Poetry.

New Publications.

The Principles Of Real Being. IV. Intrinsic Principles of Substance and Suppositum.

We have briefly shown in the preceding article that a complete being, to be a substance and a suppositum, requires no positive addition to its three intrinsic principles, but needs only to be left to itself. This is, in our opinion, an obvious truth. But as there are philosophers of high repute who do not fully share the same opinion, and, on the other hand, the notions of substance and of suppositum are both intimately connected with some theological truths which cannot be well explained without a distinct knowledge of what these two notions really imply, we deem it expedient to enter into a closer examination of the subject, that we may better understand by the light of reason, and confirm by the weight of authority, the traditional doctrine on substance and suppositum, their essential constitution, formal distinction, and supernatural separability.

Substance is very commonly described as “that which is in itself and by itself”—quod in se et per se subsistit. This definition exhibits the “predicamental” substance—that is, a substance ultimately complete, which is at the same time a suppositum also, according to Aristotle's comprehensive conception of substance. And it is for this reason that such a definition is made up of two members; of which the first—viz., “that which exists in itself”—strictly applies to substance as such; whilst the second—viz., “that which subsists by itself”—strictly refers to the suppositum as such, and exhibits substance as possessing its own natural subsistence or suppositality.

Philosophers, when speaking of things as existing in their natural state and condition, are wont to say indiscriminately that substance is a being which “exists in itself,” or a being which “subsists by itself.” [pg 002] This they can do without any danger of error so long as they keep within the bounds of pure nature; since, in the natural order, anything that exists in itself subsists by itself, and vice versa. But natural things can, by supernatural interference, be raised to a mode of existence transcending their natural condition, as we know by divine revelation; and in such a case, the mode of substance and the mode of the suppositum must be, and accordingly are, most carefully distinguished from one another. Thus we know by faith that in Christ our Lord there is the true substance of a human body and of a human soul; and nevertheless we know that his human nature does not subsist by itself, but by the Divine Person of the Word. The obvious inference is that a nature which exists in itself does not necessarily subsist by itself; in other terms, the formality of substance and the formality of the suppositum are entirely distinct from one another, and the one can remain without the other. “What makes substance to be essentially a substance,” as Suarez remarks, “is not its subsisting actually by itself, but its having an essence to which subsistence is naturally due—viz., an essence which is of itself a sufficient principle of subsistence.”1 From this we learn that the words per se esse, or “to subsist by itself,” are inserted in the definition of substance, not to show what substance as such is, but only to point out what is naturally due to substance—viz., what accompanies it in its natural mode of existing. Substance as such would therefore be sufficiently characterized by the words, “that which is in itself.”

Let us now inquire what is the legitimate meaning of these last words. A thing is said to exist in itself which not only has in itself what is needed for its own sustentation, but is moreover actually unsustained by anything lying under it, while it is itself the first subject of all its appurtenances. Such is the legitimate and traditional meaning of the words, “to exist in itself.” Hence substance may be legitimately defined as “a being which by its intrinsic constitution has no need of being supported by a subject, and which is not actually supported.”

A living author, however, in a valuable work to which I have no access at this moment, and from which, therefore, I do not make any quotation verbatim, asserts that substance “up to the present day” has always been understood to mean “a thing which by its intrinsic constitution has no need of being supported by a subject,” without taking into consideration its actual mode of existing. We shall presently show that this assertion is not true, and that this pretended definition is essentially incomplete. Meanwhile, let us observe that the precise difference between our definition and this new one consists in this only: that whilst the first presents substance as having no actual support, the second presents it as having no need of actual support, whether it be supported, at least supernaturally, or not. This difference, of course, would amount to nothing, and might be entirely overlooked, if things could not exist but in their natural condition; for anything which is in no need of support will naturally exist unsupported. [pg 003] But as philosophy is the handmaid of theology, we must remember that natural things can be raised to a supernatural state, and thus change their mode of existing; and in such a case the difference between the two said definitions may amount to much; because, if a thing which is naturally in no need of support be actually supported, then, according to the first definition, that thing thus actually supported would cease to exist as a substance, whilst, according to the second definition, it would still continue to exist as a substance, as it would still have no need of support. Hence the importance of ascertaining which of the two definitions we are authorized to hold according to the traditional doctrine of philosophers and theologians.

And first, Aristotle, at the head of the peripatetic school which held its sway for centuries, defines substance to be ultimum subjectum—“the last subject”—that is, the undermost subject; by which he unquestionably means that substance is something which not only lies underneath (subjacet), but is moreover the “last” thing which lies underneath. In other terms, substance, according to Aristotle, must have nothing lying under it, and, while supporting all its appurtenances, is itself actually unsupported. Hence it is, that quantity, for instance, though lying under some figure and supporting it, is no substance at all; for, though it is a subject, it is not the undermost.

This definition of the Greek philosopher has been universally accepted and made use of by Christian as well as pagan philosophers of all times, though many of them called the first subject what Aristotle had called the last—a change which does not affect the meaning of the definition, since what is last in the analytic is first in the synthetic process. It is clear, therefore, that both Aristotle and his followers do not define substance simply as that which has no need of support, but as that which is actually unsupported.

S. John Damascene, in the fourth chapter of his Dialectics, defines substance to be “that which is in itself in such a manner as not to exist in anything else”;2 and after a few lines, “Substance,” he says, “is that which has its existence in itself, and not in anything else”;3 and again in another chapter of the same work, “Substance,” he says, “is anything which subsists by itself and has its own being, not in any other thing, but in itself.”4

According to these definitions, which are identical, substance is a thing which not only is able to support itself, but actually supports itself to the exclusion of any other distinct supporter. This is quite manifest; for, if substance, in the opinion of this great doctor and philosopher, had been only a thing having no need of support, how could he require so pointedly and explicitly the actual mode of existing in itself and not in anything else?

S. Ambrose admits a notion of substance quite identical with that of Aristotle and of all the ancients, and employs it even in speaking of God himself. “God,” says he, “inasmuch as he remains in himself, and does not subsist by extrinsic support, is called a substance.”5 [pg 004] God, of course, does not fall under the predicament of substance, as philosophers know; and yet the substantiality even of his nature, according to this holy doctor, implies the actual absence of extrinsic sustentation.6

S. Thomas, as we might expect, teaches the very same doctrine. “Substance,” says he, “is a thing whose quiddity requires to exist unsupported by anything else”—cui convenit esse non in alio;7 and he adds that this formality (esse non in alio) is a mere negation; which is evident. And in another place, “Substance,” says he, “does not differ from being by any difference which would imply a new nature superadded to the being itself; but the name of substance is given to a thing in order to express its special mode of existing.”8 Two things, then, or two constituents, are needed, according to S. Thomas, that we may have a substance: a physical being and a special mode of existing. The physical being is a positive reality, a nature perfectly constituted, both materially and formally, whilst the special mode is a mere negation; but, though a mere negation, is that which causes the thing to be a substance, as the name of substance is given to the thing in order to express its special mode of existing. Therefore the thing itself apart from such a special mode cannot be a substance, any more than a six-pence apart from its rotundity can be a circle.

Toletus includes in his definition of substance both the thing and the special mode of existing. He says: “The first substance is a sensible nature which is not predicated of any subject nor exists in any subject.”9

Suarez says even more explicitly, “It is not necessary for the essence of substance that it should have its own subsistence, but that it should have the mode of substance.”10 We cannot, then, overlook, and much less discard, this special mode without destroying the essential notion of substance as such. Now, he who defines substance to be simply a thing which has no need of support overlooks and discards this special mode; hence he destroys the essential notion of substance as such.

Balmes, in his Fundamental Philosophy, says: “In the notion of substance, two other notions are implied—to wit, that of permanence and that of non-inherence. Non-inherence is the true formal constituent of substance, and is a negation; it is grounded, however, on something positive—that is, on the aptitude of the thing to exist in itself without the need of being supported by another.”11 This passage establishes very clearly the common doctrine that the aptitude of a thing to exist without being supported is not the formal constituent of substance, but only the ground on which the proper formal [pg 005] constituent of substance (non-inherence) is conceived to be possible.

Ferraris, a modern Italian Thomist, in his course of philosophy, says explicitly that substance is destroyed if its “perseity”—per se esse—be taken away.12 The word “perseity” stands here for the “special mode” of S. Thomas, the “mode of substance” of Suarez, the “non-inherence” of Balmes, etc.

Liberatore has the following: “Going back to the notion of substance, we may consider three things which are implied in it: the first, that it exists, not in any manner whatever, but in itself; the second, that it consists of a determinate reality or essence, from which its determinate active powers arise; the third, that it is in possession of itself—sui juris—with regard to its manner of existing. Of these three things, the first exhibits properly and precisely the notion of substance; the second presents the concept of nature; the third expresses the notion of suppositum.”13

The preceding quotations, to which others might be added, are more than sufficient, in our opinion, to refute the assertion that substance at all times was considered simply as a thing having no need of support; for we have seen that the most prominent philosophers and theologians of all times uniformly consider the actual negation of support as an essential principle of substance. Sanseverino, a very learned modern philosopher of the Thomistic school, treating in his Logic of the predicament of substance, establishes the fact that, according to the common teaching of the scholastics, “not the essence of the thing, but its mode of existing, formally constitutes the predicament of substance.” Although that special mode of existing is not implied in the essential concept of the thing, inasmuch as it is a thing, yet, according to the doctrine of the schoolmen, the same special mode is implied, as a formal constituent, in the essential concept of the same thing, inasmuch as it falls under the predicament of substance; so that, in the constitution of substance, the essence of the thing is to be ranked as its material, and the special mode of existing as its formal, principle. And the learned writer sums up all this doctrine in one general conclusion of Henry of Ghent, which runs thus: “Every predicament arises out of two constituents, of which one is the thing which is to be put under the predicament, the other is its mode of being which determines the predicament, and by these same constituents are the predicaments distinguished from one another”14—a doctrine explicitly taught by S. Thomas himself.15 And here let us reflect that, if all the schoolmen, as Sanseverino with the authority of his philosophical erudition declares, affirm that the mode of substance, the non-inherence, the negation of support, is an essential constituent of substance as such, we are free to conclude that to affirm the contrary is to give a false notion of substance; [pg 006] while to say that philosophers have at all times, or at any time, taught the contrary, is to give a very false statement of facts.

This may suffice to convince the student that the essential formality of substance as such is the negation of actual support. And now let us inquire what is the formal constituent of suppositum. Suppositum and substance, though not identical, are similarly constituted. The positive entity of both is the same, and the difference between them arises entirely from the different character of their negative formality, as we are going to explain. For the essence or nature of every created being is naturally accompanied by two negations, of which neither is essential to it, while either of them, absolutely speaking, can be made to disappear. The first is the negation of anything underlying as a supporter and acting the part of a subject; and it is to this negation, as we have proved, that any complete nature formally owes its name and rank of substance. The second is the negation of anything overlying, so to say, and possessing itself of the created being in such a manner as to endue it with an additional complement and a new subsistence; and it is to this negation that a complete nature formally owes its name and rank of suppositum. The complete nature, or the thing in question, when considered apart from these two negations, does not, therefore, convey the idea either of substance or of suppositum, but exhibits a mere potency of being either or both; as it is evident that there cannot be a substance without the formal constituent of substance, nor a suppositum without the formal constituent of suppositum.

This doctrine, which is so simple and clear, and which fully explains the true meaning of those phrases, “it exists in itself,” and “it subsists by itself,” can be confirmed by what S. Thomas teaches on the subject. And since we have already said enough in regard to the mode of substance, we shall give only what he says concerning subsistence or suppositality. That the words per se—“by itself”—which strictly exhibit the formality of the suppositum, are the expression of a mere negation, is admitted by S. Thomas in a passage above mentioned. This would lead us immediately to conclude that the formal constituent of suppositum, in the judgment of the holy doctor, is a mere negation. But we may find a more perspicuous proof of this in those passages where he explains how the human nature in Christ subsists without the human personality. The absence of the human personality in Christ does not depend, says he, “on the absence of anything pertaining to the perfection of the human nature—but on the addition of something that ranks above the human nature, to wit, on the union of the human nature with a divine Person.”16 And again: “The divine Person, by his union, prevented the human nature from having its own personality.”17 It is manifest from these two passages that, according to S. Thomas, the absence of the human personality in Christ is to be accounted for by the addition of something above the human nature, and not by the suppression or subtraction [pg 007] of any positive entity belonging to the human nature. If, then, the absence of the human personality entails no absence of positive reality, it is obvious that the human personality is not a positive reality, but a real negation. Such is S. Thomas's doctrine, endorsed by Scotus and many others.

There are, however, some philosophers and theologians, Suarez among others, who consider personality as something positive; and we must briefly discuss the grounds of their opinion.

They say that, if the human personality is nothing positive, human person will be the same reality as human nature, and therefore the one will not be really distinct from the other; and if so, the one cannot be assumed without the other. How, then, can we say that the Eternal Word assumed the human nature without the human person?

We reply that all negation which belongs to a real being is a real negation, and constitutes a real mode of being. Accordingly, although the human personality is only a negation, the nature existing under that negation really differs from itself existing without that negation, no less than a body at rest really differs from itself in movement, although rest is only a negation of movement. And this suffices to show that the objection is wholly grounded on the false supposition that nothing is real which is not positive.

They affirm that subsistence or suppositality gives the last complement to the nature, as it terminates it and makes it subsistent. Hence subsistence, as they infer, must add something positive to the nature; which it cannot do unless it be a positive reality.

We deny the assumption altogether. Subsistence, in fact, gives no complement whatever to the nature, but, on the contrary, presupposes the complete nature, which, when simply left to itself, cannot but be subsistent by itself, and therefore is said to have its own subsistence. It is not subsistence that causes the thing to subsist; it is the thing which abides by itself that, in consequence of this same abiding by itself, has subsistence, and is called subsistent; just in the same manner as it is not rest that causes the body to be at rest, but the concrete resting; as rest is evidently the consequence of the resting. Hence this second objection, too, is based on a false assumption.

Another of their reasons is the following: In God, personality is a positive reality, therefore in creatures also; for the created person is a participation of divine person, which is a positive reality.

We do not see how this assertion can be true. In God there are three Persons, but neither of them is participated or communicated to creatures. Indeed, creatures bear in themselves a faint imitation of the three divine Persons, inasmuch as they involve three intrinsic principles in their constitution, as we have explained in the preceding article; but these three principles are not three persons. Yet, if divine personality were in any way communicable to creatures, creatures would subsist in three persons; for how could the personality of the Father be communicated in any degree without the personality of the Son and of the Holy Ghost being communicated in the same degree? Personality in God is a relative entity, and cannot be conceived without its correlative; and consequently, if the human personality [pg 008] were a participation of divine personality, it would be impossible for man to be a single person; whence it appears that human personality is not a communication of divine personality, and is not even analogous to it. What we call a human person is nothing but a human individual nature which is sui juris—that is, not possessed by a superior being, but left to itself and free to dispose of its acts. It therefore imitates, not the divine Persons, but the divine absolute Being, inasmuch as it is independent in disposing of everything according to his will. Now, independence, even in God, implies the negation or absence of any necessary connection or conjunction with anything distinct from the divine nature. It is but reasonable, then, to hold that the human nature also exists free and independent by the very absence or negation of personal union with a higher being. We remark, however, that such a negation in God is a negation of imperfection, while in creatures an analogous negation is a negation of a higher perfection, since it is the negation of their union with a more perfect nature.

It has been argued, also, that to be a person is better than not to be a person; whence it would follow that personality is a perfection. On the other hand, negations are not perfections; hence personality cannot be a negation.

To this we answer that the proposition, “to be a person is better than not to be a person,” can be understood in two different manners. It may mean that to have a nature which is capable of personality, and is naturally personal, is better than to have a nature incapable of personality; and in this sense the proposition is true, for it is certainly better to have the nature of man than the nature of an ox. This, however, would not show that personality is a positive formality. But the same proposition might be taken to mean that to have one's natural personality is better than to exist without it, in consequence of hypostatic union with a higher being; and in this sense, which is the sense of the objection, the proposition is evidently false. For the whole perfection of the human person is the perfection of its nature; so that human personality, instead of being a new perfection, is only an exponent of the perfection and dignity of human nature, which is such that the same nature can naturally guide itself and control its actions. We therefore concede that human personality is a formality of a perfect nature, but we cannot admit that it is a perfection of itself. If human personality were a perfection of human nature, we would be compelled to say that human nature is less perfect in Christ than in all other men; for, though the Eternal Word assumed the whole human nature, he did not assume that pretended perfection, human personality. But S. Paul assures us that Christ's human nature “is like ours in all things, except sin.” We cannot therefore suppose that the human nature is less perfect in him than in other men; and this leads us to the conclusion that human personality is not a positive perfection.

Some have pretended that the mystery of the Incarnation would become quite inexplicable if the human person were nothing more than the human nature left to itself. Their reason is that by the Incarnation the human nature is separated from the human person; which they deem to be impossible if the [pg 009] person is nothing else than the nature alone.

This is, however, a manifest paralogism. If, in fact, the human person is the human nature left to itself, the nature assumed by the Word will certainly not be a human person, since it is clear that the nature thus assumed is not left to itself. This suffices to show the inconsistency of the objection. Let us add that it is not entirely correct to say that by the Incarnation the human nature is separated from the human person; it would be more correct to say that the human nature is prevented from having that natural subsistence which would make it a human person.

Lastly, it has been said that, if the human nature which has been assumed by the Eternal Word was entirely complete, the union of the Word with it could not be intimate and substantial. Hence, according to this reasoning, there must have been something wanting in the human nature assumed, which something has been supplied by the hypostatic union.

We cannot but repeat, with S. Thomas, that the human nature assumed by the Word is absolutely perfect, and therefore exempt from any deficiency which could have been supplied by the hypostatic union. And as for the reason alleged, we say that it is grounded on a false supposition. The union of the Word with the human nature is not a conspiration of the divine and the human into oneness of substance, for the thing would be impossible; and therefore it is not wholly correct to say that the union is substantial. The proper term is hypostatic—that is, personal; for, in fact, the human nature conspires with the divine Word into oneness of person, the two natures or substances remaining entirely distinct. Now, the oneness of person is not obtained by supplying any deficiency in the human nature, but by adding, as S. Thomas teaches, to the perfect human nature that which is above it—that is, by the Word taking possession of it in his own person.

Such are the principal reasons advanced by those who consider human personality, and suppositality in general, as a positive mode. We think we have answered them sufficiently.

We cannot better conclude this controversy than by inviting the same philosophers to take cognizance of the following argument. The mode of suppositum, as well as the mode of substance, is not an accidental but a substantial mode, as all agree, and every one must admit. Now, no substantial mode can be positive; and therefore neither the mode of suppositum nor the mode of substance can be positive. The minor of this syllogism can be proved thus: Positive modes are nothing but positive actualities or affections of being; and unless they are mere relative denominations (which is not the case with substantial modes), they must result from the positive reception of some act in a real subject. This is an obvious truth, for nothing is actual but by some act; and all acts which are not essential to the first constitution of the being are received in the being already constituted as in a real subject. And since all acts thus received are accidental, hence all the positive modes intrinsic to the being must be accidental modes; and no substantial mode can be positive. Therefore whatever is positive in the suppositum and in the substance belongs to the nature of the being [pg 010] which has the mode of suppositum or of substance, whilst the modes themselves are mere negations.

This truth, however, should not be misunderstood. When we say that “to be in itself” or “to be by itself” is a mere negation, we do not refer to the verb “to be”; we only refer to the appendage “in itself” or “by itself.” To be is positive, but belongs to the nature as such, as it is the essential complement of all being, whether substance and suppositum or not. The negation consists, in the one case, in not being sustained by an underlying supporter, and, in the other, in not being taken possession of by an overlying superior being. Indeed, when we unite the verb to be with either of the two negations, we unite the positive with the negative. But the positive comes in as determinable, while the negative comes in as determinant. Hence the resultant determination or formality is only the actuality of a negation. Now, the actuality of a negation, though it is real inasmuch as it is the affection of a positive being, yet it is negative; for all actuality is denominated by its formal principle, and such a principle, in our case, is a negation.

A writer in a Catholic periodical has ventured to say that if the formality of substance (and the same would also apply to the suppositum) is negative, then substance “will consist merely in a negation.” It is surprising that a philosopher has not seen the absurdity of such a conclusion. Substance is not to be confounded with its formality. There are many positive things which involve a negation. In an empty pocket, emptiness is a negation; ignorance in the ignorant is a negation; and limit in all things finite is a negation. Yet no one will say that an empty pocket, an ignorant pupil, or a finite being “consist merely in a negation”; and therefore, although the formality of substance is a negation, it does not follow that substance is a mere negation.

It now remains for us to show that neither of the two aforesaid negations is essential to any created being, and that a created being can therefore, absolutely speaking, exist, at least supernaturally, without either of them. Our first proof is drawn from the fact that neither the one nor the other negation is reckoned among the essential constituents of created beings. All complete nature, by common admission, consists “of essence and existence”—ex essentia et esse—the existence being the formal complement of the essence, and the essence itself involving, as its principles, an act with its corresponding term, as the readers of our last article already know. Accordingly, there is nothing essential in a complete being besides its act, its term, and its complement; and therefore neither the mode of substance nor the mode of suppositum is essential to a complete created being.

Our second proof is drawn from the notion of existence. “To exist strictly and simply,” says Suarez, “means only to have a formal entity in the order of nature; and therefore things existing are equally susceptible of the mode of being which consists in leaning on a supporter, and of the opposite mode which excludes all support.”18 This is a tangible truth; for although a complete being possesses in its [pg 011] own constitution what is required for its own existence, yet it has nothing in its constitution which implies the necessity of existing in itself and by itself. It can indeed, and will naturally, be in itself without anything underlying as a supporter, since it sufficiently supports itself on its own term; but it contains nothing that would make impossible the sub-introduction of a supernatural supporter. And, again, a complete being can subsist by itself without further completion, since it is sufficiently complete by its formal complement; but it contains nothing which would exclude the possibility of its acquiring a further completion and a supernatural subsistence.

A third proof might be drawn from the fact that our own bodies exist indeed in themselves, but do not subsist by themselves, as their material nature is taken possession of by a spiritual being—the soul—and subsists by its subsistence. From this fact, which is alluded to in S. Athanasius' Symbol as an image of the assumption of the human nature by the Word, we might show that suppositality can, even naturally, be supplanted by the union of a lower with a higher nature. But we will not develop this proof, as it requires too long an explanation and many new considerations, which cannot be embodied in the present article.

Last, but not least, it is evident that all negations which are not included in the essence of a thing can be supplanted by the position of their contrary. Hence the mode of substance and the mode of suppositum, which are negations, and are not included in the essence of created things, can be supplanted by the intervention of a supernatural power.

As we must here keep within the bounds of philosophy, we abstain from discussing other cognate questions which can be safely answered only by a direct appeal to dogmatic definitions and theological arguments. We may, however, state that the old scholastic theologians and the fathers of the church, both Greek and Latin, admitted that the mode of substance, as well as the mode of suppositum, can be made to disappear from the thing to which it naturally belongs in the manner above explained. For their common doctrine on the mysteries of the Incarnation and of the Holy Eucharist is, that the two mysteries are analogous to one another,19 and admit of a parallel mode of reasoning for their explanation. The analogy more or less explicitly pointed out by them involves the admission of a principle which may be expressed in the following words: “As the whole human nature can exist in Christ without the mode of human person, which is excluded [pg 012] by the hypostatic union of the Word with it, so can the whole sensible nature (species) of bread exist in the Holy Eucharist without its mode of substance, which is excluded by the substantive presence of Christ's body under it.” This traditional doctrine has been almost ignored in these latter centuries by those who were anxious to explain everything according to a special system of natural philosophy, and who little by little formed a new theory of the sacramental species; but the physical system on which these theologians took their stand having given way, and their new theory having lost its plausibility, we are of opinion that instead of seeking for new explanations, as some do, it is more prudent to fall back on tradition, and take into consideration the authorized teachings of our old polemic writers, of those especially who so valiantly fought against Berengarius and other heretics in behalf of the Eucharistic dogma.

Before we conclude, we wish to make a few remarks on some ambiguous expressions which may be a source of error in speaking of substance and of suppositum. We have said that Aristotle includes in his first category the suppositum as well as the substance, and that for this reason the words, “by itself,” “to support,” “to subsist,” have been promiscuously applied to the substance as well as to the suppositum. This has been done not only in philosophy, but even in theology. Thus we read in good authors that the divine Person of the Word “supports” or “sustains” Christ's human nature. Yet these words, as also “sustentation,” when applied to subsistence, must have a meaning which they have not when applied to substance; and it is plain that to employ the same words in both cases may give rise to serious mistakes. Some authors, besides overlooking the distinction to be made between “existing in itself”—esse in se—and “subsisting by itself”—per se subsistere—confound also with one another their opposites—viz., “to exist in something else”—esse in alio—and “to subsist by something else”—per aliud subsistere. Suarez, for instance, though usually very accurate in his expressions, says that “the mode of existing by itself and without dependence on any supporter has for its opposite to exist in something else;”20 which is not correct, for the divinity of Christ exists in his humanity, and nevertheless does not depend on it as a supporter. It would be more correct to say that the mode of subsisting by itself has for its opposite to subsist by something else. And it is evident that to subsist by something else is not the same as to exist in it.

To get rid of all such ambiguous phrases, we observe that the word “sustentation,” as compared with any created nature, can have three different meanings, according as we apply it to the act, the term, or the complement of the created being.

When sustentation is considered in connection with the act or the formal principle of a being, it means positive conservation; for all contingent being comes out of nothing by the positive production of an act, and needs to be kept out of nothing by the positive conservation of the same act, as we know from special metaphysics.

When sustentation is considered in connection with the intrinsic term of a being, it means underlying; and in this sense we say that substance sustains its accidents. This meaning of the word “sustentation” is most conformable to its etymology; and thus, if anything is lying under any reality in that manner in which substance lies under its accidents, we shall say very properly that it sustains that reality. In this sense, sustentation and support may be taken as synonymous.

When sustentation is considered in connection with the formal complement of a being, it means overlying in such a manner as to superinduce a new complement and a new subsistence. Such is the manner in which the Person of the Word sustains Christ's humanity. This kind of sustentation implies hypostatic union and super-completion.

We might, therefore, divide sustentation into conservative, substantive, and hypostatic. The first is usually called conservation; the second might keep the name of sustentation; whilst the third might perhaps be fitly styled personalization, as this word seems adequately to express the nature of personal sustentation.

As to the phrases, “to be in itself” and “to be by itself,” we have seen that their distinction is most important. It may be useful to add that, even in God, to be in himself and to be by himself are to be distinguished by a distinction of reason indeed, but which is grounded on a real foundation. God is essentially a se, in se, and per se—that is, of himself, in himself, and by himself. These three attributes are absolute, and belong to the divine nature as an absolute reality; but as in this absolute reality there are intrinsic relations of personalities, we may reflect that, in this relative order, to be of himself can be considered as owing especially to God the Father, who does not proceed from any other person, but is himself the first principle of their procession; to be in himself can be considered as having a special reference to God the Son, in whom the whole entity of the Father is found as in the substantial term of his eternal generation; and, lastly, to be by himself can be explained by reference to the Holy Ghost, who is the essential complement of the Blessed Trinity, as that is said to be by itself which is ultimately complete in its own entity.

Accordingly, God, as existing essentially of himself—a se—has no need or capability of conservation; as existing essentially in himself—in se—he has no need or capability of sustentation; and as existing essentially by himself—per se—he has no need or capability of super-completion. But with contingent beings the case is quite different. And first, contingent beings are not “of themselves,” as they are from God; and for this reason they have an essential need of conservation, as we have stated, so far as their essential act is concerned. Secondly, although they naturally exist “in themselves,” yet this their mode of existing is not the result of an essential necessity, but only of a natural ordination, which God can supersede. They exist in themselves when the term of their own essence is their undermost support; for then the whole essence supports itself in a natural manner, and is a natural substance. Thirdly, although created beings naturally “subsist by themselves,” yet this manner of existing is not the consequence [pg 014] of an essential necessity, but only of a natural ordination, which can be superseded by the Creator. They subsist by themselves when the formal complement of their essence is their ultimate complement; for then the whole being is left to itself as a natural suppositum.

These explanations will be of some assistance, we hope, to the philosophical student in forming a correct judgment as to the formal constituents of substance and suppositum, and as to the manner of speaking about them with proper discrimination. We wish we had handled the subject in a better style and a less monotonous phraseology; but it was our duty to aim at preciseness rather than ornament. If there is any part of philosophy in which precision is more necessary than in another, it is that which treats of the principles of things; and if we succeed in presenting such principles in their true light, we shall deem it a sufficient apology for the dryness of our philosophical style.

To Be Continued.

On Hearing The “O Salutaris Hostia.”21

On The Wing: A Southern Flight.

What induced us to pick our way on foot from the railway carriage to the Hôtel du Parc et Bordeaux, near eleven o'clock at night, on our arrival at Lyons, I cannot possibly conceive.

It was the 3d of January that we performed this unnecessary penance; and the only explanation I can give is that we were all rather dazed by the long journey from Paris, and had forgotten that of course there was waiting at the station an omnibus to carry on the passengers. We had been silent and sleepy for some hours, when the bright lights twinkling up and down the heights of the city of Lyons, and across the bridges, and, corruscating at the station, had roused us all up, and made us exclaim at the fairy sight. I had seen it again and again; but I always look out eagerly for the first peep at that tossed-about town after night has closed in, and I know none more brilliant and picturesque. I thought we all looked rather rueful as we entered the hotel, and that it suddenly struck us we had come on foot, and might therefore look too economically inclined to suit the views of the buxom lady who advanced to meet us. I saw her cast rather a doubtful eye to the rear; but her face brightened when she found we had at least been able to afford a porter to carry such luggage as we might want for one night. We had no valid reason to give in reply to her anxious enquiries as to why we had not availed ourselves of the hotel omnibus; which very soon afterwards came rattling into the yard, quite empty, the guard and coachman viewing us indignantly. Madame, finding we had nothing to say for ourselves, compassionately furnished each with a candle, and allowed us to gather together our scattered wits in sleep.

