilica set like a picture in the

great arched entrance of the Borghese.

Going on then, Don Francesco opened a strong, locked door, that showed

another door immediately within, closing the same wall. These led into

another of those narrow white corridors running between the walls of the

chapel behind the altar. Turning then into a third short corridor

leading toward the chapel, they faced still another door, over which

were painted the arms and tiara of Pope Paul V., who built the chapel.

This door unlocked, they found themselves in a little chamber directly

behind the grand altar, with the miraculous picture, set in a box cased

in metal, right before them. It stands a little back from the screens

that cover it in the chapel, and there is space enough at either side

for a person to slip in in front and see the picture face to face. Two

iron hooks that barred the passage were taken down, and the Signora went

in and found herself in front of this most venerable image.

The picture is painted on panel, and, though dim, is still distinct on

so near a view, the rich, soft colors coming out as one gazes—a long,

oval face full of serious majesty, with large eyes, and a mantle

dropping over the forehead. But this mantle is now almost hid; for the

head of the Mother, and of the Babe that looks up into her face, and the

outline of their shoulders, are closely filled in with gold and gems.

But for this nothing but a dark square would be distinguishable from the

chapel. The outline is so clearly made, however, as to give a perfect

idea, when looked at from below, of a crowned woman with a crowned child

in her arms.

If, in the presence of the picture, one can think of jewels, these are

worth looking at. They are the gems of a cardinal and of a pope—stones

of immense value set in pure gold. Besides rubies and amethysts, in the

centre of the Virgin’s crown is a large emerald surrounded by diamonds,

and from the jewelled chain at her neck hangs a cross made entirely of

large sapphires.

The Signora took the candle in her hand and held it before those faces,

and the clergymen with her knelt, one at either side of her.

After a little while they rose, the Signora kissed the floor before the

picture, and the case that held it, and they turned away. On leaving she

observed that this little chamber behind the altar was quite covered

with frescoes. Then came the low corridors again, and the narrow stairs;

one more peep from the gilded balcony, and at length she stepped out

into the church again, bewildered and enchanted.

“I will tell them nothing about it,” was her conclusion as she went

home. “They might feel hurt at being left out. It shall be a little

secret of my own.”

They went to first Vespers and to the High Mass next morning, but the

finest part was the Vespers of the day, to which they went early, and

were so fortunate as to have chairs in the chapel near the altar. The

chapter came in in procession from the basilica, singing as they came,

and the place was soon crowded.

Nothing was wanting to make the scene perfect; the magnificent chapel,

the beautiful dress of the canons, who all wore purple silk soutanes,

with rich lace on those picturesque little _cotte_ of theirs, and the

music—each was in harmony with all the rest. Then, as the music went up,

down through the cupola, glowing with the colors of Cavaliere d’Arpino,

and faintly veiling the frescoes of Guido Reni, came the soft and

loitering snow of blossoms, flowery flake by flake. They were lost one

instant against the white band of Carrara marble—cornice, capitals,

figures, and flowers—under the arches, then green of verd-antique, and

red of jasper, or the colored mantle of one of Guido’s saints threw them

into relief again. Little by little the mosaic of the pavement grew dim

under that exquisite snow-fall, which seemed, as it came down, to toss

on the music in mid-air.

The light up in the cupola grew red with sunset, and the chapel below

began to show softest shades and pale gold lights from the candles, and

the pageant slowly dissolved like a bouquet that parts into flowers,

each flower showing more beautiful separated than when massed together.

Going out into the basilica, where it seemed almost evening, so strongly

contrasted were the lights and shades, the Signora silently pointed out

to her friends the long, red-gold bar of sunshine that came in at a

window of the tribune and lay the whole length of the nave, looking so

solid one felt like stepping over or stooping to go under it, as if it

were an obstacle. It was her very idea of the bars of the tabernacle

which the Jews bore with them.

“If only the church should be lifted and borne to Paradise now, when it

is all bathed in flowers and full of incense and music!”

They lingered yet, unwilling to go. Monsignore M—— came out of the

sacristy and brought them all some of the blessed blossom-snow. People

were gathering it up from the floor of the chapel, and, it having fallen

also in the tribune, little boys were slyly vaulting over the railings,

snatching it up unseen by the _custodi_, and scampering out again. The

lights went out, the _cancelle_ were closed, and finally our friends

were forced to go home.

They stood a moment outside the church door before descending the steps,

the two girls expressing their delight with feminine enthusiasm. Mr.

Vane had but one word: “There is a certain Protestant hymn that used to

make me feel, when I was a boy, very loath to go to heaven,” he said.

“But, remembering it now by the light of this _festa_, I think heaven

couldn’t be better described than as a place——

“'Where congregations ne’er break up,

And Sabbaths have no end.’”

A few days later they made their little visit to Genzano, stopping one

day in Albano on the way. It was the feast of the Holy Saviour, in which

again an antique and venerated picture had a prominent part. They

reached the town just in time to see the procession go from the Duomo

bearing the picture up to the little church of Santissimo Salvatore on

the hill.

“What are those military bands playing for?” Mr. Vane asked, as they sat

in the loggia of their apartment, after having rested a half-hour.

“They are playing for the Lord,” said the Signora.

He stared a little, but, finding her perfectly serious, said after a

moment: “Well, I don’t know why they shouldn’t; only I am not used, you

know, to hearing fifes and drums on any but military and civil

occasions.”

“This is a military occasion,” the Signora replied gravely. “It

celebrates Him who is the God of battles and the Lord of hosts. It is a

civil occasion, too, in honor of the King of kings, the Lawgiver of the

universe, the Prince of peace.”

“You are right!” he said emphatically; “and I need not ask now why they

are firing cannon.”

They went out just at sunset and took their places on the steps of the

little church to which the procession was to come, catching glimpses of

it in the distance as it appeared in some turn of the ascending way.

The slope of the street just in front of them had been swept, and two

men were sprinkling it in a very primitive fashion. One trundled along a

cart with a little barrel of water on it, and the other dipped in a

small wooden bucket and scattered the water from side to side. He did it

very dexterously, however, showing practice. Nearer the steps the street

was paved with a mosaic of flowers, and all the houses by which the

procession was to pass were decorated in some way, with flowers,

pictures, and lamps to light later, some already lighted and showing

faintly through the gloaming. All the windows and little balconies and

elevated door-steps near the church were filled with women and children,

every face turned toward the winding street up which a cross was

glittering and a sound of music coming. A banner came in sight after the

cross, and then a crucifix with its canopy, and then banner after

banner, and crucifix after crucifix, showing in air over the wall that

wound with the street. At one turn were visible the tops of the tallest

heads; then, a little farther on, the whole heads of men, and the

flowing locks of the boys of the choirs; and, lastly, they came into

full sight near by, the inferior persons marching in lines at each side

of the street, leaving hollow spaces where there was no banner or

crucifix to be carried, the clergy walking in the centre. As the picture

of the Holy Redeemer came along, borne on the shoulders of four men, all

the crowd about sank on their knees. The picture was carried up the

steps and placed on a table set there to receive it, and there were

prayers and hymns before dropping the curtain over it and taking it into

the church.

The sun went down and one large star burned in the west. It was easy to

imagine an angel hand and wings above, and golden chains dropping down

to a lamp of which that star was the flame. All the lamps, many-colored

as the rainbow, were lighted in the windows, throwing their light, as

the twilight deepened, in a strong splash, here and there, on a leaning

face intent and praying, on a mantle of vines, on a bit of carving, a

rough stone balcony, or a stair climbing up into the dark. One little

arched window, with a vine over it, held a single beautiful face of a

young woman, and a single lamp that shone on her black hair and eyes and

perfect features, motionless there in prayer, till she looked like a

cameo cut in pink carnelian.

The prayers ended, and some one drew the curtain before the lovely face

of the picture. As he did so a chorus of exclamations burst from the

kneeling crowd, and several women burst into tears.

“What do they say?” Mr. Vane asked in surprise. “What is the matter?”

“They say, '_Grazie, Santissimo Salvatore!_'—Thanks, most holy Saviour,”

she replied.

He smiled faintly and repeated after them, “_Grazie, Santissimo

Salvatore!_” and it seemed that his eyes glistened in the candle-light.

“I am glad it touches you,” the Signora said as they went to their

lodgings. “Some, even Catholics, think it superstitious; but it is no

more so than it is a superstition for us to kiss and weep over the

pictures of our friends.”

The next morning they went up to early Mass in the pretty Capuchin

church, at the head of its long avenue of overarching trees, loitering

slowly home again when the Mass was over.

“Now,” said the Signora suddenly, spying a man with a large basket—“now

I will show you what figs are. You have not known before.”

She beckoned the man and asked how many he would sell for a _soldo_. He

replied, “Twelve.”

“You may give me eight dozen,” she said. “Each of you dear people are to

have two dozen and to carry them yourselves. Out with your

handkerchiefs! That is the fashion. Don’t be scrupulous.”

“They don’t look as if I should wish to eat two dozen,” Bianca remarked

doubtfully. “They look to me like little bits of green apples.”

“Please to defer your judgment,” remarked her friend; “and what you do

not wish to eat I will take.”

When they had reached home and were seated at the breakfast-table, the

Signora took one of the little figs, with some ceremony and much

anticipated triumph, and, lacking a fruit-knife, peeled its green skin

off with the handle of a tea-spoon. All their eyes were watching the

process; and when it was ended, and she pushed out the little

teaspoonful of delicious fruit for Mr. Vane to have the first, the

others were convinced by only seeing. It was a rich, deep red, of the

consistency of solid old preserved strawberries, but with the fig

flavor.

