Echternach was always the capital of St. Willibrord’s peaceful realm.

There was his tomb; there rose convent and basilica, perpetual heralds

of his great deeds. The convent was a city in itself, and the basilica

is a most precious relic of eleventh-century architecture—a veritable

pearl which alone would make the reputation of a town. I will not be

drawn into further details, for fear of leaving my subject.[173] It

suffices to remember that this wonderful monument, a victim of

revolutionary vandalism, had been sold as national property, and was

falling into decay, when the piety and patriotism of the people of

Echternach snatched it from certain destruction. They formed, under the

name of _Willibrordus Verein_, a society whose aim was to recover the

basilica and restore it to worship. This society, founded in 1862 by a

few citizens in a little town of four thousand souls, now numbers its

members by hundreds. It has already devoted more than one hundred

thousand francs to the basilica, and will soon crown its work by

bringing back the shrine of the saint, now preserved in the parish

church. All reverence to the intelligent Christian people who guard

their honor so faithfully and understand so well the interests of their

own glory! Inspired by the three-fold love of religion, country, and

art, the Willibrordus Verein is one of the finest institutions that I

know. It does honor to the whole of Luxembourg, and will leave a lasting

memory. Of how many associations of our day can as much be said?

Footnote 173:

On the basilica of Echternach read a good notice by Prof. Namur

inserted in t. xxii. of _Annals of the Archæological Academy of

Belgium_; and another by M. Bock, in _Rheinlands Baudenkmale des

Mittelalters_.

The entire town of Echternach has retained that stamp of antiquity so

eagerly sought by artists, and so much despised by our petty, material

generation. Surrounded by the fantastic hills that form the valley,

whose strange summits look like crumbling castles; still enclosed by

three-quarters of its ancient fortifications, with here and there a

ruined tower, it strikes the beholder with a surprise which only

increases as he penetrates to the interior of the town. Passing through

crooked and narrow streets, where each house has an architecture of its

own which is often very impressive, he reaches the public square, where

stands the antique town-hall, known by the more ancient name of

Dingsthal, an interesting building which rests on Gothic arcades. The

parish church is equally worthy of attention for its old Romanic

architecture and its beautiful position upon the summit of an eminence

overlooking the town.

What especially tends to give to Echternach its peculiar character is

the habits of its population, so in harmony with the tranquil, cheerful

country and its mediæval monuments. Here more than elsewhere Catholic

faith has impregnated the life of the people. All their actions reflect

its powerful simplicity, its generous hardihood, its customs of ten or

fifteen centuries back. The poetry of the past, that exquisite influence

of ancient times which we inhale with delight, is here an incense ever

ascending from this happy valley. In this respect nothing can equal the

dancing procession of Echternach, which takes place always on

Whit-Tuesday, in honor of St. Willibrord, and attracts those who come

especially to invoke his aid for nervous diseases. This procession has

taken place for more than five hundred years. It can be traced back to

the fourteenth century, and may be perhaps of even earlier origin. The

dance has been explained in various ways: sometimes as expressing the

joy of a Christian people coming to venerate the relics of their patron

saint; sometimes as a symbolical representation of nervous attacks,

epilepsy, and other maladies of the kind, from which the country was

delivered by St. Willibrord’s intercession in the fourteenth century.

It is this ceremony, whose original and picturesque character is quite

unique in the Christian world, which I am about to describe to the

reader.

II.

When Whit-Sunday comes an amazing animation rouses the little town from

its habitual tranquillity, and the excitement only increases on the

Monday. Hotels and private houses are thronged with guests; many

travellers, unable to get lodgings, camp out in the neighboring villages

or go back to _die Kirch_, to return by railway the next day. The

streets are thronged with dusty tourists: gentlemen of leisure regarding

everything with a patronizing smile, peasants in rustic garb, rich

strangers arriving in spruce equipages, and respectable jaunting-cars

with three rows of seats, conveying the opulent farmers of the

neighborhood. Booths are planted everywhere, blocking up the streets and

setting their backs against every available corner. Mountebanks and

charlatans, who come to levy their tithe on public piety, stun with

their piercing outcries the busy folk running about to look for

lodgings. Religion preludes the imposing solemnities of the following

morning. The faithful flock to religious offices and sermons. All day

long they are at prayer before the sarcophagus where lies the body of

the saint. There you will see the most fervent; and by their attitudes,

the expression of their faces, and the ardor of their gaze, it is plain

that they have some great favor to implore and hope not to go away

unsatisfied. Prostrate before the altar, these rude laborers from the

Eyfel and the Ardennes, with their great horny hands and tanned faces,

opening their whole hearts to God and absorbed in prayer, are beautiful

to look upon. They seem to symbolize the destiny of mankind, born to

labor, to suffer, and to pray. It is pleasant to ponder and pray in the

stillness of that little Romanic church, beside the greatest man of the

country.

It was an humble church with vaulted roof,

The church we entered in,

Where for eight hundred years the sons of men

Had wept and prayed ’gainst sin.

There, on the hill sacred for so many ages, under the shade of the

lindens that screen the courtyard of this modest edifice, in the

presence of the wide and peaceful landscape, the heart feels at ease,

the mind is in repose. It is like a haven of rest or like some enchanted

country. The hideous, infernal tumult of the church’s enemies dies away

in this Catholic oasis. Man and nature are in harmony; the serenity that

reigns in this lovely country sinks into the most stormy heart. Here

Dante would have found the peace he sought under the vaulted roof of the

monastery at Monte Corvo.

Evening fell; the chants for Benediction rang through the church as I

entered. Thousands of voices, accompanied by the grave and solemn tones

of the organ, were singing the beautiful litany of St. Willibrord, which

is like the national air of Echternach, and has a peculiar sweetness in

a language that admits of saying _thou_ to God and to the saints:

St. Willibrord, shining star of our country,

St. Willibrord, ornament of the Roman Church,

St. Willibrord, breaker of idols, _Pray for us_.

I cannot describe the effect of this chant, rising on so many voices in

accents of plaintive supplication, penetrating the heart with its

expression of love and trust. These people love St. Willibrord and treat

him with a sweet familiarity. “Who and what was he that men should come

every year to kneel before his relics and pay him honors so exceptional?

What had he more than others, and by what was he distinguished? By

beauty, genius, science, riches?” Such was the idea of the sermon which

followed Benediction, and was heard by that whole multitude in

breathless attention, some standing, others kneeling on the flags—for

all the chairs had been taken away. The sacred orator developed his

theme with remarkable skill, and, after proving that St. Willibrord had

shone by none of these gifts, he concluded that he had reached this

exceptional glory on earth and in heaven because he had understood and

applied better than others the divine command, “Love God above all

things, and thy neighbor as thyself.”

O grandeur of Christianity! O eternity of the church! A thousand years

ago Alcuin said the same in his panegyric; the modern preacher’s noble

words were like the lingering echo of the same Christian voice sounding

through ages—of that voice which ever repeats itself, and yet is always

fresh, for it is the voice of truth. Thus, at the two extremities of

this decade of centuries, the friend of Charlemagne and the young priest

of Luxembourg were the two ends of a chain whose every link is an

extinct generation, and which brings down to our own day the

unchangeable, immortal tradition. One thousand years hence other

pilgrims will come to contemplate these great lessons of time and pray

before the sacred tomb, treading beneath their feet the ruins of our

civilization and modern society.

After Benediction I went to walk on the heights above the town. The

night was clear and the moon hung calmly serene in the heavens. Every

time I pass through Echternach I climb these hills; the place is full of

calm and refreshment, and I always feel happy there. Looking down upon

the town, with its spires and ancient roofs mirrored in the peaceful

river, I listened to the last sounds dying away in the streets; for the

town went to rest as early that night as on any other. Heaven and earth

seemed so quiet, so infinitely peaceful! If at that hour propitious to

dreams you would evoke in spirit the memory of the past, it would rise

like a gigantic phantom. One glance cast into the domains of fancy would

show the wild valley heaped with Druidic stones, crowned with altars and

Roman monuments, and traversed by the swift, silvery flood of the Sûre,

which seems to pierce like a dart the mysterious depths of the ancient

Ardennes. On the summit of the height appears a wonderful man, who

breaks the Gallic and Roman idols, and with their fragments builds

Christian oratories; he levels the forest and cultivates the valley;

builds dwellings around the church, calls men, and they come at his

bidding; and this new Orpheus, with no lyre but his voice, leads in his

train Barbarism, conquered, charmed, converted.

The next day I breakfasted between five and six o’clock in one of the

many pretty pleasure-gardens of the town. The evening before had been

very warm; the day dawned under the same auspices, but perfectly clear.

The people of Echternach declare that it cannot rain on the day of their

procession, or, at least, that the rain must stop before they enter the

church. On all sides resounded clear and full the voices of pilgrims

coming in procession from villages near by and chanting the litany of

St. Willibrord. These aerial tones, coming to us in the freshness of

dawn through blossoming trees, opened the day very pleasantly. I went

out. Through every street there poured a stream of country people,

preceded by crosses and banners. Whole parishes came with their pastors;

they had left home at daybreak and walked several leagues, with prayers

and chants rousing the wondering birds, unused to hear human voices

praise the Creator in advance of them. The nearest villages came in

procession; others, who could not send a solemn train, furnished a large

number of pilgrims, who marched in isolated groups. Without counting the

pilgrims of the Luxembourg, Belgium, France, and Russia are represented

every year. The number of devout Christians whom each anniversary brings

to the sacred tomb varies from 12,000 to 15,000, leaving out those who

come without having made a vow, some from religious feeling, others from

mere curiosity. About 20,000 strangers in all crowd into the narrow

precincts of the little town every Whitsuntide. For whole hours you see

the flood of humanity ascend and descend the steps of the parish church;

for all the pilgrims on their arrival go first to kneel at the saint’s

shrine. About eight o’clock the multitudes pass over to the other bank

of the Sûre, where the procession is to begin. The Sûre forms the

boundary between the territory of Luxembourg and Prussia. Just there the

procession falls into line of march. At the foot of the hills, beside a

little stone cross, they erect a temporary pulpit, from which a priest

addresses the people before the ceremony begins. Thousands had collected

to await the coming of the clergy. Some walked about, others sat along

the edge of the road or leaned against the parapet of the bridge. The

crowd, scattered in picturesque confusion and disorder, buzzed like a

hive of bees. The throng increased; along every road came hosts of

pilgrims ploughing their way. From afar came vague, indistinct sounds of

singing, and along the valley, through the narrow road traced between

the Sûre and the hills, there advanced a long column. Banners floated in

the sunshine and gleamed through the trees; the procession undulated and

unrolled its length as it followed the windings of the river. The

voices, as they drew nearer, became distinct, and soon the head of the

procession appeared. They were pilgrims from Prüm, in the Eyfel, more

than twelve leagues from Echternach, coming to make their annual

devotions to St. Willibrord. These good people had set out on Sunday

evening; they had walked part of that night and of the next day, praying

and chanting. On Monday evening they had disbanded, scattering about

through fields and in barns a few leagues from Echternach, and had

resumed their march early in the morning. Tanned, heated, dusty, clad in

coarse raiment, they came on in good order, forming an almost

interminable train. It seemed as if the whole village had come. Their

accoutrements were rustic, fantastic even; the men carried crosswise

over their backs an umbrella fastened by a string which passed over

their breasts, crossing the strap of a large leathern valise hanging on

the other side. The women had baskets on their arms. These valises and

baskets held the provisions for that journey of four or five days. It is

remarkable that this pilgrimage of the people of Prüm is voluntary and a

popular movement; the clergy take no part in its organization, and

seldom join it, the parishioners making it their own affair. On this

occasion, indeed, a priest was with them, but the order of march and the

devotions were directed by a certain number of men placed at intervals

in the procession. They carried, as the insignia of office, a red staff

surmounted by a little copper cross. The priest, who closed the

procession, walked between two young men clad in quaint and antique

garb, with hats turned up and trimmed with flowers. One carried the

cross, the other a large votive candle adorned with emblems, the annual

gift of their village to the patron of Echternach. The procession

advanced in perfect order. Indifferent to curious looks, turning their

eyes neither to the right nor to the left towards the human hedge that

lined their path, they passed on, saying their rosary aloud and

repeating after each _Ave_ this familiar salutation, full of simplicity

and grace: “St. Willibrord, we are coming to thy tomb!” I loved to see

and hear them. Their fervor in prayer and contempt of fatigue, their

rustic dress and primitive manners, their indifference to all but their

one object, made these peasants a people set apart, and their pilgrimage

a type of the pilgrimage of human life as it ought to be made. I watched

the pious train until it entirely disappeared on the other side of the

bridge; for, before returning to the Prussian bank to take part in the

sacred dance, the people of Prüm were going to kiss the shrine and pray

before the relics of the saint.