The “we” consisted of brother Frank, sister Mary, and I; also of Ann, our maid. I suppose I must describe the party. I wish I could draw them instead. Frank is dressed all over in a gray tweed. I sometimes tell him he looks like a gray parrot; but that is absurd, because he is so extremely taciturn, which gray parrots are not. He makes a capital courier. He always knows what we poor women shall want, and how much we can do, which is a great comfort to me; because, as Mary is delicate, and we are travelling on her account, I should be so worried if Frank insisted on doing fourteen hours of railroad per diem. He is such a good fellow that he would never wish us to overtask ourselves. But then he is so strong that I know it must seem very extraordinary to him that we should be such poor creatures, and get tired out so soon. I sometimes wonder what has made Frank so tender and gentle, and so considerate. Perhaps it is the being so much with Mary. She makes everybody gentle who comes [pg 016] near her. Somehow she seems to stroke everybody's fur the right way, no matter how ruffled they were before. Poor Mary! she has for many years been a widow, after a brief and unhappy married life, and having lost both her children, a girl and a boy. She is the eldest of us three, but has a marvellous knack of looking the youngest and the brightest. She has been very beautiful, and is so still in many ways. Now I come! But how shall I describe myself? The more I think of it, the more impossible I find it. As I am the relater of our adventures, I suppose my readers will form for themselves some idea of what I am like. So I will only say that my name is Jane, and that I am an old maid, but that I do not feel old. As to my looks, I really do not know what to say. I am not always altogether dissatisfied with them; but then, on the other hand, when I am inclined to judge them leniently, the unlucky feeling comes over me that it is solely owing to my hat, or the way my hair is done, or some fortuitous circumstance upon which I cannot reckon as a permanency, and which may be gone before any one else has had the time to observe it. So that though I have my lucky moments, I have little or no capital to go on. Now, Mary, with her large, soft eyes, her exquisite mouth, and beautiful teeth, attracts strangers wherever she goes; although she is always insisting upon it she is quite an old woman. And now comes Ann. She is about my age, but does not at all consider herself an old maid, and therefore always contradicts me when I speak of myself in such disparaging terms. I generally say something in reply about the observation being six for me and half a dozen for herself. But this she does not like. Ann is a very good girl, and a capital maid. She has pretty, fuzzy black hair, and bright though small black eyes; she has a very white skin, and a neat figure. But she does not like travelling, and is especially disgusted when the scenery is very bold and magnificent. Mountains are her abhorrence, distant views her antipathy. This is far from being our first journey; and whenever we have found ourselves in the railway carriage from Dover to London Bridge, Ann invariably remarks how lovely the country is as we dash through the flat green fields and monotonous cherry gardens of simple Kent. And her admiration culminates when we pass any gentlemen's seats. The absence of striking features, the unbroken, unaccidental horizon, the universal green, and the level lines, give Ann a sensation of peace and repose; while I, who have something of an artist's soul, am feeling how very difficult it would be to get an effective subject or a “nice bit of color” out of the platitudes of dear England's quiet homesteads.

We were off the next day by daylight, I feeling like a swallow flying south; and very soon we perceived in the clear air a warmer glow than any to be had the other side of Lyons. Even the desert region of La Crau seemed full of charms to me. The dim, gray expanse of thick-lying stones that Hercules persuaded by his prayers the angry Jove to shower down on the Ligurians, broken only by thin tufts of mint and scant rosemary, themselves also of a gray green, and leading on over thousands of acres to the blue distant hills that were blushing into rosy hues when we crossed the desert, were not without delightful “points,” which I could [pg 017] have transferred to my sketch-book had time allowed me. “La Belle Provence” is a very journalière beauty, and requires a bright sun to clothe her in sparkling jewels, and to dye her dress in blue and violet and rose-madder, to be worthy of the name that centuries have agreed to give her. When there are no lights, there is apt to be an air of desolation and barrenness. Those hills, arrayed in many tints, give back the lights from rocky and unproductive cliffs; but down in the valleys, with the exception of La Crau, the culture is rich and varied. The first stunted olive-trees as we approached Marseilles were welcome less on their own account—for they are miserable specimens—than for the association of ideas connected with their pallid leaves, and because they gave promise of the large ones that would gladden our eyes further on.

The station of Hyères is a few miles from the town. We had ordered a carriage to meet us; and all the way Mary was looking out for the large umbrella pine that she remembered so well years ago, when there was no railway so far south. It had been the great landmark on the road from Hyères to Toulon. We measured our rides and walks in that direction by the great pine. There it stood, the same as ever, and brought back all Hyères and the two winters spent there, besides other shorter visits, to our memory with one rush. All else was changed. New houses had sprung up on all sides. Mme. Susanne's old tumble-down hotel, where Mary had stopped for a few days on her wedding-tour, is changed into a magnificent building with caryatides supporting the façade like a Genoese palace; and the palms on La Place des Palmiers, which I had known in their babyhood, have grown to a size that would not disgrace Arabia. The hotel we went to stands in what used to be Le Jardin Frassinet. It had been full of orange-trees when we first knew it, as had all the other gardens in the place. But one very severe winter having greatly injured the trees, the inhabitants have given up the cultivation of oranges, and have planted peach-trees instead, much to the detriment of the beauty of Hyères. I found Mary, the day after our arrival, gazing wistfully at a group of tall cypress and one palm-tree that had marked the boundary of the gardens belonging to the house where she lived with her children the second time she came here. We missed her soon afterwards, and refrained from following her, for we knew she wanted to visit alone the scenes of some joys and many sorrows long ago passed away—so far as anything is really past which is worthy the name of joy or sorrow. She came back with her hands full of the little, dark, mottled arum and its lance-head leaves that grow so profusely on the hills and by the roadside. They are of a dingy-purple hue, shaded off into white; and we exclaimed against them as she put them in a glass, alleging that they had an unpleasant odor. “I know they have,” she answered; “but their quaint, twisted shape, and blossoms like the head of a snake, are so full of memories that I rather like the smell than otherwise.” After that we let her enjoy her arums alone, for we knew how much that meant. Doubtless she had been wandering about, recalling visions of the past: the dead—the lost, but not dead, that worse separation!—and all the tangled maze of the years that are gone. Mary's [pg 018] bouquet of arums was redeemed by a handful of the sweet white alyssum; and these two flowers, with a few of the bold-faced, unflinching daisies of Provence, so unlike our modest northern flowers, were all the wild blossoms we could hope to find in January.

We could not leave Hyères without performing a pilgrimage to Notre Dame de Consolation, the old church on a hill overlooking the coast. The ascent is marked by the Way of the Cross rudely painted in small niches of masonry by the side of the road. When we were last here, there was a daily Mass said by a hermit-priest. He had some years previously tried his vocation at the Carmelites', and had not succeeded. But the impulse to seek utter solitude was too strong to be resisted; and for a long time he had lived in the surrounding mountains, a veritable hermit, subsisting upon the poorest fare, which was brought to him at regular intervals by the peasants. Whether he had erected a hut for himself, or lived in a cave, I never learnt; but when the bishop of the diocese became aware of the fact, he thought it to be regretted that a priest should not celebrate Mass, and proposed to him that he should live in one of the small rooms of the deserted convent which is attached to the Church of Our Lady of Consolation, take care of the church, and say Mass. This offer he gladly accepted; and there he resided for some time. We used to go sometimes, on a bright spring morning, to attend his Mass. Our breakfast was packed in a basket, and hung to the pommel of my donkey's saddle, to be eaten afterwards on the top of the low, semi-circular wall which encloses a piece of ground in front of the church. I always looked with a special interest, not altogether unmingled with curiosity, at the slight, bent figure of the priest, who could not be more than forty years of age, as he emerged from the door of the sacristy, and, with eyes so cast down that they seemed closed, passed by us to the altar. Who shall say what had called up that deep thirst for utter solitude and silence which had driven him to so extreme a life? Was it some calamity, or some crime, or only—as is far more probable—that strange instinct which is implanted in the nature of some men to flee their kind, and be alone with themselves—an instinct which possibly many have felt stirring within them at odd moments, but which, when touched by divine grace, grows into a wonderful and exceptional vocation; once more common, in the early days of Christianity, when the whole world lay in pagan luxury and gilded vice, and which even our subduing, taming, commonplace civilization fails in some rare cases to smother in the soul?

What became of the hermit of Our Lady of Consolation I could never learn. Perhaps the solitude seemed incomplete when ladies could attend his Mass, and picnic afterwards on his premises. At any rate, he has been gone for many years; and Mass is only said on certain feasts, when the peasantry come in crowds, and bring flowers and offerings to the Madonna, as represented by a peculiarly ugly and dark-colored wooden statue, which has grown to be very precious to those who have obtained special favors in answer to their prayers offered here. Many years ago, Mary, in her Protestant days, had brought a lace veil, the gift of a Russian prince, who was leaving [pg 019] Hyères with a sick wife, and who wanted prayers for their safe journey; thereby producing a curious admixture of heretical, schismatical, and Catholic feeling which no doubt had each their separate value and acceptance before God, being all offered in simplicity and good faith; for it was with no unwilling hands that, mounted on one of the prie-dieux in the church, she had arranged the veil over the statue, and then knelt to say a prayer for the prince's intention.

The church is full of votive offerings. The walls are entirely covered from roof to floor. As many of them have been put up by sailors, they more or less have reference to the dangers of the deep. There is a model of a ship hanging up near the entrance, probably because its larger copy was saved from wreck. The pictures representing recovery from sickness or preservation from peril are often extremely grotesque, and might provoke a smile were it not that they carry one's thoughts direct to the faith and gratitude they represent.

I had often wandered through the deserted rooms and cells of the old convent. There is no glass left in some of the windows; but the weather is kept out by the external wooden shutters which are universal in the south. There is a lovely view from all sides. In front, the sea, with Les Isles d'Or (the Golden Islands) hemming it in as if it were a large lake, save to the left, where it opens out into the wide ocean. These islands form some of those originally called Les Larins, which name included the group before the coast of Cannes. And in most of them the first religious houses for men were established by S. Honorius, though only one island, that on which he and all his monks were martyred by the Saracens, bears his name. Les Isles d'Or, or Les Isles d'Hyères, as they are also called, are now but sparsely inhabited. Years ago, “when we were young,” we had landed on one of these islands, where stands a fort, and a few soldiers are stationed. There are also a half-dozen of cottages, inhabited by fishermen and shepherds. We were a joyous band, and had sailed from the mainland in the admiral's cutter, the French fleet riding at anchor off our coast. As we scrambled up the sandy beach, and pushed our way through the tangled undergrowth of myrtle, heath, cytisus, and leutisca, we found ourselves face to face with the solitary sentinel pacing in front of the blind walls of the low but solid-looking fort. His face broke into smiles, and, with a saucy gleam in his dark eyes, he said to the foremost gentlemen of our party, “Comment, Messieurs! vous nous en menez toutes ces belles dames? Mais vous allez révolutionner notre pauvre curé.”22 We could find no remains of monastic houses on the islands; but there are traces of walls close to the sea, on the mainland, which are said to be the remains of a convent of nuns who met with a severe punishment for an ill-timed jest. Possibly they were not all that as nuns they might have been. At any rate, they seem to have found their life occasionally dull; and when the longing for a little excitement became irrepressible, the abbess would toll the great bell of the convent, which by rights was never used save to ring the Hours and the Angelus, or to summon the neighbors for aid when any of the frequent panics about the landing of [pg 020] the marauding Saracens threatened the safety of the Sisters. The jest had been played too often, and when at length the oft-expected Saracens really came, the poor nuns rang their bell in vain. No one appeared to the rescue, and the Saracens had it all their own way, and the convent was destroyed.

The sea must have encroached since those days, for the waters wash over the scanty ruins, and I have picked my way along the foundations with little salt lakes lying between. Far to the left lie Les Salines, where they evaporize the sea-water in shallow square spaces, and thus obtain a coarse gray salt. They say that sometimes flamingoes may be shot among this marshy land; but I could never obtain one, though I know it abounds in wild fowl of every description. The deep orange-colored boughs of the large willow-trees give a peculiar charm to the distant landscape in the winter when the leaves are off; and close upon the edge of the shore is a fine wood of umbrella pines, whereof three giants, standing apart from the rest, had been great favorites of ours. We had looked out eagerly on our arrival for our three pines. Alas! one was missing. Years ago these three solitary, magnificent trees had had a strange fascination for me. I wanted to find my way to where they stood; but it was beyond the marshes, and near the salines. There was no direct road, and no one could tell me how to get there; not even the young French naval officers, who used to come often and spend the evening with us, and who must have landed not so very far from where they stood. The craving to see my three pines face to face grew, however, too strong to be resisted; and so one day I set off on donkey-back, taking Ann with me, and resolved that I would not return till I had accomplished my end. Great were our difficulties. We had to thread our way along narrow raised paths through the marshes, just wide enough for our donkeys to tread; and as, of course, we dared not leave these paths, which did not wind, but turned at right angles, we as often seemed to be going away from the pines as the reverse. At one moment we were pursued by a couple of savage dogs, who tore after us from the open yard of a farm-house, and who were so very angry at our intrusion that escape along our narrow way, and with our leisurely steeds, seemed questionable. At length I found myself at the base of a high sand-bank, on which the yellow sea-thistle, with its glaucous leaves, found a scanty subsistence and a doubtful root-hold. This I had to scramble up, while for every ten inches I made in advance I slid back six. At last I was at my long-desired goal, and my three giants were really magnificent to behold. It was on my fourth visit to Hyères, with intervals of years between, that I accomplished this feat, and I had always looked at my pines the first thing in the morning, when the strip of sea between the mainland and the isles was still lying gray in the early light. Then, again, I watched for the red glow of the setting sun on their smooth stems, painted, as it were, in burnt sienna. Again, on moonlit nights I had looked for their broad, deep black crests, falling like an ink-spot on the silver sea. And now at last, when they had almost become to me like some mystery, meaning more than met the eye, I could throw my arms [pg 021] about them, and lay my hot cheek on their noble trunks.

It was not till then I knew how tired I was. I could not delay long with my old friends. I do not remember anything about the getting home, save that the dogs who had so guarded my garden of the Hesperides, and stood between me and the fulfilment of my desire, now that I had accomplished the feat, let me return in silence. I was very weary; but I was thoroughly contented and satisfied. And now one of my old friends was laid low! How he came to his end I know not. But I felt that he had died, not that he had been cut down; and for a moment a strange, weird melancholy stole over me at finding I had outlived a noble tree. It seemed as if I must be very old to have done that, and that it was hardly natural. I remember I asked myself then, at the very time of my culte of the pine-trees, and I have repeated the question since, whether there was not in my feelings something of that dim instinct which binds man in an obscure affinity with all nature, down to its lower strata and its primeval developments. As man contains something of all in his own being, so must he have a sympathy with all; for, as has been wisely said, man is a universe in himself, with another universe to wait on him. Most people have a special attraction to some race of animals. Some have a love for, and a power over, the horse and the dog greater than others; and this not always nor only as the results of habit, but as a natural gift. Certain flowers have a peculiar attraction for many people, in preference to others equal in beauty and perfume. All these preferences may point to hidden laws of affinity, of which we know very little more than the bare fact that all in creation finds its portion in each man, and that in his own single self he is chemical, vegetable, animal, and spiritual. I am afraid to say any more, lest my readers should think I believe we are in general descended from the little open-mouthed sea-squirts called ascidians, but that I claim for myself in particular some higher origin in the shape of a conifer great-grandfather. I assure them it is nothing of the kind. With regard to my sympathy with animals, of course, being an old maid, I ought to prefer cats and gray parrots. On the contrary, I prefer dogs, and Frank is the only gray parrot I ever thought of loving.

Before leaving Hyères, I made a sketch from the top of the hill (which in my younger days, for want of knowing better, I used to call the mountain) on which stand the picturesque ruins of the old château which formerly belonged to the French branch of the huge family of Fox; who, varying their name, if not their nature, according to the sky under which they flourished, had taken root in England, France, and Germany in the old feudal times. They possessed certainly a magnificent abode at Hyères, and probably kept all the neighborhood in awe. It is a glorious situation. It overlooks a long stretch of the road to Toulon as that winds through the fertile, well-cultivated valley; and to the right rises the rocky summit of Le Coudon, the point of land that first strikes the sailor's eye as he leaves the coast of Africa, and which on exceptionally clear days is dimly visible even from the coast itself. Next to it comes Le Phare Pharon, a lower mountain crowned by a fort. I know few views which [pg 022] combine such an exquisite variety of form and color as this. The small cork-trees and the stunted oaks, equally beautiful, whether wearing their russet leaves through the brief winter, or almost matching the cork-trees in dark-green foliage; the olives, here of a very respectable size, with their gnarled trunks and fantastic shapes; and then the patches of vivid-green corn, winter peas, and the green artichokes; the undulation of the land, assuming every shade from deep violet to light red—make altogether one of the loveliest views I know anywhere. But then, I am bound to acknowledge that there are not many such in the neighborhood of our much-loved Hyères, and that, on the whole, the simple little place has far less beauty to recommend it than many of the towns along the Riviera. Its great merit for invalids arises from the air being a good deal softer than at most of the sea-coast resorts of the sick. Mary could sit out for hours in the open air at Hyères, when at Cannes, and even at San Remo, she could only have driven in a close carriage; for, in spite of the brilliant sunshine in those places, the air is apt to be too exciting both for irritable lungs and susceptible nerves. One reason—probably the principal reason—for this is that Hyères is three miles from the sea, and more in the mountains than are the towns of the Riviera generally.

We had a lovely afternoon journey from Hyères to Cannes; passing numerous little bays and creeks where the blue waters lay in deep repose, or fringed with tiny wavelets that but kissed the shingly shore, and died in a gleam of light. As you looked down on them from the railway-carriage, you felt you might have seen a mermaid combing her sea-green hair, or a cupid astride a dolphin, as quite an expected vision. The intense blue sky and deeper blue sea, the various-tinted rocks, and perhaps a solitary pine hanging over, and near by a group of the same, with their dense crowns of ever-murmuring boughs, through which the evening air sings like the hum of winged insects, were each so full of harmonious and yet gorgeous color that they leave on the mind the impression of a Greek idyl, full of serene beauty—mere beauty, it may be—but intense, placid, and eternal. There are scenes in nature that are like the forms in Greek art. They are one; and they are typical. No wide view, albeit glorious, can produce this effect, however much it may appeal to the imagination. But a rock-bound cove on the Mediterranean, with its sparse vegetation and its depth of color, is as suggestive of thoughts beyond itself as is the pure grace of a Greek statue. It belongs to another world than ours, and to a region of thought rarely lighted on in these times, and then by a few only. When I question myself of the “why,” I am at a loss to answer. Perhaps it lies in the fact that, to produce this abstract effect on the mind, the objects in nature must be few, simple, and perfectly beautiful of their kind. Then they recall Greek art, in which there is no multiplicity, no overlaying, but which represents as absolutely a pure idea as it is possible for art to do. It is without subtlety, as it is without crowding. It can be felt better than described, for the feeling is too deep for words. Nothing in English scenery, no accidental combination of beauty, has ever brought the Greek geist before my mind. Never for a second, amid [pg 023] the birchen groves and flower-fringed lanes of my own land, had I thought of old Greece and the old Greek feeling. Pantheism would not be the natural religion of our northern skies. Never had I so strongly felt the tie between nature and art, and, as a necessary sequence, between nature and Grecian thought, till I had wandered on the pale sands by the calm blue waters of the tideless sea. It is like a floating essence, too intangible for words. If I could express it, the expression would perforce be brief and veiled. I would sing my idyl to a three-stringed lute, or paint my white nymph against a whiter sky.

It was essential to Mary not to live close to the sea, therefore we engaged apartments at Cannes in one of the hotels situated among the hills, and full a mile and a half from the coast. It so happened that nearly all the people whom we met at the table-d'hôte were English like ourselves, or rather British, for some came from the Emerald Isle; and amongst these a family of three charming girls, full of the spirit and humor of the race. They had with them an elderly maid, who had been their nurse, and whose quaint sayings afforded us much amusement while we were there. She had joined them only just before we arrived, bringing out the third sister, who had shown symptoms of delicacy like the second, and both were under the supreme care of the elder sister. Mrs. O'Brien had managed her journey in foreign parts very cleverly, though making every inch of the way under protest at the heathenish customs and abominable practices of these “foreigners,” as she deigned to call the French in their own land.

It had been with the greatest difficulty that she had, on leaving Ireland, been prevented from taking with her a large boxful of household stores, which, as she expressed it, would be such a comfort to “those poor darlints, just starvin' in foreign parts, with nothing but kickshaws and gimcracks to keep the life in them.” In spite of all the remonstrances of her master, she had actually succeeded in so far cheating the custom-house that she had smuggled “jist a nice little hand of pork, salted down at home,” among the young ladies' linen. Norah flew into our room, amid fits of laughter, to show it to us, and to consult upon how we could possibly get it boiled. We could not insult the hotel by asking that it might appear at the table-d'hôte; and a hand of pork was rather a peculiar dish for three young ladies to keep up in their bedroom for private eating. On the other hand, Mrs. O'Brien would never recover it if her eleemosynary offering were discarded. It ended in my explaining the state of the case, under seal of secrecy, to the landlady; and then we actually held a supernumerary feast in our drawing-room, at a late hour, all to show Mrs. O'Brien that her kindness was appreciated. We did not sleep particularly well that night, and the rest was made into sandwiches and eaten on our next excursion up the mountains.

Mary and Mrs. O'Brien became great friends; for Mary's sympathetic nature and marvellous control of countenance at once drew the old lady out, and prevented her discovering how intensely amused her listener was. Amongst other topics, she was very eloquent upon the subject of the Prince of Wales' recovery from his serious illness, [pg 024] declaring how she, “as is a nurse myself, know well what a fine healthy man he must have been born ever to have got over the like of that. And now, sure, we must pray that nothing may happen to the blessed, darlint prince; for if he were to be taken, the country would be just ruined, and nothing left us but the constitution!”

She would talk by the hour of her “darlint” young ladies, sometimes blaming their conduct, sometimes extolling them to the skies. Occasionally, to tease her, they would pretend to walk lame, and tell her that was all the fashion, and was called the Alexandra limp. “Och! now, honeys, you, with straight limbs as God has made you, mocking at the darlint princess, as may be isn't lame at all. If I saw you mocking at me, as is no princess, but is blind, and me groping round the table, don't you think, honeys, as I should feel it?” Then turning to Mary: “Ah! your honor, they was always as wild as a litter o' pigs on a windy day, good luck to them. I've seen them all come into the world, bless their hearts, one after the other, pretty nigh as fast as nature would let them. And a nice handful I've had wid them, too, bringing the most of them up by hand like a weaned calf. Children's stomachs is just like sponges. But if you overdo the binding, may be you'll give them obdurate bowels.” Mary bore even this without a smile; but we all laughed together when the morning after her arrival she found the nice little boy Celestin, who brought in the lamp and the basket of wood, and helped in the house generally, and who could not have been above fifteen, innocently aiding Marie, the housemaid, in making the beds. She could not understand a word of French, and of course he knew no English; but she seized him by the collar, and ejected him violently from the room, exclaiming, “Get out o' that, you young varmint!” and protesting that he should never touch one of her “darlints' sheets in this heathenish land, where they made no difference between a man and a woman, but put the men to make the beds and the women to tend the cattle.” The end of it was that she took the bed-making into her own hands, though she never got reconciled to the mattresses stuffed with the outer sheaths of the Indian corn, or the pillows with wool. “That pillow is as hard as a dog's head, and won't do for my young lady; and the other's as limp as a dead cat,” she remarked aloud to herself one day that Elina was going to bed early with a bad headache.

By degrees we became rather well acquainted with the other visitors at the hotel, which arose, no doubt, from the fact of our all being fellow-countrymen. For a long time Mary was the only married woman of the party; and with the exception of the three merry Irish girls, the ladies were all old maids like myself. Frank found Cannes rather slow, as he expressed it, and spent the greater part of the six weeks we were there in making excursions in the neighborhood, stopping away three or four days at a time. It was long before we got thoroughly comfortable with any of our fellow-sojourners in a strange land. In the first place, we were the only Catholics, and most of the others were very decided Protestants, and so rather shunned us at first. Some of them especially objected to Mary, and seemed to think that her good looks and her accurate French pronunciation were [pg 025] rather offensive than otherwise. It made no sort of difference to her, and I am sure she never even found it out. One day, as I was coming down-stairs, Miss Marygold was crossing the wide passage which went from the entrance to the dining-room door. As I passed her, she tossed her head, and said, “I have just met your sister, Miss Jane, going out for a walk, and looking about five-and-twenty. I must say I think it must be very inconvenient not to show one's age better than that.” “At any rate,” said I, “it is an inconvenience, Miss Marygold, that many would be happy to share with her.” And I swept along the wide passage lined with oleanders, myrtle, and cypress in large pots, sat down to the piano in the public salon, and dashed through the overture of “Robert le Diable” with much brilliancy of execution. I afterwards found out that both the Miss Marygolds strongly objected to a little red bow which Mary was apt to fasten in her hair when we went down to dinner. Their own coiffures resembled either a doll's apron stuck on the top of her head, or a small “dress-improver” of stiff lace. I suppose they thought there was some virtue in wearing what was at once ugly and ridiculous.

No one, on first arriving at Cannes, can form any idea of the exquisite beauty that will be within their easy reach as soon as they get beyond the long, straight street parallel with the flat coast. The town itself has no pretensions to beauty, except from the picturesque, fortified old church, standing high above the town, and whose mouldering walls assume so many different tints against the dark-violet background of the Estrelle; that beautiful line of mountains that runs far out into the sea, and forms the most prominent object of the scenery. The market is held down the one long street, where it opens on the small garden and esplanade by the shore. This is planted with magnificent plane-trees, and nothing can be more picturesque than the groups of peasant-women, with their bright-colored kerchiefs crossed over their shoulders, and their thick woollen skirts, sitting each at her little booth of cakes, or sweets, or household utensils, and especially the charming little crocks, pots, and pans of native manufacture. At a short distance from Cannes, at Valory, there is a very fine establishment of pottery works, well worthy of a visit. The native clay produces the most beautiful colors; and as the numerous visitors at Cannes have taken pains to supply the manufactory with very good models taken from the antique and from some of the best specimens of Minton and Staffordshire china, the result is most satisfactory. We found that they are in the habit of sending very large crates of garden-vases, besides smaller and more delicate articles, all over Europe. The road along the coast towards Antibes is bordered by beautiful villas with gardens running down towards the sea, and generally laid out in terraces. Even now, in the month of January, they were full of roses, geraniums, ageratum, and violets in bloom. Part of this picturesque spot is called California, on account of the bright yellow blossom of the mimosa, which, when fully out, is truly “a dropping well of gold.” The light, feathery flower covers the whole tree, and there is scarcely a leaf to be seen. The beautiful eucalyptus, or blue gum-tree, is [pg 026] much cultivated here. The peculiar variety of its foliage, the lower and older leaves being almost heart-shaped, and the upper ones often a foot in length, and hardly two inches wide, makes it very remarkable. The lower leaves are of a blue green, shading off into deep bronze, and the new shoots are almost yellow. It is quite recently that this beautiful tree has been transplanted from Australia to Europe; but as it makes twenty feet in a year, there are already magnificent specimens. It has a highly aromatic gum; and it is supposed that in time it will greatly supersede the use of quinine, having medicinal properties which resemble that invaluable remedy, while it will be less expensive. When Mary is suffering from one of her neuralgic headaches, nothing relieves her so much as steeping the long leaves of the eucalyptus in hot water, and holding her head over the perfumed steam. A branch hung near the bed is also, they say, conducive to sleep.

The beauties of the position of Cannes are far outdone by that of the little town of Cannet, distant about three miles, and built among the mountains, and where the air is softer. Nothing can exceed the loveliness of the view from the Place, shaded by splendid plane-trees, of the half-deserted little town, or the same view seen from the terrace of the one Pension, where we found every preparation for receiving guests, but which was locked up and entirely empty. You overlook numerous orange-gardens of the most vivid green, the starry blossoms and golden fruit gleaming amid the foliage. Then, far down the valley, and clothing an amphitheatre of hills and mountains, are groves of olives, with their soft velvet folds, mass overlapping mass of tender, dim green, shimmering all over with silver touches, as the air stirred the branches, and turned upwards the inner lining of the leaves—after which all other foliage is apt to look crude and hard. The blue sea lies beyond, and the sharp, purple outline of the Estrelle; while to the right the mountains fade off further and further, ending in snow-capt heights.

From amid the dense, soft shadows of the valley rise the old tower of the church and the picturesque cupolas of the strange Moorish villa where poor Rachel, the famous French tragedian, breathed her last, and which is fast falling to decay. It is no longer let to strangers; but we made our way through the tangled gardens and wilderness of orange-trees. Everything looked tumbling to pieces. The house itself is in ruin; and being painted in bright colors externally, and chiefly built of wood, at least in the ornamental parts, it looks like the cast-off decorations of a dismal theatre. Two white pigeons were picking up the scattered grain in the little, untidy court. A few mutilated plaster figures of gods and goddesses near the entrance added to the tawdry and unreal aspect of the whole. It was as if the poor actress had selected it to die in for its scenic effect, and so had closed her life on a mute and deserted stage. I fancied I could see her lithe form and her sinuous glide (for she never seemed to walk like a common mortal) along the veranda. I could recall the intense passion of her matchless voice as she thrilled you through with the words:

And then she came here, alone, to die! As I turned away from the place, so beautiful even in its desolation, I wondered if the rumor might be true which was prevalent at the time—that her maid, a French Catholic, seeing her poor mistress in a state of coma just before her death, had dared to baptize her—and thus give us a large-hearted hope for the woman and the Jewess.

We drove through the narrow, sharp-angled streets of the little town of Cannet to the church in the valley. The streets were so narrow, and the turnings were so sharp, that it always seemed that our horses were in one street while we and the carriage were in another. Three little children, with bright, dark eyes and tangled hair, hung over a wall, each with a rose in its mouth. They looked as if they would drop the flowers, and themselves after, into our laps. The church was very clean and well cared for; full of tawdry decorations, but fresh and neat, as if all were often renewed by loving hearts, if not by cultivated taste. M. le Curé is very old, and has not sufficient help for the wants of so large a parish; and there are no Sisters to teach the children. They seem a simple people; and if only there were a habitable house, what pleasure might be found in living in this earthly paradise, and working amongst them!