After breakfast was over they went out to visit the gardens of the

Cesarini palace, for which they had a permit. These are laid out and

kept by a Swiss gardener, and are a wilderness of flowers and trees and

fountains on the level and down the hill-side. After wandering about the

upper part for a while they descended a slowly-winding path, bordered by

hydrangeas in full flower, that stood shoulder-high and dropped their

great balls of amethyst bloom toward the earth, and came out into a

little terrace where the trees and shrubs left an open front. A long

bench at the back, and a richly-carved antique capital of a column near

the wild-vine parapet, gave them seats, and before them was the whole

verdant amphitheatre, with Lake Nemi at the bottom, and the town of Nemi

half up the opposite bank, like a little white flower painted half way

up the inside of a green cup. And down from the flower, like its white

stem, dropped a white stream, cascade after cascade, to the lake, its

motion petrified in the distance.

Tall white cloud-shapes marched round the hill-tops and looked

over—shining shapes that seemed to hold Olympian deities within their

folds, “impenetrable to every ray but that of fancy.” The amphitheatre

sloped steeply in a green cone rich with orchards and vineyards, and

pressed in a waving line around the water. Opposite the little terrace

in which they sat, as in a box at the opera, the shore made a green

heart in the water, and from behind one curve of it a boat, tiny in the

distance as a black swan, slipped out and moved across the view. The

lake lay like an emerald half-fused, its shaded greens touched in places

with a soft purple bloom or a silvery lustre, and catching now and then

a melting image of some cloud-cap higher than the rest. There was a

sound of mellow thunder from some direction—Jupiter Tonans driving

through those driving clouds.

They sat there silently drinking in the beauty of the scene, speaking

only a word or two now and then, waiting till it should be noon and they

should hear the Angelus from Nemi. When it came, a dream of a sound,

touching with the outermost wave of its song the party of strangers

across the lake, they stood up and said the prayers together. Then,

bidding adieu to Nemi and its lake and the beautiful garden, they went

slowly away.

That afternoon they went back to Albano, and the next evening returned

to Rome. They had only one other excursion to make—that to Monte

Cassino. Certain affairs were calling Mr. Vane to America, either for a

longer or shorter stay, to go with only his daughters, or to have a

nearer companion yet, and the end of their visit was approaching. It

would soon be September, and in October they must start. Besides, it was

found that, subject to her father’s approval, Bianca had promised to

marry early in the spring, and some preparations must be made for the

wedding.

TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT MONTH.

TO POPE PIUS IX.

A JUBILEE OFFERING, JUNE 3, 1877.

I.

To-day the scattered peoples of the earth—

Haply the monarchs may not all forget—

Pay unto thee, great Pope, their willing debt

Of love sincere—blest debt of heavenly birth!

We kneel afar, a people of to-day,

Whose life but doubles in its hundred years

Thy long episcopate of many tears;

But none the less we love, nor ceaseless pray

That He who leadeth Joseph like a sheep

May bless thee with fair length of glorious days,

May give thee yet triumphant voice to raise

When men, with happy tears, shall vigil keep

Of that great feast when Christian Rome no more

In chains shall stand a world’s awed gaze before.

II.

Eudoxia’s church—where Michael Angelo

Hath Moses wrought in terrible array—

With faith’s most loving rites keeps holiday

In holy thought of those long years ago

When, 'neath its roof, the throng devout drew near

To see thee made a shepherd of the sheep,

Thy crook receive, that thou shouldst bravely keep,

Thy flock e’er leading by the waters clear.

“St. Peter of the Chains”—prophetic name!

Beneath this title was thy charge begun;

As Peter’s self thy hands his chains have won,

With these, his years. When shall God’s angel claim

Thy liberty, the prison gates fling wide?

Christ in his vicar no more crucified!

III.

O happy senses of the Virgin Blessed

Standing the cross of Calvary beneath—

So winning martyrdom without its death—

Queen of all martyrs evermore confessed!

O happy Pontiff! wear’st thou not to-day

Beneath the triple crown one wrought of thorn?

So crowned for love thou hast unfailing borne

To thy pure spouse the faithless would betray?

Art thou not martyr, too, by that deep woe

Thou sharest with our Queen Immaculate?

About thee rise the cries of blinded hate,

Thou seest afresh the wounds of Jesus flow;

His cross thy palm, his words sublime thine too—

“Father, forgive; they know not what they do.”

IV.

As said Lacordaire, of the rosary,

That love must ever its own speech repeat

That, ever murmured, groweth e’er more sweet,

So, seeking long some gift to bring to thee

On this high day that keeps thy years of gold—

Some thought that shall heart’s dearest service prove—

Find I but one e’er-echoing word of love

That doth all else I seek most fair enfold.

Too great thy deeds for my poor verse to tell

That need the Tuscan’s speech of Paradise;

Even to think them, tears are in my eyes

And sorrow stifles the _Te Deum’s_ swell—

Tears for so dear a feast seem gift unkind,

But love in every falling bead is shrined.

V.

As, when our Lord doth rest in solemn state

On altar for his worship set apart,

And from the fulness of each faithful heart

The fairest flowers to him are consecrate—

Pure lilies, that with fragrant breath pour forth

The speechless worship human love must give;

Red roses, in whose flush love seems to live—

As, 'mid this wealth, some gift of little worth,

Some penance-hued, frail-blooming violet,

Is brought by humble soul with love as great

As lies within the lilies’ lordlier state—

Each cancelling so little of love’s debt—

So I, my father, 'mid thy lilies place

My rue, thy blessing shall make herb-of-grace.

THE PRESENT STATE OF JUDAISM IN AMERICA.

Judaism, in its purity, is not a false religion. It was revealed and

established by God, and nothing which comes from him can be untrue.

Judaism, as it now exists here and in Europe and Asia, is, on the one

hand, overladen and almost smothered by the inventions and additions of

men, until the original deposit of the truth is with difficulty

discerned; on the other hand, it is refined and explained away until it

has become little better than a system of worldly morals. To-day, in

Europe, Jews, and the descendants of Jews who have lost their ancestral

faith without becoming Christians, are powerful in the cabinets of

kings, in parliaments, in the money exchanges, and in the world of

journalism. In America, while they have as yet, perhaps with a single

exception, taken no leading part in the political affairs of the

country, they have become a power in finance, and are beginning in a

quiet way to influence, and to some extent to control, journalism. The

ability of the race is unquestionable, and their virtues, as a race, are

many. They are prudent and thrifty; they are charitable to each other,

and their charities are not always confined to their own people; they

are seldom guilty of crime, although when a Jew does become a criminal

his offences are apt to leave little to be desired in the matter of

completeness, audacity, and cruelty; they are excellent parents, and the

domestic virtues among them are cultivated to a high degree; their women

are for the most part chaste; their men are seldom cruel creditors, even

when their defaulting debtors are Gentiles. They have their faults and

objectionable peculiarities; among certain classes of them these

imperfections are especially noticeable; but, as we shall show, the

rising generation of Jews in America will probably become tolerably well

Americanized, and will, to some extent at least, cease to be an

unpleasantly peculiar people.

To Catholics the study of the changes which have taken place and are now

occurring among the Jews should be invested with peculiar interest. We

cannot forget that the Holy Scriptures of the Jews are a portion of our

Holy Scriptures; that Our Blessed Lady was a Jewess, and that our Divine

Lord willed to be born a Jew according to the flesh; that he made

himself subject to the ceremonies and rites of the Jewish law, which was

then the divine law, and consequently his own law; that the first drops

of his precious blood were shed in the Jewish rite of circumcision; that

his chosen apostles, and among them the first pope, were all Jews; that

the Catholic Church at its first organization was wholly composed of

Jews; and that the first Christian martyr was a Jew.

When Jesus Christ had finished his work on earth and had ascended into

heaven, the Jewish law was fulfilled but not destroyed; it remained in

full force and effect, subject only to such modifications as God

himself, speaking through the infallible mouth of the church which he

had established, should ordain in matters of ritual, sacrifice, and

outward observances. The code of laws given by God to Moses on Mount

Sinai, and engraved by the divine hand upon tables of stone, is as

binding to-day upon all of us as it was binding upon the Jews on the day

when Moses came down from the mount bearing the sacred tablets in his

hands. The devout Jew who to-day, with reverently covered head and

contrite heart, stands in his synagogue and listens to the reading of

the law, hears the same words that Jesus of Nazareth read when, as was

his custom, “he went into the synagogue and stood up for to read.” True,

hearing, he does not hear the full meaning of the divine words; seeing,

he does not see how they have been fulfilled; his understanding has not

been opened to know that the Messias for whom he still yearns was the

Jesus whom his ancestors crucified on Calvary, and that, on the altar of

the church which, perhaps, stands next door to his synagogue, this same

Jesus, risen, glorified, and descended again from heaven, stands ready

to receive and bless him.