At last, about nine o’clock, a numerous band of clergy appeared, and the

ceremony opened with the accustomed sermon. Fancy the scene: the lovely

morning and beautiful country, the vast host of listeners intent on the

words of the priest. For a frame there were the high hills on one side,

on the other the silvery course of the Sûre, and below the spires of the

town.

Not less wonderful was it to hear on Prussian ground a Catholic voice

calling upon thousands of the faithful to pray for the Holy Father and

the persecuted church. And while the priest was speaking there came from

all the heights belated pilgrims hastening to the ceremony. They were

seen afar off, coming down the steep paths bordered with flowering

hedges; and the bells rang out full peals, and the word of God was

scattered among the multitude with the song of birds.

When the sermon was ended, the clergy, in white surplices, formed in

line of march and opened the procession. Behind them came the musicians,

and afterwards the immense throng of those who were to join in the

dance. At first there was much crowding. Leaning against the parapet of

the bridge, I had to ply my elbows lustily to prevent the multitude from

suffocating me, and farther on, when the train began to defile through

the narrow street which leads to the Sûre, the pressure was quite

frightful. There were not ushers enough to preserve order. A few firemen

and policemen had to be everywhere at once, and were swallowed up in the

billows of the confused crowd. The cause of the disorder was the

impatience of some people, who, instead of waiting until the street

should be cleared for the beginning of the dance, went forward to post

themselves higher up in the procession. This choked the way in some

places, and there was terrible pushing. Women screamed; several were

nearly suffocated. I saw some men, who, as they awaited their turn with

philosophic patience, set their backs against walls and rowed with their

arms against the human flood to save themselves from wreck. A

hospitality, as unexpected as it was welcome, rescued me from the tumult

to become a peaceful spectator in a neighboring house instead of an

actor in the scene. “It is sweet,” says Lucretius, “when the sea is

swollen and tossed by rough winds, to look from the shore upon the

distress of others, not finding pleasure in their troubles, but in our

own exemption from them.” I felt, in selfish enjoyment, the spirit of

these lines, gazing at my ease from an upper window upon the undulation

of several thousand heads floating apparently upon a liquid expanse.

Actually, a needle thrown from above would not have reached the ground.

Order was soon restored. The police got angry and used their fists

unsparingly to force back into their places the intruders, who continued

to leave the ranks and insinuate themselves in among the front rows of

the procession. All this went on while the head of the _cortége_

disappeared at the turn of the street, dancing to the traditional air

played by the musicians. It was a quaint tune, rather quick in measure

and old-fashioned. It was hard to say whether it expressed joyful

excitement or the emotions of grief; for music, with its wonderful

suppleness, may sometimes speak to us of our joys and sorrows, according

to the mood in which we listen. And now this melody, centuries old, set

in motion a dancing multitude. The sight was strange, striking,

indescribable. To an unaccustomed spectator the first moment is of

stupefied amazement. His fancy enters a new world; the movement of all

these heads bending and rocking in a rhythmic measure produces a

fantastic effect that no words can convey. I do not know whether I can

tell exactly what I saw, or if my sketch will give even a faint idea of

a scene which defies analysis and description.

Think of a stream of twelve thousand persons in a street where only

eight can walk abreast; fancy all these people, in rows of four, six, or

eight, advancing, held together by handkerchiefs or staves to keep order

in the ranks and measure in the dance; fancy them, I say, executing a

dance which consists of three steps forward and two back, and which

moves the whole multitude from end to end with one unceasing action of

ebb and flow. The interminable train stretched over about fifteen

hundred metres from the bridge of the Sûre to the parish church. It took

not less than four hours to accomplish that quarter of a league by

dancing, and under the direct rays of the sun, without a moment’s rest.

It is easy to imagine that order and regularity were sometimes

disturbed, but what was lost in symmetry was gained in picturesque

originality of detail. There were almost as many different styles of

dancing as there were various groups, everybody managing his own

affairs. The groups just behind the musicians succeeded best, being kept

in step by the music; and in general the people of Echternach danced

more harmoniously and correctly than the others. As the bands were few

and stationed quite far apart, the pilgrims who could not hear them

hopped about in utter confusion, while the rest had a certain harmony of

movement. These eccentricities of choreographic movement were worth

seeing; here they glided with light step, elegantly and smoothly; there

they jumped about with heavy tread and immense exertion. Watching

carefully those who seemed to have best preserved the tradition, I

thought that the most pure and “classic” rhythm consisted in five steps

of a dance, quite slow and without turning, three forward and two back,

made by gliding rather than bounding. The whole character was grave,

solemn, and suited to a religious dance. A band from Echternach opened

the march and played the tune for the first pilgrims. The others danced

to the strains of a few isolated instruments. Each _cortége_ had its own

musicians, and, as each parish danced separately, they had their local

players. It is needless to say that variety reigned among the

instruments—drums, violins, flutes, clarionets, and hautboys—all hard at

work and producing combinations hardly grateful to musical ears. But the

good fellows did not pretend to be artists. They worked for conscience’

sake; they piped and they blew, they beat and they scraped, with all the

accumulated force of lungs, fists, and bows. St. Willibrord is not

fastidious; he takes the will for the deed, and if there be here and

there some cockney scandalized by this cacophony, so much the worse for

him. Ill though they play the melody, it is a good work to make the

attempt, and the worthy pilgrims accommodate themselves to

circumstances. Formerly no fiddler was allowed to play in village fairs,

if he had not paid for the privilege at the procession of Echternach

that same year. This custom, with many others, is obsolete, but many

musicians remain faithful to tradition.

This year, while the procession was crossing the town, there came

marching through a cross-street a brilliant band of music preceded by a

banner; it was a philharmonic society from Remich on the Moselle, and

was received with acclamation. It joined the procession, and its fine

execution came as a welcome reinforcement to the poor musicians, who

were nearly exhausted.

I could not take my eyes off the wonderful scene, sometimes taking in

the whole picture at a glance, sometimes pausing to examine details in

all their picturesque variety. Most attractive of all was the sight of

the children of Echternach, dancing at the head of the procession just

behind the village band; they put such life into the affair, and felt it

such a festive occasion. It was refreshing to watch the rosy-cheeked,

laughing rogues, usually in their shirt-sleeves, bounding merrily “for

St. Willibrord.” Then came the grown folk of Echternach, then the

various parishes, each, as I said, forming a distinct group with its own

musicians. The sexes were separated. Formerly the pilgrims from Prüm and

Waxweiler, who came from the most distant points, had the right of

opening the procession, while the inhabitants of Echternach, through

courtesy, took the last place. Now there is no fixed order; the parishes

take their places at hap-hazard, and many people leave the ranks to join

the front rows at the risk of throwing the whole procession into

confusion. I saw the good people of Prüm, with their monumental green

and blue umbrellas capable of sheltering whole households. Now they were

unstrung from their proprietors’ backs, and, bound two and two, served

as a balustrade to be grasped by three or four persons to keep them even

in the ranks and regulate their step. Here and there, amid the rhythmic

movement of these thousands of heads, I descried some unhappy being

afflicted with St. Vitus’ dance, shown by wild, spasmodic springs,

violent excitement, and the pitiful rocking of all the limbs. They were

usually women, young girls stricken with this terrible disorder. I

noticed one in particular whom every one looked at with earnest

sympathy. She leaped in a wild, feverish way, supported under the arms

by her mother, whom I knew by the look of anxiety and sadness imprinted

on her face. The kind people of the town stood ready at their doors with

refreshing beverages for these poor creatures; but they hardly stopped

to drink before continuing their dance under the whip of the sun, as the

great Alighieri says, whose words came to my mind more than once at

sight of these miseries. So drawn along by this weird dance, the

pilgrims appeared and vanished, as wave follows wave, and the monotonous

melody carried on ten thousand people to the sound of its fantastic

cadences. Add one or two thousand pilgrims who, not joining in the

dance, followed the procession, saying their beads or reciting the

litany, and you have in all twelve thousand Christians of both sexes and

of every age and rank, who, through four whole hours, formed St.

Willibrord’s triumphal procession and visited his sacred tomb.[174]

Footnote 174:

According to the _Echternachter Anzeiger_ of June 5, the number of

dancers was 10,600; of other pilgrims 1,800. This does not include 188

musicians, 72 priests, 1,100 chanters, and various corporations. There

were, moreover, 14,000 or 15,000 spectators, making a total of about

30,000 people. Comparing these numbers with those of former years, we

shall see that the ancient ceremony increases in importance and

_éclat_. This conclusion is correct, as M. Krier’s statistics show,

_Die Springprocession_, p. 148. Since the beginning of this century

the number of dancers had not before reached 10,000.

All the energy of the vigorous Luxembourg sinews is required to bring to

a successful close this long and fatiguing pilgrimage, whose

difficulties increase as they near their end; for I forgot to say that

the procession danced up the sixty-two steps which lead to the parish

church. Not every one can go to Corinth, says the proverb. The same is

true of Echternach, though in a different sense, thank God! But it would

be a mistake to think that the famous ceremony demands anything

excessive or superhuman. The calm, grave character of the dance, and the

numerous pauses which are made necessary by the blocking of the way,

suffice to husband the pilgrim’s strength. Their vow, though hard and

laborious, is not impossible or dangerous. The proof of this is that

many children in the procession dance the whole length of the way twice

over. No sooner do they reach the church at the head of the procession

than they scamper back to join the rear and begin the exercise over

again. Pilgrims who, on arriving at Echternach, do not feel equal to

executing their vow, and yet wish to contribute to the brilliancy of the

festival, give a few sous to one of these children, and the

indefatigable little fellows acquit themselves of their task with

imperturbable seriousness and charming grace. But prodigious people are

again the people of Pürm. They arrive at the town, to use a familiar

expression, with twelve leagues in their heels; and at once they set to

work and dance four long hours. Then, when their devotions are ended,

they take barely time to eat their modest fare out doors or at an inn

table, and go home singing and praying to the high table-lands and

extinct volcanoes of their wild country.