It is said that the Englishman carries Bass' pale ale and Warren's blacking with him where-ever he goes, to say nothing of Harvey's sauce. At any rate, he has established his own special amusements at Cannes, with no apparent consciousness of their incongruity with the scene around them. Of course we took our share, though denouncing and protesting all the way at the horrors of pigeon-shooting. We drove over sandy lanes close to the shore, through groups of pine-trees on either side; a glorious panorama of mountains and snow-clad peaks beyond, the dark-blue sea, and the purple Estrelle. There was a vulgar booth and a shed, and some rickety benches like those at a country fair. We sat down, facing three boxes, in which the innocent birds were concealed until the moment—unknown, of course, to the sportsman himself—when, bursting open, the pigeons spread their wings at liberty, to be perchance instantly killed by a clever shot. I acknowledge that I tried not to look, and that my heart gave a spasmodic leap every time I heard the clap of the lid of the box and then the sharp shot. I looked at the pine-trees and the far-off mountains, with the many-tinted, undulating middle distances, and tried to forget the coarseness and cruelty of the scene I was supposed to have come to as an amusement. The nuts and the ginger-bread were wanting, and Aunt Sally was distinguished by her absence; but there was nevertheless a milder reflection of everything that might have graced this same kind of scene in England; and so the English gentleman of the XIXth century, brought by fortuitous circumstances into a new and exquisitely beautiful land, was doing his best to make himself “at home,” and to inspire the natives and foreigners with his own tastes. I am fond of sport, though I am but an old maid; but somehow this does not strike me as being sport in the true acceptation of the word. And I sat wondering how long it will be before [pg 028] my own brave countrymen, who are already addicted to battues, will build one-storied, round summer-houses in their woods, painted inside with arabesques, Cupids, Venus, and Diana, and having six or eight small windows all round it; then, seated in a large gilt fauteuil, with a bottle of choice Chambertin by his side, he will languidly pop his short gun at the thrushes or the finches as they flutter from bough to bough before him; and so, at the end of a couple of hours, saunter home with a bagful of “game,” wearied with the exertions of la chasse au tire, like the gentlemen in France in the times of La Régence.

The Duc de P. was there, and the Duc de C., and the Duke of H., and actually one of the men—what may they be called?—who preside over the pigeon-shooting at Hurlingham, and who had been got over to ensure everything being en règle. What more could any one want? I wondered to myself whether the extraordinary beauty and sublime majesty of the surrounding scene had anything to do with enhancing the pleasure of the pigeon-shooters; whether, in short, the successful slaughter of the poor birds was rendered more enjoyable by the fact of its taking place under a sky and in a spot fraught with exquisite beauty; noble and serene, vast and varied.

And if not, why did they not stop among the cockney flats of Hurlingham? When all was over and we returned home, I actually found myself semi-conscious of a sort of pride that the best shot, in this decidedly trying proof of skill, was an Englishman! So much for the inconsistency of human, especially of female, nature.

We are in the land of perfumes. Acres of roses, violets, and other scented flowers are cultivated solely for the perfume manufactories at Grasse, a few miles from Cannes. Of course, this is not the time of year to benefit by this exceptional form of farming; but in the spring it must be lovely.

We are preparing to leave Cannes, and, as I write these lines, Frank silently lays a sheet of paper by my side. And I see—a Sonnet.

A National Or State Church.

Fifty-three peers protested against the disestablishment of the Protestant Church in Ireland, “because it is impossible to place a church disestablished and disendowed, and bound together only by the tie of a voluntary association, on a footing of equality with the perfect organization of the Church of Rome.” Mr. Disraeli had previously said the same thing in the House of Commons: “The discipline, order, and government of the Roman Catholic Church are not voluntary. They are the creation of the simple will of a sovereign pontiff” (if he means Jesus Christ, the phrase is Catholic), “and do not depend at all on the voluntary principle.... I maintain that as long as his Holiness the Pope possesses Rome, the Roman Catholic religion, in whatever country it is found, is an establishment.” In fact, there is a great deal of truth in these remarks. How, indeed, can undisciplined guerrillas contend against a well-trained army of veterans? How can a number of voluntary associations, like so many insurance or stock companies, liable at any moment to disband, with no cohesive power, compete with a grand organization whose charter is divine, whose officers are divinely appointed, and whose laws bind in conscience in spite of adverse imperial, royal, or republican legislation? The peers were right; Mr. Disraeli is partially right. No sect or combination of sects can for any length of time, in a fair field, compete with the Catholic Church. Hence the cry of the sects in this country for state aid. The Catholic Church never asked for it except as a matter of justice or restitution. Whenever it was bestowed on her institutions, it was because they deserved it. If much was given to her, it was because her hierarchy or her religious orders, inspired by divine zeal, had founded and organized charitable institutions while the sects were asleep, lacking even in sufficient philanthropy, not to say charity, to provide for the wants of their own suffering members. The Catholic Church built and organized her asylums, schools, and other institutions, tried to support them, and did bravely support them, as she still does in this country, by the voluntary contributions of generous Christians, before the state gave anything. The sects did very little. They were too indolent, too deficient in vitality, to do much. They begged from the state. They threw the burden on the state; so that, whereas in Catholic times there were no state poor-houses, state asylums, or state charities, now they swarm. Protestantism is too cold a system to warm the hearts of men into life-giving charity; so it depends, except in rare cases, on the state for the support of the poor and the orphans. The money is taken from the public treasury for the support of schools, asylums, and kindred institutions.23 Such being [pg 030] the case, who can blame Catholics for receiving a portion of their own taxes to help their own institutions, mainly supported on the voluntary system? Are not the frequenters of Catholic schools and the inmates of Catholic institutions the children and citizens of the state as well as others? Will the state educate or support as cheaply as the church has done, or make as good citizens as she makes? If Catholic charitable institutions are abolished, if Catholic schools are broken up, how much will it annually cost the state for the building of new institutions and for their maintenance? Are the Sisters of Charity as safe custodians of the morality of orphans as the spinsters and political hirelings of the state institutions? Are teachers and matrons who work primarily from a religious motive as apt to discharge their duty faithfully as those who labor primarily for the “consideration” attached to their services? Well do the gentlemen who attack the Catholic Church know how futile it is for any sect to strive against her unless backed up by state aid; and hence, perhaps, the cry which has recently resounded throughout our country for a national or state church—a national Protestant church in opposition to the never-ceasing progress of Catholicity.

The late “Evangelical Alliance” publicly endorsed the cry of a national church. The Rev. W. H. Fremantle, M.A., of London, an ecclesiastical functionary of the national church of England, in “a manner,” as the report in the Tribune has it, “quick and energetic, and, as he warmed to his subject, eloquent to a degree which elicited great applause,” on October 9, 1873, at a meeting of the “Alliance,” urged on his hearers the advantages and necessity of having a national church, “the true ruling elders” of which should be “our statesmen, our judges, and our officers who bear the supreme mandate of the whole Christian community.” With laconic pith, he said: “The Christian nation is a church.” The applause elicited by his remarks was no doubt due to the fact that his auditors remembered how admirably the Christian “statesmen” in Congress and our late Vice-President, some of our “judges,” our “Evangelical” bankers and merchants, represented the interests of the Alliance in their respective avocations! The Rev. W. J. Menzies, of Edinburgh, emissary of the national church of Scotland, seconded and approved the doctrines of his Episcopalian brother. In vain did a sturdy American, the Hon. J. L. M. Curry, LL.D., of Richmond, try to defend the American system and the principles of our Constitution against these well-fed and well-paid gentlemen. The rubicund foreigners of the church establishments of Denmark, Sweden, and Germany came to the rescue of their English and Scottish brethren. They had preached to the “Alliance” in favor of the tithes, taxes, and intolerance of their own establishments, and were not willing to allow Mr. Curry to oppose them. The very president of the “Alliance,” himself an American, was obliged to coerce the honorable gentleman [pg 031] into silence. His voice was drowned in an “evangelical” chorus of national churchmen. We are no longer, then, astonished to read that the Rev. Dr. Stoughton, of England, was greeted in a Protestant Sunday-school in this city with the anthem of “God save the Queen.” It was not a religious hymn, mark it well, but an anthem in praise of the head of a church establishment, who is more than pope, for she is impeccable as well as infallible, according to the axiom of English law that “the king can do no wrong.” No longer are we surprised to learn that the head of another national church, the would-be pope-Emperor of Germany, gave the “Evangelical Council” his blessing; that several of our highest magistrates, unless they are belied, have been secretly leagued against the Catholic Church in favor of a state Protestantism. Newspapers of reputed rank have been continually striving to create a Protestant public spirit in the state, and thus, as it were, to prepare the way for an absolute union of church and state on a Protestant basis. Indeed, we have a national, or at least a state, church already; although it has so far been administered to us only in homœopathic doses. Have we not a state school system with a Protestant Bible on its rostrum? Have we not “Juvenile Asylums,” “Soldiers' and Sailors' Homes,” state charitable institutions all controlled on the Protestant system, conducted to a great extent by Protestant clergymen? Are not the Bibles used in them Protestant? Are not the school-books essentially sectarian in which such expressions as “gor-bellied monks,” the “glorious Reformation,” the “great and saintly Martin Luther,” are frequent? Have we not a Protestant Indian policy and a Protestant “Freedman's Bureau”?

It is true you cannot call the colorless Protestantism of these institutions peculiarly Methodist, or peculiarly Episcopalian, or peculiarly Baptist; but it is nevertheless Protestantism. We have a name for it. The late “Evangelical Alliance” gives it to us. The word “Evangelicalism” will express the Protestantism of our incipient national and state churches. We defy any impartial visitor to the so-called “non-sectarian” state institutions to deny that their chief male officers, superintendents, guardians, and teachers have been chosen on account of their “Evangelicalism.” Every one that knows the inner working of our state institutions for charitable purposes is aware that they are mere pastures in which Evangelical ministers are retired on salaries of thousands a year taken from the state pocket.

The desire for having a state or national church is growing stronger. German imperialism, or pagan Roman Cæsarism revived, has given an impetus to it in Europe, in order to create a foreign public opinion to sanction its own persecutions of the Catholic Church at home. Switzerland has been moved by the pull of the German wire. Perhaps the same influence is at work in our republic. Or is it that a certain class of the Protestant clergy, dreading starvation if left depending on the bounty of flocks that are losing their Christianity and its generous impulses, envious of the portly frames and plethoric purses of the foreigners of the European establishments who lately visited our shores and banqueted at our expense, long to draw nutriment from the bosom of an established mother, rather than risk death from marasmus [pg 032] at the breasts of a dry and barren voluntary system? If this be the cause of the growing “Evangelicalism” of the sects, of their effort to combine for the purpose of giving us a national church, let us devoutly pray that the next delegates from abroad will be as spare in person and purse as our own country parsons. For the sake of our republican institutions, may his divine and imperial majesty of Germany and her gracious ecclesiastical majesty of England send hither no more of their rotund and jocund functionaries, to make the hearts of our Evangelical clergymen yearn after the flesh-pots of Egypt!

Or can it be that the venerable heads of our “Evangelical” mayors, governors, and their compeers, returning in their senility, as is not uncommon with decaying brains, to their early loves, are striving to restore the state establishments of the old Puritan colonies? The recollection that all the original colonies except Catholic Maryland had a state church has not yet died out among these “Evangelical” ancients. They remember that so late even as 1793 an attempt was made even in New York to saddle an Episcopalian establishment on the back of our state, and this, too, at a time when the members of the Holland Reformed Churches were in the proportion of fifteen to one Church-of-Englander! Perhaps Governor Dix has an agreeable recollection of this beauteous trait in the character of his sect. Perhaps he remembers how well she had battened on the flesh and blood of the Irish people for centuries, though her votaries were not one-twentieth part of the Irish population. In 1643, the “orthodox” Episcopalian colony of Virginia expelled two New England Puritan ministers; while the New England Puritans, by way of “Evangelical” retaliation, sent back to Old England two professors of Anglicanism. The poor Quakers were driven out by all the colonies except Catholic Maryland. Indeed, even our modern “Evangelicals” had not the courtesy to invite them to their “Alliance.” In Virginia, the man who refused to have his child baptized was fined two thousand pounds of tobacco. In the colonies of Massachusetts and New Haven, for a time only church members could exercise the full powers of citizenship. The legislatures of the New England colonies convoked even the church synods. These were truly “Evangelical” times, and after these do the “Evangelicals” hanker. So late even as 1779 tithes were collected by law in some of the colonies. In fact, it was only in 1818 that the separation of church and state was effected in Connecticut. But in those days the Catholics were few, and nobody feared them. If they had been as numerous and formidable then as they are now, the disestablishment would never have been accomplished. These were the halcyon days when, in the words of Rev. Mr. Fremantle, already quoted, “the Christian nation was a church,” “the true ruling elders of which were statesmen, judges, and officers who bore the supreme mandate of the whole Christian community.” What a yearning there is for the return of those good times when none but “Evangelicals” may hold office to defraud the revenue, invest in Crédit Mobilier stock, or manage banking houses for the purpose of swindling credulous “Evangelical” depositors!

It is timely to warn all good citizens against the Protestant effort to restore the state-church system of the early colonies. The Rev. W. H. Campbell, D.D., of New Brunswick, at one session of the “Alliance” said: “Revolution has everywhere borrowed the force of its political ideas from the Protestants of the XVIth century.” Never was language more correct. Rebellion against lawful authority, the overthrow of legitimate governments, the subversion of civil society, the destruction of law and order in modern times, are all traceable to Protestant principles. Nor can you ever tell where they will stop. As there is no fixity or certainty or unalterable code of doctrine or morals in Protestantism, a statesman can never tell when its councils will be impelled by whim, fanaticism, or prejudice. There is no telling but that the Protestant assembly which to-day favors the state to-morrow will be in revolt against it. It has been on the side of unbridled license, of the extreme of liberty; and, again, it has been the creature, the slave, the blind instrument of despotism. A statesman always knows what to expect from the Catholic Church and her assemblies. Her principles are patent, her system plain, her doctrines unchanging, her secondary discipline modifiable according to law or necessity, but only by the spiritual power. She is always conservative, never revolutionary. She gives to Cæsar what belongs to him, but no more. She makes a reserve in her allegiance to the state: she reserves the rights of God, the rights of conscience. She must obey God rather than men when men try to alter or subvert God's revelation. If the state wishes to persecute her, it may begin at once. She has nothing to hide from the state; and she will alter nothing of her doctrines. If the state dislikes her, at any rate she is an open foe. But Protestantism is a fickle subject. Like the ancient pagans, she admits the supremacy of the state over her; admits that the church is only a voluntary corporation subordinate to the state; yet practically she is never to be depended on. Fickle by nature, the state can never tell when a fit of madness may seize on her; when her imagination may be possessed by some idea subversive alike of good order and even of morality. We all know the history of the Anabaptists and Antinomians in Germany; the deeds of violence of the Independents in England. Protestantism, like a wanton filly, carries the state as a rider, but always at the risk of its neck. Let our statesmen, then, beware of the attempt which is being made to give us, if not a national, at least a state church. The threat has been made that when slavery was abolished, the next thing to undertake would be the destruction of the Catholic Church by the establishment of a state church.

It is easy to show that a national church is essentially opposed to our American principles, and that consequently all attempts to establish one are anti-American. On this point many rationalists and infidels agree with Catholics, as they logically must when they argue from sound principles of pure reason or of pure politics. The Catholic religion recognizes the competency of reason in its own sphere, and admits its logical inerrancy. All the principles of the natural, political, metaphysical, or moral order known with certainty even by those who do not believe in revelation at all, are the common property of the [pg 034] Catholic Church; for although she insists on the subordination of reason to faith, she asserts emphatically the autonomy of reason, and condemns those who would abridge its powers. Hence true statesmen who judge our Federal or State constitutions from the viewing-point of reason alone agree with Catholics in opposition to the so-called “Evangelicals,” the chief of whom believe in “total depravity,” the loss of free will, and unmerited damnation. The ablest lawyers in the country teach that the fundamental idea of our civil government is that there shall be no interference of the state in church affairs. Absolute independence of the church; no interference of the state in religious matters—such is the American idea. It is expressly laid down in the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States that Congress shall have no power to legislate on religious questions. The ablest commentary perhaps ever written on the Constitution is the Federalist; some of the best articles in which were written by Alexander Hamilton, whose son has recently published them. The teaching of this great man is that the framers of the Constitution were especially anxious to eschew church establishments or state religions in the policy of our republic. Indeed, some of the leading authors of the Constitution were rationalists, and more afraid of Protestant sectarian interference in state affairs than they were of the Catholic Church, which in their days was not strong enough to be feared. “Our theory is,” writes Gerrit Smith, “that the people shall enjoy absolute freedom in politics and religion.” Of course this freedom could not exist if we had a state church. Mr. Smith, whose intelligence and Americanism no one can dispute, in his celebrated letter on the school question,24 from which the above phrase is taken, adds: “A lawyer than whom there is no abler in the land, and who is as eminent for integrity as for ability, writes me: ‘I am against the government's being permitted to do anything which can be entrusted to individuals under the equal regulation of general laws.’ ” How few of the “Evangelicals” would be willing to act on this correct interpretation of our Constitution? How could they so easily give up the government pap that nourishes the Methodist preachers of the “Freedman's Bureau” and the “Indian Bureau,” not to speak of the other countless branches of our homœopathic national church?

The attempt to establish a state church is also opposed to most of our State constitutions, and notably to that of New York. The first constitution of this State was so essentially hostile to a church establishment that it contained an article incapacitating any minister of the Gospel from holding any office, civil or military. Tradition has it that some Episcopalian minister, playing the political marplot in the preliminary convention, had so annoyed Mr. Jay that he had the article inserted. In 1846, this article was expunged; and ever since our State legislature, our public offices, and even our judiciary, have been afflicted by ambitious, incompetent, sometimes even illiterate, and always bigoted, political preachers. They are always striving to inflict on us more and more of their bigotry, while their acts show that one of their chief [pg 035] aims is to gratify the “Evangelical” appetite for power. We must especially guard our State constitution from the treacherous assaults of the sects. Even now their express provisions are violated or evaded.25 They are easily modified.26 Some of them are not inconsistent with a church establishment, and may at any moment become the prey of “Evangelical” bigotry or fanaticism.

Catholics are by conviction opposed to a change in the character of our Federal and State—we speak of New York—constitutions. They do not conflict with the Catholic idea. There is nothing in or out of the Syllabus that is opposed to our system of government. This we shall now proceed to show. Pius IX., on December 17, 1860, in an allocution condemned a proposition which begins with these words: “National churches may be established.” It is number 37 in the Syllabus. We know that it will be objected to us that the Pope also condemns the attempt to separate church and state in countries in which they are by law united, and the abstract principle that they ought to be separate. It is true that where church and state have been united, not by force, but by the nature of things and the sanction of laws, it is condemnable to attack their union as iniquitous or improper; but it is also true that it is not always obligatory or expedient on the part of the state, as such, to establish a church, build its institutions, and salary its clergy out of a common fund. The Roman pontiffs, in the height of their temporal power, never compelled the Jews to build with their money Catholic churches and pay the salaries of Catholic priests. Let us historically examine the character of the union of church and state in the Catholic countries of Europe, and we shall find how just, fair, and honorable such an union becomes. What was the title to most of the Catholic church property in Europe? None better. The barbarian baron or king, grateful to the priest, the monk, or the bishop who had civilized him and taught him to save his soul, generously built a church or a monastery and endowed it. Legacies, donations, free gifts—these were the means by which the bishopric and monasteries grew rich. No title to property is better than this, which a thousand years had sanctioned. Of course every new donation increased the power of the church. The temporalities of the church had natural influence in the state. The abbots and bishops were peers of the realm. The church lived on her own resources—neither asked nor received anything from the state except protection and liberty. Before the Reformation, this was the character of the close union between the church and state. After the Reformation, when the church had lost her power chiefly through the corrupting influence of the kings and barons on the [pg 036] bishops and abbots, despite the protests and the efforts of the popes, the politicians confiscated the church property. This confiscation was simply robbery, for the church corporations, as well as individuals, had rights which the state was bound to respect. But it happened, as it often happens, that wicked kings or mercenary and unprincipled politicians used the political machinery of the state legally to rob the church. They abused the right of eminent domain. Gov. Dix himself, in his annual message for 1874, limits the exercise of this right. “The right,” says he, “of every individual to be secured in the undisturbed enjoyment of his property lies at the foundation of all responsible government. It is, indeed, one of the primary objects for which governments are instituted. To this fundamental rule there is but one proper exception. If private property is needed for public use, it may be taken by making just compensation to the owner; but the use must be one which is common to all, or which is indispensable to the accomplishment of some object of public necessity. This right of eminent domain, as it is denominated, is an incident of sovereignty, and it is one of the most arbitrary of all the powers of government.”27 It is unquestionably the “most arbitrary of all the powers of government,” if we consider how many are the demagogues, political traders, and mercenary corruptionists who help to make the laws in parliaments, congresses, or State legislatures to regulate the property of respectable people; and how often the executive power in the state, be it imperial, regal, presidential, or gubernatorial, is wielded by despotic and corrupt hands. Imagine a parliament of Communists using the right of eminent domain of the state against the lands and tenements owned by the Trinity Church corporation of New York; or an assembly of “Evangelicals” legislating in regard to Catholic church property! The state in France, for instance, during the Revolution stripped the church of her lawful possessions; Napoleon endeavored to bring order back to the Republic by re-establishing the church. But it is plain that the salary allowed by his concordat in a.d. 1801 to the clergy, and the revenue allowed by the state for the maintenance of church edifices, was not a tithe of the interest accruing from the property stolen by the state from the church. The sum now allowed to support the Catholic clergy of France is, therefore, only a fraction of restitution money due to them by the state. So it is in other countries in which the state, after confiscating the church property, salaries the clergy. The church in those countries does not get her due. She asks no favor from them; she does not even get her rights. The propositions in the Syllabus referring to the union of church and state must be explained in the light of these facts. The Catholic Church does not go to China or to Turkey, and say to the governments of those countries: “You must establish me here; you must build my temples and schools and asylums.” No, she claims no right of eminent domain over the pockets of infidels; and even when she converts them, she only asks their voluntary aid. All she asks is liberty to work and protection [pg 037] in her legitimate duties. She and her converts will do the rest. This was all she asked of the Roman emperors; this she asked of the mediæval kings. If they gave her liberty and protection, she thanked them, blessed them, worked for them, and civilized them. If they refused, still she blessed them and worked in spite of them; for she must “obey God rather than men.” She might with justice ask more than this in Prussia or England or Sweden; for there she might ask back her stolen property. But in this country she only asks a fair field and no favor. Contrast her conduct with that of Protestantism. Protestantism goes to the state begging on her knees; admitting the state's supremacy over her; confessing that she is the humble servant of the king; and asks his gracious bounty. She will gladly sit on the foot of his throne as his slave, though a dangerous and treacherous one, if he will only smile on her, clothe and feed her. She will even stoop to become the receiver of stolen goods. Is it not so? Where is there a national Protestant church really established that is not living on property stolen by the state from the Catholic Church? Look to England and Scotland. Are not the Protestant establishments in those lands the possessors of ill-gotten goods—of lands and churches iniquitously stolen from the Catholic Church? Surely the orthodox Catholic laity of the middle ages who gave these demesnes to the monasteries and churches never intended that the king should turn them over to a heretical establishment. The Prussian establishment is a theft from beginning to end; for every one knows that the apostate head of the Catholic religious order which ruled the duchy of Brandenburg, and laid the foundation of the Prussian power, had no right to transfer the property of his order to a Protestant clergy. Who could defend such a proceeding? Would our “Evangelical” brethren approve the conduct of a Protestant board of trustees or vestrymen who, on being converted, or a majority of them being converted, to the Catholic faith, should by a trick transfer the property of their congregation, their church, or college to the Catholic authorities to be used for Catholic purposes? How, then, can they approve the conduct of the English, German, and Scandinavian clergy who have received the lands and buildings taken from the Catholics by violence and regal usurpation? There is truly a very great difference between the Protestant and Catholic church establishments of Europe—a difference in origin, as well as in the manner of their continuance—and this difference is by no means flattering to the honesty or manliness of the sects. Correctly, therefore, did we say that Catholic principles as well as true American principles are opposed to a state church establishment in this country, and that nothing in the Syllabus condemns our system of government.

It is time, therefore, for all true American citizens to unite under the Catholic standard of opposition to national or state church establishments. The rights of conscience, the rights of religion, are the rights of God. They are not national, but universal; that is, catholic. We are not willing to come back to the pagan régime of Roman Cæsarism, and admit the ruler of the state or the state itself as supreme master of religion as well as of politics. The “Evangelical” [pg 038] semi-paganized Protestants of Germany may bow the knee to the modern Cæsar, and admit him to be supreme pontiff; but they must keep their despotism at home. The Swiss “Evangelicals” may revive the ancient Spartan worship of the state, and assert its supremacy in spiritual matters; but they must keep their statolatry from our shores. The true American, like the true Catholic, will bow the knee to no idol, not even to the state, much as he may love it. He adores only his God. The state shall not interfere with his conscience, or dare to come between him and his God, no matter how much these foreign “Evangelical” emissaries may wish it. He is Catholic, even when he least suspects it. He hates despotisms, as the Catholic Church does; he suspects that German “Evangelicalism” is only a livery stolen to cover unbelief, as the Catholic Church knows it to be. He suspects the sincerity of those foreign “Evangelical” emissaries and their native hypocritical associates who preach in favor of state-church establishments; he suspects them as traitors to American liberty or as seekers for notoriety or a full purse. When his suspicions have been clearly proven correct, he will turn from the sects in disgust, to love the grand old church which can be controlled by no national or state limits, and which has been battling all her lifetime against emperors and kings for the very principles of liberty that constitute the glory and the greatness of our republic.

The Captive Bird.

From the French of Marie Jenna.

The Farm Of Muiceron. By Marie Rheil.

From The Revue Du Monde Catholique.

Home Rule For Ireland.

The term Home Rule as applied to British politics, in its local signification, has been a very unfamiliar one to American readers until quite recently, and even yet it is not generally recognized as the watch-word of a powerful and growing political party in and outside of the English Parliament, which has its headquarters in Ireland, and numerous ramifications extending throughout the principal cities and towns of England, Wales, and Scotland. In its leading features and designs this new organization may be said to be in fact the revival by another generation of the one formerly founded and led by O'Connell, and, like its prototype, is established for the purpose of effecting by constitutional means the abrogation of the treaty of union between Great Britain and Ireland, which was so delusively concocted and ratified, in the name of those countries, at the close of the last century; and the consequent reconstruction of the Irish Parliament on a footing of equality with that of England.

It is by no means what might be called a revolutionary movement, for it seeks neither to pull down nor destroy, by force or conspiracy, those bulwarks which society has raised for its own protection against lawless and unscrupulous demagogues; its object is simply to restore, as far as desirable and practicable, the old order of things, and to redress, even at this late day, an act of flagrant wrong and injustice done three-quarters of a century ago to a long misgoverned people, by restoring to them the right and power to regulate their own domestic affairs, subject, of course, to the authority of the common sovereign of the United Kingdoms.

The history of the treaty and acts of legislative union between Great Britain and Ireland, and of the motives which conduced to the formation of the conspiracy against the independence of an entire nation; of the plots formed in the fertile brain of Mr. Pitt against the civil and religious liberties of the sister kingdom, and but too successfully carried out by Castlereagh, Cooke, and other officials in Dublin, has never been sufficiently studied, even in this country, where every measure affecting the freedom of mankind, in what part of Christendom soever, possesses peculiar interest. This defective knowledge of a subject comparatively modern may be attributed partly to the fact that we Americans have been too much in the habit of looking at foreign politics through English spectacles, and in part because there seems to be a principle in human nature which inclines us to ignore, if not despise, the sufferings of the needy and unfortunate. Vanquished nations are regarded generally as are poor relations whom no one cares to know or acknowledge.

And yet the circumstances which eventually led to the destruction of the Irish Parliament were almost contemporary with, and to a certain degree grew out of, our own Revolution. The causes that effected the severance of the North American colonies from the mother country, [pg 055] and facilitated the consummation of our aspirations for independence, operated, paradoxical as it may seem, to bind Ireland firmer in the chains of alien thraldom, as well as to extinguish the last spark of her freedom.

It is generally conceded that the Irish Parliament, from its inception in the XIVth century till 1782, was not only not the legitimate legislative representative of even a moiety of the people of that country, but was actually a very efficient instrument in the hands of their enemies. At first it was merely an irregular gathering of the nobles and chief men of the “Pale”—a term applied for hundreds of years after the invasion to four or five counties on the eastern and southeastern sea-board, over which the Anglo-Normans held sway. Whenever a raid on the native chieftains was projected, or a scheme of spoliation to be adopted, it had long been the custom of the lord deputy, or other representative of English authority, to summon the heads of Anglo-Irish houses and a few of the principal burghers of the larger towns and cities within his jurisdiction, to meet him at Dublin, Drogheda, or Kilkenny, and, having given the motley gathering the sonorous title of parliament, to demand the enactment of new statutes against the “Irish enemy,” or to extort fresh levies of men and money for his incursions into the interior.

Gradually, however, those erratic assemblies began to assume form and regularity, and even to display a certain independence of action distasteful to the governing power. As English conquest in Ireland gradually widened its sphere, particularly in Leinster and Munster, the number of members who attended those sessions increased; and as the descendants of the invaders, having lost the attachment of their forefathers to England, naturally evinced a desire to legislate for themselves, it was thought desirable in London to nip in the bud a flower which might insensibly expand into national independence. Accordingly, in the reign of the seventh Henry, the Irish Parliament being still weak and yielding, a bill was passed by it acknowledging the dependence of that body on the king of England and his council. This act, called after its originator, Poynings, most effectually repressed the aspirations of the only representative body in the kingdom, and produced the desired results. But as if this were not enough, we find subsequently, in the reign of William and Mary especially, instances of the English Parliament legislating directly for Ireland; and in the sixth of George I. there was passed a declaratory act which, if any vestiges of freedom or manhood yet remained in the Irish Parliament, most effectually destroyed them. These efforts, thus made from time to time to destroy the liberty and efficiency of the Parliament, naturally disgusted a great many of its members who had the least spark of self-respect or personal honor left, and drove them from the nation's councils; those who remained being almost without exception government officials or newly-arrived and needy adventurers, ignorant of the character, wants, and wishes of the people, who hoped, by the display of extraordinary zeal and sycophancy, to push their fortunes and find favor in the eyes of the Castle authorities. It is not surprising, then, that a body composed of such elements should have unhesitatingly voted away the royalty of the ancient [pg 056] kingdom to Henry VIII., whose predecessors never claimed a higher title than that of lord; that at the bidding of the same monster, it officially and almost unanimously declared for the Reformation, and with equal alacrity, in the reign of his daughter Mary, explicitly repudiated everything it had done a few years previously.

Yet it still bore the semblance of a national legislature; and, gradually yielding to the influence of a growing public opinion, some good men, Catholics as well as Protestants, were again to be found among its members in the subsequent reigns, until that of William III., when, by an unconstitutional law of the English Parliament, the former were for ever excluded, and never during its existence was one of that proscribed faith allowed to sit on its benches. From this reign also may be dated the many cruel penal enactments, over one hundred in number, which disgraced its statute-books; though, to do its members justice, they never went so far in ferocity and ingenuity as did their brethren of London at the same period and even long previously.