But the Jew, ignorant of this and still clinging fast to the faith of

his fathers, has an infinite advantage over all the other non-Catholics

in the world. His religion, as we have said, was revealed by God, and

therefore is not false in its essence, however much it may be overlaid

and hidden by the innumerable superstitions and additions with which

successive generations of rabbis and doctors have encumbered it. It is

not a revolt against the Catholic faith nor a contradiction of it; for

not only did it exist before the Catholic Church was established, but it

was revealed by God, and he cannot contradict himself. The Jew errs only

because he cannot or will not see that the Catholic Church is the lineal

heir and rightful possessor of the church of which Adam was the first,

and Caiphas the last, high-priest; and as for his sin in this hardness

of heart and blindness of eye, God will judge him. Outside of this, and

outside of the human additions which have been made to his creed, he

believes what God spake unto Abraham, Moses, and the prophets, and his

religion is entitled to respect because it is of divine origin. But the

origin of all the other non-Catholic religions in the world is human or

diabolical. They are revolts against the authority and teaching of the

church which Jesus Christ established in the world; to the earthly and

visible head of which he gave the keys of the kingdom of heaven; to the

words of which he enjoined all men to render obedience; on which he has

bestowed the inestimable grace of perfect unity; and which the Holy

Spirit keeps ever in the truth. The Jew can say with truth, “God founded

my church”; but the Protestant can only say, “Martin Luther, or King

Henry VIII., or Queen Elizabeth, or John Knox, or John Wesley, or

Alexander Campbell, or Jo Smith, or the devil founded _my_ church.”

Judaism, however, although divine in its origin, ceased to possess the

divine sanction from the moment when our Lord had completed his work on

earth and ascended into heaven, and the Holy Ghost descended to preside

over the organization of the church from which he has never since

departed. The Jewish religion, thus deprived for ever of the divine

sanction, was at once deprived of its divine authority and became a

merely human organization, subject, like all other human things, to

corruption, change, decay, and disintegration. These processes have been

going on within it for eighteen hundred years, and they have now reached

a most advanced stage.

Prior to the crucifixion and ascension of our Lord the essential unity

in faith of the Jewish people had been preserved. The lawyers, the

doctors, and the Pharisees had added much to the law of Moses in the way

of laying heavy burdens on the people; they took tithes of annise and

cummin; they made broad the edges of their phylacteries, and they were

famous for making long extempore prayers, in which latter respect they

resembled too closely some of our esteemed Protestant brethren. But the

essential and divinely-given articles of the Jewish faith remained

unimpaired, and in these essentials the unity of the people was

complete. The process of change and disintegration commenced immediately

after the establishment of the Christian Church and what may be called

the formal transfer to her of the guiding and enlightening influence of

the Holy Spirit. But for many centuries this process was slow and its

progress excited little or no attention. The Jews, until a very recent

period in their history, were a persecuted people; and persecution tends

to make men cling closer to that which is the cause of the persecution.

There were times in the history of the Jews when their only city of

refuge was Rome; when the popes, alone of all the sovereigns of the

earth, stretched forth over them a protecting arm and permitted them to

dwell in peace and security. Within the last century, or less, all this

has been changed: nowhere in all Europe now, save in Bulgaria and one or

two other provinces, are the Jews persecuted; they have obtained equal

political and social rights; they are cabinet ministers, premiers,

members of parliament, eminent journalists, and autocratic bankers. With

this prosperity have come the marked evidences of that disintegration in

matters of faith to which allusion has been made. And here in America,

where the Jews have been always free, these changes have now become more

signal and wide-spread than in any other country.

To show how this has come about, it will be necessary, in the first

place, to explain briefly the nature of the additions which have been

made by the Jewish doctors to the divine law; the effect of these human

edicts and precepts upon the minds of those Jews who retain their faith;

and their contrary effect, upon other minds, in promoting and

disseminating the spirit of infidelity which is now so widely prevalent

among the Hebrews. The strictly “orthodox” Jew to-day is more burdened

than were ever any of his ancestors by practically endless rules,

observances, rites, and ceremonies, while his “reformed” or

“ultra-reformed” brother has not only shaken himself free from all, or

nearly all, of these human inventions, but has emancipated himself also

from the letter and spirit of the law of Moses and from the bonds of the

faith.

The books of the Jewish law as they now exist are the Old Testament, as

we call it; the “Mishna,” or Second Law; and the “Gemara,” or supplement

to the “Mishna.” These two latter books, taken together, form the

“Talmud.” But the “Mishna” is the explanation of the Old Testament; the

“Gemara” is the explanation of the “Mishna”; and there remains behind or

above all these the mystical and mysterious “Cabala,” which contains

within itself the sum and essence of all human wisdom, and of such

portions of divine wisdom as men are permitted to know. The “Cabala,”

properly speaking, is not a book, and has never been wholly committed to

writing. The “Cabala”—and the meaning of the word is the “tradition”—is

a divine, sublime, secret, and infinite science, treating of the

creation of the universe, of the esoteric meaning and significance of

the Mosaic laws, and of the secrets of God. No trace of its origin is to

be found. Moses, David, Solomon, and the prophets are said to have been

masters of it. It was taught to successive generations, but with the

utmost secrecy and only to a select few, who were deemed worthy to

receive this priceless knowledge. Those portions of it which are written

are brief, obscure, and full of abbreviations and initials, to be

understood only by the initiated. They resemble the manuals of

Freemasonry—pregnant with meaning to the members of the craft, but

unintelligible to all who have not the key of the cipher. He who is a

perfect master of the “Cabala” is so wise and potent that he not only

can work wonders, but may exercise almost creative powers. Nay, even an

imperfect and surreptitiously-obtained knowledge of its mysteries

enables one to perform miracles. He who can place certain letters in a

certain way, and pronounce them in a certain manner, may suspend the

operation of the laws of nature and command the angels of God to do his

will. The Cabalists, however, claim that seldom, if ever, has their

divine science been used by unworthy men or prostituted to selfish

purposes. The penalty for such a sin is eternal death; it is written in

one of their books that “he who abuses the crown perisheth,” and this is

understood to refer to those who possess themselves of this knowledge

and then use it for selfish purposes. The true Cabalists study their

science not for gain, but for the sake of obtaining profound knowledge.

They apply their rules to the letters and words of the Mosaic law, and

ascertain thereby its hidden significance, drawing from every word or

sentence an esoteric meaning, often full of sublime intelligence, and as

often pregnant only with absurdity.

Emanuel Swedenborg seems to have been an unfledged Cabalist; it is

probable that he became in some manner acquainted with a few of the

outward formulas of the Cabala, and that he based on these his wearisome

treatises upon the secret meaning of the Scriptures. Certain it is that

nothing which Swedenborg imagined is not to be found in the Cabala.

Fortunately, a knowledge of the Cabala is not necessary for salvation;

on the contrary, knowledge of it is a special perfection which every one

is not able to attain, and for the want of which no one is to be blamed.

The “Mishna” contains the oral or traditional laws transmitted from

Moses, through a line of which the personality of every member is known,

to the Rabbi Jochanan, who lived at Jerusalem at the time of the

destruction of the second Temple. It was compiled by Rabbi Jehuda Hanasi

in the latter half of the second century. The “Gemara,” or supplement to

the “Mishna,” is a wonderful book, containing thirty-six treatises upon

history, biography, astronomy, medicine, and ethics, interspersed with

legends, aphorisms, parables, sermons, and rules of practical wisdom.

The oral or traditional laws in the “Mishna” are claimed to be of divine

authority; and the passages in both these books which seem to be absurd

in the letter have a secret meaning understood best, if not exclusively,

by the Cabalists. The morality taught in these writings is not to be

despised. For example, it is laid down that men should not use flattery

or deceit in business affairs; they should not be boisterous in their

mirth nor permit themselves to sink into abject melancholy, but should

be reasonably and gratefully cheerful; they should be neither greedy of

gain, nor slothful in business, nor over-righteous in fasting and

penance; all that they do they should do for the glory of God; they

should love every Israelite as themselves, and they should be kind and

charitable to the stranger; they must abstain from inward and silent

hate, and if aggrieved by a neighbor they should make it known to him,

affectionately asking him to redress the wrong; they should be

especially solicitous to comfort, aid, and protect the widow and the

orphan, not merely if these be poor, but because they have suffered and

their hearts are laden with grief. There are three mortal sins—idolatry,

fornication, and bloodshed; but calumny is equal to all three. Every one

who professes the true faith must believe that there is a Being whose

existence is inherent, absolute, and unconditional within himself; who

has no cause or origin, and like whom there is no other; who is the

first producer of all things; in whom all creatures find the support of

their existence, while he derives no support from them; and that “this

Being is by men called God—blessed be he!” There are six fundamental

principles of the faith—the creation of all things by God out of

nothing; the pre-eminence of Moses as a prophet and lawgiver—a

pre-eminence so great that there never has been and never can be another

equal to him; the unalterableness of the law which he gave; the dogma

that the proper observance of any one of the commandments of the law

will lead to perfection; the resurrection of the dead; and the coming of

the Messias. But upon this excellent foundation has been built up that

structure of ceremony, ritual, observance, and false and narrow

philosophy which has become unbearable to so many of the Jews in this

country and in Europe, and from the yoke of which too many have escaped

by throwing aside all faith, while others have contented themselves with

taking refuge in the half-way houses of “reform.”

It is difficult to estimate with accuracy the number of Jews in the

United States. But the census of 1870 affords us some valuable data upon

which a calculation may be based. In 1850 there were 36 Jewish

synagogues in the United States, with sittings for 18,371 persons, and

having a value of $418,600. In 1860 there were 77 synagogues, with

sittings for 34,412 persons and a value of $1,135,300. In 1870 no less

than 189 Jewish “organizations” were reported; there were 152

synagogues, seating 73,265 persons and valued at $5,155,234. Now in the

city of New York there are 26 synagogues, and the Jewish population of

the metropolis is not less than 75,000. This would give an average of

some three thousand souls to each synagogue; and if we took this average

as a basis of calculation, we should have a Jewish population in the

whole of the United States amounting to 456,000 souls. But we have

reason to believe that this is much less than the actual number. We have

received from two high authorities estimates of the Jewish population in

the republic; both are avowedly only estimates, but they have been made

with care. One of them places the number of Jews in the United States at

“one in thirty of the whole population,” which would give a total of

1,600,000 souls; the other reports the number to be “almost exactly

1,000,000 souls.”