One should be in the church when the procession pours in by traditional

custom through the left aisle, to pass round the altar in the choir and

go out through the right aisle. The dance does not cease an instant as

they pass through the sanctuary; the orchestra goes on playing the

quaint, archaic melody, the dancers make the old Romano-vaulted roof

ring with the clang of their measured steps. The pilgrims do not think

their vow fulfilled until, after making the tour of the church, they

find themselves in the courtyard before an old wooden cross, where they

break ranks. Nothing can be more fantastic than this irruption of

dancing and music in the house of God. The spectacle in the church is

beyond description; you feel as if you were dreaming, and your spirit

floated in the domain of the impossible. What do the people mean? Have

they come to pillage and destroy? Is this tumultuous throng the prey of

a sudden delirium, of a dancing mania? Or, if it be worship, does it not

revive the solemn orgies of ancient Greece, where certain deities of

Oriental origin were honored by the leaps, the cries, and the races of

their idolaters? No; to the first instant of amazement there succeeds a

more correct and complete judgment. Beneath the external agitation,

beneath the noise and movement, you see the religious calm which fills

these souls, and the solemnity pervading the expression of their inner

feelings. It is this contrast which gives to the singular ceremony its

character of deep originality. No doubt we have lost the sense of

mysterious symbolism in the sacred dance; we no longer see its true

motive or significance; we only know or divine that the devout thought

which first inspired it animates it at the present day.

Among various ideas suggested by this astonishing experience, there was

one that I could not get rid of, and which returned to me on the

festival and its eve again and again. While multitudes knelt before the

altar, kissed the shrine, touched it with objects of devotion, and

filled the church with their prayers, you would have said that the great

man must be there, present among the faithful, speaking to them and

listening to them. What glory equals that of the saints? What other son

of Adam enjoys such honors? Those whom the Catholic Church has crowned

with eternal palms do not reign only in heaven; the human glory which

they despised is given to them abundantly, and these little ones, who

passed through life obscure and despised, see themselves suddenly

surrounded with an amazing glory with which Cæsar, Homer, Archimedes,

and Plato do not shine. The world rings with their name, and the least

and most ignorant of human beings know, love, and revere them. They are

not only illustrious, they receive solemn veneration, they share in a

certain way the honors of God himself. Their names are uttered with

bended knee, nations flock to their tombs, and they are gloriously

enthroned in Christian hearts. Beside such a destiny is it worth while

to try to immortalize one’s name and to flutter, as the poet says, upon

the lips of men? What is the greatest name on earth, unless it be

encircled with the aureole of sanctity? Ignored by the crowd, uttered

coldly by most of those who know it, respected by a few, but invoked by

no one with clasped hands and heart uplifted to him who bore it. The

name of the least saint prostrates in the dust all human generations

through the long succession of ages, and resounds like a word of life on

all lips. The church alone is the dispenser of glory, and even among

secular names the noblest and most lasting are those of Catholic

associations.

III.

The reader asks, no doubt, what is the final impression produced by the

spectacle of the dancing procession, and how we should estimate this

strange ceremony? I will try to answer the double question clearly. In

the first place, one must see the procession with one’s own eyes to

judge it fairly. The public must beware of newspaper reports, which are

numerous and usually wholly incorrect, not to use a more uncivil term.

There is no name which certain papers have not applied to the subject;

for correspondents of a farcical turn amuse themselves every year at the

expense of a credulous public. We may say, _en passant_, that no class

of beings can be more contemptible than reporters hunting for a

sensation—travelling bagmen of the press who are allured by scandal as

the vulture is by a carcase. It is easy to fancy what the ceremony at

Echternach must have become under their pen. The very name of dancing

procession makes them scent a topic, and, devoid of all religious

feeling, they describe first and judge afterwards a spectacle they are

incapable of understanding. Their descriptions are so unfaithful that

you doubt whether the good people ever saw the procession, or whether

they did not write the account before going to the ceremony. They give

caricatures of a mass of humanity entangled in frightful confusion and

bounding with all their strength to the sound of a gigantic hubbub. The

ranks get mingled; the dancers crush each other and spring about,

regardless of the toes of their neighbors, who scream for mercy. With

rubicund faces streaming with perspiration, and with eyes starting from

the sockets, these wretched fanatics would die rather than pause. On all

sides numbers give up in despair and drop breathless among their

barbarous companions. Sometimes they are drawn out of the crowd by

compassionate persons and restored to life, but no one in the procession

stops for anything, and the pitiless Catholic _bamboula_ goes on and on,

sowing devastation at every step. I spare the reader further details and

give only the canvas of an embroidery more or less varied according to

the imaginative powers of the correspondent. In short, despite the

diversity of some details easy to add, this fancy sketch has appeared in

nearly all the anti-religious papers in Belgium, and will end in being

stereotyped. It is needless to say that it is false throughout. Among

ten thousand persons who were dancing I did not see one give out. Also,

contrary to another assertion, the number of epileptics and other

invalids in the procession is very small. I saw in all five or six

persons evidently afflicted with nervous diseases.

After reading this high-toned description, flavored with a few

Voltairean jests of the old type, it is natural to pronounce the

procession of Echternach an absurdity. The sarcasms of free-thinkers

annually assail the venerable ceremony, but without injuring it. In

fact, it is irreverent enough in this nineteenth century to increase in

importance. Eye-witnesses of the strange spectacle always retain an

impressive memory of it. I confess to having been rather prejudiced

against the grotesque scenes I expected to see. At the end of a quarter

of an hour I was convinced of the powerful religious character of this

great public act, and I remarked that all the spectators shared my

feeling. Any one must have a singularly empty mind and heart not to be

struck by the grandeur of the scene. Those who always take a petty view

of things, because they can take no other, may laugh at the discordant

music and the clumsy dancing of some of the pilgrims. For myself, when I

see the same belief, centuries old, translated by thousands of men into

bold, spontaneous action, I cannot restrain my admiration. Before the

intrepidity with which these men, trampling under foot all human

respect, honor with consecrated rites their patron saint, I feel moved

and impressed. Where is there such faith left in Israel? “When I hear

the old tune,” said one of the most honorable _bourgeois_ of Echternach

to me, “and when I see the first pilgrims arrive, I feel something

circulate between my flesh and skin that makes me fairly shiver.” A

young student of the town said to me very prettily: “I do not care much

for the dancing of the grown people, but the sight of the dancing

children carries me back to my own happy childhood, and my eyes fill

with tears.”

These feelings are unanimous. You see once in a while in the crowd a

travelling clerk on his vacation hazarding a timid and colorless sarcasm

which a generous public passes over unnoticed. Beyond dispute, the sight

of the procession exercises a moral and religious influence. Like

incredulity, faith is contagious; timid spirits feel strengthened in

this region where the breath of Catholic life circulates so freely; sick

hearts come out renewed from the spectacle of thousands of Christians

revealing the true remedy for human woe. The people of Luxembourg,

essentially serious and meditative, understand the aim of the ceremony;

its quaintness does not prevent them from seeing it as it really is—a

great and solemn affirmation of faith, at once an act of penance and a

prayer, to be preserved in the original form out of respect to their

ancestors and veneration for the saint. Whatever the origin of this

ancient custom,[175] it deserves to be preserved not only because it

fosters and develops religion in the people, but because it revives

before our eyes, in the most picturesque way, the manners of our

fathers, whose least traces historians and archæologists are jealous to

discover. A Luxembourg writer says well on this subject: “We preserve

with scrupulous fidelity old monuments and objects of antique art. Why

not do our best to preserve in its original type this remarkable

procession, this monument graven in the living hearts of our

brethren?”[176]

Footnote 175:

I have given the two current opinions on the origin of the dancing

procession. I share neither, and hope my different explanation clear

by weight of proof.

Footnote 176:

Krier, _Dancing Procession_, p. 55. This author wrote his work first

briefly in French, then in German with more details. The latter is a

serious and interesting work as regards the ceremony. It is also an

edifying appeal from a Christian priest to his brethren.

The intelligent town of Echternach perfectly understands that it is

incumbent upon its honor to respond to this wish. It has neglected

nothing in the cause, and at various times has had to surmount great

obstacles. The administrative prohibitions of Joseph II., the

brutalities of the French Revolution, the petty opposition of the Dutch

government, have not discouraged them; they have held faithfully to

their patriotic tradition, and have no cause to repent it, for they find

in this devotion a source of great prosperity. Their unalterable

attachment is the more remarkable because even the clergy have often

been opposed to the procession. In 1777 the Prince Elector of Treves,

Clement Wenceslaus—under the reign of the Febronians, I should

add—actually forbade the dance, and thus furnished excuse to Joseph II.

to forbid it also a little later. To-day quite a number of the clergy

look unfavorably on these extraordinary demonstrations of faith. They

think religion is compromised by associating it with practices which,

without being bad in themselves, may provoke the mockery of the

incredulous and alienate them farther from the church. This opinion,

based, of course, on a sincere devotion to religious interests, appears

to me an unconscious and useless concession to the petty spirit of the

age, which is never satisfied with half-measures. Anti-religious

fanaticism will not be appeased by our throwing to it as a sop a small

portion of Catholic treasure. What it wants is the entire suppression of

religion. To yield any point whatever will only serve to whet its

appetite and augment its pretensions.

Far from sharing these fears, I think that in these days of struggle it

is important to oppose the faith as a whole to unbelief as a whole, and

not yield an inch of ground, unless we wish to lose all. From the

earliest days of Christianity there have been people who took scandal at

faith which goes beyond what is strictly necessary; among Christ’s

apostles there were those who blamed Magdalen for anointing the feet of

her Master with precious ointment. It is instructive to remember that it

was Judas who showed himself most shocked by what he called useless

expense. We may be sure that, as a general rule, the enemies of the

church detest all her practices and would like to see them every one

abolished. Give them the dance of Echternach to-day; to-morrow they will

demand the suppression of the procession itself, and soon after they

will wish to close the church where the saint’s relics are venerated. We

know something of this in Belgium. Because we submitted to the

proscription of jubilee processions last year, we have had to resign

ourselves this year (1876) to seeing God in the Eucharist confined to

the temple; and we shall see worse things still, if we do not guard

against them in time. It would, therefore, be mere folly to sacrifice to

interested claimants a venerable custom, dear to whole populations and

full of poetry and originality. “But why dance?” you ask. “Cannot faith

be shown in some other way?” Of course it can. Do not let us kneel down

to pray, or stand uncovered before holy images, or make the sign of the

cross, or do a hundred other things equally useless, strictly speaking.

Yet who would propose to give them up? There is in the heart of man a

powerful, mysterious tendency to express the inner feelings of the soul

by symbolical actions. Thence come these many ceremonies which have no

sense in themselves, and all owe their worth to a hidden significance.

The dance of Echternach has no other origin; it is the symbolical

representation of the sentiments of joyful confidence which the people

feel in the holy patron of their town. In every age joy has been

expressed by dancing, and among those who blame the custom of Echternach

may there not be some one who has danced for joy at hearing good news?

Many examples could be cited since David danced before the Ark of the

Alliance down to our own days, so readily do these impetuous emotions of

the soul translate themselves into movements of the body.