But though four-fifths of the people were disfranchised and their co-religionists denied a seat in the Parliament, that body was again gradually approaching the assertion of its right of self-legislation. A new generation had sprung up during the later half of the XVIIIth century who knew not William of Orange nor the bitter anti-Irish prejudices that characterized his followers. The bold, incisive, and satirical writings of Swift, the learned disquisitions of Molyneux, and the homely but vigorous appeals of Lucas, had not been without their effect on the young students of Trinity and other colleges, fresh from the study of the lessons of human liberty so frequently found in classic lore; and the consequence was that when they entered the Parliament as members, confident in their position as gentlemen of fortune, and self-reliant, not only from their aristocratic connections, but from their innate sense of mental superiority, language began to be heard and applauded which, for elegance, grace, and manliness, had never been equalled in that hall before. The outbreak of our Revolution, the broad principles of justice and humanity laid down in the speeches and writings of our ancestors, and the trumpet-toned Declaration of Independence occurring at the same time, gave an impetus and a clarity of ideas on questions of government which, up to that time, had assumed neither form nor consistency.

The first symptoms of active agitation for their political rights may be said to have sprung up at this period among the Irish of all conditions and creeds, but more especially in Ulster and the cities of Dublin, Cork, and Limerick—the homes of manufactures and the centres of produce, exports, etc. Their grievances were of two classes: restriction on foreign trade, and parliamentary dependence and corruption. Under the first head, it was charged, and with great truth, that Irish merchants were prohibited by English laws from trading with France, Spain, Portugal, Holland, many of the West India Islands, and the whole of Asia, for the purpose of benefiting their rivals in England; thus utterly crippling the manufacturing interests of the country, and completely stopping the exportation to these markets of farm products, of which she had [pg 057] even then a superabundant supply. This limitation of commerce had long been not only the principal cause of the impoverishment of the nation, but a fruitful source of clamor and popular discontent, which had invariably been unheeded by the dominant power as long as it was able to repress them by the strong arm. At length, however, a change was about to take place. Soon after our War of Independence broke out and the French alliance was cemented, England was obliged to withdraw from Ireland nearly the whole of her military and naval forces, thus leaving the latter undefended by either regulars or militia, and at any moment open to attack from the allies. Indeed, Paul Jones several times appeared on the coast, and in 1779-80 the Franco-Spanish fleets were absolute masters of the Channel. The people, kept in a constant state of alarm, at last determined to arm for mutual protection; and thus was originated that short-lived but remarkable body of citizen soldiery known as the Irish Volunteers.

The movement began in Belfast in August, 1778, and before two years elapsed it had spread over the whole country, and counted on its muster-rolls nearly one hundred thousand men, fully armed and equipped at their own expense. Noblemen, judges, magistrates, and prominent members of Parliament were proud to serve in the Volunteers as company or field officers; and Lord Charlemont, one of the most accomplished and liberal members of his order, accepted the office of commander-in-chief.

The external security of the island having thus been amply provided for, attention was naturally turned to internal evils. Various meetings of Volunteers were held in the several counties, and strong resolutions passed in favor of the freedom of foreign trade. The Castle authorities were not in a position to resist a demand so made; the Irish Parliament, led by such men as Grattan, Flood, and other nationalists, voted in favor of the immediate emancipation of commerce; and the British premier, Lord North, in December, 1779, submitted three propositions to the English Parliament to permit the export of glass and woollens from Ireland, and permission for her to trade with the American colonies, Africa, and the West Indies. During the following February, a bill embodying these provisions was introduced by the ministry, and passed with little opposition.

This point gained, the Volunteers set to work to free the Irish Parliament itself from all dependence on the London Privy Council and the Parliament of the sister kingdom. In April, 1780, Grattan moved his Declaration of Rights, which avowed, among other truths, “that his most excellent majesty, by and with the consent of the lords and commons of Ireland, are the only power competent to enact the laws to bind Ireland.” This resolution was, however, opposed on technical grounds, and withdrawn. During the following year, Mr. Yelverton asked leave to bring in a bill virtually repealing Poynings' law, which was granted by a vote of 167 against 37, though later in the session Flood's motion of a similar purport was defeated by a majority of 72. The people, who had anxiously watched the action of their representatives, were now in a ferment of excitement, and numerous meetings of civilians and Volunteers were held throughout the provinces, the most noteworthy of which was the [pg 058] convention of the Ulster Volunteers at Dungannon, February 15, 1782. This powerful assembly passed a series of manly resolutions in favor of the right of the subject to bear arms, to express his opinions freely on political affairs, and to worship God according to the dictates of his conscience; but the one most to the point read as follows: “Resolved, unanimously, That a claim of any body of men other than the king, lords, and commons of Ireland to make laws to bind this kingdom is unconstitutional, illegal, and a grievance.” This was followed up by like meetings in the other sections of the country, at which similar resolutions were adopted. A few days after there was a change of ministry in England, and of course a change of policy. Messages were sent in the name of the king to both Parliaments, ordering them to take into their most serious consideration “the discontents and jealousies prevailing among his loyal subjects of Ireland, in order to such a final adjustment as may give mutual satisfaction to both kingdoms.” The answer of the Irish Parliament to this demand met with no opposition on the question of its adoption, though it declared emphatically “that there is no body of men competent to make laws to bind this nation except the king, lords, and commons of Ireland; nor any other parliament which hath any authority or power of any sort whatever in this country save only the Parliament of Ireland.” There was no mistaking or avoiding this expression of public opinion, endorsed as it had been by a national army able and willing to second their demands; so in May, 1782, the act of sixth George I. was repealed in the English Parliament, and the old objectionable law of Poynings simultaneously suffered a similar fate in that of Ireland.

Irish trade was now free, and Irish legislation independent at least of alien dictation; but another great task lay before the Volunteers, which unless accomplished, their well-won victories were likely to prove barren indeed. This was the purification of their own House of Commons, and the right of representation for the people at large. That the popular branch of the legislature wanted reformation badly may be judged from the status of its members as given by contemporary writers. Only seventy-two of them were returned by vote; one hundred and thirty-three sat for “nomination” or “close” boroughs, absolutely controlled by a few peers; ninety-five were similarly sent to the Parliament by about fifty commoners; so that, out of the three hundred members of the house, two hundred and twenty-eight were wholly and solely dependent for their seats on less than half their own number. When we consider, also, that of those creatures at least one-half were officials, pensioners, or expectants of pensions and government favors, we can well imagine how little reliance could be placed on their integrity or honesty in a struggle between a hostile, inimical power and the people; and it must also be remembered that at that time neither the right of representation nor of suffrage was allowed to the Catholics, who comprised seventy or eighty per cent. of the entire population.

The Volunteers, therefore, set to work to do for their countrymen what fifty years afterwards was at least partially effected by the Emancipation and Reform Acts for the United Kingdoms. They again held meetings, passed resolutions, and [pg 059] even called a national convention to meet in Dublin during the Parliamentary session of 1783-4. One hundred and sixty delegates accordingly met in the Rotunda amid the general congratulations of the citizens and the high hopes of the nation. But, alas! this sanguine confidence in the manliness and liberality of the delegates soon received a shock so rude that its effects were felt in the most remote parts of the island, and carried with them gloom and dismay to the masses of the people.

The Volunteers were an essentially, and it might be said an exclusively, Protestant organization from the beginning, but it was earnestly supported by the Catholics from a feeling that unrestricted trade and legislative independence were national boons of the first importance, as well as from an apparently well-founded trust that, these being obtained, the abrogation of the penal laws and the right of representation would speedily follow. They could not believe that an influential but very small minority, seeking liberty for themselves, would persistently deny it to the large majority of their countrymen. They were now about to be undeceived. One of the very first resolutions passed at the convention read as follows: “Resolved, That the Protestant inhabitants of this country are required by the statute law to carry arms and to learn the use of them,” etc.; and, lest any doubt should remain of the bigotry and narrow-mindedness which pervaded the representatives of the Volunteers, the plan of reform, as drawn up by Flood and subsequently adopted, was made to read thus: “That every Protestant freeholder or leaseholder, possessing a freehold or leasehold for a certain term of years of forty shillings' value, resident in any city or borough, should be entitled to vote at the election of a member for the same.”

The limitation of the right to bear arms and to vote to Protestants only was the destruction of the moral as well as physical power of the Volunteers, and a death-blow to the longings and aspirations of the patriotic Catholics. It was more than a blunder, it was a crime—a piece of rank, selfish hypocrisy, which ill became men who had the words of freemen on their lips, but, it appears, the feelings of tyrants in their hearts. In vain did the Irish Catholics protest in a series of resolutions; in vain did the Earl of Bristol, then Protestant Bishop of Derry, vehemently advocate the claims of the people to something like religious and social equality. The convention was deaf to all remonstrance and entreaty, and blindly rushed to its own destruction.

It had taken the only step that could have gratified its enemies, and, by throwing away the friendship and support of the vast majority of the population, it left itself exposed and naked to the attacks and machinations of the Castle authorities. Pending the American war, England looked with fear and anxiety on that large body of armed men that could at any time, and with little risk, sever the connection between the two countries, for she was powerless to resist them; yet, when somewhat recovered from her humiliating defeats in her quondam colonies, she turned all her attention and used all her art to destroy not only the Volunteers, but the Parliament that had recognized and fostered them. She was determined, if possible, that such a dreaded contingency should not occur again. The convention, as we have seen, [pg 060] had rejected the moderate demands of the Catholics, many of whom, despairing of justice in that quarter, naturally looked to the government for some modification of their disabilities; while the Parliament, always under official control, took advantage of the occasion to sow division and discord among its members. When Flood, fresh from the Rotunda, moved for leave to bring in a reform bill embodying the plans of the convention, it was refused by a majority of eighty in a total vote of two hundred and thirty-four.

The history of Ireland from this time till the close of the century could well be blotted out, for the sake of human nature, from the annals of the race. The Volunteers, who ought not only to have been the defenders of the country from foreign enemies, but the protectors of the civil rights of their countrymen at home, after the scornful rejection of their claims by Parliament and the adjournment of their convention, ceased to be either feared or respected. Many of their most prominent officers went over to the government, others of more advanced views joined the secret society known as the United Irishmen. The English authorities, having thus succeeded in their first project even beyond their expectations, applied themselves with extraordinary industry to carry out the second. Agrarian outrages became more frequent; “Peep-o'-day boys” and “Defenders” terrified the peaceful farmers of one or other side; Orangemen were petted and armed, while Catholic bishops and priests were deluded with false promises; the royal grant to Maynooth College was increased at the same time that martial law was proclaimed in the most peaceful Catholic districts; and churches were being burned to the ground unrestrictedly by those who wore the king's livery. At the general election, which took place in 1790, the most scandalous means were adopted to secure a thoroughly subservient majority in the lower house; and, lest this should not be sufficient, new peers were created through corrupt influence, in order that the lords might not offer any opposition to the behests of the Castle.

It is difficult to imagine the scenes of outrage, rapine, private revenge, and general consternation which grew out of a persistence in so wily and nefarious a policy. Supported secretly by the authorities, the Orangemen became utterly regardless of the lives of their Catholic neighbors; while they, with a choice only between the oppression of an armed faction of bigots on one side, and the tender mercies of English law on the other, naturally inclined to the latter as the lesser of two evils, and began to long for imperial protection. There were many, however, who joined the United Irishmen, and here again arose another division. That society was a sworn secret organization, and, as such, the hierarchy and the priesthood were bound to condemn it, no matter how much they may have sympathized with its aims, and to denounce all who were in its ranks.

But notwithstanding the state of fear, confusion, and disruption to which the country was reduced, the English officials still feared to bring before the Parliament the question of a union. A blow must first be struck that would drive terror into the hearts of the whole people; so terrible and sanguinary that even the greatest lover of his country's independence would, it was hoped, [pg 061] gladly desire peace and order, even at the price of British connection. This was done in 1798. The United Irishmen proposed to resort to armed insurrection and an appeal for French support, but as yet had committed no overt act of treason. The government, which had all along been cognizant of their schemes and movements, resolved to anticipate them by driving the country into premature rebellion; its tactics differing, however, in various localities. To Wexford, always a very peaceful, Catholic county, where there were very few United Irishmen, they sent the infamous North Cork militia, whose cruelty was only surpassed by their abject cowardice. These miscreants were to a man Orangemen, and their line of march to the town of Wexford, for miles on both sides, was marked by the ruins of burned chapels and the corpses of slaughtered peasantry. It was only then that the people of that country rose up in arms, seeking “the wild justice of revenge,” and waged on the murdrous brood a war which, for bravery and decisiveness during the time it lasted, has few parallels in modern history. In Dublin, the chiefs of the intended insurrection were suddenly seized, imprisoned, and many of them finally executed. The Presbyterians of Ulster, the originators of the United system, were hurried into untimely outbreaks by the knowledge of the discovery of their designs, and, after three or four detached efforts at rebellion, were easily put down by the militia and regular troops. Then came the judicial murders, drum-head courts-martial, torture and death. No man, no matter how innocent, considered himself safe, and no woman was free from insult and outrage. The spirit of the government seemed to be infused into all its officials from the highest judge on the bench to the lowest constable, and that spirit was one of terrorism and slaughter.

Ireland was now prostrate, defenceless, and bleeding from every artery and vein, and this was considered a fitting time to rob her of her Parliament, and snatch from her enervated grasp the last remnant of her independence. The measure was introduced into both Parliaments almost simultaneously, at first with doubtful success, but afterwards carried with little difficulty, except the expenditure of enormous sums by the government in bribing and pensioning members. The most alluring prospects were held out to the Catholics to induce them to support the measure out of Parliament—they had no voice inside of it—but, to their credit be it said, not even a moiety of them were deceived by such treacherous proposals. They were assured that, after the union, English capital would flow free as water into the country; that protection for their persons and property against Orange fanatics would be fully guaranteed; and that many of the more oppressive clauses in the penal code would be repealed—all of which, it is unnecessary to say, were conveniently forgotten by Pitt and his successors once the abominable bargain had been closed. The act of union passed the Irish House of Commons June 7, 1800, and the House of Lords on the 13th of the same month, to take effect on the 1st of January following.

The deed was at last accomplished, and Ireland, deceived, betrayed, and dejected, sank down into the lethargy of despair till once more aroused to action by the magnificent genius of the great agitator, [pg 062] O'Connell. For a long time he dared not hope or ask for a repeal of the union, but confined himself to the removal of Catholic disabilities, as the operation of the nefarious penal laws was elegantly called; though occasionally, in his more comprehensive speeches, he alluded to the future possibility of such a demand. Emancipation gained, the Reform Bill carried, and the tithe, poor law, and other questions of minor importance more or less satisfactorily disposed of, O'Connell turned his serious attention to the restoration of the Irish Parliament.

He initiated the movement in 1840, but for some time with very little appearance of making it in any sense a national one. The people were supine, and those who should have been their leaders rested content with comparative religious equality and the friendship of the Whigs, who, when in power, were always generous of petty offices to the poor relations and dependants of those who could influence elections in their favor. But the great Liberator, though he had nearly reached that term of threescore and ten allotted as the span of man's life, was still full of vigor and determination. He travelled through every part of Ireland, arousing the dormant, reassuring the timid, arguing with the disputatious, and hurling his anathemas against those who, from cowardice or venality, refused to join in the crusade against English influence in Ireland. His success was more than wonderful. The hierarchy unanimously declared in favor of “repeal,” the priesthood almost without exception became his warmest and most efficient supporters, and of course the mass of the people, always on the right side when properly led, greeted him everywhere with the wildest applause. Money poured in from all sides to help the national cause; not Ireland and the British Islands alone contributing their quota, but the continent of Europe and the ever-generous people of America lavishly advanced funds for the purpose of aiding the people in obtaining self-government.

Then came the year 1843—the year of the monster meetings at central and time-honored localities, such as Mallow, Tara, Mullaghmast, and Clontarf, where assembled countless thousands of well-dressed, well-conducted, and unarmed peasantry, to listen to the voice of their champion and his co-laborers, and to demand in peaceful terms the restoration of their filched legislative rights.

The British government was decidedly alarmed, and with good cause. It tried to stem the torrent of popular opinion by the most extravagant distribution of patronage, by landlord intimidation, the denunciations of a venal press, and even by intrigues at the court of Rome; but all to no effect. Rendered desperate, it even projected a general massacre at Clontarf; but this savage project was defeated by the judicious conduct of the repeal leaders. Next it evoked the terrors of the law; for in Ireland, unlike most free or partially free countries, the law has actual terrors for the good, but very little for the wicked. O'Connell and eight of his associates, including his son John, three editors, and two Catholic priests, were arrested, indicted for “conspiracy,” tried, and all, on the 30th of May, 1844, were sentenced to imprisonment, with the exception of F. Tierney, who had died before the trial. The effect on the [pg 063] country was the reverse of what was expected. O'Connell's popularity, if possible, increased, the repealers became more numerous, and several Protestant gentlemen of fortune and influence, who had hitherto held aloof, joined the association. But when three months had elapsed, and the decision of the packed Dublin jury and the rulings of the stipendiary English judges were set aside by the House of Lords, led by Brougham, the enthusiasm of the people knew no bounds.

These indeed were the halcyon days of Ireland. Never were her people so numerous, prosperous, and contented, so full of thankfulness for the present and hope in the future. Of the nine millions of her population, at least two-thirds were active repealers or in sympathy with their cause. No nation, in fact, was ever more unanimous on any public question than were the Irish of the years 1844-5, and never was the country so free from crime of every degree. Much of this enviable condition was to be attributed to the oft-repeated admonition of O'Connell, that “he who commits a crime gives strength to the enemy”; more, perhaps, to the unceasing admonitions and personal presence of the priesthood at the monster gatherings; but most, we think, to the workings of F. Mathew's beneficent projects. It was a fortunate coincidence that the Apostle of Temperance and the great Liberator were contemporaries. For the one teetotaler the first could show, the other could point out an ardent repealer.

But a change was impending that, amid the sunshine and gladness of the hour, was undreamt of—a change that was to spread woe and desolation over the face of the fair island. Famine, gaunt and hideous famine, with her attendants, pestilence and death, was knocking at the door, and would not be denied admittance.

The first symptoms of the failure of the potato crop, then almost exclusively the food of five or six millions of people, appeared as early as 1845, and, though it created much alarm and distress in certain neighborhoods, was not of so widespread a nature as to excite general anxiety till the close of that year and the beginning of the next. O'Connell, the mayors and corporations of the large cities, and many other prominent persons, lay and clerical, having exhausted all the resources of private charity, strenuously but vainly urged on the government the necessity of taking some steps to save the lives of the people. They represented, and truly, that the grain crop alone of the country was sufficient to feed twice the number of inhabitants, and asked that its exportation might be prohibited; that a large portion of the imperial revenue was raised in Ireland, and suggested that a portion of it might be expended there on useful public works, and thus afford employment to the famishing and needy; that a great part of the lands then unproductive might be reclaimed with benefit to the holders, and proposed that the government ought to loan money to the landlords for that purpose, to bear interest, become a first lien on the land, and to be repaid at the expiration of a certain number of years. Their appeals were answered by coercion and arms acts, and by the repeal of the Corn Laws, by which the Irish producer, who was obliged to sell his cereals in English markets in order to pay his rent, found himself undersold by importers from [pg 064] the great grain-producing countries, like Russia and the United States. In truth, England did not want to stay the famine, for it was her best and only ally against the repeal movement; and the “providential visitation,” as it was blasphemously called by her politicians and clerical demagogues, was allowed to take its course. Thus unchecked, the dire destroyer swept on from county to county during the years 1846-7-8-9, till the island, so fair to view in 1844, became almost a deserted graveyard, and its inhabitants who had neither sunk beneath its curse nor fled the country became a nation of paupers. It is now proven by trustworthy statistics that during those five years over one million fled for ever from their homes, and that at least a million and a third perished on their own soil, amid plenty, from want of food and the ravages of the fatal typhus!

No wonder, then, that the great repeal organization drooped, quarrelled, and finally ended a lingering and impotent existence a few years after. The bone and sinew of the land, who had given vitality and strength to its labors, were either far across the Atlantic or rotting in pauper-graves. No wonder, also, that its great founder and chief, overburdened with years, but more by national misfortunes, should have sickened at the sights around him, and, fleeing from the ills he could not cure, should have died on a foreign soil, far from his beloved fatherland.

But though the famine had mortally wounded the repeal movement, its demise was hastened by dissensions among the leaders themselves. In 1846, in a discussion on the expediency of the use of moral force solely as a means of obtaining national redress of grievances, hot and personal remarks fell from the lips of the speakers on both sides; great excitement was created among the audience, and finally O'Brien and many of the ablest and most active of the repeal writers and speakers withdrew, and formed what was called the Confederation or “Young Ireland” party. Though thoroughly honest, high-toned, and brilliant as orators and journalists, the Young Irelanders could never win any appreciable amount of popular support; and though up to February, 1848, when the French Revolution threw Europe into a ferment of excitement, they never contemplated armed resistance, the people generally looked upon them with suspicion, and refused their co-operation. In the summer of that year, however, they did make an attempt at revolution, and, as might have been expected, miserably failed. Thus the “Association” and the “Confederation” disappeared almost at the same time; and now that a quarter of a century has passed, and a new generation has come to the front, we find the principles and aims of the original organization revivified and incorporated into what is called the “Home Rule League.”

In its demands, this association is more moderate than was O'Connell. He wanted repeal of the treaty and act of union, pure and simple, and the restoration of the national legislature as it was in 1782, with the emancipation and other kindred acts superadded. The Home Rulers, if we may judge from the resolutions passed at a very large conference held lately in Dublin, only ask for a parliament to regulate their domestic affairs, leaving to the British imperial Parliament full power and authority over all matters concerning the entire empire, or, in other words, placing Ireland [pg 065] in the same position with regard to the law-making power as that now held by Canada, except the right of Ireland to send a proportional number of members to the imperial assembly. The success of such a scheme in Ireland would naturally lead to the restoration of the old Scotch Parliament, and possibly to imperial representation for Canada and other trans-marine colonies of Great Britain. Hence the widespread interest it has excited throughout the empire.

The objections to the home-rule plan, as far as we can gather them from the English and Tory Irish press—for the politicians have carefully avoided its discussion—are principally three:

I. The confusion and possible conflict of authority which might arise from having two co-ordinate legislative assemblies under the same government.

II. That the people of Ireland are unable to govern themselves, and, as the last Parliament was lost by the corruption and venality of its members, a restored one would be open to the same deleterious influences.

III. That as the Catholics, from their numbers, would necessarily have a majority in the Commons, the rights of property and the guaranteed privileges of their Protestant fellow-subjects would be in danger.

IV. That the granting of legislative power would be only a step to complete independence.

To these objections it is answered, first, that as the advocates of home rule merely require power to regulate affairs purely domestic, and not touch on those within the jurisdiction of an imperial Parliament, there would be little possibility of a collision of the two bodies; secondly, they admit the premises, but deny the conclusion regarding the probability of bribery and corruption, for the conditions are altered. The rotten and presentation boroughs, from whence the tools of the Castle sprung, have been swept away by the Reform Bill, and landlord influence has received a decided check by the adoption of the ballot. They further allege that the Catholics now, particularly since the Encumbered Estates Act was passed, are the most numerous body of landholders in the kingdom, and are consequently conservative, and would be exceeding jealous of any agrarian law that might be proposed; that the late Church Disestablishment and Land Acts have done away with many of the causes of quarrel between Catholics and Protestants growing out of tithes, endowments, etc.; and triumphantly point to the numerous Protestant gentlemen, many of whom are clergymen, who have joined their movement. As to the idea of total separation, they very properly retort that if Ireland will not rest satisfied with the concession of her just demands, it is not likely that she will be more loyal to the crown as long as they are withheld.

This repeal movement, in another shape, like its predecessor, had a very obscure birth and a small christening. About three years ago, a few gentlemen met in a private room in the city of Dublin to chat over political affairs, amongst whom was Isaac Butt, a member of Parliament, and a lawyer of large experience and great eminence in his profession, who suggested the outlines of the present plan of operation. Like most hardy plants, its growth was at first slow, but it has [pg 066] recently sprung up a hale, hearty tree, with boughs overshadowing all classes and creeds at home, and roots extending through the sister island and its dependencies. From the first the leadership has been accorded to Butt, who, though by no means a man of the gigantic calibre of O'Connell, is still a very competent political guide and an energetic organizer. Though a Protestant and a great favorite with the more liberal sectarians, he seems to enjoy the confidence and friendship of many of the Catholic bishops and a large number of the priesthood, particularly those of the venerable Archbishop McHale, whose name we find appended prominently to the call for the late conference in the capital. With Butt are such men as Sir John Gray, Mr. Mitchell-Henry Sullivan, Dease, Major O'Reilly, Digby, Synan, Murphy, Blennerhassett, the O'Connor Don, and other prominent laymen; while the Catholic clergy in great numbers, headed by Dean O'Brien, of Limerick, are active sympathizers. The Home Rulers count in their ranks in Ireland alone about sixty members of Parliament, besides nearly half that number representing English constituencies. Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, one of the most profound and the best organizing minds that Ireland has produced for many generations, is, it is said, about to return from Australia, and again enter the British Parliament as the representative of an Irish constituency. Duffy is a Catholic, a man of varied and remarkable experience in public affairs, and would be a most valuable acquisition to the nationalists in council or Parliament.

The movement, as we have stated, is not merely confined to Ireland. It is nearly as popular and has almost as many supporters in England and Scotland; and in every liberal newspaper published in those countries that reaches us we find reports of numerous meetings in the principal towns and cities, and even villages, of Great Britain. The English Catholic press particularly favor it, and this adds greatly to its strength. A late number of the London Tablet says in reference to the home-rule conference: “We can all know at present what is demanded under the name of home rule; and we may frankly say at once that we have been agreeably impressed by the moderation and evident thoughtfulness which have presided over the preparation and adoption of the various resolutions that embody the proposed home-rule constitution. It is superfluous to say that there is not a trace of revolution about them.... What, however, is not superfluous to say is that the new programme of the Home Rulers appears to us to have discarded with discrimination almost everything which could prejudice their cause, and to have retained almost everything calculated to render their project acceptable to the British public and imperial Parliament.”

The Weekly Register, on the same subject, makes the following sensible remarks:

Many of the bishops and clergy in England, also, are warm sympathizers, if not active advocates, of the proposed repeal, as the following extract from a recent letter of the Rt. Rev. Dr. Turner, late Bishop of Salford, will in part demonstrate. With regard to home rule, writes that prelate, “it seems to me that some measure of home rule for Ireland is certain. It is but a question of time and amount. Parliament will, sooner or later, be obliged to grant it, if only for the despatch of imperial business. A strong feeling prevails in favor of large powers of local and municipal self-government even in England, and the extension of this principle must inevitably come to Ireland.”

We cannot but agree with the good bishop in his views of the necessity of some change in the parliamentary system of the United Kingdoms, at least as far as Ireland is concerned, and trust, sincerely trust, that his predictions will be justified by events, and that very quickly. With a home government, a denominational plan of education, and a fostering public opinion for ability and native genius, which would surely follow, that long-suffering but faithful island might in the near future equal, or even excel, the glories that shone around her in her first ages of Christianity.

Sonnet: Good Friday.

Grapes And Thorns. Chapter X. The Descent of Avernus.

By The Author Of “The House of Yorke.”

It was Annette who told Miss Pembroke the result of the trial, taking it on herself as a sort of mission. Without saying a word on the subject to each other, perhaps without defining it clearly in their own minds, they had yet acted on an impression that she was to be treated with peculiar delicacy and tenderness in the matter.

As young Mrs. Gerald came down the street toward her mother-in-law's home, she saw Miss Pembroke approaching her slowly from the opposite direction, a child at either side. She was just coming from her school, and these two little ones lived in the neighborhood, and were privileged to walk home with their teacher, each holding in its little hands, for warmth, a fold of her large sable cloak.

It was a still, frosty day, with a sparkling depth of cloudless blue overhead, and a spotless carpet of newly-fallen snow, white as swan's-down, underneath. But the mid-air, rosy now with sunset, imparted a tinge of violet to the sky and a soft blush to the earth. Sleighs, with their gay bells, flew to and fro, the drivers muffled to the eyes from the stinging cold; and the planks of the sidewalk crackled under the steps that trod them.

“What a motherly look she has!” Annette Gerald said to herself, as she stood waiting at the gate, and watching her friend.

Honora had quite a matronly appearance, indeed, in the thick furs she always wore in winter. She was fond of warmth, and scarcely quick enough in her motions to resist the cold of a northern climate by means of exercise alone, and the cap, muff, boa, and mantle made her look like a Juno exiled to the court of Odin. The cold melancholy of her expression, the face as untouched with color as a white camellia, was in keeping with the fancy.

She did not hasten when she saw a visitor waiting for her, nor give any smile or word of welcome. If there was a sign of emotion, it was in the slight gesture with which she detached herself from her two little attendants, who, for the first time, missed the leave-taking they prized so much. They had been wont to be stroked on the cheeks, with a gentle “Good-by”; and, running, hand in hand, down the street, to turn at the first corner, and see their teacher wave her hand to them as she stood on the piazza.

“My dear Annette, why did you not go in, instead of freezing here in the snow?” she said, and seemed too much occupied in opening the gate to be able to look in her friend's face, though her disengaged hand held that of her visitor closely.

“Oh! I never feel the cold in this still weather,” Annette said lightly. “Besides, I do not like to enter alone a deserted house. There is no one here but the servant. Mamma Gerald is with us, and we persuaded her to stay to dinner. I wish you would go up too.”

They had entered the house. Miss Pembroke paused a moment at the foot of the stairs, then led the way up to her chamber. Evidently she knew that there were tidings for her, and suspected that they were not good. “I shall not dine at home to-day,” she said, catching sight of the servant.

But she did not, apparently, mean to go out, for she deliberately removed her wrappings, and put them away; then seated herself beside her friend, and looked at her with an expression that bade her speak out her errand, whatever it might be.

“It has gone as badly as it could,” Annette said quickly.

“He is, then, found guilty?” Miss Pembroke asked, without the slightest sign of emotion.

Annette nodded. “He is convicted on circumstantial evidence. It is as plain as such evidence can be, but not plain enough to shake my hope, at least, of his innocence. Lawrence is utterly disgusted and indignant with the whole affair. He says he would at any time head a party to rescue Mr. Schöninger. He felt so angry that he wouldn't stay at home after coming up to tell us, but started off again somewhere.”

“Is he sentenced?” Miss Pembroke asked, speaking with some difficulty.

“Yes!” And since the eyes fixed on her still waited for more, Mrs. Gerald added: “There is a year solitary.”

Honora's eyes opened a little wider. “A year solitary?” she repeated.

“Why, yes, dear. You know it is the custom to give a year of solitary imprisonment before....”

Miss Pembroke put her hand up, and seemed to clear some mist from before her eyes. “Before what?” she asked in a confused way.

“Dear Honora!” exclaimed her friend, “need I say what?” And then started up with a little cry; for Miss Pembroke, without a word or sign of warning, had slipped out of her chair, and fallen heavily to the floor.