According to the census of 1870, there were no Jewish synagogues or

other Hebrew organizations in Arizona, Dakota, Delaware, Florida, Idaho,

Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New

Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Vermont, Washington Territory, or Wyoming. But, in

point of fact, there are many Jews in all, or nearly all, these States

and Territories. The following table will show the number of Jewish

organizations in the United States, the number of their synagogues, with

their sittings and their value, according to the census of 1870:

Organizations. Synagogues. Sittings. Value.

Alabama 2 2 1,650 $30,000

Arkansas 1 1 300 6,500

California 7 7 3,600 314,600

Colorado 1 — — —

Connecticut 5 3 1,850 105,000

Dist. of Columbia 2 1 800 18,000

Georgia 6 5 1,400 52,700

Illinois 10 9 3,950 271,500

Indiana 5 4 1,900 113,000

Iowa 5 1 150 1,900

Kansas 2 1 300 1,500

Kentucky 3 3 1,500 134,000

Louisiana 5 5 2,200 75,000

Maine 23 23 7,315 36,400

Maryland 5 4 2,750 650,000

Massachusetts 5 2 1,500 33,000

Michigan 5 3 1,300 51,000

Missouri 4 4 2,100 217,100

New Jersey 1 1 300 8,000

New York 47 33 21,400 1,831,950

North Carolina 1 1 200 500

Ohio 7 7 4,000 360,584

Pennsylvania 15 14 7,750 681,000

Rhode Island 1 — — —

South Carolina 3 3 900 91,200

Tennessee 4 4 1,100 21,000

Texas 1 1 400 6,000

Vermont 8 7 1,890 35,300

West Virginia 1 — — —

Wisconsin 4 3 750 8,500

Totals 189 152 73,265 $5,155,234

A careful examination of this table discloses some remarkable contrasts

which are not without their significance. While the synagogues in North

Carolina, Iowa, Kansas, Wisconsin, and some other States are small and

cheap structures, costing only from $500 to $2,800 or $3,000 each, those

in Georgia have cost, or are valued at, an average of $10,500; in

Alabama and Maine, $15,000; in Illinois, $30,000; in Connecticut,

$35,000; in California, $45,000; in Pennsylvania, $49,000; in Ohio,

$51,500; in Missouri, $54,000; in New York, $60,000; and in Maryland,

$162,000. These instances exemplify to some extent the comparative

wealth and religious zeal of the children of Israel in the different

States named, and many of our readers, we suppose, will learn with

surprise that there are far more Jews in Maine than in all the other New

England States put together; and that the Jews of Maryland are

apparently very much more wealthy and zealous than their co-religionists

in any other part of the republic. But we must now trace the history of

the settlement and progress of the Jews in this country, and set forth

the outer as well as inner causes which have tended to work changes in

them: to Americanize them to a great extent; to remove or soften the

prejudices formerly cherished against them; and to weaken, modify, or

destroy, in a degree which cannot yet be accurately determined, their

own religious faith.

Jewish emigration to this country began at a very early period in its

history, but only within the last thirty years has this emigration

assumed perceptible dimensions. The Jews who came to the United States

prior to 1848 were for the most part members of a low class; they were

chiefly of Polish, Russian, Portuguese, or Spanish birth; they were

either poor or pretended to be poor; they were peddlers, dealers in old

clothes, pawnbrokers, money-changers in a small way, and petty

merchants. From all social intercourse with the rest of the community

they were cut off; they did not seek that which probably would have been

denied them had they asked for it; the traditional prejudice against the

Jews which exists so generally among the Gentiles was not diminished by

the appearance, the actions, and the general reputation of these

children of Israel. They were supposed to be exclusively devoted to

trade and to money-making, and to be quite devoid of any scruples as to

the means by which they might get the better of the person to whom they

sold or of whom they bought. A Hebrew writer of some note many years ago

remarked that the Jews, as a race of people, were more widely and

generally known and less generally appreciated than any other class upon

the earth; that the peculiarities which have marked them as objects of

dislike were by no means original in their character, but were the

fruits of centuries of oppression and degradation; and that they needed

only a few years of existence in a free country, where equal rights

would be accorded to them, and where they might in peace and security

manifest the virtues which were in them, in order to win for themselves

not only the toleration but the active esteem and respect of their

fellow-citizens. The truth of this remark has been amply substantiated

by what has occurred in England, France, Germany, and other portions of

Europe; while in this country the Jews have succeeded in Americanizing

themselves to a very great extent, and in obliterating in a marked

degree the peculiarities which formerly served to point them out as a

wholly separate and foreign people. That this process has been

accompanied by the partial loss of their religious faith is

unquestionably true, but it is not clear whether they have become

Americanized because they have to this extent lost their faith, or

whether they have lost their faith because they have become

Americanized.

The Jews in America at the present moment are divided into five

classes—the “Radical Orthodox,” the “Orthodox,” the “Conservative

Reformed,” the “Reformed,” and the “Radical Reformed.” There is a wide

gulf between the first and the last of these classes; but the shades of

difference between a Radical Orthodox Jew and an Orthodox Jew, or

between a Conservative Reformed Jew and a Reformed Jew, are somewhat

difficult to define. The Radical Orthodox Jews are few in number, and

are said by their co-religionists to be daily growing less. They are

chiefly of Polish, Austrian, or Hungarian birth; they for the most part

are in humble and obscure walks of life; they form no associations with

Gentiles; they accept as the rule of their life the Mosaic law

interpreted by the “Talmud” and the “Cabala”; they do not welcome

Gentiles, or even Jews of later views, to their synagogues. We believe

there is but one synagogue in New York belonging to this school of Jews,

and in which one may witness Jewish worship as it was performed a

thousand years ago. The children of the Radical Orthodox Jews—especially

the male children—do not adhere closely to the faith and ritual of their

fathers; and some of the fathers themselves, as they become rich in this

world’s goods, manifest a disposition to affiliate themselves with one

or other of the less rigorous sects. Some of them are content to join

the ranks of the Orthodox Jews, who hold most firmly to all matters of

dogma, and to all the essential rules of life laid down by the law of

Moses, but who at the same time dispense themselves from the strict

observance of a certain number of the more onerous observances and

regulations enjoined by the rabbinical writers.

The line of demarcation between the Orthodox Jews and the Conservative

Reformed Jews is vague and undetermined; but the Reformed Jews are very

much advanced. They hold themselves bound no longer to obey the

ceremonial and dietary laws laid down by Moses and his successors, and

their faith in the predictions of the prophets has almost wholly faded

away. The higher class of the Hebrew community for the most part belong

to the Reformed sect; but these congregations are also largely composed

of the well-to-do middle-class Jews. Nearly all of the Jews of American

birth are found in the ranks of this sect or in the one of which we have

yet to speak; and very many of the German and English Jews resident here

are also members of the Reformed synagogues. They openly avow their

desire and ambition to become thoroughly Americanized, and to cease in

all respects to be regarded as an alien and foreign people. They still

retain their belief in God, but this belief is in too many cases vague

and ill-defined. The expectation of the coming of the Messias in any

literal sense has, with rare exceptions, ceased to be entertained among

them. They will not confess that the prophecies of his coming were

fulfilled in Jesus Christ, and their philosophy has led them to the

conclusion that these prophecies do not now remain to be fulfilled, save

in a metaphorical sense. The Messias is indeed to come—but not as an

individual. Humanity as a race, elevated, happy, prosperous, blessed

with long life, health, and earthly comfort, is the Messias; the

prophets saw him and were glad, but it was reserved for the children of

this generation to discover what was the hidden and real meaning of

their predictions concerning him.

A learned Jewish scholar has thus expressed this phase of Jewish

thought: “The majority of intelligent Israelites have long since

abandoned the wish of building up an independent national existence of

their own. The achievement of higher conditions of human life they are

disposed to regard as the fulfilment of Messianic prophecy, and the

furthering of this end, in intimate union with their fellow-men, as the

highest dictate of their religion.” These are weighty words; and there

is abundant reason to believe that they truthfully represent the

dominant tone of thought among the American Jews. The latest sect among

them—the Radical Reformed Jews—go to the root of the matter and have the

full courage of their opinions. They have the goodness to admit that

there is, or may be, a God, but they deny that he has ever revealed

himself to man save by the law of nature, and that God is himself

nature. In other words, these Jews have become Pantheists. Benedict de

Spinoza was excommunicated and denounced by the forefathers of those who

now revere and extol him. The most eloquent and gifted, if not the most

learned, of the Jewish rabbis in America has become the leader of this

sect, and has left the magnificent synagogue which was built for him,

only to draw after him into new paths a large proportion of his former

congregation. They are extremely wise in their own conceit; they prate

of the necessity of doubting all things; they deride the rites and

practices of external religion; they say they worship God, but inasmuch

as God, as they insist, is only nature, and nature is part of

themselves, in worshipping God they worship themselves. We are told that

many of those Jews who still maintain their connection with the

Conservative Reformed or Reformed congregations are by conviction in

full sympathy with the Radical Reformers. The laity are far in advance

of the rabbis of each sect. The rabbis are for the most part men of

foreign birth and foreign education; there are, we believe, not a dozen

rabbis of American birth in the whole Union. The almost universal

tendency of thought and practice among the younger Jews is in the

direction of that phase of infidelity of which we have spoken; and the

elder members of the race take little care to counteract in any

effectual manner this apostasy. The education of Jewish children in this

country is left pretty much to take care of itself. There are few, if

any, Jewish schools, and none at all of a high character. The Jewish

children for the most part attend the public schools, where they either

are taught no religion at all or listen to such vague and disjointed

utterances concerning the truths of Christianity as the caprice or the

prejudices of the teacher may lead him to pronounce. In some instances

the children of well-to-do Hebrews among us are sent to receive their

education in Unitarian academies; in others the sons of wealthy American

Jews are educated in the German universities, from whence they return

full-blown infidels. Intermarriages between Jews and nominal Christians

are not rare; and the children of these unions are, as a rule, educated

in the religion of the mother—if she happens to possess any.