Still, the church, while introducing into her ceremonies a rich and

varied symbolism, has never admitted dancing; and this prudent reserve

is to be admired because dancing, harmless in itself, is one of those

dangerous things which can, according to time and place, produce

deplorable abuses. With the same wise moderation she has not absolutely

forbidden it; and where the practice has been introduced naturally, and

has become a part of popular devotion, she has tolerated it, as at

Echternach, and even encouraged it because she saw in it clearly a

religious element. Nothing is more wonderful in the church than this

perfect wisdom, this superior good sense, with which she regulates great

social and political questions and decides the petty details of

individual life. Her attitude towards this ancient ceremony is as clear

and correct as possible; she mildly favors it in spite of its strange

forms, and refuses to blame these unless they become an occasion of

scandal. From the moment that the dance should lose its traditional

character of austere and respectable devotion, and become a pretext of

pleasure and disorder, it would be at once condemned by the church and

would fall into discredit. Thank God! that day is not near, and the

procession of Echternach will still outlive many a kingdom and empire.

As a matter of course, it will be discussed as long as it lasts, and

will always have adversaries and partisans. Prose and poetry will for

ever dispute over human society, and will seek to model it after two

opposite fashions. We live to-day in a prosaic age. Prose triumphed with

the French Revolution and has passed through western Europe with a

hammer, destroying, together with works of art, all the flower of

Catholic institutions and habits. They will revive, but slowly, and this

generation will not see their complete restoration. Now, despoiled of

all which lent a charm to existence, society languishes in a desert of

monotony. Rhythm, so to speak, has disappeared from our lives with that

glorious succession of festivals, customs, memories, and hopes which

surrounded us from the cradle to the grave. All that was Catholic

poetry; it enlivened the existence of the poor laborer, and made of a

peasant, attached to the soil and toiling for his master, a happier man,

more contented with himself, than workmen in the cities who get a good

salary and enjoy their independence. There is in the human soul a

sublime aspiration after beauty and poetry which nothing can destroy,

and its wings grow strong as they meet with resistance. Does not the

tedium which has devoured the last generation betray a sense of want and

an aspiration after Catholic life with its artistic magnificence and

poetic influences? Humanity is tending in that direction, and has

already met the enemy who would bar the way. Thence comes the loud and

terrible struggle which tears the whole earth, and of which we may,

without presumption, hope to see the close.

The procession of Echternach, like the mysteries of Oberammergau in

Upper Bavaria, is a precious relic of the old popular poetry of

Catholicity translated into the habits of life. That is its true and

complete meaning. It is neither more nor less; it is not an act of

worship nor a vulgar profanation. It stands on that boundary line where

the church condescends to popular feeling and makes the hard road

through life easier by her help. It is the natural fruit of popular

devotion which sprang from a religious feeling and has been preserved

with respectful piety. It could not be imitated or transplanted; like

generous wine, it would lose the flavor of the soil if it were

cultivated on strange land. It is only possible there where all is

harmonious with it. One must have a studied hostility towards religious

things to fail to see its æsthetic character, even without recognizing

the sincerity and the venerable tone of the old custom. Some people fall

into ecstasies over Grecian theories and the beautiful religious dances

sculptured on the metopes of the Parthenon. Others devote their lives to

the study of the chorus in ancient tragedies and its evolutions on the

stage. I do not say that the dance of Echternach, as such, is comparable

to these choreographic works of art, but why refuse to a Christian

practice in use among our fathers the benevolent attention lavished on

pagan society? Has it not a double claim to study in the fact that we

received it from our Catholic ancestors? For five centuries, at least,

it has lived and flourished among the populations of the Ardennes and

its surroundings. Every year it draws from their homes thousands of

these sedentary peasants; it furrows with the steps of pilgrims the

long, white, desert roads of Luxembourg; it draws together in fraternal

relations men far removed from each other, by the same prayers and the

same emotions; it lifts towards heaven in unalloyed joy their faces

bowed pitilessly earthward all the rest of the year. It teaches them to

know beyond their own fireside and parish the great Christian family of

which they are members, and leaves in their memory for all the rest of

the summer and through the long winter evenings ineffaceable impressions

of peaceful happiness. That is poetry, it seems to me, and of the best

kind; more is the pity for those who cannot feel it. As the name of

_pèlerinard_ is not one that frightens or mortifies me, I will assert

that the ancient procession of Echternach inspired me with unlimited

admiration, that it edified, moved, and consoled me, and appeared to me

a most charming episode in the great, mournful epic of human life.

THE PAN-PRESBYTERIANS.

After two years of careful preparation the great Pan-Presbyterian

Council has assembled; has eaten seven luncheons in public and at the

public expense, and a corresponding number of breakfasts, dinners, and

suppers in private and at private cost; and has dispersed; its members

talked much—but these were their only deeds. The labor of the

Pan-Presbyterian mountain brought forth not even a mouse. Its promise

was large; its performance was ludicrously small—so small that the

leading journals of England appear to have been almost unaware of the

existence of the Pan-Presbyterians, while the principal organ of opinion

in the Scotch city where the council was held—“close to the grave of

John Knox, the founder of Presbyterianism”—gave to the record of its

proceedings not so much space as it often devotes to the report of a

local synod, and dismissed it at its close with good-humored but

contemptuous ridicule. Here, however, the ingenuous reader may inquire,

“Who are the Pan-Presbyterians, and for what purpose were they in

council?” The question would be a natural one, and he who propounds it

need not blush for his ignorance. The people of Scotland may be presumed

to know all that is worth knowing about Presbyterianism in all its

forms; but it appears that in certain rural districts of that very

Presbyterian land the impression prevailed that Pan-Presbyterian was the

title of a new sect indigenous to America, and recently smuggled into

Scotland like the Colorado beetle; while in the more learned circles of

Edinburgh this bucolic delusion was derided by erudite philologists, who

explained that “Pan-Presbyterianism is a learned form of stating that

Presbyterianism is Everything, and that a Pan-Presbyterian is a person

who holds that comprehensive yet exclusive doctrine.” In point of fact,

however, the Pan-Presbyterians were simply three hundred and twenty-five

gentlemen, most of them with the handle of reverend to their names, who

claimed to be the delegated representatives of the various Presbyterian

sects throughout the world. From time to time some of the almost

innumerable Protestant sects show that they are ashamed of their

sectarianism. Those of them who recognize at all the fact that Jesus

Christ established _one_ church in the world are uneasy when they

remember that they are members only of a sect which has a human origin.

This feeling, if rightly nurtured and obeyed, would lead those who

entertain it into the fold of the church; but prejudice, pride,

ignorance, and self-interest too often stand in the way, and lead to

attempts to satisfy the natural Christian yearning for unity by projects

for the amalgamation of a few of the sects into one body. Thus we have

had a Pan-Anglican Congress, a Bonn Conference, and an Evangelical

Alliance; and now this Pan-Presbyterian Council. Presbyterianism has a

history of about three hundred and twenty-five years, and in this period

it has succeeded in dividing and subdividing itself, until even its own

doctors do not know with exactness how many different kinds of

Presbyterians there may be, or in what manner the points of doctrine

which separate them should be formulated. It was suggested at the

council that accurate information upon this subject was desirable, and

the task of obtaining it was entrusted to a committee, who hope they may

be able to report in three years’ time. The project for the

Pan-Presbyterian Council was originated by an eminent American

Presbyterian minister—President McCosh, of Princeton (New Jersey)

College; and it took definite shape at a meeting held in London in 1875,

when “the alliance of the reformed churches throughout the world holding

to the Presbyterian system” was organized. Before the council could be

summoned, however, careful precautions had to be taken in order to

prevent the assemblage, which was to meet for the promotion of unity,

from breaking up in a row and resulting in the establishment of one or

more new schisms. A charm of novelty was thus imparted to the

undertaking; every one felt that a Presbyterian synod which could hold

its sessions without a free fight would indeed be a new spectacle. The

harmony of the council was to be assured beforehand by forbidding it to

exercise any authority whatsoever. It was especially prohibited from

attempting to “interfere with the existing creed or constitution of any

church in the alliance, or with its internal order or external

relations.” Thus the door was opened for the admission of the

representatives of sects who are almost as wide apart from each other in

what they believe and teach as they are from the church. So long as they

called themselves Presbyterians, or “held to the Presbyterian system of

church government,” it was enough. There is a Presbyterian sect in

Holland whose pastors, at least, teach that the Bible is not an inspired

book, and who deny the divinity of Christ; there is a Presbyterian sect

in France which avows the boldest rationalism; there are Presbyterian

sects in the United States who rejoice with exceeding great joy in the

belief that there are millions of infants not a span long frying in

hell; and there are others who have recoiled so far from Calvinism that

they have fallen into Universalism. In Scotland itself bitter strife

prevails between the various Presbyterian sects on such questions as the

connection of the state with the church, the binding force of the

“Standards,” and the extent and nature of the Atonement; and there is a

large party which is declaring that if a certain reverend professor, who

has written to prove that parts of the Bible are forgeries, myths, or

fables, is disciplined for that expression of opinion, they will revolt

and help him to set up a sect of his own. But the Pan-Presbyterians

resolved to concern themselves with none of these things. Everything

unpleasant was to be avoided; unity was to be talked about, but no

attempt to effect it by defining truth or denouncing error was to be

made. Even with these restrictions the promoters of the council realized

the danger of their experiment, and at the last moment they diminished

its perils by enacting that no one should speak twice on the same

subject, and that the discourses should be limited from twenty to ten

minutes each. The latter provision, which was stringently enforced, more

than once saved the council from painful scenes. We had occasion, when

writing in these pages six months ago,[177] to show that in the

Presbyterian body in Scotland theoretical infidelity had made such

headway and had obtained so firm a foothold that to deny the inspiration

of the Bible, and to cast doubt upon the authenticity of the miraculous

events recorded in its pages, was regarded by a powerful section as an

evidence of profound scholarship and of a fearless love for truth,

rather than as a proof that the advocates of these opinions had ceased

to be worthy of the name and position of Christian teachers. In a word,

the condition of the Presbyterian sects throughout the world was such

that a general council of its leading men was highly desirable, provided

that there remained in the sects anything worth saving, and they

possessed in themselves the power of saving it. For ourselves, we

believe that the mutilated fragments of Christian truth still retained

by the majority of the Presbyterian laity and by a considerable number

of the Presbyterian ministers are well worth saving; but we fear that

the Presbyterians themselves will not, or cannot, save them. If these

Pan-Presbyterians were truly representative men, then, we should say, it

is all up with Presbyterianism. The spirit which conceived the council

and which governed its proceedings was the spirit of cowardice, of

temporary expediency, of prophesying smooth things, and, if we must

speak with entire plainness, the spirit of utter and base unfaithfulness

to God’s revealed truth, even to that version of his revealed truth

which the Presbyterians profess with their lips, and which they have

formulated in their own creeds, confessions, and catechisms. In the face

of the fact that on the Continent of Europe their co-religionists are

rapidly becoming Unitarians, rationalists, and infidels; that in

Scotland German rationalistic philosophy has won its way into their

theological schools and poisoned the very fountains of their

ecclesiastical learning, so that it has now become notorious that a

large share of their ministers either do not believe what they preach or

else preach that which is in irreconcilable antagonism to the

“Standards”; and that in America the Presbyterian bodies are drifting

into Socinianism on one hand, and back into the hardest and most

repulsive form of Calvinism on the other—in view of all these undeniable

facts, or rather with assumed and predetermined blindness to them, the

chosen representatives of the Presbyterian sects assemble, spend seven

days in talking with each other, and separate without uttering a word or

performing an act in affirmation or defence or vindication of absolute

and divine truth. No! That was not in the programme; it was only on

condition that nothing of the kind should be attempted that the council

was got together at all; it was only because this promise was observed

that the council managed to do its talking and to disperse in peace. At

one of its meetings a curious scene occurred. A woman—an earnest

Presbyterian of the old sort, a spiritual descendant of Jennie

Geddes—had made her way into the council, and had listened to the debate

for some time in silence; but her emotions at last overcame her, and,

rising to her feet, she politely informed the chairman that she hoped

God’s lightning would come down and strike the assembly for its

unfaithfulness. This irate lady was indiscreet; but she only expressed,

we suppose, the feelings of many an honest Presbyterian. The council,

however, was wise in its generation, and it must be confessed that it

acted upon strictly Protestant principles. The essence of Protestantism

is a revolt against supreme authority; it is the affirmation of the idea

that one man’s opinion is as good as another’s, and perhaps better. An

attempt to provide means for an organic unity of the sects represented

would have ended in a free fight; the affirmation of positive truths

condemnatory of the heresies which honey-*comb the sects was impossible

so long as the bargain by which these heresies were to be ignored was

carried out.