It is not necessary to make an outcry because a lady has fainted, unless there is no person of sense present. Annette Gerald did what was needful without calling for help, and her efforts were soon rewarded. The cold hand she held suddenly became warm and moist as the recoiling wave of life rushed back, and in a few minutes Miss Pembroke was able to rise from the floor, and go to the sofa. Annette sat by her in silence, now and then touching her hand or her hair with caressing fingers, and waited for her to speak.

If she had to wait some time, it was not because her friend had not returned to full consciousness. Miss Pembroke was too strong and healthy to creep back to life, even after so violent and unaccustomed an attack. It was, perhaps, the first time she had ever fainted, and she was left almost ignorant of what had happened to her; but of the cause she was not a moment in doubt. It came back clearly on the first wave of returning consciousness. She lay with her eyes closed, and strove to set her mind in order again, and set it so firmly that this terrible and entirely unexpected fact should not again derange its action. She had not once anticipated such a conclusion. Her thoughts had occupied themselves with the horrors of the accusation, and the worst result she had looked for was that, though the prisoner would doubtless be acquitted, [pg 070] he would not be able to shake off the disgrace of having been suspected, and would go out into life branded with an ineffaceable mark—a mark which his name would bear even in her own mind. She had said to herself that, pity him as she might, she desired never to see him again, not because she believed him capable of any great crime, but because his image would always be associated with painful recollections, and because his dignity had been soiled by such circumstances and associations. Now, however, he was presented to her mind in quite a new light, more pitiful, yet with a pity far more shrinking and remote from its object. In this woman, confidence in, and obedience to, authority was an instinct; and as she contemplated the decision of the law against Mr. Schöninger, she began to look on him somewhat as a Catholic looks upon those whom the anathema of the church has separated from the fellowship of the faithful, “so that they are not so much as to say to them, God speed you.” A silent and awful distance grew up between them.

After a while, she sat up, and began calmly to put her hair and dress in order.

“It is very terrible, Annette, and we may as well try to put it quite out of our minds,” she said. “We can do nothing, that I see, but pray for his conversion. I thank you for coming alone to tell me of this, for I would not have had any other person see me so much affected by the news. People imagine things and tell them as facts, and there are many who are capable of believing that I had loved Mr. Schöninger. I never did.”

There were times when Honora Pembroke's soft eyes could give a look that was almost dazzling in its firm and open clearness; and as she pronounced these last words, she looked into her companion's face with such a glance.

Mrs. Gerald rose and walked somewhat impatiently to the window. She had hoped and expected to startle Honora into some generous expression of interest in Mr. Schöninger, and to win from her some word of pity and kindness which, repeated to him, would be like a drop of cooling water in his fiery trial.

“I am sure I should never imagine you capable of having an affection for any one whom the whole world does not approve,” she said rather pointedly, having snatched the curtain up and looked out, then dropped it again. “If you can put the subject out of your mind, and remember Mr. Schöninger only when you are praying for the heathen, so much the better for your tranquillity. I am not so happily constituted. I cannot dismiss the thought of friends because it troubles me, nor because some person, or many persons, may believe something against them.”

“What would you have me do?” Miss Pembroke asked rather loftily, yet with signs of trouble in her face.

“Nothing, my dear, except that you put on your bonnet and come home to dinner with me,” Annette replied, assuming a careless tone.

Miss Pembroke hesitated, then refused. It would be certainly more sensible to go if she could, but she felt herself a little weak and trembling yet, and disinclined to talk. The best distraction for her would be such as she could find in reading or in prayer, if distraction were needed. She felt, moreover, the coldness that had come over her [pg 071] friend's manner more than Annette was aware, and for a moment, perhaps, wrung by a cruel distrust of herself, envied her that independence of mind and ardor of feeling which could at need strengthen her to face any difficulty, and which rendered her capable of holding firmly her own opinions and belief in spite of opposition. Miss Pembroke seemed to herself in that instant weak and puny, not because she did nothing for Mr. Schöninger, but because, had she seen the possibility or propriety of her doing anything, she would have lacked the courage. It was a relief to her, therefore, to find herself alone, though, at the same time, she would gladly have had the support and strength which her friend's presence could so well impart to one in trouble.

The door closed, and she looked from the window and saw her visitor walk briskly away without glancing back.

“I wish I had some one,” she murmured, dropping the curtain from her hand, and looking about the room as if to find some suggestion of help. “I am certainly very much alone in the world. Mother Chevreuse is gone; I cannot go to F. Chevreuse about this; and the others jar a little with me.”

And then, like a ray of soft and tender light coming unexpectedly to show the path through a dark place, came the thought of Sister Cecilia and her gentle companions. They had asked her to come to them, if they could ever be of any use to her, and Sister Cecilia particularly had spoken to her with an affectionate earnestness which was now joyfully remembered. “I cannot hope to be to you what Mother Chevreuse was, but I would be glad if I could in a little, even, supply her loss to you. Come to me, if you ever wish to, quite freely. You will never find me wanting in sympathy or affection.”

And she had scarcely been to them at all!

She dressed herself hastily, and called a carriage. It was too late to walk there, for already the sun was down; and it was nearly two miles to the convent.

The sharp air and brisk motion were restorative. They brought a color to her face, and sent new life through her weakened frame. Besides, when one feels helpless and distressed, rapid motion gives a relieving impression that one is doing and accomplishing something, while, at the same time, it saves the necessity of effort.

Sister Cecilia was in her own room, writing letters, her little desk drawn close to the window for the light. She looked out when she heard the carriage, and beckoned Miss Pembroke to come up-stairs then hurried to meet her half way. She had guessed her visitor's motive in coming, and it needed but a glance into her face to confirm the thought.

“Come into my chamber, dear,” she said. “It is the pleasantest room in the house at this hour. See what a view I have of the city and the western sky. I sit here to write my letters, and every moment have to leave off to admire the beautiful world outside. It is a sort of dissipation with me, this hour of sunset. This arm-chair is for you. It is my visitor's chair. I should feel quite like a sybarite if I were to sit in it.”

She seated Honora by the window, drew up her own chair opposite her, and went on talking cheerfully.

“I sometimes think that all the [pg 072] earth needs to make it heaven is the visible presence of our Lord and his saints. It would require no physical change. Of course I include the absence of sin. There is so much beauty here, so much that we never notice, so much that is everyday, yet miraculous for all that. Look at that sky! Did you ever see such a rich air? It needs the cold purity of the snow to keep it from seeming excessive.”

A long, narrow cloud had stretched itself across the west, and, drawing to its bosom the light of the sun, now hidden behind the hills, reflected it in a crimson flood over the earth. Through this warm effulgence fell, delicately penetrating, the golden beams of the full moon, changing the crimson of the air to a deep-opal color, and putting faint splashes of gilding here and there beside the rosy reflections.

“How the earth draws it in!” said the nun dreamily. “It never wastes the beauties of the sky. It hoards them up, and gives them out long after in marbles and precious stones. Did it ever occur to you to wonder how those bright things could grow in the dark underground? I used to think of it in Italy, where I first saw what marbles can be. I remember my eyes and my mind wandering to that as I knelt before the Confession of S. Matthew the Evangelist, in Santa Maria Maggiore, where the walls of the atrium glow with marbles; and the lesson I learned from it was this: that even though pains and sorrows of every kind should intervene between us and the joy of life as thickly as the clay, and rock, and turf had intervened between the sunshine of heaven and the dark place where those marbles took form and color, we could yet, if we had real faith, be conscious of all the glory and joy taking place overhead, and reproduce them for ourselves down in the dark, and make that beauty more enduring because we were in the dark. At the sunny surface, the brightness slips off and shadows succeed; but that solid jewel in the depths is indestructible. My dear”—she turned to her companion with a soft suddenness which warmed but did not startle—“do you remember S. Paul's recommendation, ‘always rejoice’? It is possible. And now tell me why you do not.”

Her eyes, beaming with religious enthusiasm and tenderest human affection, searched frankly the pale face before her, and her hand was laid lightly on Miss Pembroke's arm. No reserve nor timidity could stand before her. They melted like snowflakes beneath the heavenly summer of her glances. Honora told freely and simply what had distressed her.

How sweet is the friendship of one true woman for another!—sweeter than love, for it is untroubled, and has something of the calmness of heaven; deeper than love, for it is the sympathy of true natures which reflect each the entire being of the other; less selfish than love, for it asks no merging of another into itself; nobler than love, for it allows its object to have other sources of happiness than those it can furnish; more enduring than love, for it is a life, and not a flame.

“But can you not see, my dear,” the nun said presently, “that it would have been better if you had not had any friendly intercourse with him, even though this terrible thing had never happened? The injunction not to be unequally yoked with one another refers, I [pg 073] think, to all ties as well as to marriage. The gulf is too wide between the Christian and the Jew to be bridged over for familiar friendship. It is too wide for anything but prayers to cross. Once admit any intercourse with unbelievers, and you peril your faith; and, besides, you cannot set a barrier firmly anywhere when the first one is down. I have heard it said that this Jew loved you, and even fancied it possible that you would marry him.”

“People ought not to say such things!” exclaimed Miss Pembroke, blushing deeply.

“People ought not to have the chance to say such things, my dear girl,” replied the nun. “It was offering you an insult when he offered you his hand.”

“O dear Sister! is not that too severe?” expostulated Honora. “Setting aside what has happened since, should I not recollect, when a man makes me such an offer, what his intention is, and how the subject looks to him? And cannot I refuse him, and see that it is impossible for me to do otherwise, yet feel kindly toward him, and wish him well, and believe that he has meant to show me both affection and respect?”

“Honora,” said the Sister, “if any man had struck your mother, then turned to offer you his hand, would you not have recoiled from him in disgust and indignation?”

“Surely I would!”

“And is your God and Saviour less dear and sacred to you than your mother?” the other pursued. “Can you allow your thoughts to dwell with kindness and complacency on one who blasphemes the crucified Redeemer, and calls him an impostor? Because you have not heard this man talk against your faith, you forget what he must think of it. I tell you they mock at him, these Jews, and they call us idolaters. And what could he think of you, when, knowing that you adore Christ as God, he asked you to be the wife of one who would laugh, if he did not rave, when he saw you making the sign of the cross? He must have thought your faith so weak that he could in time make you renounce it. And the reason why he thought so was because he saw you receiving him in a friendly way, as if friendship were possible between you. I speak of what he was. What he is, we have nothing to do with.”

Miss Pembroke's eyes were down-cast. “When you place the subject in that light, I am forced to think myself all in the wrong,” she said. “But most people do not think in that clear, positive way. They act on an inherited motive, and their beliefs are moss grown, as it were.”

“They have no faith,” was the quick reply.

Honora was silent a moment, then said, with some hesitation: “I am always afraid of being uncharitable and illiberal, and perhaps I err the other way.”

“My dear, it is easy to make a mistake there, and very dangerous too,” the Sister replied with decision. “What is charity? You must first love God with all your heart; and if you do that, you will be very shy of the enemies of God. You cannot serve two masters. As to liberality, there is no greater snare. It is not liberal to squander the bounty and honor of God; it is not ours to spend. It is not liberal to praise those whom he condemns, and bless those whom he curses. It is not liberal to love those who refuse to acknowledge and obey [pg 074] him, and to contradict what he has clearly said. Or if these things are liberal, then liberality is one of the worst of vices, and one of the most futile too. Why, if I were to desire the reputation of being generous, and, having nothing of my own, should take what is not mine and give it away, I have stolen, it is true, and I have obtained a reputation that I do not deserve, but, also, I have enriched some one; whereas, if I put my hand into the treasury of God, and try to bestow on another what he has denied, the hand comes out empty. I have insulted the Almighty, and have not benefited any one. Do not suffer yourself to be deceived by sounding phrases. What are these people who talk so much of liberality? Are they liberal of what is theirs to give? Far from it. Do they give away all they have to the poor? Do they forgive their enemies? Do they give up their pride and vanity, and spend their lives in laboring for the needy? Quite the contrary. They are lavish only of what is not theirs to give. It has been reserved for those whom they call bigots to show an ardent and unsparing liberality in sacrificing their private feelings, their wealth, their comfort, their reputation, their lives even, for the glory of God and the saving of souls. There is the true liberality, my dear, and all other is a snare.”

“I wish I could shut myself up with God, and get into the right path again. I am all wrong.”

“Why not come here and make a retreat?” the Sister asked.

It was so precisely and unexpectedly what she needed that Honora clasped her hands, with an exclamation of delight. “The very thing! Yet I had not thought of it. When may I come? Very soon? It was surely an inspiration, my coming here to-night.”

Immediately her troubles began to lift themselves away, as fogs begin to rise from the earth even before the sun is above the horizon. The certainty of approaching peace conferred a peace in the present. She was going to place herself in the hands of Him who can perform the impossible.

Sister Cecilia had supplied her need perfectly. Hers was not one of those impassioned natures which need to be, soothed and caressed into quiet. A certain vein of gentle self-sufficiency, and a habit of contentment with life as she found it, prevented this. She wanted light more than warmth.

It was already dark when they went down-stairs, and since, from economy, the nuns did not have their entries lighted, the two had to go hand-in-hand, groping their way carefully, till they came to a turn in the lower passage; and there, from the open door of the chapel at the further end, a soft ray of light shone out from the single lamp that burned before the altar. By daylight both chapel and altar showed poor enough; but in the evening, and seen alone by this small golden flame, the imperfections were either transformed or hidden. Dimly seen, the long folds of drapery all about gave a sense of seclusion and tenderness; one seemed to be hiding under the mantle of the Lord; and the beautiful mystery of the burning lamp made wonders seem possible. Kneeling there alone, one could fancy all the beautiful legends being acted over again.

Sister Cecilia and Honora, still hand-in-hand, knelt in the entry the moment they saw that light.

“You remember the chalice of the bees?” whispered the nun.

“I never come here in the evening, and see that bright little place in the darkness, but I think of that sweetest of stories. And I would not be surprised to hear a buzzing of bees all about the sanctuary, and see the busy little creatures building up a chalice of fine wax, as clear as an alabaster vase with a light inside.”

They walked slowly and noiselessly by the door, and, as they passed it, saw beside the altar what looked almost like another lamp, or like that illuminated vase the Sister had fancied. It was the face of Anita, which reflected the light, her dark dress rendering her form almost invisible. That face and the two folded hands shone softly, with a fixed lustre, out of the shadows. No breath nor motion seemed to stir them. The eyes fixed on the tabernacle, the lips slightly parted where the last vocal prayer had escaped, she knelt there in a trance of adoration. But one could see, even through that brightening halo and sustaining peace, that a great change had taken place in the girl during the last few weeks. Her face was worn quite thin; and the large eyes, that had been like dewy violets bending ever toward the earth, burned now with a lustre that never comes from aught but pain.

“How the innocent have to suffer for the sins of the guilty!” sighed the nun, as she led her visitor away. “That child has received a blow from which I am afraid she will never recover. She is like a broken flower that lives a little while when it is put in water. Her conscience is at rest; she does not say now that she is sorry for having had anything to do with that trial; she does not complain in any way. She seems simply broken. And here she comes now! She has heard our steps, and is afraid she has stayed too long in the chapel.”

The young girl came swiftly along the passage, and held out her hands to Miss Pembroke. “I knew you were here,” she said, “and I was waiting to hear you come down. Mother told me I might come and say good-by to you.”

“But you have not yet said a word of welcome,” Miss Pembroke replied, trying to speak cheerfully.

“Oh! yes, when I saw you come, I welcomed you in my own mind,” she replied, without smiling.

Honora waited an instant, but Anita seemed to have nothing to say except the good-by she had come for. “Our whispering did not disturb your prayers?” she asked, wishing to detain her a little longer.

“Oh! no.” She glanced up at Sister Cecilia, as a child, when doubtful and lost, looks into its mother's face, then dropped her eyes dreamily. “I do not say any prayer but ‘amen.’ Nothing else comes. I kneel down, thinking to repeat, perhaps, the rosary, and I am only silent a while, and then I say amen. It is as well, I suppose.”

Honora kissed the child's thin cheek tenderly. “Good-by, dear,” she whispered softly. “Say one amen for me to-night.”

She went out into the still and sparkling night, and was driven rapidly homeward. On her way, she passed the prison, and, looking up, saw over the high wall a light shining redly through the long row of grated windows. It was a painful sight, but no longer unendurable. “No prayer but amen,” she repeated. “What does it matter by what road we go, so long as we reach heaven at last; whether it be in peaceful ways, or through sin and suffering?”

Another carriage drew up at the gate as she reached home, and Mrs. Gerald descended from it, having just returned from Mrs. Ferrier's.

“Upon my word, young woman!” Annette's voice called out from a pile of furs in the carriage. “We have been saying our good-nights in whispers, and hushing the very sleigh-bells, so as not to disturb your slumbers; and here you are out driving.”

Her bright and cheerful voice broke strangely into Honora's mood. Was there, then, anything in the world to laugh about, anything that could possibly excite a jest?

“Good-night, Mother Gerald!” the young woman added. “Don't stand there taking cold. And if you do not see Honora in the house to-night, make up your mind that I have carried her off with me, as I shall try to. Come here, my dear, and give an account of yourself. Where have you been?”

As Honora reached the carriage door, young Mrs. Gerald leaned out and caught both her hands. “Come with me to find Lawrence,” she whispered hurriedly. “He has not been home yet, but he will go for you.”

Though recoiling from the errand, Miss Pembroke would not refuse it. She stepped into the carriage, and suffered herself to be driven away. It was the first time such a service had ever been demanded of her. “Where is he? Do you know?” she asked.

“Oh! yes. He is only playing billiards,” the young wife answered, and a sharp sigh seemed to cut the sentences apart. “It is the first time for a long while, and I want to break it up in the beginning. John went down and told him that his mother was dining with us, but Lawrence paid no attention.”

She leaned back a little while without saying a word as they sped over the smooth snow. “It seems a shame to drag you into such an affair, Honora,” she said presently; “and I had not thought of it till I saw you, and then it came like a flash that you could help me. What I want of you is to write on a card that you and I are waiting for him. John will carry it in to him, and he will recognize your writing.”

The horses were drawn up before a large marble hotel, lighted from basement to attic. The shops underneath were all closed; but from three broad lower windows a bright light shone around the heavy lowered curtains, and in the stillness they could hear the faint click of billiard-balls. There was no sound of voices from inside, and it was impossible to know if the players were few or many.

Honora wrote hastily, by the moonlight, as she was bid, “Annette and I are waiting for you,” and John took the card.

“Why doesn't he go to this door?” she asked, seeing the man disappear around a corner of the house.

“You child!” said her friend compassionately; “are you so innocent as to suppose that any one can walk into one of those places when he pleases? These charming réunions are held with locked doors, and one has to have the password to go in.”

Honora was silent with indignation. To her mind, Lawrence could not do his wife a greater injury than in allowing her to become acquainted with such places, and she was half disposed to be vexed with Annette for not leaving him to himself, and refusing to be drawn into any objectionable scenes and associations.

Annette divined the last thought, and replied to it.

“It is impossible for a wife to be scrupulous as to the means by which she shall withdraw her husband from danger,” she said with quiet coldness. “They are one. If he is soiled, she cannot be quite clean, except in intention, unless she is very selfish; and then her intention is not good, which is worse yet. Of course she should be careful not to draw others into her affairs.”

“You must know far better than I, Annette,” her friend said quickly, feeling as though she must have spoken her thought. “At all events, you cannot be called selfish. And, indeed, if the angels of heaven were over-scrupulous with regard to their associations, we should lack their guardianship.”

Here John appeared, walking briskly round the corner of the hotel, and immediately after Lawrence Gerald came to the carriage-door.

“You here, Honora!” he exclaimed. “What could have induced you?”

“We had better not ask each other questions,” she replied coldly. “It is late. Will you come home with us?”

She drew back into a corner, and made room for him, with an air almost of disgust; for the moonlight showed his face flushed with drinking, and, as he spoke, a strong odor of brandy had been wafted into her face.

He was too much confused for anything but simple obedience, and in rather a stumbling way took the seat assigned him.

“Honora has been driving this evening, and is sleepy and chilly,” his wife made haste to say in explanation, inwardly resenting her friend's hauteur, and regretting having brought her. “She is going home to stay all night with us. I am sure you did not know how late it is.”

She furtively picked up his hat, that had fallen off, went on talking lightly, to cover his silence or prevent his saying anything senseless, and tried in every way to screen him from the scorn that she had exposed him to. He leaned back in the carriage, and took no notice of her. The presence of Honora Pembroke had confounded him, and he had just sense enough left to know that he could not keep too quiet. What had stirred her to interfere in his affairs he could not guess, for Annette had always so screened him that it never occurred to him she could have asked her friend to come. Had he known, it would have fared hard with his wife. He had, however, prudence and temper enough to keep him from making any disagreeable demonstration. John was at hand when they reached home, and, as the ladies went hastily up the steps and into the house, they were not supposed to be aware that it was his arm which enabled Mr. Gerald to go in without falling. Then Mrs. Ferrier stood in the open drawing-room door, and, under cover of her welcome to Honora, he managed to get up stairs unnoticed, fortunately for all.

For the truce between Annette's husband and her mother was over, and their intercourse was assuming a more unpleasant character than ever. Now, it was nearly always Lawrence who was the aggressor. Even when Mrs. Ferrier showed a disposition to conciliate, he found something irritating in her very good-nature. Partial [pg 078] as his mother was, she was moved to expostulate with him after witnessing two or three of these scenes.

“You ought to recollect her good intention, Lawrence, and try to overlook her manner,” she said. “I know well she does not show very good taste always; but you cannot criticise a woman in her own house.”

“I am seldom allowed to forget that it is her house,” returned the son rather sulkily.

“At least, my dear, do not provoke her into reminding you of that,” Mrs. Gerald urged.

Lawrence wished to stand well with his mother, and had, indeed, improved in his behavior toward her in proportion as he had grown more impatient with Mrs. Ferrier. He seemed now to regret having answered her unpleasantly. “If you knew, mother, all the little annoyances I have to bear from her, you wouldn't blame me so much,” he said coaxingly. “With other frets, she has a habit of asking any of us who may be going out where we are going, and when we are coming back; and Annette has humored her in that till she thinks she has a right to know. Teddy always tells her, too; but then he tells lies. That makes no difference, though, to her. Well, I have broken her of asking me when I am alone; but if Annette is with me, she asks her. Can't you imagine, mother, that it would get to be irritating after a while? It makes me so nervous sometimes that I have really skulked out of the house slyly, as if I had no right to go. And then, when I come in, she will say, ‘Why, where have you been, Lawrence? I didn't hear you go out.’ If a door opens anywhere, she goes to see who is about. I believe if I should get up in the middle of the night, and try to creep out of the house without being heard, I should see her head poked out of the chamber-door before I'd got half-way down-stairs. Then she peers and finds out everything. Annette and I had a bottle of champagne the other night in our room, and the next morning she spied out the bottle, and spoke of it. I suppose she heard the cork pop when I drew it. You never looked after me half so closely when I was a little boy, always in mischief, as she does now I am a man. She knows what my clothes cost, every rag of them, and how many clean collars and handkerchiefs I have in the week.”

“I am sure she need not trouble herself about how much your clothes cost, since you pay for them yourself,” Mrs. Gerald said, her face very red. “And if she grudges you clean collars, send your linen home, and I will have it washed there.”

“Oh! she has no such thought,” Lawrence made haste to say. “She doesn't mean to be cross about any of these things, but only prying. She wants to overlook everybody and everything in the house, and it annoys me. I only tell you so that you may not wonder if I do speak out now and then about some small thing. Then what do you think she has proposed about my going into business?”

“Well?” Mrs. Gerald said uneasily.

“She has selected a partner for me.”

His mother waited for an explanation.

“And who should it be but John!”

“John who?” asked Mrs. Gerald wonderingly, trying to recollect [pg 079] some notable person of that name among her youthful acquaintances.

“Why, I do not know that he has any other name. The big English fellow who lets you in here, and waits at dinner, and opens and shuts the carriage-door.”

“What! you do not mean the footman?” Mrs. Gerald cried.

Her son laughed bitterly. “I asked her if he was to open the shop-door, and carry parcels, and if he would have the same sort of cockade on his hat, and she got quite angry about it. She says he has saved a good deal of money, and means to go into business, and she thinks I couldn't have a better partner. What do you think of it, mother?”

Mrs. Gerald leaned back in her chair, and put her hand up to her face, half hiding a blush of vexation.

She was not willing to tell Lawrence all she thought of the matter. “What does Annette say?” she asked.

“Annette vetoed the proposal up and down. I've heard nothing of it for a week or more. I only told you because you seem to think me too difficult.”

Mrs. Gerald sighed. She had hoped to see her son busy and contented after his marriage, and she found him only more idle and dissatisfied than before. With the partiality of a mother, she tried still to find him unfortunate instead of blameworthy, and, rather than see any fault in him, looked only at his difficulties, refusing to recollect how easily he could now overcome them all. She fancied erroneously that to suggest to him that his trials had a good deal of brightness to relieve them, would be to show a lack of sympathy and tenderness, and that the best way to comfort him was to let him see that his annoyances showed in her eyes as misfortunes. It was a mistake which, in her over-sensitive affection, she had always made with him.

His wife acted otherwise. “There is no use in anticipating evil, Lawrence,” she said. “Perhaps that may be the means of bringing it about. Fortune loves a smiling countenance. As to mamma's plans and wishes with regard to John, the best way for us is to assume that it is impossible she should ever regard him as anything but a servant. And, indeed,” she concluded with dignity, “I think she never can do otherwise.”

But this assumption did not prevent young Mr. Gerald from going privately to F. Chevreuse, and begging him to interfere and try to bring her mother to reason; and perhaps Mrs. Ferrier was never so near being in open revolt against her pastor as when he undertook to show her that there were certain social distinctions which it was her duty to recognize and respect.

“I think, F. Chevreuse,” she said stiffly, “that a priest might do better than encourage pride and haughtiness.”

“He could scarcely do worse than encourage them,” he replied calmly; “and it is precisely against these sins that I would put you on your guard. Persons are never more in danger of falling into them than when they are complaining of the pride of others, and trying to reform what they conceive to be the abuses of society and the world. The only reformer whom I respect, and who is in a thoroughly safe way, is that one who strives to reform and perfect himself. When he is perfect, then he can begin to correct the faults of others. Moreover, the established customs and distinctions of society have often a [pg 080] good foundation, and are not lightly to be set aside. What would you say if your chambermaid should insist on sitting down to dinner with you and driving out with you?”

Mrs. Ferrier found herself unprepared to answer. Indeed, no lady could be more peremptory and exacting than she was with all her servants except John. She was not yet ready to explain that her generalities all had reference to one exceptional case.

“But John is not at all a common servant,” she ventured to say. “He never lived out but once before, and then it was with a very grand family in England; and he wouldn't have come here with us, only that he wanted to look round a while before setting up business. I had to coax him to come, and give him the very highest wages. And Annette did all she could to persuade him.”

“John is an excellent man, I am sure,” F. Chevreuse replied. “I hope he will succeed in whatever good work he attempts. But we were speaking of your daughter's husband. My advice is that he return to the office where he was before, and remain there till something better presents itself. I do not approve of any large and showy enterprise for him. It would not suit him. In that office his salary would be enough to render him quite independent, and leave him a little to lay up.”

“Lay up!” repeated Mrs. Ferrier, with an incredulous circumflex.

“He will put one-half his income into his wife's hands, and she can do as she will with it,” F. Chevreuse replied. “Annette has spoken to me about it, and it is his own proposal. She will put the money in bank every month. What he keeps will be his own affair, and what she takes will be a small fund for the future, and will relieve a little that painful feeling he must have in living here without paying anything. It is decidedly the best that can be done at present. Besides,” he added, seeing objection gathering in her face, “it may save you something. The young man is not to blame that he is not rich, and he is quite ready to take his wife home to his own mother, and Annette is quite willing to go, if necessary. They might live there very happily and pleasantly; but as, in that case, Lawrence would be the one on whom all the expense would fall, I presume you would make your daughter an allowance which would place her on an equality with him.”

Mrs. Ferrier was forced to consent. Nothing was further from her wish than to be separated from her daughter, not only because she was more than usually solicitous for Annette's happiness, and wished to assure herself constantly that her husband did not neglect her, but because she had an almost insane desire to watch Lawrence in every way. Nothing so piques the curiosity of a meddlesome person as to see any manifestation of a desire to baffle their searching. The annoyance naturally felt and often shown by one who finds himself suspiciously observed is always taken by such persons as a proof that there is something wrong which he is desirous to conceal. Moreover, John had let fall a word of advice which she was not disposed to disregard.

She had been complaining of her son-in-law.

“You had better let him pretty much alone, ma'am,” the man replied. “You'll never drive him to being a sober fellow, nor industrious. Scolding doesn't mend [pg 081] broken china. I have a plan in my mind for them which I will tell you after a while, when the right time comes. He wouldn't thank me for it now; but by-and-by, if he doesn't drink himself to death first, he may think my advice is worth listening to.”

John had a quiet, laconic way which sometimes impressed others besides his mistress, and she did not venture to oppose him openly, nor even to insist on hearing what his mysterious plan might be.

It was, altogether, a miserable state of affairs, one of those situations almost more unbearable than circumstances of affliction, for the cares were mean, the annoyances and mortifications petty; and the mind, which is ennobled by great trials, was cramped and lowered by the constant presence of small troubles which it would fain disregard, but could not. For, after all, these small troubles were the signs of a great one threatening. It was plain that Lawrence Gerald, if not stopped, was going to kill himself with drinking. His frame was too delicately organized to bear the alternate fierce heats and wretched depressions to which he was subjecting it, and more than one sharp attack of illness had given warning that he was exhausting his vitality.

F. Chevreuse came upon him suddenly one day when he was suffering from one of these attacks. The priest had called at Mrs. Ferrier's, and, learning that Lawrence was in his room, too unwell to go out, went up-stairs to him somewhat against Annette's wish.

“I will take the responsibility,” he said laughingly. “The boy wants me to wake him up; you women are too gentle. You are petting him to death. No, my lady, I do not want your company. I can find my own way.”

And accordingly Lawrence opened his eyes a few minutes later to see F. Chevreuse standing by the sofa where he lay in all the misery of a complete physical and mental prostration.

The priest drew a chair close to him, taking no notice of the evident disinclination of the young man to his society. “Now, my boy,” he said, laying a hand on the invalid's shrinking arm, “are you dosing yourself up to go through the same bad business again? What has come over you? Come! come! Wake up, and be a man. You are too good to throw away in this fashion.”

The young man turned his face away with a faint moan of utter discouragement. “I am not worth bothering about. I've played my stake in life, and lost, and what is left is good for nothing. Besides, if I tried, I shouldn't succeed. Why do you trouble yourself about me? I tell you that what there is left of me isn't worth saving.”