We have said that the Jewish laity is in advance of the rabbis in the

matter of what is called “reform,” but which is too generally nothing

but destruction. The position of the rabbis is a peculiar one. They are

not priests, for they no longer offer sacrifice. They are not even the

sons of priests; the hereditary character of their office has long since

been lost; they are rabbis, or, in other phrase, teachers, not by

hereditary descent nor by divine selection or consecration, but merely

by their own choice and the good-will of their neighbors or friends. The

last high-priest of the Jewish Church who had any divine sanction for

the title which he bore was Caiphas, and his office was taken away from

him, in the sight of God and in truth, on the day of Pentecost, when the

Holy Ghost descended to dwell until the end of time with the Christian

Church. Since that day there have been no priests of God upon the earth,

save the priests of the Catholic Church; and consequently since that day

there have been no true Jewish priests. The altars of the Jews have

crumbled away; their sacrifices have ceased; the sons of the tribes of

Aaron and Levi have abandoned even the pretence of belonging to a

priestly order. In the place of the priests have come the rabbis, who

are mere ministers or teachers. They are to the Jews what the Baptist,

Methodist, Presbyterian, and other Protestant ministers are to the

respective Protestant sects. They are a little less than some of the

Protestant ministers claim to be; for some of these do set up in an

uncertain way a vague and altogether fallacious pretence to the

possession of “orders” and to having been empowered to perform priestly

functions. The rabbis make no such pretence, and their position, such as

it is, is confessedly invested with only purely human sanction. They are

teachers, but do not claim that they have a divine authority to teach.

They are subject to the will and caprice of the congregation to which

they are attached; they are like school-teachers, whose tenure of office

depends upon the pleasure of the school commissioners. Some of them have

sought to put themselves at the head of the reform movement, and have

succeeded, but only on the condition that they should keep pace with the

advance of the laity. The younger German rabbis have been most prominent

in this respect. They have effected an organization among themselves, as

well here as in Germany, and have managed to act together with something

approaching to unanimity. Destitute, however, of any rule of faith and

practice higher than their own will and whim, and having no central or

supreme authority to which they can appeal, they lack the essential bond

of unity, and some of them are constantly wandering off in one direction

or the other. They began their work of reform by modernizing the ritual

of the synagogue, and eliminating from it, little by little, those

portions of it which, directly or indirectly, assert the dogmas that are

inconveniently opposed to the new ideas whereof they are enamored. Among

the regular prayers of the synagogue, for instance, were supplications

for the bringing back of the chosen people to the land of their fathers,

the restoration of the throne of David, and the coming of the Messias.

The new philosophy, as we have shown, teaches that the Messias is not to

come in any literal sense; that inasmuch as modern progress is best

subserved by democratic or republican institutions, the establishment of

a monarchy of any kind is not to be desired or prayed for; and that the

return of the Jews as a nation to Palestine is not to be wished, even if

it were feasible.

It became advisable, therefore, to reconcile theory with practice, and

to cease pretending to pray for that which was either impossible or

undesirable. If it were absurd to believe any longer that the Messias

was to come as a personal king and redeemer, to lead back his people to

the Promised Land, and to elevate them as the rulers and princes of the

earth, then it was something worse than absurd to continue the

repetition of the prayers imploring the hastening of his coming. If the

Books of the Law and of the Prophets are not the veritable word of God;

if they contain merely ingenious and beautiful myths, symbolical poetry,

and a code of moral and dietary rules which, in some respects at least,

are no longer either necessary or advisable to be obeyed, it is

dishonest to pretend to regard these writings with devout reverence, and

to insist upon any one governing himself by them. By this course of

reasoning the German rabbis, often pushed further than they cared to go

by the laity who were behind them, sapped the foundations of faith among

the common people of the Jews, and prepared them for the downward path

which so many of them are now treading.

Having thus reviewed the present state of Judaism in America, we may ask

ourselves what is likely to be the future of what was once the church of

God, but has now fallen to the level of a mere sect. It is clear that

the Jews, here as in the Old World, and more rapidly here than in the

Old World, are losing the faith of their fathers. Judaism, divine in its

origin, but no longer invested with the divine sanction nor inspired or

guided by the Holy Ghost, is undergoing the same process of

disintegration and decay which the Protestant sects are suffering.

Judaism, now wholly human, like Protestantism, is leading its adherents

to infidelity. Every day, as Protestants see this, the devout and pious

among them turn to the one church which Jesus Christ established in the

world, and in her bosom find refuge, peace, and salvation. The number of

conversions from Protestantism to the holy Roman Catholic Church, here

and in Great Britain, is continually on the increase. But nothing is

more rare than the conversion of a Jew. They are rapidly parting with

their own faith, but very seldom do they embrace any form of

Christianity in its stead. In a few years the great majority of Jews in

the United States will probably have ceased to be Jews, save only in

name. But how many of them will become Catholics? All roads lead to

Rome; but very few Jews have made that journey. A Jew who becomes a

Catholic is a most excellent Catholic; he seems to desire, by the fervor

of his faith and the burning zeal of his charity, to make some

reparation for the sins of his people. Jews should be the best Catholics

in the world; and God has told us, through the mouths of Jewish

prophets, that the time will come when they will be all that they should

be. The word of God is sure and cannot fail. He has told us that the day

is coming when the Jews shall ask him, “What are those wounds in the

midst of thy hands?” and when he shall reply, “With these was I wounded

in the house of them that I love.” In that day he “will pour out upon

the house of David the spirit of grace and the spirit of prayers; and

they shall look upon him whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn

for him as one mourneth for an only son, and shall grieve over him as

the manner is to grieve for the death of the first-born.” In that

glorious day God has promised that he will destroy the names of idols

out of the earth, so that they shall be remembered no more; and that he

will take away the false prophets and the unclean spirit out of the

earth. He will bring back the captivity of Juda and the captivity of

Jerusalem, and “will build them as from the beginning”; he will cleanse

them from all their iniquities, whereby they have sinned against him and

despised him; and he will so crown them with blessings that all the

world shall be amazed thereby. “It shall be to me a name, and a joy, and

a praise, and a gladness before all the nations of the earth that shall

hear of all the good things which I will do to them.” “Behold, the days

come, saith the Lord, that I will perform the good word that I have

spoken to the house of Israel and to the house of Juda.” When the Jews

become Catholic Christians, Jerusalem shall “be called by a new name,

which the mouth of the Lord shall name,” and the Jews shall become “a

crown of glory in the hand of the Lord and a royal diadem in the hand of

God.” Then they shall no more be called forsaken, and their land shall

be no more called desolate; “but thou shalt be called 'my pleasure in

her,’ and thy land inhabited.” Then shall the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

be celebrated by Jewish hands in the Holy City where Jesus Christ first

offered up the ever-living Sacrifice, and then shall the Jews eat the

heavenly Bread and drink the sacred Blood which have so long been given

to us Gentiles and rejected by them. “The Lord has sworn by his right

hand and by the arm of his strength: Surely I will no longer give thy

corn to be meat for thy enemies, and the sons of the stranger shall not

drink thy wine for which thou hast labored; for they that gather it

shall eat it, and they that have brought it together shall drink it in

my holy courts.” Wonderful are these words; full are they of a meaning

at once mystical and clear. The Jews, in God’s own time, will become

Catholic Christians, and, united with the whole body of the faithful on

earth, they shall eat the divine Bread which is the life of the world.

The abandonment of their traditional faith will continue to lead them

more and more to the abandonment of all their distinctive national

peculiarities and practices, and they will become merged in the great

body of the children of men. Then such of them as God may choose will

have given to them the grace of faith, and as individuals, and not as a

nation, will they become Catholic Christians. We know that in the vision

of St. John the Apostle he saw one hundred and forty-four thousand of

the children of Israel, of every tribe twelve thousand, who had come out

of great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the

blood of the Lamb. We are certain, then, that before the end of the

world at least this number of Jews will have been converted. It may be

that the number represents only those who belonged to the church while

it was yet mainly composed of Jews. If so, let us hope that those of the

once chosen people who yet remain may be found, or at least many of

them, in that great multitude which no man can number, of all nations,

and tribes, and peoples, and tongues, which St. John also saw, standing

before the throne and in the sight of the Lamb, clothed with white robes

and palms in their hands, crying with a loud voice “Salvation to our God

who sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb.”

LETTERS OF A YOUNG IRISHWOMAN TO HER SISTER.

FROM THE FRENCH.

CONCLUSION.

JULY 30.

This morning I was in a sort of mortal sadness. I opened the “Book of

those who suffer” at these words: “You have willed, O my God! to

separate me from her to whom I have so often said that I should wish to

die the same day as she. This desire has not been granted, and thou hast

condemned me to survive.

“_She_ is at rest; and never have I more fully realized than in this my

exceeding grief the meaning of that beautiful Christian word,

_quies_—rest.”