Footnote 177:

See THE CATHOLIC WORLD for April.

The official programme of the work of the council was thus conceived:

“To consider questions of general interest to Presbyterians; to

strengthen and protect weak and persecuted churches; to explain and

extend the Presbyterian system; and to discuss subjects of church

work—evangelization, training of ministers, use of the press,

colportage, suppression of intemperance, observance of the Sabbath,

systematic beneficence, and the suppression of Romanism and

infidelity.”

We must here record, with a grateful heart, that “Romanism” came off

very lightly. We are not certain that for this crowning mercy we are not

indebted to those wily fellows, the Jesuits. For it was observed that,

whenever one of the speakers began to adduce evidence that the Pope was

Antichrist, the chairman suddenly discovered “that time was up”; and it

was likewise remarked that more than one soul-stirring revelation of the

diabolical seductions of the Scarlet Woman was cut short by the

announcement that “the luncheon hour had arrived, and that Bailie

McTavish would preside”—an intimation which never failed to empty the

hall. Now, there are Jesuits in Scotland—no less than a score of

them—and that they are quite equal to the task of devising means like

these for their protection cannot be doubted by any enlightened

Protestant mind. As for the twin sister of Romanism—infidelity—that

escaped almost scot free. The learned and pious delegates fought shy of

the subject; it was felt to be a dangerous one.

The council began its sessions in the Free Assembly Hall, Edinburgh, on

the 4th of July. It was found to consist of 325 members, of whom 238

were regularly-appointed delegates, and 87 were honorary, or associate,

delegates. Thirty-one of the delegates were from the Continent of

Europe; Scotland, England, Wales, and Ireland sent 92 delegates; the

colonies 30; and the United States 85. The American delegates had

brought with them 32 “associates”; and it was, perhaps, in order to

guard against bulldozing on the part of the Americans that the Scotch

delegates appointed on the spur of the moment 48 “associates” to sit

with their delegates and thus maintain a proper balance of power. The

precaution was not unnecessary; even after it had been adopted the

Americans did far more than their share of the talking. The established

church of Scotland, in appointing its delegates to the council, had

instructed them to take a high and mighty attitude, and to refrain from

doing or saying anything which would imply that they had been sent there

to treat on terms of equality with the representatives of the other

sects. The American delegation was respectable for its ability, and the

ultra-orthodox element was dominant in it. The two hostile camps into

which the handful of French Presbyterians are divided were both

represented; and so were the two Presbyterian sects of Holland. There

were enough Presbyterians in Belgium to send one delegate, and no more.

The German Presbyterians declined to be officially represented, and the

three German members of the council came as volunteers. Bohemia and

Hungary had their delegates; Switzerland sent some gentlemen who were

rather sat upon; the modern inheritors of the old Waldensian heretics

were the constituents of a delegate who had little to say; and the

remainder of the thirty-one European delegates were representatives of

“the missionary churches” in Italy, Spain, and Greece. As nearly as

could be ascertained, there are about fifty different Presbyterian

sects, and it was estimated that more than half of these were

represented in the council. But the delegates were not endowed with any

power to act, or even to speak officially, in the name of their

respective constituents. Those of the sects in Switzerland, Germany,

Bohemia, and Hungary which have a connection with the state had either

refused to be represented at all or had permitted their members to

attend only as individuals. This complete absence of everything like

legislative or judicial power in the council is a sufficient apology for

its failure to promulgate new decrees or to define any dogma. But had

the Pan-Presbyterians been of one mind and heart, they might at least

have lifted up their united testimony, in some shape or other, in

defence of those cardinal truths of Christianity which are now assailed,

all the world over, by men in their own ranks. This they did not venture

to do, for the reason that, had they tried to do it, their congress

would have ended in a row.

The opening sermon of the council was preached by Professor Flint, who

took for his text the prayer of our Lord for the unity of his church,

and whose discourse was an argument to the effect that when the

Founder of the church prayed that his followers “all may be one,” he

intended that they should be all divided. “A universal church,” says

Professor Flint, “was as grandiose and diseased a dream as was a

universal empire”; and he warned the council against striving after

organic unity even among the fifty separate Presbyterian sects. The

adoption of the rules of order, which provided that the meetings

“should be opened shortly with prayer,” caused a member to complain

that it was very awkward to use the word “shortly” in connection with

prayer; but the chairman replied that while it was awkward it was very

necessary, else they would have nothing but praying. The first subject

of discussion was “Harmony of Reformed Confessions,” which were

divided into three classes—ante-Calvinistic, Calvinistic, and

post-Calvinistic. These originally were not intended to be formulas,

but only apologies—“vindications of the Protestant faith against

Romish misrepresentation and slander.” For a while these confessions

maintained their supremacy, but now “they have lost their authority in

almost every country except England, Scotland, and the United States”;

and each church interprets the Scriptures to suit itself, even upon

such grave questions as “reprobation and infant salvation.” Should the

council@ leave this matter in its present indefinite state, or should

it undertake to formulate a new confession to which all Presbyterians

should subscribe? A Swiss delegate ventured the startling suggestion

that if such a confession were formulated “the Divinity of Christ

should be the central stand-point in it”; and another delegate

produced the draught of a new dogmatic constitution, in thirty-one

articles, which had been obligingly formulated by Professor Kraft, of

Bonn, who had patched it up from the various confessions and had sent

it to the council with his compliments. Principal Brown, of Aberdeen,

remarked that it would be extremely desirable that this or some other

similar constitution should be adopted, or something else done,

chiefly “in order to silence—no, it would not do that—but to put to

shame the calumny of the Church of Rome, which said that the Reformed

churches were divided into as many distinct and conflicting religions

as there were sects of them. The more intelligent Romanists knew this

was false” (then we cannot be classed among the more intelligent

Romanists), “but it suited them all the same to say it and repeat it,

because it had a certain pithy and plausible sound. And Presbyterians

were there to testify that it was false, and that in all that was

substantial and vital in Christianity the Reformed churches were

practically one.” After this bold declaration it would have been

naturally in order to take the step necessary to prove it. But canny

Professor Brown hastened to add that, on second thoughts, he was of

the opinion that the council had better leave the matter alone and not

attempt any unity save that of “sympathy.” Professor Candlish lamented

that “there was not now that lively sense of the unity and harmony of

the Reformed confessions that there once was.” In fact, no one knew

exactly what changes the various churches had made in the “Standards,”

and he thought it would be interesting, at least, to collect

information on that point, so as to ascertain how many different

Presbyterian beliefs there were. Dr. Lang, of Glasgow, warned the

council that it was treading on dangerous ground. “There were deeper

issues involved than merely touching the surface of their confessions:

there was the whole question as to the authority and place of the

Bible, and behind that the whole question of the supernatural.” The

widest differences of opinion existed on these questions—every one

knew that—but as long as possible let them be kept in the background.

By covering them up, and avoiding “a restless and continual

nig-nagging at the matter,” a sufficient degree of harmony could be

maintained, at least for the present. A lay delegate, a lawyer, said

that if the council once ventured to deal “with the very complicated,

delicate, and difficult question of creeds,” there might be found many

who would propose to solve the difficulty by dispensing with all

creeds. Dr. Begg at this point boiled over, and read the council a

severe lecture, expressing the disgust with which he had listened to

some of the statements which had been made and apparently accepted.

“Every age had its own theology!—(laughter and applause)—he did not

in the least believe that. Theology had been the same since the days

of Eden. The idea of having a new theology at every stage was a

blunder. (Laughter.) They heard of discoveries being made; but these

discoveries were only resurrections of old errors. (Laughter.) He

found a revolt against the divine authority and the divine Word—and

the rebels were the discoverers of these new theologies.”

The discussion was now growing warm, but as it was announced that “the

hour for luncheon had arrived, and that Mr. Stevenson, M.P., would

preside,” the threatened fight was averted, and the subject was disposed

of at a subsequent meeting by the passage of the following resolution:

“That this council appoint a committee with instructions to prepare

a report to be laid before the next General Council, showing, in

point of fact—1. What are the existing creeds and confessions of the

churches composing this alliance, and what have been their previous

creeds and confessions, with any modifications thereupon, and the

dates and occasions of the same from the Reformation to the present

day. 2. What are the existing formulas of subscription, if any, and

what have been the previous formulas of subscription used in those

churches in connection with their creeds and confessions. 3. How far

has individual adherence to those creeds by subscription or

otherwise been required from the ministers, elders, or other

office-bearers respectively, and also from the private members of

the same. And the council authorize the committee to correspond with

members of the several churches throughout the world who may be able

to give information; and they enjoin the committee, in submitting

their report, not to accompany it either with any comparative

estimate of those creeds or with any critical remarks upon their

respective value, expediency, or efficiency.”

There was an unhappy and heated controversy concerning the appointment

of some of the members of this committee, but this excitement was

unnecessary. The information can all be obtained by the purchase of a

few books and pamphlets; and as the committee is forbidden to accompany

its report with “any critical remarks,” the presence upon it of a few

rationalists or Universalists can do no mischief.

The remainder of the time of the council—and it sat thrice a day for a

week—was occupied with talk. Nothing was done that was worthy of the

name of action. Extracts from scores of religious essays were read;

hundreds of little religious or semi-religious speeches were made; and

that was all. We do not know what the Presbyterians here and elsewhere

expected; but if they expected anything practical they have been sadly

disappointed. Some of the little speeches were comic—as, for example,

that of “the Rev. Mr. Robinson, of Louisville, U. S.,” who seems to have

pursued antiquarian researches with startling results, since he has

ascertained that Presbyterianism began with Abraham; that Moses was a

member of the presbytery of Egypt; and that Elisha and Ezechiel were the

moderators of the Presbyterian synods of Samaria and Jerusalem.