He spoke with bitter impatience, and made a gesture as if he would have sent his visitor away.

F. Chevreuse was not so easily to be dismissed.

“The devil thinks differently,” he remarked, without stirring. “He is fighting hard for you. Rouse yourself, and join with those who are fighting against him! You have an idea that, because you have made mistakes and committed sins, you must lay down your arms. Nonsense! There are all the lives of the saints against you. Some of them never began to try till they found themselves on the brink of destruction. You fancy, too, that because you and your family have had misfortunes, and because you [pg 082] have not been very successful in trying to become a rich man, you must stand humbly aside for cleverer men, and ask no favors. You're all wrong. God made you, and put you into the world, just as he has the rest of us, and you have a right to the light and air, and to repair your mistakes and repent of your sins, without troubling yourself too much about what people say and think, and to do the best you can in worldly affairs without being humbled or ashamed if you can't fill your pocket with money quite as readily as some can. Let the money go, but don't let your manliness go, and don't throw away your soul. You are talking nonsense when you say that you are worthless. Respect yourself, and compel others to respect you, Lawrence. Nerve yourself, call up your good resolutions, and ask God to help you. Despair is a crime!”

The young man put his arm up, and covered his face with it, as though to hide an emotion he was ashamed of; or, perhaps, because the light hurt his eyes. “If I could forget everything, and sleep for a month without waking, I don't know but I could begin again and try to do better,” he said faintly. “But there is no life in me now for anything.”

F. Chevreuse rose immediately. “Rest, then, if that is what you need,” he said kindly. “Rest, and forget everything painful. If any tormenting thought comes, say a little prayer, and tell it to begone. Don't drink any liquor to quiet your mind. Let Annette get you some gentle sedative. I'll tell her to keep everybody away from you, and let you lie here six months, if you want to. But when you are better, come to see me.”

He was standing, ready to go, but waited for an answer. There was none. He spoke more earnestly.

“You know well it is for the best, Lawrence; and I want you to promise to come to me when you are able to go out, before you go to see any one else.”

“Well, I will. I promise you.”

But the promise was given, apparently, only to get rid of the subject, and F. Chevreuse went away feeling that he had accomplished nothing.

Annette went directly to her husband, somewhat timid as to the reception she might meet with; but if he was displeased at having had a visitor, he did not seem to hold her responsible. He took the glass containing the opiate from her hand, and set it down beside him. “After a while,” he said. “And now I am going to lock every one out of the room, and try to go to sleep. If I want anything, I will ring.”

She began to make some little arrangements for his comfort, but, perceiving that they irritated him, desisted, and left him to himself. As she went along the passage, she heard the lock click behind her. Oddly enough, this little rudeness gave her a feeling of pleasure, for it showed that he felt at home there, and claimed a right to all that was hers.

“If only he will sleep!” she thought.

He did not sleep. His first act was to throw away the opiate she had brought. “Some such dose as they give to teething babies, I suppose,” he muttered. Then he seated himself on the sofa, and, clasping his hands over his head, as if to still the bursting pain there, remained buried in thought. One [pg 083] could see that he was trying to study out some problem in his mind, but that difficulties presented themselves. More than once his eyes wandered to a little writing-desk opposite him, and fixed themselves there. “It would remove the only obstacle,” he said; “and yet how can I? That would be going over it all again. Now I am not to blame, but only unfortunate; but if I do that....”

It was pitiable to see a young face so distorted by pain of mind and body, and to see also that the pain was stinging him into still more angry revolt.

He began pacing up and down the room, and, in his doubt and distress, seized upon one of those strange modes of solving the question in his mind which, trivial as they are, most persons have at some time in their lives had recourse to.

“If there is an odd number of squares in the carpet from corner to corner of the room, I will do it,” he said, and began to count them. The number was odd. But, apparently, he wished to make assurance doubly sure, for he next counted the stucco ornaments on the ceiling. “Odd again! Now for the third trial.” He glanced about in search of the object which was to decide his fate, and spied a large patriarchal fly that had crawled out of its winter hiding-place, and was clumsily trying its wings.

“If he can fly over that cord, I will go,” he said; and since this was the last trial, and the poor insect seemed to him something like himself at that moment, he watched with breathless interest its efforts to surmount the great obstacle of the curtain-cord that lay in its path. The little creature attempted to crawl over, but, losing its balance, tumbled off and lay helplessly on its back. The young man set it carefully and tenderly on its feet once more. “Now do your best,” he said. “You and I have made a failure, but we will try once again.”

Inspired, it would seem, by this encouragement, the fly put out its wings, gathered all its energies, and flew over the cord, tumbling ignominiously on its back again at the other side.

Lawrence Gerald did not give himself the trouble to assist again his fallen friend, but went promptly to pull the bell-tassel. He had thrown off all responsibility, and, choosing to see in these trivial chances the will and guidance of some intelligence wiser than his own, resolved instantly on following where they pointed.

“I dare say I shall stumble like that clumsy fly, but I shall succeed in the end. At all events, I will try. I can't and won't stay here any longer. It is torment for me, and I don't do any one else any good.” He seemed to be arguing with some invisible companion. “They will be better without me. Besides, it was not I who decided. I left it to chance. If it was....”

His wife entering interrupted the soliloquy. She found him lying down, as she had left him, but with a color in his face that would have looked like returning health, if it had not been a little too deep.

He stretched his hand out, and drew her to the footstool by his side. “Now, Ninon,” he said coaxingly, “I want you to be a good girl, and arrange something for me so that I shall not be annoyed by questions nor opposition. It's nothing but a whim; but no matter for that. I want to go to New York for a day or two, by myself, you know, and I must start to-night. [pg 084] I'm not going to do any harm, I promise you. I feel a good deal better, and I believe the little journey will cure me. The train starts at eight o'clock, and it is now five. It won't take me half an hour to get ready. Will you manage it for me, and keep the others off my shoulders?”

She consented promptly and quietly, asking no questions. If he should choose to tell her anything, it was well; if not, it was the same. She knew the meaning of this coaxing tenderness too well to presume upon it. It meant simply that she could be useful to him.

“What is he going to New York for?” demanded Mrs. Ferrier, when Annette made the announcement down-stairs.

“Mamma, you must not expect me to tell all my husband's business,” the young woman answered rather loftily.

Poor Annette did not wish to acknowledge that she knew no more of her husband's affairs or motives than her mother did.

“Then he will want his dinner earlier?” was the next question, Mrs. Ferrier having, by an effort, restrained her inclination to make any further complaints.

No; all he wanted was luncheon, and his wife had ordered that to be carried up-stairs.

“I suppose I am not allowed to ask how long he will be gone?” remarked the mother.

“Oh! certainly, mamma; but that is not quite settled,” Annette said pleasantly. “It depends on circumstances. A few days, probably, will be the most.”

When Annette went up-stairs again, her husband was dressed for his journey. A valise, locked and strapped, lay on the sofa at his elbow, and his wrappings were strewn about. She observed that the oak writing-desk, that had not been opened for months, to her knowledge, had been opened now. The key was in the lock, and the lid was slightly raised. She noticed, too, that a little inner cover had been torn out, and lay on the carpet, broken in two.

“The carriage will be round in a few minutes,” she said. “I thought you would want plenty of time to buy your ticket and get a good seat.”

He merely nodded in reply, but looked at her wistfully, as if touched by her ready compliance with his wishes, and desirous to see if any pain or displeasure were hidden under her quietness.

But he detected no sign of any such feelings. She was merely examining his fur gloves, to make sure that the buttons were on, looking narrowly to the strap of his cloak, busying herself in the most commonplace manner with his preparations.

“Shall I go to the station with you?” she asked carelessly.

“I wish you would.” His tone was quite earnest.

Annette had arranged it so that they went down-stairs while her mother was at dinner; and though the dining-room door had been left ajar, before Mrs. Ferrier had time to leave her seat or call out, the two had left the house, and were driving through the clear starlight.

“Annette,” her husband said suddenly, “I've been thinking that if I had a boy, I would bring him up very strictly. No matter how much I might wish to indulge him, I would resist the wish. He should be taught to control himself from fear, if he had no other motive. He should be made hardy, and healthy, and active. I wouldn't [pg 085] allow him much time to dream and think of himself; he should be kept busy; and I would never let him depend on any one, or sit still and fancy that some great fortune were going to drop into his hands without any effort on his part.”

Mrs. Gerald was silent, astonished by this unexpected lecture, of which she quite well understood the meaning. He would have no child of his brought up as he had been. But why should he speak of it now?

“There's too much liberty and recklessness among young men,” he went on. “They have too much their own way. Parents ought to see what misery it will lead to. If they don't care for what the child may make them suffer, they ought to recollect what the child has got to suffer when at last it wakes up to life as it is, and finds itself with ruinous tastes and habits, and not one right idea of anything. I am inclined to believe that it would be better for half the children in the world if they were brought up and trained by the state instead of by their own parents.”

They had reached the station, and he stepped slowly out of the carriage. His wife ventured to ask how long he would stay away.

“Oh! I've nothing to do in New York,” he said carelessly. “I shall not stay there more than two or three days.”

He leaned into the carriage, and took her hands. In the darkness she could not see his face, though the light from outside shone in her own; but his voice was tender and regretful, even solemn. “Good-by, dear,” he said. “You have been only too good to me. May God reward you!”

He bent to kiss the hands he held, then hurried away before she had recovered herself sufficiently to speak.

“What a good-by it was!” she thought with a startled heart. “One would think he were never coming back again.”

He did come back, though, and sooner than he was expected. He appeared at the door the next evening, nearly falling in, indeed, so that John had to steady him. Annette had run out of the drawing-room on hearing the servant's exclamation, but, at sight of her husband in such a state, was about to turn back in disgust.

“It isn't liquor, ma'am,” John said. “Something's the matter with him. I told you yesterday that he wasn't fit to go away. Just push that chair this way for him to sit down in, and bring him a glass of wine.”

“I had to come back,” the young man said. “I was sicker than I thought, and not able to go on. I don't know how I reached Crichton; and just now, walking up from the station, the cold wind on my forehead made me dizzy. I thought I should feel better to walk. Don't be frightened, Annette. I can go up-stairs now.”

He had every symptom of fever, and before morning had grown so much worse that a doctor was sent for, though much against his will.

“I don't believe in doctors,” he protested. “My mother always cured me when I was sick without sending for a doctor. It's all guess-work. They only know what you tell them, and they sit and stare at you, and ask you questions when you don't want to speak a word. I hate to have a doctor look at me.”

Mr. Gerald was indeed a very difficult patient for both doctor and nurse, irritable beyond expression, and nervous to the verge of delirium. [pg 086] At first no one was allowed near him but his mother. Then he found her tender sadness depressing, and insisted on having his wife in her place. Finally he begged John to take care of him.

“Keep the women away, if you don't want me to lose my senses,” he said to the man. “They start and turn pale or red every time I cough or speak in my sleep; and even when they pretend not to notice, I know they are watching me all the time. I don't dare to groan, or sigh, or rave, though it would sometimes do me good. I want somebody by me who doesn't care whether I live or die, but who just does what I ask him to. Let Louis open the door and sit up in the dicky. It's what he was made for. He's far more of a footman than you.”

“I wouldn't give either of you your salt as footman,” John retorted, smiling grimly. But he did not refuse to assume the post of nurse, and, having undertaken it, rendered himself so useful and unobtrusive that the others all gave way to him, and the sick man had no disposition to change again. He seemed a rather hard, dry man, but he was patient, and showed none of that obtrusive attention which is sometimes more troublesome to an invalid than neglect. If Lawrence groaned and tossed about, the attendant took no notice of him; if he said, “John, don't leave me alone a minute,” the man would sit by his side all night, as untired, apparently, as a man of wood.

So three nights passed, and still the invalid grew worse.

“Wouldn't you like to have me read some prayers to you, sir?” the watcher asked one night. “They might quiet you.”

Lawrence broke out impatiently:

“Do you think I am going to die? I am not. That is what the women are all crying about. Mrs. Ferrier came in to-day, and told me she was having Masses said for me, and sprinkled me with holy water till I was drenched. And Bettie, when she sat here to-day while you were away, rattled her beads and cried all the time, till I told her to get out of the room. That's the way with some people. The minute a fellow is sick, they try their best to scare him to death. Why don't you offer to read the paper to me, or tell me an amusing story? Give me the opiate now.”

“The doctor said you were not to take another till twelve o'clock,” the attendant said.

“I don't care for the doctor's orders. Give it to me now. I know best what I need.”

“I believe you do,” John said quietly, and gave him the opiate.

But in spite of care, and of a determination to recover, the illness grew upon him, till finally the physicians intimated that if he had any religious preparations to make, they had better not be delayed any longer, for his strength was rapidly wasting, and they could not promise that the result would not be fatal.

Mrs. Ferrier went in great distress to F. Chevreuse.

“What shall we do?” she asked. “After having refused to see a priest, and flown into a rage whenever we mentioned the subject, at last he is willing to have one. But he will see no one but F. O'Donovan; and F. O'Donovan is laid up with gout, so that he cannot move hand or foot. I went out to him to-day, and I thought that if he could possibly be wrapped up and brought in in a carriage, I would ask him; but, father, I couldn't have the face to [pg 087] speak of it. The doctor doesn't allow him to stir out of his room. Even Mrs. Gerald sees that it can't be done. I've begged Lawrence to listen to reason, but he is so set that if he had asked to have the Pope himself, he'd be mad if we didn't send a messenger to Rome. I could send to L—— for a priest, but that might be too late. He is failing very much. I do wish you'd go once again, father.”

F. Chevreuse had already been twice, and had been denied admittance in terms anything but respectful.

“Certainly I will go,” he said. “I should have come up this evening, if I had not been sent for. Poor Lawrence! I cannot understand why he should have such a prejudice against me.”

It was early twilight when they reached the house, and, as they entered, the lamps burned with a faint ray, as if they, like all sounds and sights in that place, had been muffled.

“You go right up and tell him there's no one to be got but me,” F. Chevreuse said.

But Mrs. Ferrier shrank back. “He never will consent if I ask him.”

“Annette, then.”

“He won't allow Annette near him,” the mother sighed.

“John,” said the priest, “will you go up and tell Mr. Gerald that I am here to see him?”

“I wouldn't venture to, sir,” John answered. “I don't believe it's of any use; and if you'd take my advice, sir....”

Even Mrs. Ferrier was scandalized by the man's presumption, and faltered out an “O John!”

“I will go myself,” F. Chevreuse interrupted. “Stay down here, all you people, and say the rosary for my success. Say it with all your hearts. And don't come up-stairs till you are called.”

As he went up, a door near the landing softly opened, and in it stood the young wife with a face so woful and deathlike that tears would have seemed joyful in comparison. She said not a word, but stood and looked at the priest in a kind of terror.

“My poor child!” he said pityingly, “why do you stay here alone, killing yourself with grief? Go and stay with your mother and Honora till I come down.”

She made that painful effort to speak which shows that the mouth and throat are dry, and, when words came, they were but a whisper. “O father!” she said, “don't go in there if you have any human weakness left in you! You have to be an angel and not a man to hear my husband's confession. Find some one else for him. He will not speak to you.”

“Never fear, child!” he answered firmly. “I may have human weakness, but I have the strength of God to help me resist it.”

She watched him as he softly opened the door of the chamber where her husband lay, heard the faint cry that greeted him: “Not you! not you!” then the door closed, and she was alone again.

The priest approached the bed, and spoke with gentleness, yet with authority: “F. O'Donovan is too sick to come; and if you wait for another to be sent for, it will be too late. Think of your soul, and let everything else go. In a few hours you may be in the presence of God, listening to your eternal doom. What will you care then, my poor boy, who helped you to loosen from your conscience the sins you have committed in this [pg 088] miserable world? It cannot be because you hate me so much, this unwillingness. Is it because your sins have been so great? There is no sin that I have not heard confessed, I think; and the greater it was, the greater was my comfort and thankfulness that at last it was forgiven. Come, now, I am putting on my stole. Ask the help of God and of our Blessed Mother, and forget who I am. Remember only what I am—the minister of the merciful God—and that I have no feeling, no thought, no wish, but to save you.”

The bed-curtains made a still deeper shade in that shadowed room, and out from the dimness the face of the sick man gleamed white and wild.

“I cannot!” he said. “You would not want to hear me if you knew. You would never give me absolution. You do not know what my sins are.”

The priest seated himself by the bedside, and took in his strong, magnetic hand the thin and shaking hand of the penitent. “No matter what you may tell me, you cannot surprise me,” he said. “Though you should have committed sacrilege and every crime, I cannot, if I would, refuse you absolution. And I would not wish to. I have only pity and love for you. Tell me all now, as if you were telling your own soul. Have no fear.”

“No priest ever before heard such a confession!” The words came faintly. “You do not know.”

“Confess, in the name of God!” repeated the priest. “The flames of hell are harder to bear than any anger of mine can be. God has sent me hither, and I have only to obey him, and listen to your confession, whatever it may be. It is not my choice nor yours. We are both commanded.”

“Promise me that I shall have absolution! Promise me that you will forgive me!” prayed the young man, clinging to the hand that he had at first shrunk from. “I didn't mean to do what I have done, and I have suffered the torments of the damned for it.”

“I have no right to refuse absolution when you are penitent,” was the answer. “The person who repents and confesses has a right to absolution.”

“You will give it to me, no matter what I may tell you?”

“No matter what you may tell me,” repeated the priest. “The mercy of God is mighty. Though you should hem yourself in with sins as with a wall of mountains, he can overlook them. Though you should sink in the lowest depths of sin, his hand can reach you. A sinner cannot be moved to call on the name of the Lord, unless the Lord should move him and have the merciful answer ready. I have blessed you. How long is it since your last confession?”

The sick man half raised himself, and pointed across the room.

“There is a crucifix on the table,” he said. “Go and kneel before that, and ask God to strengthen you for a hard trial. Then, if you come back to me, I will confess.”

F. Chevreuse started up, and stood one instant erect and rigid, with his face upraised. Then he crossed the room, knelt before the crucifix, and held it to his breast during a moment of wordless prayer. As a sigh reached him through the stillness of the chamber, he laid the crucifix down, and returned to the bedside.

“In the name of God, confess, [pg 089] and have no fear,” he said gently. “Have no fear!”

The penitent lay with his face half turned to the pillow, and the bed was trembling under him; but he no longer refused to speak.

To the company down-stairs it seemed a very long interview. Mrs. Ferrier, Mrs. Gerald, and Miss Pembroke, kneeling together in the little sitting-room near the foot of the stairs, with the door open, had said the rosary, trying not to let their thoughts wander; then, sitting silent, had listened for a descending step, breathing each her own prayer now and then. Their greatest trouble was over. Evidently F. Chevreuse had overcome Lawrence Gerald's unwillingness to confess to him; and the three women, so different in all else, united in the one ardent belief that the prayer of faith would save the sick man, and that, when his conscience should be quite disburdened, and his soul enlightened by the comforts and exhortations which such a man as F. Chevreuse could offer, his body would feel the effects of that inward healing, and throw off its burden too.

In an adjoining room sat Louis Ferrier, biting his nails, having been forbidden by his mother to seek distraction in more cheerful scenes. He watched the women while they knelt, and even drew a little nearer to listen to their low-voiced prayer, but lacked the piety to join them. He was both annoyed and frightened by the gloomy circumstances in which he found himself, and, like most men of slack religious belief and practice, felt more safe to have pious women by him in times of danger.

John had taken his place on a low stool underneath the stairs, and had an almost grotesque appearance of being at the same time hiding and alert. With his head advanced, and his neck twisted, he stared steadfastly up the stairway at the door within which the priest had disappeared.

For nearly an hour there was no sound but the small ticking of a clock and the occasional dropping of a coal in the grate. Then all the waiting ones started and looked out eagerly; for the chamber-door opened, and F. Chevreuse came out.

One only did not lift her face to read what tidings might be written in the face of him who came forth from the sick-chamber. Kneeling, almost prostrate on the floor, Annette Gerald still remained where F. Chevreuse had left her. She did not look up even when he paused by her side, and she felt that he was blessing her, but only bowed still lower before him.

“Take comfort, my child,” he said. “You have no reason to despair.”

She looked up quickly into his face, with an almost incredulous hope in her eyes.

He was pale, but some illumination not of earth floated about him, so that she could easily have believed she saw him upborne in air with the buoyancy of a spirit. The heavenly calm of his expression could not be described; yet it was the calm of one who, reposing on the bosom of God, is yet aware of infinite sin and suffering in the world. It was such a look as one might imagine an angel guardian to wear—heavenly peace shorn of heavenly delight.

He motioned her to rise, and she obeyed him. She would not then have hesitated, whatever he had bade her do. His imposing calm pressed her fears and doubts to a perfect quiet. There was nothing possible but obedience.

“Go to your husband, and see if he wants anything,” he said. “Let him be very quiet, and he may sleep. To-morrow morning I shall bring him the Viaticum; but I think he will recover.”

She went toward the chamber, and he descended the stairs. John, bending forward eagerly, caught sight of his face, and drew quickly back again, blessing himself. “The man is a saint!” he muttered, and took good care to keep himself out of sight.

F. Chevreuse was met in the sitting-room door by Mrs. Gerald, and the other two pressed close behind her; and when they saw him, it was as though a soft and gentle light had shone into their troubled faces.

“You are afraid that so long an interview has exhausted him,” he said. “It has not. The body is seldom any worse for attending to the affairs of the soul, and a tranquil mind is the best rest. Annette is with him now, and, if left undisturbed, I think he will sleep. Pray for him, and do not lose courage. God bless you! Good-night.”

Not one of them uttered a word. The questions they would have asked, and the invitation they would have given the priest to remain with them, died on their lips. Evidently he did not mean to enter the room, and they felt that his doing so was a favor for him to offer, not for them to ask.

They glanced at each other as he went away, and Honora Pembroke smiled. “He looks as though he were gazing at heaven through the gate of martyrdom,” she said.

But the next morning, after seeing Gerald, he stopped a few minutes to talk with the family, and still they found that indefinable air of loftiness lingering about him, imposing a certain distance, at the same time that it increased their reverence and affection for him. The familiar, frequently jesting, sometimes peremptory F. Chevreuse seemed to have gone away for ever; but how beautiful was the substitute he had left, and how like him in all that was loftiest!

Lawrence was better that morning, and gained steadily day by day. Nothing could exceed the care and tenderness with which F. Chevreuse watched over his recovery. He came every morning and evening, he treated him with the affection of a father, and seemed to have charged himself with the young man's future.

“I think you should let him and Annette go to Europe for a year,” he said to Mrs. Ferrier. “It would be better for him to break off entirely from old associations, and have an entire change for a while. His health has not been good for some time, and his nerves are worn. The journey would restore him, and afterward we will see what can be done. I am not sure that it is well for him to live here. When a person is going to change his life very much, it is often wiser to change his place of abode also. The obstacles to improvement are fewer among strangers.”

The young man received this proposal to go abroad rather doubtfully. He would not go away till spring, and was not sure that he would go then. As he grew better in health, indeed, he withdrew himself more and more from the priest, and showed an uneasiness in his society which not all F. Chevreuse's kindness could overcome.

“You must not shun me, Lawrence,” the priest said to him one day when they were alone. “You have done that too long, and it is not well. Try to look on me as [pg 091] very firmly your friend. Let me advise you sometimes, and be sure that I shall always have your good in view.”

Lawrence had been very nervous and irritable that day, and was in no mood to bear expostulation. “You can't be my friend,” he replied with suppressed vehemence. “You can only be my master. You can only own me body and soul.”

“That is a mistake,” was the quiet answer. “I do not own you any more than I do others.”

But he patiently forbore to press the question then.

“Encourage him to come to me whenever you think I can benefit him,” he said to Annette. “You can tell best. He has not quite recovered his spirits yet, and it will do no good for me to urge him. Make everything as cheerful as you can for him. It sometimes happens that people get up from sickness in this depressed state of mind.”

“Yes!” she replied, looking down.

She also had grown shy of F. Chevreuse, and seemed willing to keep out of his sight.

But to others she was perhaps rather more gay than they had known her for some time. Her mother found her at once kinder and more exacting, and complained that they seemed now to have become strangers.

“And how nervous you have grown, Annette!” she said. “You crush everything you take hold of.”

“What have I crushed, mamma?” asked the daughter, with a light laugh. “Have I made havoc among your bonnets or wine-glasses?”

“It isn't that,” Mrs. Ferrier said fretfully. “You squeeze people's hands, instead of touching them. Look at that baby's arm!” They were entertaining a baby visitor.

Annette Gerald looked as she was bid and saw the prints of her fingers on the soft little arm she had held unconsciously, and caught an only half-subsided quiver of the baby lip as the little one looked at her, all ready to cry with pain.

Every woman knows at once how she atoned for her fault, by what caresses, and petting, and protestations of sorrow, and how those faint red marks were bemoaned as if they had been the stripes of a martyr.

“If you touch any one's arm, you pinch it,” the elder lady went on. “And you take hold of your shawl and your gloves and your handkerchief as if somebody were going to pull them away from you. I've seen your nails white when you held the evening paper to read, you gripped it so; and as to taking glasses and cups at the table, I always expect to see them fly to pieces in your hands.”

“Isn't she an awful woman?” says Mrs. Annette to the baby, holding it high and looking up into its rosy, smiling face. “Isn't Annette a frightfully muscular and dangerous person, you pink of perfection? What shall we do with her? She pinches little swan's-down arms, and makes angelic babies pucker up their lips with grief, and sets tears swimming in their blue violets of eyes. We must do something dreadful to her. We must forgive her; and that is very terrible. There is nothing so crushing, baby, as to be forgiven very much.”

And then, after one more toss, the infant was let suddenly and softly down, like a lapful of roses, over the face of its friend, and for an instant Annette Gerald's eyes were hidden in its neck.

“Come and have a game of chess, Annette,” her husband called out across the room.

“Yes, dear!” she responded brightly; and, setting the child down, went to him at once, a red color in her cheeks.

“Why do some people always notice such little things,” he said frowningly, “and, instead of attending to themselves, watch how people take hold of cups and saucers, and all that nonsense, and fancy that some wonderful chance hangs on your eating butter with your bread, or preferring cheese?”

Annette was engaged in placing the men, and did not look in her husband's face as she answered in a gentle, soothing voice:

“It is rather annoying sometimes, but I find the best way is to treat the whole jestingly. If one shows vexation, it looks serious. But you can ridicule a person out of hanging mountains by threads.”

He was going to answer, when something made him notice her face. The color was still bright there, but the cheeks were hollow, and dark circles had sunk beneath her eyes.

“Why, you are not looking well,” he said, only just aware of the fact. “Are you sick? Did you get worn out taking care of me?”

She waited an instant till the others, who were leaving the room, should be out of sight, then leaned across the table, careless that her sleeve swept away the two armies she had just placed, and took her husband's hand in hers, and bowed her cheek to it with a sob.

“O Lawrence! Lawrence!” she whispered.

He made a motion to draw his hand away, but let it remain. “My God! what is the matter with you?” he exclaimed.

She leaned back instantly, and made an effort to control herself. “It must be that I am not well. Don't mind me. And now, you will have to place your own men, and give me the first move.”

He placed the men, and appeared to be thinking pitifully of his wife as he glanced now and then into her face. “It seems selfish of me not to have taken better care of you, Annette,” he said.

“Oh! you needed care yourself,” she replied lightly. “Don't imagine that I am sick, though. It is nothing. You didn't marry me to take care of me, you know, and I am not very exacting.”

She would have caught back the last words, if she could, before it was too late. They escaped her unawares, and were a remembered, rather than a present, bitterness.

He blushed faintly. “Whatever I married you for, I have no desire to exchange you now for any one else,” he said, moving a pawn sideways instead of forward. “If you were ever so poor, I wouldn't want a rich girl in your place. But then, you know, I'm not sentimental. I never was much so, and it's all over now. I'm thirty years old, and I feel a hundred. I can't remember being young. I can't remember being twenty years of age. I wish to God I could!” he burst forth.

His wife made a careful move, and said, “I have a presentiment that I shall give you check in three moves more. Look out for your queen.”

“My only romance,” he went on, “was about Honora. I thought that I could do and be anything, if she would only care about me. What a stately, floating creature she always was! I used to think she looked as if she could walk on clouds and not fall through. Yes,” [pg 093] he sighed, “that is where she belongs—among the clouds. I never blamed her for not having me; she was too good. I never was worthy of such a woman.”

Slowly, while he spoke, the bright blood had deepened in his wife's face, and swept over her forehead. Had he been less preoccupied, he would have seen the slight, haughty movement with which she drew herself up. It was only when he had waited a moment for her to move that he glanced up and met her eyes fixed on him with an expression very like indignant scorn.

“By what strange contradiction is it, I wonder,” she said coldly, “that the woman who does most for a man, and is most merciful and charitable toward him, is never too good for him, while the one who scorns him, and will not come a step off her pedestal to save him, is always the ideal woman in his eyes?”

Bitter tears of utter grief and mortification welled up and wet her eyelashes. “In another world,” she said, “when the faults and mistakes of this are set right, you may think yourself worthy of the companionship of Honora Pembroke, and of any union and closeness of affection which that life may know. And then she may be given to you. And, Lawrence, if she would and could consent to take you now, I would not refuse to give you up. At this moment, if, without any wrong, I could see her enter the room, and hold out her hand to you, and tell you that she was ready to take what she had refused, and be to you all that you could wish—if it could be right that it should happen so, I would not utter one word of objection. I would leave you to her without a moment's hesitation.”

While she spoke, his hand had played tremblingly with the chessmen before him. “So you give me up too,” he said in a low voice.

Her proud face softened. She looked at him, and recollected herself and him, and pity sprang up again and effaced indignation. “I do not give you up, Lawrence,” she said gently. “I cannot and have no wish to; I only spoke of what I would do in circumstances which cannot take place. You had insulted me, without intending to, I know, and it was but natural that I should retort. You know that I would not leave you, nor give you up on any provocation. If you should leave me, I should follow you, because I should feel sure that you would sooner or later need me. We are one. You are mine; and I always stand by my own.”

He looked at her with an expression at once penetrating and shrinking. “You would stand by me, Annette, whatever should happen?” he asked.

“Certainly!” she replied, but did not meet his eyes. “There is no imaginable circumstance which could make me desert you. And now, what of this game? To your queen!”

He made a motion to save his queen, then pushed the board aside. “I cannot play,” he said; “I cannot confine my mind to it. Sing me something. It is long since I have heard you sing.”