I said this with all my heart, and I have comprehended.... O Kate! I

loved you too much for this world. Bless me from on high, and visit me

with Picciola. It seems to me that the divine Goodness must permit that.

AUGUST 2.

“The present war is the natural and necessary consequence of the great

apostasy of the sixteenth century and the principles of the Revolution!”

O my God! if this might be a holy war! But I fear; for France is so

guilty! Prayers are being offered in all the dioceses; the emperor has

put himself at the head of the army. May God save us! We needed a St.

Louis, if we were to deserve victory. Do you remember, Kate, how much we

admired these words of Bossuet? “War is often a salutary bath, in which

nations bathe and are regenerated.” Oh! how you must pray, all our kind

friends in heaven.

AUGUST 4.

Amélie has bidden us adieu; she is a charming creature. Her mother will

not accompany her. She fears her own weakness; and she is a veritable

Spartan.

On the 2d of August took place a first engagement at Saarbrück; our

troops were victorious. May this success augur well! They say that there

is a terrible effervescence in minds. Our Bretonnes are praying that

their sons may soon return.

Arrival of our Parisians! Alix and Margaret have all the grace of the

twins; my godson is magnificent. I like to feel that we are together in

these troubled times. How I pity mothers!

AUGUST 7.

Terror, anguish, defeat—these are the synonyms of this date. Two days

ago we were beaten at Wissembourg; yesterday at Forbach. We are waiting

for news. Our reverses are a chastisement; the French government is

withdrawing its troops from Rome. Is it, then, to secure success that

France abandons the Pope? Oh! it is not France which acts thus; she is

too profoundly Catholic for that; but she will be none the less certain

to undergo the penalty for this cowardice. Kate, pray for France! The

Prussians are upon our soil, and civil war is also feared.

AUGUST 13.

Horrible details are received of the battle of Reichshoffen. Marshal

MacMahon behaved with admirable heroism. He would not quit the field of

battle after witnessing this odious butchery—40,000 against 150,000!

Lord, O Lord! have pity. There must have been some treason there. The

cuirassiers and chasseurs of MacMahon sacrificed themselves to

facilitate the retreat. The newspapers make one weep. Kate, what is said

in heaven?

My Guy is charmingly beautiful; and when he is twenty years old an

enemy’s cannon-ball will have the right to carry him off!

AUGUST 21.

Dear Kate, I bless God for having placed you in the peace of eternity

before these murderous struggles, in which your heart would so often

have been wounded! Ah! it seems to me that it is a great favor to be

taken from this earth before the calamities which are impending.

A subscription has been set on foot, in order that all France shall

offer a sword of honor to MacMahon. Marshal Lebœuf, General-in-Chief, is

replaced by Marshal Bazaine; the army is falling back on Chalons. There

were brilliant affairs on the 14th, 15th, and 16th. But what agitation

in the country! The republicans consider the moment favorably for their

triumph, and René declares that the Prussians of France are still more

to be dreaded than the Prussians of Germany. Montaigne said: “There are

triumphant defeats which equal the finest victories.” Our troops are

sublime. Fresh levies are being made, companies of _francs-tireurs_ are

organized; will France be saved? Catholic La Vendée is rising _en

masse_.

AUGUST 24.

The Prussians are at Saint-Dizier. It is said that in the partial

engagements the losses are considerable on both sides. The enemy is

bombarding Strasbourg. Read heart-rending details. _Povera Francia!_

They say that two sons of Count Bismarck are dead; it is the justice of

God passing by! Oh! when we think of so many families who are suffering

from the disasters of invasion, who see their homes invaded and their

days in peril, how ardent are our prayers!

That which I dreaded is come upon us. René and his brothers are going! O

my God! guard them from danger. I love France too well to hinder René

from defending her. The fear of afflicting me held him back. God aid us

and have at the English! as our Breton ancestors used to say. The

English of to-day are the Prussians.

They leave us, five brothers, all valiant and strong, courageous as

lions. Ah! if they should not return. I believe in presentiments, and

something tells me that all hope of happiness is at an end for me. “Give

all to God,” a saintly priest wrote to me. _Fiat!_ Take all, my God, but

leave me thy love!

Do you remember, Kate, my mother’s stories of the heroism of our

grandfather? Do you remember that Georgina whose name I received, who

said to her brother, “Go and fight without thinking of me. God and his

angels will guard me; think of your country!”

Could I be less courageous than she? Pray for me, holy soul in heaven!

What shall I do without him?

AUGUST 26.

Levies are being raised _en masse_. Men will not be wanting, but

soldiers cannot be made at a moment’s notice, especially in our days. It

is said that Bazaine is blockaded in Metz with 70,000 men, and that he

has before him 200,000 Prussians. MacMahon is going to his relief with

an equal number of heroes. The French have burnt the camp at Chalons.

What will be the issue of this frightful struggle? The ministry which

has caused all our misfortunes has resigned; a clear understanding is

most important, and time passes away in useless discussions. General

Trochu, a Breton, is Governor of Paris.

To-day we shall be left alone....

AUGUST 29.

It is over. René has taken with him all my heart, and I feel a strange

sense of suffering. My mother has been sublime. O these adieux, these

last embraces! Who would have said that we should come to this?

Protect them, ye holy angels! Bring them back to us soon with the return

of peace! There are wounded everywhere; my mother has asked for ten, to

whom we shall attend ourselves. It is terrible to see these mutilations.

O war! how I hate it.

The army of Prince Frederick Charles is marching upon Paris; there are

no official tidings of our soldiers. Phalsbourg, Toul, Metz, Strasbourg

are all undergoing the horrors of bombardment. Where shall we go? Prayer

alone will save us. There is much patriotic eagerness in the

populations; the loan of 750,000,000 has been covered with astonishing

rapidity. What will become of the capital? What chastisement will visit

it for having erected a statue to Voltaire?

A visit—the Comtesse de G—— and her two daughters, friends of Lucy. What

a difference between the two sisters! The younger calm, gentle, and

placid, like a beautiful lake, seraphic and tender; the elder ardent and

enthusiastic to exaggeration, impassioned for the cause of good, peace,

and right, but like a volcano.

Kate, tell me that you pray for us, and that God will have pity upon his

people!

AUGUST 31.

A letter from René! Alas! his presence was so sweet to me. Gertrude and

I do not quit the chapel, except for the wounded. Mary and Ellen,

Marguerite and Alix, multiply their prayers. Arthur has made his mother

give him a Zouave’s uniform; thus equipped, he drills the children at

the school. You should hear him say how he wants to join his father and

fight with him. Our savage enemies commit revolting atrocities. How

truly are they the sons of the Teutons!

Berthe’s family is in Switzerland.

SEPTEMBER 4.

Lord, save us; we perish!

The public journals speak in an ambiguous manner of triumphs with

respect to which a terrible silence had been observed in official

quarters; a great battle was imminent.... The day is come, and its

events are brought to light. _Povera Francia!_ The emperor and 40,000

French prisoners, MacMahon grievously wounded, and a capitulation—it is

horrible! My God! hast thou abandoned France? The public consternation

cannot be described. It was said yesterday that, owing to a crypt whose

existence was generally unknown, the women and children had been able to

quit Strasbourg, so valiantly defended by General Uhrich. The enemy aims

his murderous projectiles especially at the cathedral—that unequalled

marvel in stone. Horrible! horrible! It seems as if hell had vomited

innumerable legions of monsters upon France. There were 550,000 in this

last three days’ battle. How will all this end? “Arise, O Lord! and

deliver thy people, for the time to show mercy is come!”[52]

Footnote 52:

Ps. ci.

SEPTEMBER 6.

The republic is proclaimed. Paris is in a state of delirium. Did not

Joseph de Maistre say: “The French Revolution has been satanic; if the

counter-revolution is not divine, it will be a nullity”? Read the

_Univers_ yesterday—so Christian, so right-thinking. Louis Veuillot

calls Prussia the _Sin of Europe_. Will the republic save us? The enemy

is at Soissons. We see now the result of twenty years of despotism....

“MacMahon is dead!” said a workman on the boulevards with a journal in

his hand. At these words arose a general cry: “Honor to MacMahon!” This

report is contradicted, and Mme. la Maréchale set out yesterday to join

her husband. O this wound! What Frenchman would not give his life to

heal it? No army left! Bazaine is still blockaded in Metz, bombarded by

the Prussians. MacMahon had done wonders, but was unable to effect his

junction with Bazaine. He was thrown back by the enemy upon Sedan, and a

bridge not having been destroyed, notwithstanding his orders, he was

surrounded by a network of the enemy; grievously wounded, he placed the

command in the hands of General Wimpffen, who capitulated. MacMahon

would never have done this—never! Without a miracle, France is lost. It

seems as if one were suffering a bad dream in reading that, owing to our

woods, the enemy slaughter us without mercy, whilst our blows fall on

emptiness, and that on the fatal day which annihilated our army our

artillery was for a quarter of an hour playing upon a regiment of French

cuirassiers.... The _Angelus_ is ringing. O Angelic Salutation! with

what anguish Christian hearts yesterday repeated you, on this beginning

of a new era of which no one can tell the form or the duration.

SEPTEMBER 7.

A line from Adrien to reassure us all. Alas! who does not tremble at

this hour? Kate, protect us! Some members of the Left have, themselves

alone, made the republic and seized the reins of government. Can the

enemies of God regenerate a people? “The Keeper of Israel neither

slumbers nor sleeps.” Napoleon I. (Louis Veuillot, the valiant heart,

tells us) used to say that the general who dared speak of capitulation

ought to be shot; what, then, would be the deserts of him who

surrenders? Poor France, humiliated, vanquished, deprived of her noblest

children!