Presbyterianism was the true form of government in the Jewish Church,

and it was the general assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Judea that

passed sentence of death on Jesus of Nazareth. Nay, according to this

sprightly Kentucky divine, heaven itself will be a Presbyterian

community, governed by a presbytery of four-and-twenty members. To

listen to such excellent fooling as this; to read the essay laboriously

prepared at home in Peoria or Dundee, and carefully rehearsed to

admiring wife and wondering bairns for months before starting; to

discuss, even in ten-minute speeches, such thrilling and novel themes as

the uses of elders, the sinfulness of Sabbath-breaking, the advantages

of assemblies, the wickedness of the Pope, and the unquestionable

mental, moral, and religious superiority of Presbyterians in general,

and Pan-Presbyterians especially, over all the rest of mankind—all this,

no doubt, was pleasant enough to the participants; but it was scarcely

the entertainment to which the outside world had been invited. True,

there was voted, at the close of the council, and after an unusually

hearty luncheon at which the brethren tarried long, “an address to the

queen,” accompanied by what an Edinburgh journal irreverently describes

as “unanimous votes of thanks to the Deity, Mr. A. T. Niven, C.A., and

the lord provost.” Probably her majesty will never read the address, as

it is a long one and does not call for a reply. But if she should peruse

it, she will scarcely thank its authors for suggesting that she, too, is

a Pan-Presbyterian, or that she changes her religion every time she

crosses the Tweed. It appears something like an impertinence in the

Pan-Presbyterians to write thus to the queen:

“We venture to indicate the deep interest which we take in the

circumstance that, while residing in Scotland, your majesty joins in

the Presbyterian worship and communion.”

The queen goes to a Presbyterian church when in Scotland because

Presbyterianism is the religion of the state in Scotland, of which she

is the head; and she goes to an Episcopalian church when in England

because episcopacy is the religion of the state in England. If she were

in India, and Mohammedanism were the state religion there, she would

probably go to a mosque with the same good grace that she displays when

sitting under the parish minister near Balmoral. The council also

appointed a committee to see whether money could be raised for the

publication of a mass of old treatises and essays upon Presbyterianism

which no private publisher has ever thought of reprinting; and another

committee to “consider” what could be reported to the next

council—which, by the way, is to be held at Philadelphia in 1880, if the

world and Pan-Presbyterianism be then in existence. That portion of the

programme which promised “the suppression of infidelity” was not carried

out; a day was spent in talking about the best methods of getting the

better of Spencer, Darwin, Huxley, Bradlaugh, and the like, but the

matter ended with the acceptance of the remark of Prof. Cairns, that

disputation with such people is rather worse than useless, since they

are well skilled in argument, and that the only thing to be done with

them is to pray for them. As Americans we record with justifiable pride

the encomiums bestowed upon the American delegates by the great Dr.

Phin, and the still greater Dr. Begg. “Sound Christian doctrine,” said

the first, “in this land has received a most powerful impulse from the

addresses of the American brethren”; and Dr. Begg “rejoiced because of

the firm tone which had characterized the addresses of the American

speakers, as we require in Scotland an ecclesiastical tonic to brace us

up to a firm maintenance of our own Scriptural principles.” The firm

tone was not backed up by firm action, nor by any action at all; but,

all the same, Dr. Begg is of the opinion that if the orthodox

Presbyterians in Scotland could talk as their American brethren do,

there would soon be an end to the croaking of “the frogs of infidelity

that are coming into our churches like the frogs that went into Pharao’s

bed-chamber.” But it may prevent some disappointment in the future to

our American Presbyterian friends if we convey to them the warning

uttered by the Edinburgh _Scotsman_ at the end of the council—a journal

whose opinion on the affair is all the more valuable from the fact that

its editor is a Presbyterian clergyman of renown who has abandoned the

pulpit for the press:

“Meanwhile,” says the _Scotsman_, “what with choking 'frogs’ and

covering up disputable subjects, the appearance of a complete, if

not a completely beautiful, harmony was unquestionably produced. But

it is only right to warn the Pan-Presbyterians that if they leave us

with the notion that, because all is peaceful now, unity is

established, they are the victims of a delusion. They may depart to

their Swiss hamlets or their Transatlantic cities with psalm-tunes

sounding peace within Jerusalem ringing in their ears, and imagine

that after this most refreshing time the millennium has come when

Dr. Phin and Dr. Blaikie will lie down together, and Dr. Marcus Dods

and Dr. Moody Stewart will kiss each other. But, alas! shortly after

they have told their deeply-affected flocks at home of the harmony

which prevails in Bible-loving Scotland, some morning when Dr. Rufus

Choate examines his Chicago _Trumpet_, and Dr. Brunnelhanner lays

down his meerschaum to take up his paper, they will find that all

the old dissensions have broken out again with alarming violence;

that ministers who agreed on a platform of wood can agree upon no

other; that Dr. Blaikie has attacked Establishments from love of

their members, and has Dr. Pirie’s head in Chancery; that Dr. Phin

has a new scheme to 'dish’ the Dissenters; that those who led the

devotions are now leading the fray; that those who were at peace are

not on speaking terms, or on terms in speaking which are very bad

indeed; while those who lauded the agreement between confessions

cannot agree amongst themselves as to what these confessions mean to

say. The visit of the Pan-Presbyterians may, after all, share the

fate that generally overtakes the other numerous excursionists who

appear among us about this season. For the moment we may be struck

by their numbers and their banners with their strange devices, and

be moved to the heart, or even deeper, by their bass-drum and their

instruments of brass; but when they have gone, if any memory of them

remains, it is only of something that was loud and singular, but

what it was or what it did there is nothing palpable to show.”

The Pan-Presbyterians repeated very often that, while they did not

expect, or even desire, to effect “organic unity” between their various

sects—that unity being, in their opinion, opposed to the will of

God—they were, all the same, “one in spirit and in sympathy.” But the

hollowness of even this pretence was manifested when an attempt was made

to induce them to unite in what they call “partaking of the Lord’s

Supper.” Toward the close of the council it was announced that “Dr.

Moody Stewart and his session invited the members of council to

communion at half-past twelve on Saturday.” Now, from a Catholic, or

“Romanist,” point of view, it is rather surprising that a convention of

eminent Christian ministers, assembled for what they professed to regard

as the most important purposes, should have already spent several days

without performing this supreme act of Christian devotion. But

Pan-Presbyterian ways are not as our ways. Nevertheless, one would have

supposed that, being thus invited to do what they had neglected, they

would at least have received the invitation kindly. On the contrary, a

most unhappy scene followed. The Orthodox Pan-Presbyterians were willing

to talk with their unorthodox colleagues; they would eat luncheons with

them, make speeches and read papers to them, and even listen to their

speeches and papers in return; but when it came to “partaking of the

sacrament” with them, they would not do it at any price. Dr. Phin at

once protested against the idea that he, for one, could thus be yoked

unevenly with unbelievers. “He happened to entertain certain

old-fashioned ideas with respect to the dispensation of the Lord’s

Supper” which would prevent him from joining in it unless he knew his

company. For instance, there should be “the fencing of the tables”; and

this fencing would surely shut out either the sheep or the goats. The

“fencing of the tables,” it appears, is a curious custom prevalent in

Scotland, and may be thus explained: an invitation to “the communion” is

given, and then every one who wishes to receive it is scared off either

by terrific denunciations of the awful guilt incurred by those who

partake unworthily, or is compelled to pass a severe competitive

examination as to the soundness of his faith and his acceptance of the

“Standards.” Dr. Phin was, no doubt, correct in supposing that the

application of these tests would produce unpleasant results, and his

conscience would not permit him to assist at a communion where they were

not applied. Dr. Begg took the same view, and “regretted that the

invitation had been given.” The chairman—who on this occasion happened

to be Dr. Ormiston, of New York—sought to get over the difficulty by

suggesting that “it would be understood that nobody was committed except

the gentlemen who took part in it,” and he added the remarkable

declaration that “as members of council not one of them had any

responsibility to the weight of a hair.” A lay member “protested against

any administration of free communion in connection with the council”;

and Dr. Blaikie said the committee had “taken every precaution that the

council should not be committed in any way.” With this assurance the

subject “was allowed to drop,” and when the time for the communion

arrived only one hundred and thirty of the three hundred and twenty-five

Pan-Presbyterians presented themselves to receive it—and among these

neither Dr. Phin nor Dr. Begg was seen.

The Continental Pan-Presbyterians made a pitiful show for themselves

during the council. Few of them could speak English; and the linguistic

accomplishments of the majority of their colleagues being limited, they

were compelled, when they spoke at all, to express themselves through an

interpreter, which is not generally an exhilarating process. One of the

French delegates said there were forty Presbyterian congregations in

France without pastors, and he suggested that a collection might be made

to aid in hiring men to fill these vacancies; but this hint was not

taken. A volunteer member from Berlin read a sensible paper upon

“missions,” in which he ridiculed the present system of Protestant

missions, and said that their only fruits were the inculcation of

hypocrisy and of pauperism among the so-called converts. On this same

subject, by the way, one of the members put forth the novel idea that

the conversion of one Jew was worth more than the salvation of a hundred

pagans. Dr. Hoedemaker, of Amsterdam, said that the Presbyterians there

had long been poisoned with the virus of rationalism, and that forty

years ago “there were very few who preached the living Christ in his

church”; but now, he hoped, there was some improvement. M. Decoppet, of

the French Presbyterian body, complained that the sect could make no

progress there, “because they were not allowed by the law to give a

tract on the street or to deliver public lectures”; but still he was

confident that “France would soon become a Protestant nation”—by the aid

of M. Gambetta and the Reds, we presume. The representative of the

Waldensian heretics apologized for the bad character of some of its

ministers, but said that as fast as the false shepherds were detected

they were expelled from the fold.

Politeness, perhaps, would command us to express our acknowledgments of

certain courteous, sensible, and truthful things which were said about

the church—as, for example, that “she was the mother of infidelity” and

the fountain and origin of all civil, moral, and religious evil. But, on

the whole, we think our readers will have had enough of the

Pan-Presbyterians. Dr. Begg, at the last meeting of the council, said

that “they saw the shadow of the great eclipse of Romanism again cast

over the country.” We take this to be the Beggonian method of expressing

the fact that the few Christians who remain in Scotland are on the way

to return to the church of their forefathers—the church which civilized

and Christianized Scotland, and which had the unhappiness to nurture in

her bosom the apostate priest who was the father of Scotch

Presbyterianism. Dr. Begg is not an infallible prophet, but such events

as the Pan-Presbyterian council are calculated to hasten the event which

he predicts. For the council has shown that the Presbyterian Church

throughout the world, as represented by its chosen men, is undermined by

infidelity, and that its existence, in their opinion, depends upon

concealing this fact and pretending that no one has the right to

proclaim it.

TRANSLATION FROM HORACE.

ODE 14, BOOK 2.

_Eheu! fugaces, Postume, Postume!_

Alas! my Posthumus, our years

Glide silently away; no tears,

No loving orisons, repair

The wrinkled cheek, the whitening hair,

That drop forgotten to the tomb:

Pluto’s inexorable doom

Mocks at thy daily sacrifice;

Around his dreary kingdom lies

That fatal stream whose arms enfold

The Giant race accursed of old;

All, all alike must cross its wave,

The king, the noble, and the slave.