He threw himself into a deeply-cushioned chair, and leaned his head on his hands while she sang to him—knowing, how well! that a cheerful song would not cheer him nor a pious song soothe—of

She was a magical singer, surely; and the still, cold melancholy of her tones was the very spirit and essence of death; and, like death, it pierced to the heart. She sang:

She turned quickly at a sound behind her, and saw that her husband had buried his face in the cushions of the chair, and was trembling violently. She went to him, but there was no comfort to give nor to receive. Death alone could bring release for him and for her. She could only surround him with her arms while he sobbed with the terrible hysterical sobbing of a man utterly broken down, and let him feel that he was not alone and unpitied.

“I don't know what ails me,” he said at length, trying to control himself. “Don't mind me, Annette. My nerves seem to be all unstrung. It must be that fever.”

“Oh! don't, Lawrence; please don't!” she said faintly.

He became silent all at once, and it seemed as though a chill had passed over him. She sighed drearily, and smoothed his hair with her hand. “Trust your wife,” she said. “I am by you always.”

“You are not afraid of me?” He seemed to ask the question with a kind of terror.

“My poor Lawrence! no. I do not fear you as much as you do me. Don't have such fancies.”

She did not explain in what confessional she had learned his secret; in what troubled sleep wherein the unwary tongue speaks; in what more troubled waking, when the eyes and actions speak; or in what sudden suspicion and enlightenment, coming she knew not whence. She told nothing, and he asked nothing, only leaned on her bosom, and wept again as though all his manhood had departed.

“O Annette!” he said, “I dreamed last night that I was a little boy, and that I stood by my mother while she brushed my hair into curls round her finger. I thought I had been away a long distance, and come back again, and I stood quite still, and remembered another childhood before I took that journey. I was so glad to be back—as glad as I should be now if I could go back. Some way I could see that my hair was golden, and that my mother smiled as she brushed it, though I did not look at her. Such dreams are always coming to me now. As soon as I go to sleep, I am a child that has been away and is solemnly glad to be back again. And then I wake, and am in hell!”

She went on smoothing his hair steadily.

“Some time soon the dream will come true,” she said. “Do the best you can. Do justice to the wronged. Come away with me, and we will hide ourselves somewhere in the world, and try to find peace for the days that are left. And by-and-by, Lawrence, will come the day when we shall both be as little children again, and all our terrible burdens will slip off. You must do justice to the wronged.”

“In some way, yes!” he said. “I have tried to think. He must be saved. But I cannot go away. Do you remember ever having been afraid to go up-stairs in the dark, of having felt sure that there was some one behind just ready to grasp you, till you screamed out in [pg 095] terror? It would be like that with me. If once I turn my back on this place, my life will become a crazy flight.”

“The world is wide,” she urged, “and there are safe places enough in it. Besides, money can buy anything; and he has forgiven you. He will screen you.”

“My mother!” he exclaimed. “Who will screen and save her? I will not destroy her, Annette. No, everybody in the world may perish first. I never will destroy my mother. I have done harm enough.”

“He will die in prison,” she whispered. “He has sent to Germany for help, and it did him no good. He has demanded a new trial, and there was not enough to justify them in granting it. He is in a net from which there seems to be no escape. They say that he will die.”

“You want to make me crazy!” her husband cried out, pushing her fiercely from him. “Go away! You are worse than the rest.”

There was no way but to yield to him. “Well, well, Lawrence! I will try to think of some other means.”

The season had reached early spring, and one tempestuous evening in March, as F. Chevreuse sat at home, making up some church accounts, feeling quite sure that he should not be interrupted, he heard the street-door softly open and shut, then a tap at the door of the room.

“Strange that Jane should leave that street-door unlocked!” he thought, and at the same moment heard the servant coming up-stairs from the kitchen. Her quick ear had caught the sound, and she, too, was wondering how she could have omitted to fasten the house up.

The door of F. Chevreuse's sitting-room was quickly opened, and shut again in Jane's face, and a woman stood inside. It was Annette Gerald, wrapped in a large waterproof cape, with the hood over her head.

“Send Jane away!” she said hurriedly. “Don't let her in here! Don't let her see me!”

Here Jane opened the door and put her head in, eyeing curiously the visitor, whose back was turned to her. “I'm sure I shut the door and bolted it, father,” she began, and took a step into the room. “I....”

“No matter! I'll see to it,” the priest said, waving her away.

“Oh! well, only I'm sure I locked it. And perhaps you'd like to have this lamp....”

“Jane!” he exclaimed, standing up, “when I dismiss you, you are to go.”

Jane retired, grumbling.

“She will listen at the door,” his visitor said.

F. Chevreuse flung the door open, and discovered his domestic lingering about the head of the stairs, affecting to examine an imaginary hole in the carpet.

“Once for all, Jane,” he said, “if you wish to remain in my house, you must not presume, nor show any curiosity about my affairs, nor the affairs of those who come to me. Go down into the kitchen, and shut the door, and stay there.”

Jane, albeit not very subordinate, was completely awed by a display of authority such as she had never seen before. She did not venture to resist nor complain, but returned without delay to her own place.

F. Chevreuse waited till he heard the kitchen-door close with somewhat unnecessary force, then returned to his visitor.

“What has brought you out to-night?” he asked in a low voice.

“Let me get my breath!” She was almost gasping. “Jane gave me such a fright that my heart is in my mouth.”

He set a chair for her, and seated himself near, waiting till she should be able to speak. “You had better shake the snow off your cloak,” he said.

She made a gesture of impatient refusal.

The rude mantle had slipped aside, and revealed a strangely contrasting toilet beneath. There was a shining of lustrous pale-green silk with delicately-wrought laces, a glimmer of emeralds and diamonds, and glimpses of pink roses set in bunches of green grass.

“I have been to the prison,” she whispered.

F. Chevreuse frowned, and dropped his eyes.

“The man is a fool!” she exclaimed. “He will not be saved. I had bought one of the guard. It was the hour for supper, and the man let me in, and promised that for ten minutes I might do as I pleased, and he would see and know nothing. I went into the corridor, and found the cell-door unlocked. Everything was ready, was perfect; for the storm would prevent any loungers from coming about the prison or the guard-room, and would give an excuse to any one who wanted to muffle up and cover their face. I had a large cloak all ready. But he would not go. He will not fly as though he were guilty, he said.”

“What did you say to him?” the priest inquired, without looking up.

“I told him that he could save himself, and prove his innocence afterward. I said that may be the real criminal would some day confess, and then he could come out before the world more than justified. I said that we loved and pitied him, and were unhappy at the thought of him there, and would do anything for him. He was to be secreted in our house till a way could be got for him to escape. I had left the carriage just round the corner, and John would have thought that it was Lawrence who got in with me. Mamma and Louis have gone to the President's dinner, and Gerald was to watch and let us in, and afterward come out again with me. But, no; the stubborn simpleton would not be saved. I went on my knees to him, and he was like a rock. Then the watchman knocked at the door, and I had to run. The other guard were coming in from their supper, and, if I hadn't hid behind a door, they would have seen me face to face. Oh! why did he not consent?”

She wrung her hands slowly till the jewels on them twinkled in the lamp-light.

F. Chevreuse still sat with his eyes downcast. “My poor child!” he said, “your pity for this man has led you into an almost fatal error. Never attempt such a thing again. It is not for you to cast yourself under the wheels of Juggernaut. I command you to try no such experiment again. Pray to God. That is all that you can do.”

“Yes, I know that now,” she answered despairingly. “I am utterly helpless. It is your turn. You must save him.”

“What can I do?” he asked wonderingly. “I have tried all I could, but in vain, as you know. I have left no stone unturned, and the only good result I can see is a probability that the sentence will not be executed to the utmost, and that in time something may happen to bring his innocence to light.”

“In time!” she repeated. “Have you seen the man? Why, I did not know him till he spoke. He will not live. No, there must be no delay. What you must do is this: You must go to the authorities, and say that you know who the true criminal is, but cannot tell, at least not now, and that Mr. Schöninger is innocent.”

The priest looked in her face with a gaze of calm surprise. “You mistake,” he said. “I do not know who the criminal is. If I did know, I should immediately go to the authorities, and denounce him.”

She looked him steadfastly in the face, but his calmness baffled her. He showed only a cool and dignified surprise.

“Oh! these men,” she muttered. “I feel as if I were being ground between stones.”

She stood, and the shining folds of her dress, that had been gathered up in her arms, dropped about her, and lay on the floor.

“Have you been walking through the snow in a ball-dress?” the priest asked. “Have you anything to protect your feet?”

“Oh! I have fur shoes, and my carriage is near by,” she said absently, and seemed to be considering what to do next.

“Go home now, my child, and try to put all this wild work out of your mind,” F. Chevreuse said with emotion. “Perform your own duty simply and in the fear of God, and do not try to take the burden of others on those shoulders of yours. Go home and warm yourself well, or you will be sick.”

“Oh! I am not going home,” she said, her glance caught by the sparkling of a bracelet on her arm. “To-night is a dinner and ball given to the President, you know; and since he is going away to-morrow it couldn't be put off. It must be time I was there, and I have to go home after Lawrence.”

“What! you will go to a dinner and ball to-night?” exclaimed the priest. “You feel yourself fit for company?”

She smiled faintly. “I shall doubtless be the gayest of the gay. There is not much danger of my feeling sleepy.”

“Well, women are wonderful beings,” remarked F. Chevreuse to himself.

The young woman drew her wrappings about her, and gathered up again her flowing skirts, looking to see that no stain had fallen on them; and, in arranging her toilet for a new scene, she appeared to arrange her mind also. A gentle tranquillity settled upon her face, and her head was slightly lifted, as though she were already the centre of observation to a brilliant throng.

“But you are looking very pale,” the priest objected.

“That always mends itself,” she answered carelessly. “When I have need of color, it usually comes.”

Some way, in this firm self-control, he found her more pitiful than in any abandonment of sorrow. She accepted the situation uncomplainingly, since she could do no more, and steeled herself to bear what she must.

“God bless you!” he said, when she was ready to go.

Her face stirred a little at the words. It seemed that she would rather not listen to anything of serious kindness then. Yet at the door she hesitated, and turned back. For once it was necessary that she should speak.

“I have no difficulty about company or anything but silence and darkness,” she said hurriedly, looking [pg 098] down. “I like a crowd, though I am always on the lookout for something to be said I will not wish to hear. When he and I are alone, I turn cold and creeping, for fear he should speak; and I keep close and cling to him, lest, if I should get a little way off, I should grow afraid of him. If we were to be separated for one week, I think we would never again dare to approach each other. But recollect”—she lifted her eyes for one quick glance—“I have told you nothing.”

“Certainly not,” he replied gravely.

In a moment she had gone out, and was running through the flying snow to find her carriage, left in the next street to baffle some possible watcher.

Young Mrs. Gerald was quite right in saying that she should probably be the gayest of the gay that night; and if any other person appeared to enjoy the scene more than herself, it was, perhaps, her husband.

“A very happy couple,” remarked a sympathizing friend to Mrs. Ferrier.

“Oh! yes,” the mother sighed, nodding her head. “He is always gay when he is doing no good, and as glum as a spade when he is behaving himself. I was in hopes that his sickness would sober him, but he is wilder than ever. You should see him drive my horses!”

Her son-in-law, passing by at that moment, caught the last words, and immediately joined the two ladies. “I know that Mrs. Ferrier is complaining of me,” he said gaily. “She will never forgive me for putting her precious bays out of breath. But the truth is, I am trying to save their lives; for they are so fat now that you could drive them to death at six miles an hour.”

“O Lawrence!” Annette said at his elbow—she was always hovering near when he spoke with her mother—“they say that Strauss, the composer, you know, is really coming to America next year, and will lead his own waltzes at the concerts.”

“And, by the way, Ninon,” said her husband, “is that the Strauss who always was? I have had a waltz-writing, violin-playing Strauss in my mind ever since I was born, and he had lived ages before, and was something like Mephistopheles, to my fancy. Perhaps he is the Wandering Jew.”

“Speaking of Jews—” began Mrs. Ferrier's companion.

And here Annette drew her husband away, hanging on his arm, smiling and whispering to him, the brightest, prettiest woman in the room.

“And yet last night he was off somewhere, and she sat up for him till a quarter before two o'clock,” Mrs. Ferrier said, looking after them. “I looked to see what time it was when I heard him come in. It is wearing her out. I shall not allow her to do it again.”

It was easier for Mrs. Ferrier to say what should not be than to find herself obeyed, for the next night her daughter again kept vigil. “All I ask of you, mamma, is to let me attend to my own business,” she said decidedly.

So “mamma” toiled up-stairs to bed, and the daughter lowered the lights, took out her rosary, and began her nightly task of fighting away thought, and trying to fix her mind on the future.

After an hour or two, John, the footman, put his head in at the door. “You'd a great deal better go to bed, ma'am, and leave me to let Mr. Gerald in,” he said. “I've something that will keep me up to-night, [pg 099] and it's a pity two should lose their rest. It is past twelve now.”

She felt faint and weary, and sleep was beginning to steal over her. “I believe I will go, then,” she said. “I have not slept for three nights.”

She went, with a dragging step, over the bright carpet roses. “What would become of him if I were to break up?” she thought.

When she had gone, the man put out the hall gas, opened the doors of the vestibule, and set himself to wait. He meant to have speech of Mr. Gerald that night without Mr. Gerald's wife for a witness or any likelihood of other interruption.

About one o'clock he heard unsteady steps on the sidewalk, and, as he went to the door, Lawrence Gerald came reeling up the steps, and almost fell into his arms.

“Come into the sitting-room, sir, and lie down on the sofa. It will be easier than going up-stairs,” he said.

When he had been drinking, the young man was easy to lead, and he now submitted readily, and was in a few minutes in a deep sleep.

John locked the street-door, shut the door of the sitting-room behind him, and, seating himself, waited for the sleeper to wake.

A nervous man might have grown uneasy during that watch. There is something not always pleasant in hearing one's own breathing, and the faint occasional sounds in floor and wall, and at one's elbow, even, which, in the stillness of night, seem like the movements of unseen beings drawing near. Besides, there is a terror in the thought that we are going to terrify another.

But this man was not nervous. He was made of wholesome though rough material, and he had a strong will. He had been waiting for others to act, and had waited in vain, and now he had made up his mind that it was for him to act. Justice was strong in him, where he had the ability to perceive what was just, and he would no longer see the innocent suffer for the guilty. Besides, he reflected, there was no one else who could speak. Self-defence, or the defence of one dearly loved, or a yet more sacred motive, sealed the lips of all who knew. His lips were not sealed, and justice commanded him to speak.

Three o'clock came and went, and still the young man slept. The other sat and studied him, noting how slight and elegant was his form, how fine the hands and feet, how daintily he was dressed and cared for.

John was stout and heavy, a man of delf, and the size of his boots had once provoked from Lawrence a very provoking quotation:

and more than once the young man had mockingly pushed his two white hands into one of John's gloves.

This sleeper's hair was glossy, scented, as soft as floss, and curled in many a wilful ring; John's was coarse and straight, and he wisely wore it closely cropped. Lawrence Gerald's face was delicately smooth; the lines melted harmoniously into each other; his brows were finely drawn; the teeth, that showed through his parted lips, were pearly white; and as he lay with closed eyes, the lashes made two exquisitely curved shadows on his cheeks. John's face was plain, he had no eyebrows nor eyelashes to speak of, his eyes were more for use than ornament, and his nose went about its business straight from end to end, stopping [pg 100] rather bluntly, and utterly ignoring that delicate curve which made this man's profile so perfect.

This man? This drunkard, rather, John thought; this spendthrift, and gambler, and robber. This murderer!

The nerves of the serving-man stiffened; and if he had felt any relenting, it was over. The insolent daintiness before him stirred all his bitterness. It was for such men as this that humbler honest folks were to bow and serve, and women's hearts to break!

It must be nearly four o'clock, he thought, and glanced round at the clock. Looking back again, he met Lawrence Gerald's eyes fixed on him steadily, and he returned the look with as immovable a stare. In that instant the meaning of each leaped out of his face as clearly as lightning from a cloud. Young Gerald's eyes began to shrink in their depths, and still the other held them; he drew slowly back on the sofa, cowering, but unable to turn away.

And here John's eyes released him, for another object drew them up to the mirror that hung over the sofa. Reflected there he saw that the door was partly open, and Annette Gerald's white face looking in. She came swiftly gliding toward them, silent as a ghost, and melted, rather than fell, on to her knees before her husband, between him and the other. Her arms and bosom hid him from that relentless gaze which told that all was known, and her own face turned and received it instead, firmly and almost defiantly.

“Well, John?” she said. “Speak out what you have to say.”

“This can't go on any longer, ma'am,” he whispered; “and I should think you would have the sense to see that. If you're willing to let an innocent man suffer for him, even that won't serve you long, for he will betray himself yet. You must go.”

“Yes, yes, we will go!” she replied hurriedly. “It is the only thing to do. We will go right away.”

“I will give you three weeks to get out of danger,” he went on; “or, if that isn't enough, a month. But you mustn't lose a day. I won't see that man down in the prison die for nothing. After the four weeks from to-morrow morning are up, I shall go to F. Chevreuse with a paper that your husband will write. He may tell his own story, and make what excuses he can for himself, and it shall be for everybody to read. F. Chevreuse will carry the paper to the judges, and take that man out of prison. That is all I've got to say,” he concluded. “Four weeks from to-morrow morning!”

Annette made no further reply, only watched the man out of the room, and locked the door after him. Then she returned to her husband, and, for the first time since she had entered the room, looked in his face. He was lying back with his eyes closed, as though from faintness. She brought him a glass of wine, knelt by his side while he drank it, then took his hand in hers.

“There is no other way, Lawrence,” she said.

He was sitting up now, but kept his eyes closed, as if he could not meet her glance, or could not endure to look upon the light. He answered her quietly, “Yes, it is the only way.”

“And now,” she continued, “since there is no time to lose, you will tell me the whole, and I will [pg 101] write it down. You can sign it afterward.”

He nodded, but did not speak. The blow had fallen, and its first effect was crushing.

She brought a writing-table close to the sofa, and seated herself before it. As she arranged the paper, pens, and ink, heavy tears rolled down her face, and sigh after sigh struggled up from her heart; but she did not suffer them to impede her work—scarcely seemed, indeed, conscious of them. Everything was arranged carefully and rapidly. “Now, Lawrence!” she said, and seemed to catch her breath with the words.

He started, and opened his eyes; and when he saw her, with eyes uplifted, making the sign of the cross on her forehead and bosom, he knelt by her side, and, bowing his head, blessed himself also with the sacred sign.

Then he began his confession, and she wrote it as it fell from his lips. If now and then a tear, not quickly enough brushed away, fell on the paper, it only left its record of a wife's grief and love, but did not blot out a word of the clear writing.

When the last word had been written, and the name signed, a long ray of white morning light had pierced through a chink in the shutter, and lay across the red lamp-light.

Annette Gerald took the pen from her husband's hand. “My poor Lawrence!” she said, “you and I have got to be saints now. There is no medium for us. Pleasure, ease, all hope of earthly peace—they are far behind us. We must go out into the world and do penance, and wait for death.”

“Annette,” he exclaimed, “let me go alone! Give me up now, and live your own life here. I will never come near you again.”

She shook her head. “That is impossible. The only consolation I can have is to stay with you and give you what little help I can. You could not live without me, Lawrence. Don't speak of it. I shall stand by you.”

She opened the shutters and the window, and let the fresh morning light into the close room and over their feverish faces.

The town was waking up to a bright sunshiny day, its many smokes curling upward into the blue, its beautiful vesture of snow still clinging here and there, all its busy life beginning to stir joyfully again. They stood before the window a minute looking out, the same thought in both their minds. Then the wife leaned forward. “Good-by, Crichton!” she said, and took her husband's hand. “Come, Lawrence! we have no time to lose. The sword has been set over the gate.”

To Be Continued.

A Looker-Back. III. The Temple.

Perhaps there is no place in London that appeals to so many instincts of the soul as the Temple. Religion, valor, romance, and literature have all lent enchantment to the place. Built and inhabited by the Knights Templars, the resort of kings and nobles of highest lineage, the home of generations of law-students and literary men like Burke, Johnson, Goldsmith, and Lamb, and associated with Shakespeare and many a romance, who could enter its quiet alleys, and ramble about its courts and gardens, without being stirred to the depths of his soul? Fact and fiction are here so mingled together that one is unable to disentangle them, and the visitor says, as he roams about: Here was the place of Lamb's “kindly engendure”; yonder Eldon lived; up in that third story was Arthur Pendennis' sick-chamber, where his mother and Laura went to nurse him; in that court were Goldsmith's chambers, where he loved to sit and watch the rooks; and in those gardens walked Sir Roger de Coverley, discussing the belles, with patches and hoops, strolling across the green once used by the Red-Cross Knights for martial exercises; and yonder is the ancient church, patterned after that of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem.

The church must be visited first, for it is the most beautiful and perfect in existence that belonged to the Knights Templars, and stood next in rank to their temple in the Holy City. Within half a century it has been restored to something of its ancient glory, and is substantially the same as when consecrated by Heraclius, Patriarch of Jerusalem, in the year 1185. The entrance is a beautiful Norman arch, deeply recessed, with elaborately wrought mouldings, and columns between which are figures of saintly forms, some with rolls in their hands, and some in the attitude of prayer. These stone faces at the entrance of churches are a wonderful check to worldly thoughts. They communicate something of their own solemnity and ineffable calmness. Through this door-way used to pass the valiant knights of the cross who came here with their banner—the glorious Beau-seant—to have their swords blessed on the altar before departing for

This is the entrance to the Round Church. A circular tower rests on six clustered columns of marble, each composed of four shafts, which run into each other at base and capital so as to form but one. And around [pg 103] these is a circular aisle. Six pointed arches spring from these beautiful pillars, above which is an arcade of Norman arches so interlaced as to form a combination of round and pointed arches—a fine example of the transition to the Gothic style of architecture. Parker says this Round Church is one of the best authenticated instances of the earliest use of the pointed arch in England, though the choir of Canterbury Cathedral is usually considered so. Over this arcade are six clerestory windows, between which rise slender shafts that support the groined ribs of the roof.

At the sides of the circular aisle are sedilia formed of masonry projecting from the wall, with slightly arched recesses, in the spandrels of which are grotesque faces in alto-relievo, carven in stone, each of which has an extraordinary character of its own, and is well worth studying. Some are distorted with pain; some look up appealingly; here the tongue protrudes and the eyeballs are glaring; there is a look of unutterable horror; one sets his teeth hard as an unclean animal bites his ear; another shows two fang-like teeth, while a vicious-looking creature is gnawing the corner of his mouth, and the furrowed brow expresses awful agony; here is one with his long tongue run out sideways; there is another bellowing with his mouth wide open, the nostrils dilated and the forehead all puckered up; some have ultra-Roman noses, some sharp, and others flat and broad, as if reflected from a convex surface. One grins and shows all his teeth broad and uniform. The sexton says these faces are supposed to depict the tortures of the suffering souls in purgatory. Grotesque as most of them are, there is a certain awful solemnity, even in the most hideous, that is impressive. Thank God! a few are calm and serene, with their crown of sorrow on their heads. An arcade, similarly decorated, has been found in the ruined Temple Church at Acre, and at the famous Castel Pellegrino, erected by the early Templars to command the shore-road from Acre to Jerusalem.

The first thing that strikes the attention on entering this solemn church is the group of old Crusaders lying on the pavement with their legs crossed, in token that they had served in the Holy Land.

These are not effigies of the Knights Templars—for they do not wear the mantle of that order—but knights associated with them in defence of the Holy Land. One of them represents William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, and Protector of England during the minority of Henry III., one of the greatest warriors and statesmen of the middle ages. Matthew Paris describes his burial here in 1219. Here he lies, carven in stone, clad from head to foot in armor of chain-mail, in the act of sheathing his sword. His legs are crossed, for he had borne the cross of Prince Henry, eldest son of Henry II., to Jerusalem. On his feet are spurs, and at his side a shield with the lion rampant of the Marshalls. This stout-hearted supporter of the Plantagenets was one of the council appointed by Richard Cœur de Lion to govern the kingdom during his absence. It was he, together with Americ, Master of the Temple, who at last induced King John to sign the Magna Charta, and he accompanied the king to Runnymede.

He it was, too, that, while protector in the next reign, offered pardon to the disaffected barons, and confirmed the Magna Charta. He also extended its benefits to Ireland, and commanded the sheriffs to read it publicly at the county courts, and enforce its exact observance.

It was this same Earl of Pembroke whom Shakespeare represents pleading so eloquently for the enfranchisement of the unfortunate Prince Arthur:

This great statesman was a benefactor to the Templars, and, when he died, his body was borne here in state and buried with great pomp on Ascension Day, 1219.

Here, too, are the monumental effigies of his sons—William Marshall, the younger, one of the bold barons of Runnymede, to whom we are indebted for the Magna Charta; and Gilbert Marshall, “the flower of the chivalry of that time,” who married a Scotch princess, and went to the defence of the sacred tomb.

Although the elder Marshall was just enough to extend the benefits of the Magna Charta to Ireland, we are told that, during his campaign in that country, he seized the lands of the Bishop of Fernes, and kept them, in spite of a sentence of excommunication. After the earl's death, the bishop came to London, and laid the case before the king, who, alarmed for the weal of his old guardian's soul, accompanied the bishop to his tomb.

Matthew Paris says that, as they stood by it, the bishop solemnly apostrophized the departed earl: “O William! who lyest here interred and held fast by the chain of excommunication, if those lands which thou hast unjustly taken from my church be rendered back to me by the king, or by your heir, or by any of your family, and if due satisfaction be made for the loss and injury I have sustained, I grant you absolution; but if not, I confirm my previous sentence, so that, enveloped in your sins, you stand for evermore condemned to hell!”

However alarmed the king might have appeared about his guardian's soul, restitution was not made, and the stout old bishop, who seems to have been soundly orthodox as to the temporal rights of the church, denounced the earl and his race in right Scriptural phrase: “His name shall be rooted out in one generation; and his sons shall be deprived of the blessing, Increase and multiply. Some of them shall die a miserable death; their inheritance shall be scattered; and this thou, O king! shalt behold in thy life-time; yea, in the days of thy flourishing youth.”

This fearful prophecy was fulfilled in a remarkable manner. The five sons of the protector died one after another without issue in the reign of Henry III., and the family became extinct.

There are eight of these monumental effigies lying in the centre of the Round Church. It is to them Butler refers in his Hudibras, speaking of the profanation of the place by the lawyers of his time and their clients—

In the round walk of this church there is on one side a coped tombstone, in the style of the XIIth century, of a prismatic, coffin-like shape. On the other side

This is Lord Robert de Ros, another of the bold barons of Runnymede—a knight whose career was one long romance. Beautiful in person, the successful wooer of the Princess Isabella of Scotland, and “one of those military enthusiasts whose exploits form the connecting link between fact and fiction, between history and the fairy tale,” one cannot look at his figure here without interest and emotion.

In fact, there is a wonderful air of mystery and romance about the whole of this solemn church. Here the young aspirant to knighthood used to come to keep his long vigil before the altar, and here gathered the Crusaders before setting off for the tomb of Christ. And chief among them the valiant Templars, in their long, flowing mantles, “whose stainless white their hearts belied not,” with the mystic cross upon their breasts, which Pope Eugenius had authorized them to wear.

We can never believe that, as a body, the early Templars were not worthy of their white garments. A bishop of Acre, who frequently accompanied them on their military expeditions, said of them: “Lions they are in war, gentle in the convent, fierce soldiers in the field, hermits and monks in religion; to the enemies of Christ ferocious and inexorable, but to Christians kind and gracious. They carry before them to battle a banner, half black and white, which they call Beau-seant—that is to say, in the Gallic tongue, Bien-seant, because they are fair and favorable to the friends of Christ, but black and terrible to his enemies.”

While this vision of the past was crossing the inward eye, a strain of music, as of some holy chant, came floating softly out from some inner recess, sweetly adding to the enchantment. It was only the choir practising in the vestry, but it was just far enough away to give a certain mystery and softness to their psalmody that was delightful at that vesper hour. One needs a service for such memories, and alone in this rotunda of the Templars, where

once heavenward soared, the pilgrim knelt awhile in the dim round aisle to say a Requiescant for those that once worshipped here according to God's appointed ordinances, and then went his way—in pace.

The next day brought him back to complete his survey. Churches like this, in imitation of that of the Holy Sepulchre, were frequently built in the time of the Crusades. The Milanese built one in their city after returning from the holy war. Peter Adornes made three journeys from Flanders to Jerusalem to obtain an exact copy of the Holy Sepulchre for the church at Bruges; and at Abbeville, the beautiful Church of the Holy Sepulchre [pg 106] was built on the very spot where Godfrey of Bouillon and the Crusaders assembled before going to Palestine. In it was built a tomb before which the solemn Office of the Holy Sepulchre was celebrated annually. Sometimes the Crusaders brought back with them some of the dust of the Holy City. At Pisa, and in Sicily, there were cemeteries filled with that sacred soil. It seemed less repulsive to lie for ever down in dust perhaps the Saviour's feet had trod.

The London temple has therefore something of the sacred character of the Orient about it; that is, the Rotunda. And it was dedicated to that holy Oriental maiden whom all nations unite in calling Blessed. The following inscription is over the door of entrance:

“On the 10th of February, in the year from the Incarnation of our Lord 1185, this church was consecrated in honor of the Blessed Mary, by the Lord Heraclius, by the grace of God Patriarch of the Church of the Resurrection, who hath granted an indulgence of fifty days to those yearly seeking it.”

Heraclius had come to Europe to preach the Third Crusade. In Paris he was the first to officiate at Notre Dame. His special mission to England was to induce Henry II. to fulfil his vow of going to the succor of the Holy Land by way of penance for the murder of Thomas à Becket. Finding his efforts in vain, the patriarch at last said to the king: “Hitherto thou hast reigned gloriously, but hereafter thou shalt be forsaken of Him whom thou at this time forsakest. Think on him, what he hath given to thee, and what thou hast yielded to him again; how first thou wert false to the King of France, and, after, slew that holy man, Thomas of Canterbury, and, lastly, thou forsakest the protection of Christ's faith.” The king, vexed at such frankness, said: “Though all the men of my land were one body, and spake with one mouth, they durst not speak to me such words.”

“No wonder,” replied the patriarch, “for they love thine and not thee; that is to mean, they love thy goods temporal, and fear thee for loss of promotion, but they love not thy soul.” And so saying, he bowed his head before the king, and continued: “Do by me right as thou didst by that holy man, Thomas of Canterbury; for I had rather be slain of thee than of the Saracens, for thou art worse than any Saracen.”

The king, restraining himself, said: “I may not wend out of my land, for mine own sons will rise up against me when I were absent.”

“No wonder,” responded the patriarch, “for of the devil they come, and to the devil they shall go;” and so departed, as Abbot Brompton records, “in great ire.”