SEPTEMBER 8.

On this festival of your nativity, O Our Lady of Victories! succor us.

No courier from Paris, which must be invested. The _Garde Nationale_ is

being organized; the scheme is to oppose the whole of France to these

Vandals of the nineteenth century—barbarous hordes who seem to be

impelled by some irresistible force into the heart of our unhappy

country. How French I feel myself in these days of sorrow! Dear Kate, is

it true, as we believe, that all our saints of France, headed by St.

Remi, Charlemagne, St. Louis, and Joan of Arc, are prostrate at the feet

of the Eternal to obtain the pardon which would save us?

SEPTEMBER 11.

In the frightful catastrophe of Sedan our soldiers were in want of

munitions and had not eaten for four days.

I send daily a long bulletin of news to my devoted Margaret. Has not

Marcella also something to fear? Poor Italy! Poor France! We can but

have either a shameful peace or a pitiless war.... Laon is threatened

with the fate of Strasbourg. Alas! these poor cities, besieged and

heroic. “Country of my brethren and of my friends, may the words of God

for thee be words of peace: 'May peace be within thy walls, and

plenteousness within thy towers!’ O my God! save thy servants who put

their trust in thee!”[53]

Footnote 53:

Ps. cxxi.

Every man under arms, every woman at prayer! This decree makes me bless

the republic. And René—where is he?

SEPTEMBER 13.

Laon must have ceased to exist; the commander has had the citadel blown

up. They say that Garibaldi, the insulter of Pius IX. and the king of

vagabonds and bandits, is coming to succor France; is not this the depth

of humiliation? “How long, O Lord! wilt thou delay to succor us? O God!

be thou our judge, and defend our cause against this pitiless nation;

deliver us from these men, who are full of injustice and deceit!”

The enemy is six leagues from Paris. M. Thiers has set out for Vienna,

St. Petersburg, and London. The United States have offered their

mediation. We are assured that the foreign powers desire peace, but what

proofs do they give? Russia is preparing formidable armaments, doubtless

finding the present moment opportune for taking possession of

Constantinople. The excommunicated king is adding to his crimes in

annexing to his own the last remaining States of the church.

We are told that the republican world boasts greatly of the circular of

Jules Favre and the letter of Victor Hugo.

I do not know from whence there comes to us a copy of a revelation

announcing that from the 20th to the 29th all will be over, and that

France will be delivered by a stranger. O feast of St. Michael the

Archangel! be to us a day of salvation. But, Lord, does France deserve

it? Ah! she is no longer the eldest daughter of the church, since she

consents to the odious spoliation of Italy, and since every sort of

hatred is let loose against religion. Do they not say that at Lyons the

Visitandines have been driven from their convent? We deserve every

misfortune and disgrace. Louis Veuillot, calm in the midst of so many

storms, gave yesterday a beautiful article, in which he predicted the

near approach of the triumph of the church; and today, the splendid

history of Judas Machabeus. Save us, O Lord! we who are thy people. “God

gives to his church the flotsam of every wreck, as he gives her, sooner

or later, the laurel of every triumph.”

It is said that Paris will be destroyed. “Unless the Lord keep the city,

he that keepeth it watcheth in vain!”[54] Hope! hope! Prayer will save

us!

Footnote 54:

Ps. cxxvi.

I knew yesterday that Réne was alive. O Kate! pray for us.

SEPTEMBER 17.

O surprise! O joy!—if I dared to say so.... Margaret here! Kind, dear,

and perfect friend! she could not remain away from us during these

troubles. Lord William and Emmanuel have come with her. What an

exquisite proof of affection! How we have wept together! O dear Kate,

dear flower transplanted to heaven! your native soil, how much we have

spoken of you. How René will be touched at hearing of this arrival! My

mother and sisters give a festive welcome to my _belle Anglaise_, who is

English only in name, being as Catholic, as Irish, and as French as we

are.

Communications are interrupted, or are on the point of being so. The

line of Orleans is cut. The Paris _Journal_ is here, however, with

frightful accounts of the barbarity of the Prussians. Save us, my God;

have pity on those who are fighting _pro aris et focis_!

Margaret has brought me a bit of the soil of Ireland, and some flowers

gathered from our mother’s grave.

SEPTEMBER 19.

What is happening to-day, twenty-four years after the Apparition of La

Salette? We are melting away in prayers. My mother has obtained from the

bishop the most liberal permissions for benedictions. Our good _curé_ is

dying ... of old age and grief. The love of their country is a robust

plant among the Bretons.

Dear Kate, we speak of you with Margaret. I told her that I continue to

write to you; she was touched at hearing it. How kind it is of her to

have quitted her home to share our anguish and our dangers! The province

will be invaded—that is certain. No news of René; but who does not feel

courageous at this time? Ah! assuredly, in face of the extent of our

disasters, selfish anxieties disappear, and the soul grows, in her

prodigious faculty of suffering, to compassionate all the present

miseries, all the crushing misfortunes, all the deaths. How long, O

Lord! will thy hand be heavy upon us? O mysterious depths of the designs

of God! O militant church! O venerated Pontiff, the purest glory of our

age! O Rome, invaded like France! I have just read an admirable pastoral

letter of Mgr. Freppel, the illustrious successor of Mgr. Angebault in

the see of Angers. He sees a reason for hope in this community of

sorrows between the mother and the _eldest daughter_. O Pontiff!—is not

this title become a bitter derision? The gates of hell shall not prevail

against the church, and we are surely not far distant from her signal

triumph; but how many tears, it may be, and how many martyrdoms, before

that hour! Italy, France, Ireland—the three countries of my heart, lands

that are mingled in one in my enthusiasm and love, daughters of God, and

the privileged ones of his heart—you cannot perish; God will fight for

you, and we shall bless him for ever!

Kate, beloved sister, tell me that you hear me, that your soul touches

mine. Be René’s guardian angel!

SEPTEMBER 21.

Our life is strange. Beneath all it has a wonderful serenity, a

confidence in God which defies everything; on the surface it is a sort

of fever, passing from the wildest hope to the most complete

discouragement. Gertrude has appointed us her _aides-de-camp_—Margaret

and myself. There is much to do around us. Our Bretonnes have need to be

consoled, and there are sick and dying. The good _abbé_ multiplies

himself with admirable self-forgetfulness; our pastor is dying, happy to

be called away at the present crisis.

I have a letter from René—a kind, long, sweet letter, from which I

cannot take away my eyes. He only speaks to me vaguely of the war, so as

not to increase my alarm. Every ring of the bell makes us start; the

gallop of a horse makes us run to the windows. My mother never quits her

psalter and rosary; Mistress Annah faithfully keeps her company when we

are not there; Mary and Ellen, with the other dear young ones in the

house, are our sunshine. The courageous Margaret talks politics with

Lucy, the _abbé_, and the doctor, organizes plans of defence, creates

fortresses, and finally expels the enemy. Lord William was just now

reading to us in the Paris _Journal_ of the 18th details of deep

interest relating to the affair of Sedan—“the Waterloo of the Second

Empire, and the greatest disaster of modern times.”

SEPTEMBER 25.

Jules Favre has made an appeal to William and Bismarck. France is very

low. The result has been the affirmation of the exorbitant demands of

the conquerors. The struggle is to be pushed to extremities. Regiments

are to be formed of National Guards. Here none are left but old men. No

official news. It is said that the enemy has been repulsed at

Versailles, that Nantes is burnt, that headquarters are at Meaux; they

said yesterday at Rheims: “O Clovis! why are you not there with your

Franks?” The Prussians are burning Rouen. When, then, will the terrible

work of these executioners of Heaven be ended? William wants Alsace and

Lorraine, Metz, Strasbourg, Toul, Verdun, and Mont Valérien. Ah! we

also, we shall say with the Bishop of Orleans that which was said by

Louisa of Prussia—a magnanimous soul, to whom the life of her four sons

was less dear than the honor of her country; a believing and valiant

woman, who beheld so violent and devastating a storm pass over her

kingdom that Prussia was on the point of being erased from the map of

nations: “I believe in God; I do not believe in force. Justice alone is

stable. God prunes the spoiled tree. We shall see better times, if only

each day find us better and more prepared.” The son has not inherited

the sentiments of the mother. It is said that it was Prince Albert who

commanded the burning of Bazeilles; this fearful barbarity would suffice

for his reprobation in the memory of men. “The Hebrew people saw Deborah

and Judith arise in the day of its affliction; Gaul, St. Geneviève; and

France of the middle ages, Joan of Arc.”[55] Who shall save modern

France? Whose arm shall God raise up to avenge her? “But now thou hast

cast us off, and put us to shame: and thou, O God! wilt not go out with

our armies.... Arise, O Lord! Why sleepest thou?”[56]

Footnote 55:

Gabourd.

Footnote 56:

Ps. xliii.

Rome is invaded by the republican troops; they leave the Pope the castle

of Sant’ Angelo and the Leonine city, with _magnificent_ assurances of

security. O the time of deliverance, the hour of salvation!—soon,

doubtless, soon. The church cannot perish. Gentle Pontiff, Pius IX.,

Vicar of Christ and his representative, like him crucified in heart,

given gall to drink, overwhelmed with insults, your powerless children

join their supplications to your own, and God will arise, mighty and

terrible, to confound your enemies—you who have loved justice and hated

iniquity!