In vain we shun the fields of war,

And breakers dashed on Adria’s shore;

Vainly we flee, in terror blind,

The plague that walketh on the wind;

The sluggish river of the Dead,

Cocytus, must be visited;

And Danaüs’ detested brood,

Foul with their fifty husbands’ blood;

And Sisyphus, with ghastly smile

Pointing to his eternal toil.

All must be left: thy gentle wife,

Thy home, the joys of rural life;

And when thy fleeting days are gone,

Th’ ill-omened cypresses alone

Of all those fondly-cherished trees

Shall grace thy funeral obsequies,

Cling to thy loved remains, and wave

Their mournful shadows o’er thy grave.

A lavish but a nobler heir

Thy hoarded Cæcuban shall share,

And on the tessellated floor

The purple nectar madly pour,

Nectar more worthy of the halls

Where Pontiffs hold their festivals.

S. E. DE V.

NEW PUBLICATIONS.

PUBLIC LIBRARIES IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA; their History,

Condition, and Management. Special Report. Department of the

Interior, Bureau of Education. 1876.

In 1874 the Commissioner of the Bureau of Education in the Department of

the Interior at Washington began the preparation of a complete Report on

the Public Libraries in the United States; on the 31st of August, 1876,

the report was submitted; it was printed, and it makes a volume of 1,187

pages. A careful study of the contents of this unique work compels us to

express, in the first place, our most cordial appreciation of the great

labor which has been expended upon it, and of the value of the

information which it contains. The size of the volume, we fear, has

deterred many into whose hands it has fallen from more than glancing

over its pages; we confess for ourselves that we shrank, for a while,

from the task of reading it. But we have been amply repaid for our toil,

which soon became a pleasure; and we may say here that we have seen in

foreign periodicals and journals a number of highly eulogistic and

discriminating reviews of the report. We propose to make our readers

share in the satisfaction we have derived from our study of this work;

but our space will permit us only to give a condensed summary of a

portion of its contents.

No less than 132 pages of the report are taken up with a table giving

the statistics of all the “public libraries” in the United States and

Territories numbering 300 volumes or more, excepting common or district

school libraries. The table is as complete as it could be made from the

returns received in 1875-76; but it is incomplete, because many of the

libraries named in it do not report the date of their foundation, their

average annual increase in books, their financial condition, or their

yearly expenditures. But with all these defects the table is extremely

valuable. It shows, to begin with, that the total number of these

libraries is 3,647, having as their total number of volumes 12,276,964.

We pause here for a moment to say that the report also shows that in the

district-school libraries, not included in the table, there are

1,365,407 volumes, and that in all the libraries there are about

1,500,000 pamphlets not classed as “volumes.” The census of 1870 showed

that there were 107,673 private libraries, containing 25,571,503

volumes, exclusive of those which may be in the State of Connecticut,

from which State no returns on this subject were received. Here, then,

we have a total of 39,213,874 volumes of books in the public, private,

and school libraries of the country—a mass of printed matter large

enough, estimating each volume to weigh a pound, to fill nine merchant

vessels of 2,000 tons burden each. Let us also in this place give the

following list of the number of volumes in several noted libraries in

other countries, with the remark that, as the statistics of these

libraries differ widely according to different authorities, we have in

each case taken the highest number given, and that this number relates

only to books, and not to manuscripts or pamphlets, fugitive

publications, etc.:

Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris 2,000,000

Mazarin Library, Paris 160,000

Royal Library, Madrid 200,000

Convent Library of the Escorial, Madrid 130,000

Vatican Library, Rome 1,000,000

Magliabecchíana Library, Florence 200,000

Laurentian Library, Florence 120,000

Museo Borbonico, Naples 200,000

University Library, Bologna 200,000

Brera Library, Milan 200,000

Ambrosian Library, Milan 140,000

University Library, Turin 150,000

Royal Library, Berlin 700,000

Royal Library, Dresden 500,000

University Library, Breslau 350,000

University Library, Göttingen 400,000

Ducal Library, Wolfenbüttel 300,000

University Library, Freiburg 250,000

Royal Library, Stuttgart 450,000

Royal Library, Munich 900,000

Royal Library, Copenhagen 550,000

Bodleian Library, Oxford 700,000

Advocates’ Library, Edinburgh 300,000

University Library, Edinburgh 130,000

Imperial Library, St. Petersburg 1,100,000

City Library, Augsburg 150,000

University Library, Cambridge 400,000

City Library, Frankfort 150,000

Ducal Library, Gotha 240,000

City Library, Hamburg 300,000

City Library, Leipsic 170,000

University Library, Leipsic 350,000

British Museum, London 1,020,000

In these 33 libraries in the Old World there are 14,110,000 volumes,

exclusive of manuscripts, or 1,833,176 more volumes than we have in all

of our 3,647 public libraries. We say nothing of the comparative value

of the collections, for of course there is no comparison between a

collection which has been accumulating for a thousand years and one

which was made yesterday. But we have no reason to be ashamed of our

American public libraries; on the contrary, as the report which we are

reviewing abundantly shows, we have every reason to be proud of them. We

take from this report the following table:

Whole number of public libraries 3,647

Whole number of volumes 12,276,964

Average number of volumes 3,366

Yearly additions (1,510 reporting) 434,339

Yearly use of books (742 reporting) 8,879,809

Amt of permanent fund (1,722 reporting) $6,105,581

Yearly income (830 reporting) $1,398,756

Yearly expenditures for publications $562,407

(769 reporting)

Yearly expenditures for salaries, etc. $682,166

(643 reporting)

The 3,647 libraries are distributed among the various States and

Territories as follows; and here we make our only complaint against the

report—to wit, that its laborious and faithful editors have not

furnished the footings, which we have been compelled to make for

ourselves:

Alabama, 31 libraries; Alaska, 1 (the post library at Sitka, and now

removed since the garrison has been withdrawn); Arizona, 3 (two of them

being military libraries); Arkansas, 6; California, 87; Colorado, 8;

Connecticut, 125; Dakota, 4 (two being military libraries); Delaware,

18; District of Columbia, 57 (31 of them belonging to the federal

government); Florida, 6; Georgia, 44; Idaho, 1; Illinois, 177; Indiana,

133; Indian Territory, 4 (two of them military libraries); Iowa, 80;

Kansas, 19; Kentucky, 72; Louisiana, 31; Maine, 85; Maryland, 77;

Massachusetts, 453; Michigan, 89; Minnesota, 39; Mississippi, 23;

Missouri, 87; Montana, 2; Nebraska, 14; Nevada, 6; New Hampshire, 86;

New Jersey, 91; New Mexico, 4 (one of them a military library, and two

of the others belonging to Catholic academies); New York, 617; North

Carolina, 37; Ohio, 223; Oregon, 14; Pennsylvania, 367; Rhode Island,

56; South Carolina, 26; Tennessee, 71; Texas, 42; Utah, 5; Vermont, 65;

Virginia, 63; Washington Territory, 2 (one of them a Catholic library);

West Virginia, 23; Wisconsin, 73; and Wyoming Territory, 3.

These figures are suggestive in various ways, and many interesting and

valuable inferences might be drawn from them. But a careful analysis of

the other portions of the table would also be necessary in order to

avoid mistakes; and the wholly unknown quantity in the problem—the

comparative value of different collections—would imperil the accuracy of

any deductions which might be made from the statistics in this table.

For instance, the 31 libraries in Alabama contain 60,615 volumes—nearly

5,000 less than are in the New York Society Library alone. A library is

a library, for the purposes of this report, if it contain 300 or more

volumes, just as a book is a book although there may be nothing in it.

Who is to say whether some of the smaller collections in the South are

not really more valuable than the larger and newer libraries in the

North? We fear it is not so; but there is no test by which to decide the

question. If we leave this point, and turn our attention to the

statistics relating to the principal libraries, we shall come upon more

satisfactory ground.

The thirty-eighth chapter of the report, filling 273 pages, is devoted

to a review of the public libraries of ten principal cities—Baltimore,

Boston, Brooklyn, Charleston, Chicago, Cincinnati, New York,

Philadelphia, St. Louis, and San Francisco. In these ten cities there

are 471 public libraries with 3,447,628 volumes, viz.:

_Name of City._ _No. of Libraries_ _Volumes._

Charleston 6 26,600

Chicago 23 141,910

San Francisco 30 164,228

Brooklyn 21 165,112

St. Louis 31 170,875

Cincinnati 30 197,890

Baltimore 38 230,342

Philadelphia 102 707,627

Boston 68 734,741

New York 122 906,203

—- ————-

Total 471 3,445,528

To this list we add, in order that the South may have justice done to

her:

_Name of City._ _No. of Libraries_ _Volumes._

New Orleans 15 94,080

Louisville 6 65,897

Richmond 17 63,526

A library containing 10,000 volumes or more, if well selected, may be

said to be a respectable collection. Now, there are no less than 266

libraries of this class in the United Slates, and they contain a total

of 6,984,882 volumes—an average of 26,259 volumes in each. These 266

libraries, it will be seen, account for more than one half of the total

number of volumes in all the public libraries, and they reduce the

average number of volumes in the remaining 3,381 libraries to 1,565. But

even a library with 1,500 good books is not to be despised.

The largest library in the United States is that of the National

Congress at Washington, which has 300,000 volumes; and then follow:

Social Law Library, 299,869

Boston

Harvard University 227,650

Mercantile, New York 160,613

Astor, New York 152,446

Mercantile, Philadelphia 125,668

House of Representatives, 125,000

Washington

Yale College 114,200

Athenæum, Boston 105,000

These are the only libraries which have 100,000 volumes and more. Those

which have 50,000 and less than 100,000 volumes are the

State Library at Albany 95,000

New York Society, New 65,000

York

Antiquarian Society, 60,497

Worcester

Peabody Institute, 57,458

Baltimore

Apprentices’, New York 53,000

Dartmouth College 52,550

Mercantile, Brooklyn 50,257

State University, Baton 50,000

Rouge

There are 10 libraries having more than 40,000 and less than 50,000

volumes; 23, with more than 30,000 and less than 40,000; 49, with more

than 20,000 and less than 30,000; 52, with more than 15,000 and less

than 20,000; 100, with more than 10,000 and less than 15,000; 264, with

more than 5,000 and less than 10,000; 156, with more than 4,000 and less

than 5,000; 236, with more than 3,000 and less than 4,000; 362, with

more than 2,000 and less than 3,000; 762, with more than 1,000 and less

than 2,000; and 925, with more than 500 and less than 1,000.

Of the whole number of 3,647 public libraries mentioned in this report,

we find 221 which we recognize as those of Catholic institutions. There

are no doubt others in the list, but there is no mark by which they can

be certainly recognized. Of these 221 distinctively Catholic libraries

the following are the chief:

_Place._ _Name._ _Origin._ _Vols._

San Francisco, St. Ignatius’ College, 1855 11,000

Santa Clara, Santa Clara College, 1851 10,000

Georgetown, Georgetown College, 1791 32,268

Washington, Gonzaga College, 1858 10,000

New Orleans, Libraire de la famille, 1872 15,000

Baltimore, Archiepiscopal, .... 10,000

Baltimore, Loyola College, 1853 21,500

Baltimore, St. Mary’s Seminary, 1791 15,000

Hagerstown, St. James’ College, 1842 11,000

Worcester, College of the Holy Cross 1843 12,000

St. Louis, College of the Christian 1860 22,000

Brothers,

Brooklyn, St. Francis’ College, .... 13,970

Fordham, St. John’s College, 1840 15,000

New York, St. Francis Xavier’s 1847 21,000

College,

Cincinnati, Mount St. Mary’s, 1849 15,100

Cincinnati, St. Xavier’s College, 1840 17,000

Latrobe, Penn., St. Vincent’s College, 1846 13,000

In these 17 Catholic libraries there are 264,838 volumes. It is a very

respectable number, and, when the probable quality of the books

contained in these collections is taken into account, the value of such

comparatively small libraries will be seen to be great. The number of

volumes in the other 204 Catholic libraries, as we have ascertained by a

laborious examination of the tables, is 448,688, so that the total

number of volumes in the distinctively Catholic libraries is 713,526. It

is a large number of books; but one might complain that it was not

larger. We are not sure that these complaints would be well founded. As

Catholics we establish our own libraries, but as citizens we aid in the

labor and share the cost of forming the general libraries, and we have

our part in the advantages which they afford. It will always be our

duty, of course, to exert our influence in preserving these collections

of books from the contamination of the works of authors whose aim is to

undermine morals and to destroy faith; and to introduce to their shelves

the writings of the best and most able defenders and advocates of truth

and religion. But this duty being well performed, we are free to aid in

the work of building up our general libraries and in enjoying the pure

intellectual delights which they may afford.

Thirty-eight pages of the report before us are devoted to a chapter upon

Theological Libraries. A table is given of 44 of the principal

theological libraries in the United States; they contain 528,024

volumes. Eight of them belong to Catholic theological seminaries and

contain 71,600 volumes. The two largest of the theological libraries are

those of the Union Theological Seminary of New York, and the Andover

Theological Seminary, each of which contains 34,000 volumes. The report

states that, with a few exceptions, the public theological libraries in

this country are the libraries of theological seminaries. The exceptions

are the General Theological Library in Boston, established in 1860, and

now containing 12,000 volumes; and the library of the Congregational

Association in the same city, which contains 22,000 volumes and 80,000

pamphlets. None of the theological libraries are 100 years old. The

eldest of all of them is the library of St. Mary’s Theological Seminary

of St. Sulpice in Baltimore, founded in 1791 by the Sulpician Fathers.

It now contains 15,000 volumes. The report devotes considerable space to

a dissertation upon “Catholic Libraries,” and its remarks upon this head

are conceived in a kindly and enlightened spirit. “All learning,” writes

the reporter, “is welcome to the shelves of Catholic libraries, and

nothing is excluded from them that should not equally be excluded from

any reputable collection of books. Nor will anti-Catholic works be found

wanting to them, at least such as possess any force or originality. The

history of the church being so interwoven with that of the world since

the days of Augustus Cæsar, there is no period which is not redolent of

her action, and consequently no history which does not have to treat of

her, either approvingly or the reverse. In regard to general literature,

she preserved ... all that has come down to us from classic sources, and

therefore works of this character can be no strangers to shelves of

Catholic libraries. Still less can the Sacred Scriptures be, which

Catholic hands collected, authenticated, and handed down for the use of

the men of our time. Nor will the sciences be overlooked by

ecclesiastics in forming their libraries; for in past ages it was the

care of their brethren, with such limited facilities as were at their

command and in days inauspicious for scientific investigation, to

cultivate them.” No new truths these; but they are well expressed, and

it is worth something to have them set forth in a volume prepared by

federal authority and published with federal approval. The report goes

on to speak of the general characteristics of Catholic theological

libraries. They contain, it says, abundant versions of the Sacred

Scriptures in all languages, with copious commentaries and expositions;

and the writer adds that the professors of our Catholic theological

institutions “are generally graduates of the best theological schools in

Europe.” He thus proceeds:

“Next in authoritative rank come the Fathers and Doctors of the church,

from those who received instruction from the apostles themselves and

committed their doctrine to writing, down to almost our own day; for St.

Alphonsus Liguori, the latest on whom the Holy See has conferred the

title of Doctor of the Universal Church, died only in the latter part of

the last century, and his authority is that which is principally

followed in the treatment of moral questions. Works also by later

writers, principally on dogmatic subjects, are constantly appearing. The

study of dogma embracing an investigation into all revealed truths, and

therefore essential to those who are to instruct others authoritatively,

involves a reference to many learned books in which proofs and

illustrations are elaborated to the last degree of exactness, side by

side with every possible difficulty or objection that can be brought to

bear against each doctrine treated of. Some works are occupied with the

discussion of but a single point; others take in a wide range, and some

voluminous authors have published an entire course of dogma....” “The

study of moral, the other great branch of Catholic theology, embraces a

scrutiny into every question of morals that needs to be investigated by

those who have the direction of consciences, or whose duty it is, in the

tribunal of penance, to adjudicate upon matters affecting the rights of

others. As solutions in these cases are sometimes attended with

considerable difficulty, and a grave responsibility is attached to the

delivery of an opinion, authorities for reference must be ample and

exhaustive. Such authorities will be found in the theological libraries,

and are relied upon in proportion to their world-wide repute, as

representing the opinions of prudent, learned, and experienced men.”

The report goes on to speak of the reasons why every complete Catholic

library must have copies of the published acts of the general councils

of the church, and of national and provincial councils, as well as of

the decisions and solutions of the various congregations at Rome, and

other documents emanating from the Holy See. The supply of “works on

ritual,” and those necessary for a thorough course of rational

philosophy, must be ample, and there must be works on mathematics,

physics, astronomy, meteorology, chemistry, and other sciences. We again

quote:

“The attention given in these schools to sacred eloquence—for practice

in which students are required to prepare and deliver sermons in

presence of the community—calls for the best models of sacred oratory,

besides works on rhetoric and elocution. As models of composition,

arrangement, and intrinsic solidity, the sermons of the ancient fathers

share equal attention with those of the great French orators of the last

century, and no library for the use of ecclesiastics will be without a

copious supply of the works of those and others of the best pulpit

orators in the church. Catholic libraries in general—and not those alone

which are attached to theological schools—will be found amply supplied

with controversial works written by Catholic authors. These are needed,

however, not so much for the use of the owners as for that of

non-Catholic inquirers who wish to be enlightened in regard to some

controverted point, or who desire to learn the evidences upon which the

Catholic Church bases her claims to the credence of mankind.

Catechetical works, of which there are a great number, answer this

purpose still better when the polemic spirit has been allayed, and it is

impossible to conceive of a Catholic library, large or small, without an

abundance of both these classes of books. The controversial works

discuss every objection which can be alleged against the church or the

practice of members of it, and are necessarily very numerous. Every age

has left behind it these testimonies to the controversies that agitated

it, and the present age is no less prolific than its predecessors,

though the grounds of dispute are shifting now rather from dogma to

historical questions and matters of science, indicating the lessening

hold which doctrine has on the non-Catholic mind.”

And again:

“Ecclesiastical history, of course, forms an important element in

Catholic libraries; but this history not only includes the exhaustive

tomes of writers who take in the whole history of the church, but of

others who illustrate a particular age, country, event, or transaction.

Works concerning the history of the church in the United States, or in

particular States, form a growing collection. The current of

contemporary Catholic history is well shown forth through the monthly

and weekly publications which appear in many countries and languages.

The Catholic quarterlies, however, and some of the monthly publications,

are devoted chiefly to literary or scientific criticism. The Catholic

weeklies in this country are now so numerous that their preservation in

libraries is seldom attended to. If this apology is needed for the

absence from such libraries of publications that will form an important

reference hereafter for others besides Catholics, it ought to be coupled

with the suggestion proper to be made in a work which will be placed in

the hands of persons of all religions: _that a general Catholic library

ought to be established at some central point where every Catholic

publication, at least among those issued in this country, may have a

place. Materials for history would gather in such a collection that

might not readily be found combined in any other._

“Having thus touched upon the more important characteristics of Catholic

libraries, it would be well, perhaps, to observe that while the leading

ones in this country are attached to seminaries, colleges, or religious

houses, there are many private collections of considerable value,

especially those in episcopal residences, or belonging to gentlemen of

the clergy or laity who, together with literary tastes, possess the

means to gratify them. Catholic libraries are also beginning to be

formed in cities and towns, chiefly under the auspices of associations

that seek to provide a safe and pleasant resort for young men in the

evenings. In these libraries will be found the lighter Catholic

literature, to which no reference has so far been made in this

paper—travels, sketches, poems, tales, etc., a few of which are by

American and some Irish authors, but the majority by English writers,

chiefly converts, or translated from the French, German, Flemish, and

other Continental languages. Finally, it would be well to observe that

Catholic libraries are accessible for reference, if not for study, to

all inquirers. In most cases non-Catholic visitors would doubtless be

welcomed to them with great cordiality. _Those who have these libraries

in keeping rather invite than repel scrutiny into whatever is

distinctively Catholic in their collections._”

We regret that the limits of our space forbid us to dwell further upon

the contents of this really fascinating volume. To use such an adjective

in speaking of a “Blue-Book,” or an official report, may seem

extravagant, but in this case it is not so. Its chapters upon the growth

of libraries in the United States; college libraries; law, medical, and

scientific libraries; libraries in prisons and reformatories; libraries

of the general and State governments; libraries of historical societies;

and upon “catalogues and cataloguing,” are crammed with useful and

important information; and whatever may have been the sins of omission

or commission that may be laid at the door of the “Department of the

Interior at Washington,” we are willing to bear witness that its Bureau

of Education, in the preparation and publication of this report, has

done much to atone for them.

ELEMENTS OF GEOMETRY. By G. M. Searle, C.S.P. With an Appendix

containing Problems and Additional Propositions. New York: John

Wiley & Sons. 1877.

The object of this work is to place geometry on a more perfectly logical

basis than it has been usually considered worth while to adopt in

text-books. Geometers at the present day generally agree as to the

unsatisfactory nature of the axioms usually adopted, some being

superfluous, and others, especially the famous one about parallels, not

being clearly self-evident.

The reduction in the number of axioms has of course introduced some

complexity into the reasoning in this book, and the difficulty about

parallels is not completely removed; nor does the author pretend

completely to remove it. Some new views, however, are presented which

may be worthy of consideration.

ELEMENTS OF ECCLESIASTICAL LAW. Adapted especially to the Discipline

of the Church in the United States. By Rev. S. B. Smith, D.D.,

formerly Professor of Canon Law, author of “Notes,” etc., etc. New

York, Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Einsiedeln: Benziger Brothers,

Printers to the Holy Apostolic See. 1877.

This work of Dr. Smith’s cannot fail to be a welcome addition to any

theological library. There are a great many works on canon law, it is

true, but very few which give much information on the discipline of the

church here, which is what priests in this country and those who are

preparing for the priesthood principally need to understand.

The present volume goes far to supply this deficiency, and the author

promises to supplement it soon by another, for which we shall look with

interest. He has made a good choice in writing in English; there seems

to be no need of choosing Latin for a book on this subject, and intended

for this nation chiefly.

Transcriber’s Notes:

Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected.

Typographical errors were silently corrected.

Spelling and hyphenation were made consistent when a predominant form

was found in this book; otherwise it was not changed.

Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).