Letter from René, hastily written in a cottage. Our Blessed Lady protect

his devotion! “Our help is in the name of the Lord!” O church of Jesus

Christ! how happy are thy children in the midst of their distress. What

ineffable consolations in thy sacred prayers! I live in the Psalms, I

nourish my soul with them; every feeling of the heart is there so

marvellously expressed, and in incomparable language.

SEPTEMBER 27.

Louis Veuillot, the intrepid defender of the Catholic faith, a few weeks

ago wrote as follows: “God will have pity on us. Justice will not exceed

mercy. We shall not be scourged beyond the needs of our future

well-being; we shall find in the cup of chastisement a healthful

beverage. The love of their country raises hearts above vulgar

vexations. They are willing to be ruined; they are willing to die. But

these abject and senseless things mingled with our tragedies, these

intoxicating songs when the earth is being watered with generous blood,

these statesmen who ask for prayers and authorize blasphemy, these

blasphemies beneath the falling thunderbolt, these assassins of the

pavement and these orators in the tribune—all this revelation of the

stupid crowd which will not be saved—it is these things which keep souls

under the millstone, which suffocate and grind them down.” How well this

great mind describes the deepest sufferings of all that is still

Christian in this nation of crusaders and martyrs! The admirable

demonstrations of the Bretons and Vendéans console one for the

irreligion of the greater number. Why has not all Europe risen to defend

in the Pope the cause of outraged sovereignty? The sacrilege of Victor

Emanuel has met with no resistance.

“Be to us, Lord, a place of defence against the enemy!” We are on a

volcano—the volcano of popular passions; if the hand of God does not

arrest them, what will become of us? Confidence! confidence! “Infidel

France is abased and humiliated, and is not yet willing to repent;

eucharistic France will pray, will arise, and increase in

greatness!”[57]

Footnote 57:

Louis Veuillot.

O beloved soul gone hence before _me_, and who art _myself!_ offer to

God our prayers.

OCTOBER 2.

Toul has surrendered, after a splendid resistance worthy of a better

fate. The 29th—the looked-for 29th, the feast of the glorious Protector

of France—has brought us another sorrow more: the capitulation of

Strasbourg! O dear and beautiful cathedral, which I loved so well!

“There is nothing left but ruins,” writes one of Berthe’s cousins. Why

does the Lord delay to help us? Will not our other fortresses be also

forced to give themselves up into the enemy’s hands? What will become of

France? William is at Versailles; he lay down, booted and spurred, in

the bed of the great king who so imperiously dictated laws to all

Europe. Who will redeem us from all our humiliations?

Margaret and Lord William have apprehensions which will only too soon,

alas! be verified. La Vendée is rising at the call of Cathelineau and of

Stofflet—two illustrious names. Ah! who will merit for us that we shall

be saved, when the public papers lavish outrage and abuse against

everything that is holiest in the world—against the church of God, his

priests, his pontiff, the glorious Pius IX.? Who shall restrain thine

arm, O Lord! when scarcely a voice is raised to recall to conquered

France that thou art the Salvation of the nations?

OCTOBER 7.

The gentle Bishop of Geneva used to say: “Alas! we shall soon be in

eternity, and then shall we see of how small account were the affairs of

this world, and how little it mattered whether they were accomplished or

not.” Adrien sends us long details. My soul is in anguish. O Kate! pray

for us. I went yesterday with Margaret to the cemetery; we stayed there

long. A splendid moonlight illumined the golden crosses surmounting the

marble columns beneath which our doves repose. A feeling of profound

peace took possession of my soul in the midst of this striking

contrast—the calm and tranquillity of this field of death with the

tumult and agitation of actual life in our poor France.

OCTOBER 8.

The journals give accounts, only too faithful in their details, of the

battle of Sedan, the catastrophe of Laon and of Strasbourg. It is

horrible—this destruction, these savage attacks! Of how many valiant

defenders are we not deprived, while the enemy’s forces are going to

strengthen the army now besieging Paris! William is at St. Germain; he

desires to be present at the bombardment of the brilliant capital which

gave him so splendid a reception three years ago. To the shame of

humanity, Europe remains unmoved in presence of our misfortunes. America

sends an insignificant number of volunteers. O divine Justice! wilt thou

not avenge us? Who shall tell the story of this sanguinary epic? Who

shall recount this unheard-of intermingling of shameful cowardice and

prodigies of courage, of base treason and sublime devotion, of reverses

and successes equally impossible? Who shall tell posterity that the most

loyal and generous of nations, the people which has been eager in its

succors to every misfortune, has found no defender in the day of its

calamities? And who shall make known to France that her success is a

consequence of her repentance, that there is something greater than

victory, more decisive and more powerful than the most formidable

engines of war—the protection of Him who holds in his hands the

destinies of nations? _Deus, Deus, quid reliquisti nos?_

OCTOBER 10.

Two melancholy, dark, and rainy days, such as always depress my soul.

Garibaldi has arrived at Marseilles with a thousand volunteers—doubtless

the scum of Italy. Mgr. de Saint-Brieuc summons all Bretons to the

defence of their country. “No, France will not die! This cry from the

heart of forty millions will pierce heaven and awaken all the echoes of

the earth!” Paris has provisions for two months; but after? Surely all

France will rise, and, as soon as she feels herself strong enough, she

will meet these barbarians, to whom all has been successful hitherto!

What bloodshed! What ruins! What opprobrium! Will not God raise up some

hero from this soil which has given so much to the world? Anna Maria

Taigi predicted that the Council would last eighteen months, that Pius

IX. would die towards its close, and the gentle and venerated Pontiff

would see the dawn of a new time. Does not this mean that soon the

trials of the Papacy will cease? “The church cannot perish; but God has

not made to nations the same promises of immortality.”

O Kate and Mad, my two idols! I think of you. To-morrow we go to Auray,

all together; the _abbé_ will say Mass for us there, if we can arrive

before noon.

OCTOBER 14.

I have prayed much, thought much, suffered much, hoped much, loved much,

during these four days!

A prediction, said to be from Blois, assures us of definitive success.

Alas! we were in need of saints; this republic of lawyers makes me

afraid. My mother quoted to us yesterday an old prophecy from the works

of Hugues de Saint-Cher, Cardinal-Dominican of the thirteenth century:

“There will be four sorts of persecutions in the church of God: the

first, tyrants against the martyrs; the second, heretics against the

doctors; the third, lawyers against simple people; and, lastly,

Antichrist against all.” We are in the third. There is no _unity_; there

is impotence, and therefore nothing succeeds.

A terrible rumor which will only too soon be confirmed—Orleans is

invaded. M. de Bismarck’s plan is to ruin France in detail, in order

that it may for a long time be impossible to her to avenge herself. But

vengeance belongs to God, and he will take it! The journals gave us so

much hope! What a spectacle—two nations slaughtering each other, and a

land which God created so fair covered with blood and ruins! Send us, O

Lord! legions of angels; fight for the cause of civilization and right;

save France, and may there no longer be amongst us a single soul which

does not by its worship glorify thee!

The news from Metz is reassuring in that direction—Metz, which has been

our ruin! The inhabitants are admirable in their patriotism, and engage

to defend the city if Bazaine and the one hundred thousand men can make

themselves an opening. Without a miracle, however, can the aspect of

events undergo a change? Bitche continues to resist. O my France! must

thou, like Ireland, also be crucified?

_Evening._—An enigmatic despatch, in _negro language_, announces that

the army of the Loire has been compelled to retire before superior

forces, and that St. Quentin has repulsed fifteen thousand of the enemy.

Garibaldi declares that fifteen thousand Italians will march at the

first signal. The six thousand Pontifical Zouaves will form a splendid

regiment, under the leadership of a hero, M. de Charette. Oh! how these

words rend my soul: _Garibaldi, Pontifical Zouaves_. What an assemblage!

May God pardon France! How will all this end? Phalsbourg holds out, and

other towns; but to see the enemy always in imposing numbers, to know

that everywhere they make crushing requisitions, that each day brings

fresh mourning, is a deadly sorrow! What part of our soil will remain

unpolluted by the passage of these emissaries of death?

Orleans is in the enemy’s power—Orleans, the key and the heart of

France—Orleans, the Queen of the Loire, the faithful city, the town

saved from Attila by St. Aignan, from the English by Joan of Arc! A

great battle is imminent.

Our venerated pastor suffers no more. This morning, at three o’clock,

one of our farmers, who, with Mistress Annah, was sitting up with him,

came to let us know that he was sinking, and we reached him in time to

receive his last blessing. O Kate! draw us also. The words of the divine

Office for to-day are admirably suitable to our distress: “I am the

Salvation of my people, saith the Lord; in whatsoever affliction they

shall be, I will hear them when they shall call upon me, and I will be

their God for ever.” “If I am in trouble, thou, O Lord! shalt preserve

my life; thou shalt stretch forth thy hand against the fury of mine

enemies, and thy right hand shall save me!”

OCTOBER 20.

O my God! if it were declared that these avenging hordes are to carry

fire and sword through the whole of France, if our sanctuaries and our

relics protected us not, still would we hope in thee, whose love is

greater than our misdeeds, and we would bless thee for ever.

No news from Rheims.

OCTOBER 22.

Twenty thousand Prussians have invaded Chartres, the city of Mary,

famous for its pilgrimage and for its splendid memories. Will they not

defile its cathedral? Horror! The churches of Nancy are changed into

stables. O my God! so many profanations, and still always triumph.

OCTOBER 26.

Read the circular of M. Jules Favre to the French diplomatic agents. O

statesman! your eyes, then, are not opened, and you perceive not that,

chastised for our crimes, we cannot be saved but by the help of God.