In the wall of the Round Church is a winding staircase of stone leading to the triforium. Part way up it opens into what is called “the penitential cell”—a recess in the thick wall four feet and a half long, and two and a half wide, with two squints to admit air and light, and enable the penitent to witness the divine service. It would seem, however much an active knight might chafe in such restricted quarters, as if he had much to console and support him in looking down into such a church. In the triforium are gathered together monuments that were formerly scattered about the church. Among them is a tablet to Edmundus Gibbon, an ancestor of the historian, who died in 1679.

The Round Church opens by three lofty arches into the rectangular church, consisting of a nave and two aisles, formed by clustered pillars of marble, supporting a groined vault covered with rich arabesques. This church is a beautiful specimen of the early English style. The lawyers of Cromwell's time whitewashed the pillars, and did all they could to obscure the beauty of the building; but now it is restored to somewhat of its former richness. It is paved with tiles bearing the arms of the Outer and Inner Temple, and on its triple lancet windows are emblazoned the arms of the Templars—the lamb and flag and the ruby cross. That red cross, in the very church where it gleamed seven hundred years ago, says volumes to the heart. Where are the Knights Templars now to assume it again, and go to the rescue of the Holy City, bereft of its sovereign lord? Do we not need a new S. Bernard to preach a new crusade in behalf of the captive daughter of Zion, that she may be delivered from the ungodly oppressor, and her anointed one set free?

It was an old English prelate—S. Anselm—who said: “God loves nothing in the world better than the liberty of his church.... He does not wish a servant for his spouse.”

This rectangular church was consecrated in 1240, in presence of the king and a vast number of nobles. In one corner is a beautiful old marble piscina, lately brought to light, where the priest, before the holy oblation, purified the hands that were to touch the Body of the Lord.

On a terrace to the north of the church is Goldsmith's grave, marked by a coped stone. On one side is graven: “Here lies Oliver Goldsmith”; and on the other: “Born 10 Nov., 1728. Died 4 April, 1774.” The row of houses close by is marked “Goldsmith's Buildings.” Perhaps on this very terrace he walked up and down in his bloom-colored coat, dreading to have the bill sent in. There are Johnson's buildings also. And in Inner Temple Lane, Lamb lived at No. 4, which “looks out on Hare Court, with three trees and a pump,” where he used to drink when he was “a young Rechabite of six years” of age. As he says, “it is worth something to have been born in such a place.” It was here the spirit of the past was infused into his mind, moulding it in antique fashion, and planting the germs of the quaint conceits and humorous fancies that so delight us all, and giving him a love for the old dramatists which we have all learned to share in.

Of course every one goes to drink at the fountain which Lamb, when a boy, used to make rise and fall, to the astonishment of the other urchins, “who, nothing able to guess at its recondite machinery, were almost tempted to hail its wondrous work as magic.” Miss Landon thus celebrates it:

And yonder are the sun-dials, on which Lamb so sweetly moralizes—the inscriptions no longer half effaced, but bright with the gilding of 1872. “Pereunt et imputantur”; “Discite justitiam moniti”; “Vestigia [pg 108]nulla retrorsum”; and “Time and tide tarry for no man,” are some of the mottoes on them. It is rather a disappointment to find them looking so new and fresh, as if no longer “coeval with the time they measure.” There is something wonderfully poetical about a sun-dial, which derives its revelations of time's flight “immediately from heaven, holding correspondence with the fountain of light.” It has a kind of relationship to nature, and is, therefore, the very thing to have in gardens and groves and green fields “for sweet plants and flowers to spring up by, for the birds to apportion their silver warblings by, for flocks to pasture and be led to fold by.” It has a “heart-language” not heard from a clock, with “its solemn dulness of communication.” When we give up modern artificial life, and return to our primitive relationship with nature, we shall only measure the flight of time by a sun-dial, or an hour-glass, or the opening and shutting of flowers.

It is delightful wandering around the Temple gardens, with their shrubbery and flowers and fountains, and especially along the terrace overlooking the Thames. Here one naturally looks around for the old benchers of Lamb's time, half expecting to be greeted by the pensive gentility of Samuel Salt, or the quadrate person of Thomas Coventry, coming along with “step massy and elephantine, his face square as the lion's, his gait peremptory and path-keeping,” the terror of children, who flee before him as from an “Elisha bear.” One can also “fancy good Sir Roger de Coverley and Mr. Spectator, with his short face, pacing up and down the road, or dear Oliver Goldsmith in the summer-house, perhaps meditating about the next Citizen of the World, or the new suit that Mr. Filby, the tailor, is fashioning for him, or the dunning letter that Mr. Newbury has sent. Treading heavily on the gravel, and rolling majestically along in a snuff-colored suit and a wig that sadly wants the barber's powder and irons, one sees the great doctor, with Boswell behind him, a little the worse for the port-wine they have been taking at the Mitre, to ask Goldsmith to come home and take a dish of tea with Mrs. Williams.”

It is in the Temple gardens that Shakespeare makes York and Lancaster pluck the red and white roses which became the badges of their rival houses. It is here Plantagenet says:

There are no red or white roses blooming here now, but quantities of chrysanthemums grow along the paths under the elms and lime-trees. An enormous basket, overrun with ivy, handle and all, stands near the old Elizabethan Hall where Shakespeare's Twelfth Night was performed during the author's lifetime, and where the benchers of the Middle Temple now dine off long oaken tables in the light of emblazoned windows, and beneath the eyes of kings depicted by Vandyck and other great painters.

A company of volunteers are drilling on the green, perhaps in the same place where the Knights [pg 109] Templars had their military exercises; children are playing in the gravelled walks; and groups of gentlemen and ladies, and here a lone pilgrim, are sauntering about, enjoying the calm bright evening and the view of the Thames, with little steamers rushing up and down among all sorts of craft; and beyond, the great city with its countless spires, the bells of which seem to be all ringing. Perhaps the cheerful notes of that psalm come from S. Clement's in the Strand, which Dr. Johnson used to frequent—notes that will sound as cheerfully when we are no more as they do now over the tombs of past generations who likewise have paced up and down this terrace listening to them.

Was Origen A Heretic?

Origin has been pronounced by the verdict of ages a genius of the first order. But on this man there has also been pronounced another verdict of still greater importance: “No one has surpassed him either in good or in evil”—Ubi bene nemo melius, ubi male nemo pejus. Terrible words on a man who was the wonder of his age, and an uncompromising father of the church! We propose to set forth in this article some of the reasons tending to prove that this sentence is an unjust one, and that Origen was a faithful child of the church—faithful, too, at a time when fidelity was tried by the fire, the sword, or the cold, damp dungeon. We bring forward the reasons of our opinion, suppressing none of the accusations that have been brought against this great man at sundry times, but refuting them by arguments which are at least extremely probable, and have convinced some very eminent scholars.

The orthodoxy of Origen is presumptively established from the pure sources from which he received the rudiments of the Christian faith, from the soundness of the doctrines he is known to have taught during his public ministry, from his saintly associations, from his undoubted works, and from his heroic virtues.

Born in the bosom of the church, of noble and virtuous parents, in the year 185, he drank in with the nutriment of his infancy the pure and saving doctrines of Christianity. As his powers of reason expanded, the beauty and splendor of the new but persecuted religion were laid open before him by S. Leonides, his father, whose celebrity as a philosopher was only equalled by his proficiency in profane and sacred sciences. Under such fostering care and parental cultivation, Origen received the most careful training, the wisest instructions, and most virtuous examples. So deeply did this pious and excellently versed man plant the germs of Catholic [pg 110] truth in the heart of his eldest son that the most flattering promises of Roman governors, the most subtle reasonings of philosophers, were alike unable to entice him into the paths of error at an age when the passions are strongest and the glittering tinsel of worldly honors exerts so powerful an influence on the mind. S. Leonides, aware of the necessity and value of religious education in youth, took every precaution to instil virtue into the heart while profane learning entered into the mind. Each day he required Origen to commit to memory certain parts of the Old and New Testaments, and, after their recital and an invocation of the Holy Ghost, he explained the sense of the Scripture. A plant reared in such soil, and impregnated with an atmosphere so holy, must be beautiful to the sight in its maturity. Advanced in the liberal arts to a degree far beyond his years, Origen made those studies only accessories to a more complete attainment of sacred knowledge. His progress in the sciences was only rivalled by his increase in piety. What a deep root religion had taken in his nature may be known from his burning ardor to win the glorious crown of martyrdom when the bloody persecution of Septimius Severus raged with unequalled fury in his native city, Alexandria. Among its victims was his father. Deprived of the boon of losing his life for Christ in his company, he wrote letters of encouragement and exhortation that S. Leonides would endure his torments heroically, looking only to the future life and its incorruptible inheritance. It was painful for Leonides to leave behind him seven orphan children; but, to alleviate his sorrows in this direction, Origen, upon whom he looked as a living tabernacle of the Holy Spirit, sent him words of cheer: “Be sure, dear father, that on our account you do not alter your mind”; and in another part of the same letter we read words which appear almost incredible coming from one so young: “Have confidence, father; leave all for Jesus Christ; he will be your reward.” S. Leonides was beheaded, his property confiscated, according to the laws, and Origen, at seventeen years of age, found himself and the rest of his family reduced from abundance to poverty for the sake of Christ. Next to dying in the faith, there is no greater blessing than to have been born in it. From a martyr and a bishop28 Origen learned the rudiments of the faith, and it grew with his growth and strengthened with his strength. Those who had charge of his education at the most critical juncture were still more eminent in letters and sanctity than Leonides.

He was placed under Titus Flavius Clemens, generally known as S. Clement of Alexandria, whom S. Jerome29 considered “the most learned of our authors,” and who, Theodoret believed,30 “surpassed all others in the extent of his learning.” The erudition of Flavius Clement found in Origen a worthy receptacle, and the Christian morality taught in his lectures and practised in his life were truly reflected in the rising glory of the East. Clement, drinking from the crystal fountain of truth that issued from the evangelist Mark, who had made, by the order of the prince of the apostles, Alexandria his apostolic seat, imbibed its saving [pg 111] waters in all their purity. In his Stromata, as well as on the authority of Eusebius, we learn that the immediate successors of the apostles, preservers of the true doctrine of S. James, S. John, S. Paul, were still in existence and teaching the Gospel in its entirety. “They have lived down to our times,” says Clement,31 “and scattered in our hearts the seed of truth which they had received of their predecessors, the apostles.” It was from this beautiful and fertile garden that Origen culled the flowers of Christianity that ornamented his soul, that bloom in his luminous works, that preserve their fragrance and throw around sacred studies an imperishable lustre. While Origen was pursuing his studies under Clement, he did not fail to engraft upon himself the holiness and sanctity of his teacher—the Pedagogue of the master was transformed into the life of the scholar. The holy practices running through the Pedagogue, its inculcation of austere morals and inexhaustible charity, became to Origen, through his long and arduous career, hand-posts pointing to solid grandeur, durable happiness, and supreme good.

On leaving this famous catechetical school, he perfected himself under Ammonius Saccas, whose celebrity among pagans for the reconciliation he effected between jarring philosophical systems was only eclipsed by the esteem in which he was held by the infant church, to whose cause he brought the aid of philosophy and the requirements of the times. Among all those who attended the lectures of Ammonius, the most remarkable was young Origen, though he had for rivals no less famous persons than Plotinus, the philosopher and teacher of Porphyry, and the critic Longinus. All eyes were centred on Origen, and his name was in every mouth—his mind a prodigy of letters, his soul a temple of the Holy Ghost. The vast amount of erudition now acquired by Origen, not only by reason of his extraordinary abilities, but also on account of his eminent preceptors, whose sanctity of life imparted to their expositions of religion the irresistible authority of example, attached him with unshaken firmness to the infallible truths which were sealed by his father's blood. No other belief could satisfy his yearnings, no other creed answer to the wide comprehensions of his conceptions and the loftiness of his aspirations.

The completion of his studies found him versed in astronomy, the higher mathematics, thoroughly acquainted with the sentiments and theories of the different philosophical schools, and more or less familiar with the construction of languages and the leading issues of the times. Reduced to straitened circumstances in consequence of the persecution, he opened, on his own responsibility, an institution for dialectics, music, and profane sciences.

This was a dangerous enterprise for one so young, but it was the only alternative to avoid a life of dependency and association with heretics, as well as to assist a helpless mother and a large family. He felt bound to shun the enemies of the church; he refused to mingle in their company, save when the necessity of their spiritual welfare demanded it, or the exigencies of the occasion prevented his escape. Scrupulous even to the spirit of the apostolic teachings, rather than associate with the opponents of [pg 112] Christianity, he preferred to sacrifice the friendships of his youth and the liberality of his patroness, at a time, too, when he stood most in need of assistance. His reputation attracted large numbers to his lectures, and the applause he received, while it elevated him in popularity, was the source of interior humiliation, the antidote of pride. Demetrius, Bishop of Alexandria, moved by the superior attainments, the fervent piety and unswerving orthodoxy in faith, of the young Christian, appointed him regent of the famous catechetical school, a.d. 203. The course of studies taught in this institution comprised, aside from secular pursuits, theology and Scriptural expositions. Origen32 was only eighteen years of age when he assumed this responsible charge—a charge that, in the history of the province, had never been committed but to persons of advanced years. This appointment, then, was an exception, strange in the extreme; but Origen was an exceptional scholar—so exceptional, indeed, that history has failed to record his compeer at that time of life in any other person. But, as St. Jerome33 remarks, “From his childhood he was a great man.” And Bossuet, admiring the young Alexandrian, towering in intellect above those of his day, like Saul above his brethren, declares: “Il se rendit célèbre par toute l'Eglise des sa première jeunesse et enseigna de grandes vérités.”34 The violence of the persecution under Septimius Severus had interrupted the Christian school of Alexandria, and forced its president, Clement, to fly from his murderers. It was during his retirement and under the uplifted sword that Origen assumed the regency—a position as precarious and laborious as it was honorable. It required varied knowledge, uncommon prudence, and unswerving adhesion to the traditions of Christ's ambassadors.

For more than one hundred years Catholic blood, “the secret power and seed of Christianity,”35 had flowed through the Roman provinces; Catholic heads been decapitated by the sword of the executioner. Every method of destruction and annihilation that human artifice and cruelty could devise was brought into play to sweep from the world the new religion; but the kingdom of Christ emerged from the contest more glorious and powerful, and asserted in bolder terms the divinity which was emblazoned on its standard. The saying of Gamaliel was verified: Man cannot stop the accomplishment of God's designs. Then the pagans felt convinced that some other means should be employed against the Christians, whom the emperors and governors had in vain sought to extinguish in blood. To this end, they had recourse to the schools, to the philosophers, to men skilled in the oracles; the followers of the different systems of belief, to preserve the existence of their body, girded on their helmets of sophistry and raillery; the pagan writers dealt in flings of irony and the gall of mockery; wit and sarcasm, powerful weapons, were handled with remarkable ingenuity. The life-blood of mythology, sanctioned for ages by the devotion of its victims, was on the eve of ebbing from its very arteries; polytheism, rooted in the manners of the multitude, supported by legislation, [pg 113] upheld in literature, protected by the sympathies of all, was losing ground at every step that Christianity was making upon its domains; idolatry saw its statues fall one by one, its members disappearing like vapor beneath the absorbing rays of light; and all these forms of superstition joined hands and allied their forces to impede the onward and irresistible march of Catholic truth. Alexandria, cradle of Eastern genius at that time, became the Christian Thermopylæ, and Origen the Christian Leonidas. It was he who headed the forces, and, by the splendor of his genius, prepared in his school illustrious men to lead on the van. He vindicated the truth from calumny, supported it by facts, disengaged it from the sophisms in which enemies had obscured it, and held it up to view in all its natural beauty and attraction. His learning became telling in a short time upon the prejudices of the people in regard to his despised religion, and gradually inspired a kinder feeling towards the misrepresented Christians in the minds of the cultivated. His fame drew to his auditory persons who had studied under other masters, desirous of listening to his wisdom, and of the honor of calling him their teacher. Heathens were delighted with his language, full of unction and charm, and the literati of the age, who had been lost in the intricacies of Aristotle, the obscurities of Plato, and the absurdities of Epicurus, wondered at the young Christian philosopher. His name was asked by authors for dedicatory purposes, and works were subject to his judgment for their circulation.

To give an insight into the system of education adopted by Origen, and which produced so many great men in the IIId century, we will quote from the writings of S. Gregory Thaumaturgus, who was under the direction of Origen for five years, the method employed by the philosopher to win him to Christ. The extract will also show the clearness of his ideas, the thoroughness and universality of his knowledge. The reader, if he chooses, may compare the plan of education followed by Origen with that pursued in our colleges and universities in the XIXth century, and judge for himself of the progress civilization has made in this direction. “Like a skilful agriculturist,” says S. Gregory,36 “who examines in all its aspects the land which he intends to prepare for cultivation, Origen sounded and penetrated the sentiments of his disciples, making inquiries, and reflecting upon their replies. When he had prepared them to receive the seed of truth, he instructed them in various branches of philosophy—in logic, to form their judgment, by teaching them to discriminate between solid reasonings and the specious sophisms of error; in physics, to make them admire the wisdom of God, by an analytic knowledge of his works; in geometry, to habituate their minds to rectitude, by the rigor of mathematical propositions; in astronomy, to elevate and extend their thoughts, by giving them immensity for a horizon; finally, in morals—not those of the philosophers, whose definitions and sterile divisions give birth to no virtue, but practical morals, making them study in themselves the movements of the passions, so that the soul, seeing itself as in a mirror, may extirpate every vice, even to the roots. He then approached theology, or [pg 114] the knowledge of God. He made them read on Providence, which has created the world and governs it, all that has been written by the ancients, philosophers or poets, Greeks or barbarians, without otherwise minding their systems, their sects, or their particular opinions. In this labyrinth of pagan philosophy he served as their guide to discern whatever might be really true and useful, without allowing them to be fascinated by the pomp and ornaments of language. He laid it down as a principle, that, in whatever regards God, we must trust only God and the prophets inspired by him. And then he commenced the interpretation of the Scriptures, which he knew thoroughly, and which, by the grace of God, he had penetrated in all their most secret depths.”

The magnitude of his intellectual powers excited no less interest than his manner of life; and it is not without reason that his friends allege the sanctity of his life as the best interpreter of the few objectionable passages in his gigantic works, and no weak argument for the purity of his faith. Surrounded by eminent savants, and in correspondence with others in distant countries, he found himself hard pressed to accommodate the former and answer the communications of the latter. He was obliged to engage several secretaries to write out his discourses on the arts and sciences in conjunction with his explanations of Christianity. Their assistance afforded him better opportunities of enriching his stock of knowledge. He realized what Trithemius,37 Abbot of Spanheim, repeated to himself every day: “To know is to love.” His insatiable thirst for learning left him plodding among manuscripts through the day into the long hours of the night; and when nature, succumbing under the severe stress of exhaustion, would demand rest, he would make the bare ground his bed, and the books his pillow. Simple in his dress, the mortifications he imposed upon himself on several occasions threatened his life. Temperate in all things, he was particularly so in drink. Wine he never used.

While his prodigious talents and able discourses brought within the true fold large numbers from among the most distinguished learned men and philosophers, his virtues and sublime renunciation of the world produced so many holy men that his school has been deservedly termed “the school of martyrs.” More than once he accompanied his disciples to the place of execution, and exhorted them, in the very face of the instruments of torture, to endure death with fortitude for the cause of truth and the eternal inheritance promised to those who wash their robes in the blood of the Lamb. He stood by at the martyrdom of S. Plutarch, brother of S. Heraclas, Bishop of Alexandria, both catechumens under himself, administering consolations and pouring into his soul words of hope and encouragement. A martyr's crown he courted from infancy, and from sickness and infirmities contracted in the persecutor's dungeon, it is reasonably supposed, his life went out. It could only have been divine interposition that rescued him from the numerous assaults made upon his life. When permission was refused him to visit the Christians in chains, he made incredible efforts to convey to them words of sympathy and articles of comfort. His solicitude and bearing on the [pg 115] eve of the martyrdom of his disciples, SS. Heron, Potamiæna, Herias, Sereni, and Heraclides, is conclusive proof of Origen's ardor to seal with his blood the divinity of the cause he advocated with his eloquence, and evidence of the falsity of the notorious slander which represents him yielding to the wishes of the persecutors in the midst of his torments, and offering sacrifice to the gods. The first trace we meet with in history of this accusation is in the Treatise against Heresies,38 by S. Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, and given to the world one hundred years after the death of Origen. This slander, never repeated by the learned—if we except Petavius, in the XVIIth century, while employed on the works of Epiphanius—has been wiped out of ecclesiastical history by the weight of such writers as Baronius, Halloix,39 Raynaudet, Henry Valois, Vincent de la Rue, and Frederic Spanheim.40 This defamation of his character, unfounded as it is, though so much like other insinuations against the noble Alexandrian, was not even alluded to in the Justinian age, in which he was so violently and bitterly opposed. Had S. Jerome credited this monstrous fabrication, had it rested upon anything but a sandy foundation, the literary war between the lifelong friends, Jerome and Rufinus, would have terminated at the first volley from the pen of the learned scriptural writer. It would have been a crushing argument against Rufinus, and S. Jerome was the person to turn it to advantage. In those times, it was a common thing to be reproached if one, arrested for the faith, escaped death. Some of the greatest saints, S. Cyprian, S. Gregory Thaumaturgus, and others, suffered not a little from calumnies of like import. Origen's behavior, on the occasion to which the allusion refers, was honorable, heroic, and in entire harmony with his life-long fidelity to principle. He was seized, and—whether it was the design of the magistrates to draw many Christians back to the gods of the empire by circulating the fall of Origen, or their admiration of the genius of their noble victim that prevented his summary decapitation—was thrown into a cold cell, bound in an iron collar, with heavy shackles to his feet, and his legs drawn apart to a painful degree.

It appears that during the first years that Origen filled the regency of the Alexandrian theological seminary, he experienced no small amount of inconvenience, in his controversial discourses with Jews and pagans, in consequence of the different versions of the Holy Scriptures. In their inspired pages he found true wisdom and spiritual life: “Oh! how have I loved thy law, O Lord! It is my meditation all the day.”41 In this sacred department he stands without a rival, if we except S. Jerome, “the greatest doctor, divinely raised up to interpret the Sacred Scriptures.”42 Yet to Origen the indebtedness of S. Jerome is very great. He borrowed43 from him, studied him,44 followed him,45 admired him,46 and then attacked him.47 S. Jerome declares that in reading the Twelve Prophets by Origen, in the works of S. Pamphilus, he saw in them the wealth of [pg 116] Crœsus; and, as far as our judgment goes, we never read a higher eulogium than the one S. Jerome pays to the genius of Origen on his two homilies in Cantica Canticorum.

It was Origen's love of the Scriptures that gave birth to the grand idea of compiling the sacred books of the different versions into one work—the Octapla, a legacy to posterity more than sufficient to support his reputation and endear it to all succeeding ages. For this purpose, he decided, in 212, to travel through different countries, and collect the most recognized and authentic copies of the Scriptures. Those travels opened to his view the pages of nature, on which he read the customs and habits of men, religions and governments, arts and sciences. Aside from those motives, he had another reason for travelling. He longed to see Rome, the chair of Peter,48 “upon whom, as on a rock, Christ built his church”; he desired to pay his homage in the “principal church”49 to the successor of S. Peter, “against whom the gates of hell shall not prevail.”50 He arrived at Rome about the close of the pontificate of S. Zephyrinus, to whom his presence and devotion must have been a source of consolation, as the saintly pontiff, at that time, was pained to the heart by the fall of the great Tertullian and the deplorable perversions in the African Church.

The travels of Origen are full of interest and instruction. Each journey was a crusade against heathenism, and a glorious triumph for the Gospel; like S. Paul, he wandered over sea and land to make profit for Christ, strengthening the weak and marshalling the strong; the power of his pen was felt where his voice failed to reach. As a comet that illumines its course with darting rays of light, and obscures the flickering stars, such were the brilliant tours of Origen, leaving the light of faith and the fire of charity behind them. Wherever heresy raised its head in the church, there was Origen to batter it with reason and tradition; wherever the faithful were wavering, there was Origen cheering and rallying the forces; wherever the enemy made an onslaught on Christianity, it found Origen in the breach; like an Agamemnon or a Hector, wherever battle raged the fiercest, Origen took the front. Now he is in the presence of the governor of Arabia, enlightens him on scientific subjects, and gradually raises his mind to nature's God; then he traverses through Palestine, expounding the Scriptures in the assemblies of the faithful; at one time he is at Antioch before the royal family, pleading for the liberty and free exercise of Christian worship; at another in Nicomedia, maintaining the canonicity of certain parts of the inspired writings; now he is in Greece, thundering against the Montanists; and again in Arabia, at Bozra, reclaiming fallen prelates, and defending the divinity and humanity of the second Person of the Most Blessed Trinity.

There is a point in the preceding sentence worthy of more than passing notice—namely, Origen's visit to Mammæa, mother of Emperor Alexander Severus. This estimable lady, who afterwards, in all probability, embraced the Christian religion, desirous of seeing so illustrious a doctor as Origen, sent her retinue to escort him to her palace. She was pleased with her learned guest, and her son, the future ruler of the empire, listened with delight [pg 117] to the great prodigy of learning. The virtues that characterized the reign of Severus, in contradistinction to the licentiousness, cruelty, and extortion of his predecessors, have been, not without justice, attributed to the influence exerted on him by lessons of morality given in the discourses of Origen. It is not improbable that the law he presented, soon after his ascension to the throne, to the Roman senate for its sanction, whereby the religion of Christ would be incorporated among the others of the empire, had for its source Origen's instructions to him about the divinity of the Catholic faith, its purity and sanctity. Dom Gueranger, in his Life of S. Cecilia,51 adduces monuments of antiquity going to prove the protection and favors extended to the infant church by Alexander; and Origen himself,52 in his Apology, chronicles the abatement of the persecution shortly after his return from the imperial court. On this part of his work a writer very felicitously adds: “If he modestly declines telling us the part he bore in it, we owe him so much the more honor the less he seems to claim.”53

During the comparative peace obtained under Alexander, the church made incredible efforts to fill up her shattered ranks, restore order, and produce scholars. She succeeded, for never was she more fruitful in great men than at this epoch. Origen had reconciled her, in the opinion of philosophers, to genius, adorned her with intellectual wealth, and introduced her to the occupants of the throne she was soon to fill with so much glory; and, what is still more, he had disciplined a galaxy of scholars, who were about to dazzle the world by the grandeur of their minds, and beautify the church by the holiness of their lives.

Origen's brilliant career, like the career of all great men, was not allowed to end without its trials. Aside from the assaults of the professed enemies of the church, he met with severe annoyances from the jealousy of those whose interests he had studied to further. The trouble came from a quarter he least expected. Demetrius, Bishop of Alexandria, during the early part of his episcopate entertained for Origen the highest esteem; and there is no ostensible motive to believe that Origen, throughout all his relations with the patriarch, gave him any cause of offence, or else this prelate would not have retained him in the presidency of his theological school till the year 230—a period of twenty-seven years. The humility of the regent and his innate respect for authority held his tongue in silence, whatever may have been his opinion of the conduct of Demetrius as a prelate. Still, we may conjecture Demetrius was not far from the mind of Origen when, in speaking of disorders and irregularities in the church, he wrote of bishops: “We would almost have guards like kings; we make ourselves terrible and difficult of access, chiefly to the poor; we treat them who speak with us and ask for some favor in a manner which the most cruel tyrants and governors would not assume towards suppliants.”54 It is not wrong to look upon Demetrius as a man who consulted with the general interests of Christianity his own popularity, the extension of his diocese, [pg 118] and the increase of his subjects; perhaps he was of the opinion that the advancement of religion in Alexandria and its suffragan dependencies, his own juridical district, was of more importance than its dissemination in other places. It was interested motives of this sort that led him to disapprove of Origen's evangelical missions, by which his invaluable services were temporarily withdrawn from his native city. Origen, being a layman, free from any obligations to Demetrius, except in a spiritual point of view, possessed the individual right of travelling from country to country, and of delivering lectures without the permission of any authority. If he spoke before the congregations of the faithful, it was only at the urgent solicitation of the prelates, whose jurisdiction within their respective provinces was recognized and unquestioned; champion of the faith in the East, he was waited upon by delegations from pious bishops, entreating him to come to their dioceses. Those missions Origen, in his love for the glory of God, felt conscientiously bound to perform. On a journey to crush by his eloquence the heresy of the Valentinians, that had made lamentable ravages in Greece, he paid a visit to S. Alexander of Jerusalem and Theoctistus of Cæsarea, by whom he was ordained priest. This act, irreprehensible in itself, entailed upon Origen serious difficulties, and became the groundwork upon which his enemies fabricated the most severe accusations.

Demetrius, taking to heart the course of conduct of the great philosopher, and assured, by the aspect of things, of his speedy disconnection with the interests of Alexandria, sent letters to the bishops, containing bitter recriminations for imposing hands on Origen. He did not stop at this point. He also despatched to the prelates of Asia letters full of invectives and animosity, requiring them to hold no communion with Origen, who had violated the disciplinary canons. The respite that ensued on his return to Alexandria was of short duration. A council was “assembled by the care, and under the presidency, of Demetrius,” for the purpose of examining the legality and validity of Origen's ordination. In this council we can only discover two things laid to his charge—namely, that he had made himself a eunuch, and had been ordained without the consent of Demetrius, his ordinary. Those charges, if we take into consideration the customs of the times and the imperfections of ecclesiastical discipline during the persecutions, contain in themselves very little upon which a grievous censure of Origen could be founded. In the language of the church, they are irregularities; one ex defectu, the other ex delicto. Let us for a moment concede that there were such canons in existence at the time of Origen's ordination, by the violation of which irregularities were incurred, what then follows? In that age of the church, bishops enjoyed great privileges, discretionary powers—far more discretionary than even the bishops of the United States enjoy nowadays in this missionary country—and pre-eminently so the Patriarch of Alexandria, the Patriarch of Antioch, and the Metropolitan of Palestine, who was Bishop of Cæsarea. These prelates could dispense, in nearly all emergencies, the violators of the ecclesiastical ordinances; other prelates in the East were more or [pg 119] less restricted in their functions, and in matters of moment could do nothing detrimental to those sees. What authority, then, prevented Theoctistus from pronouncing Origen released from the irregularities, and canonically qualified for the reception of orders? Had any other ordinary imposed hands on him except the Metropolitan of Palestine, the objections of the Patriarch of Alexandria would undoubtedly have carried with them more weight. But the Metropolitan of Cæsarea, while respectfully acquiescing in the priority of the See of Alexandria, through reverence of its princely founder, always exercised his own jurisdiction without the permission or consultation of Alexandria. Theoctistus of Cæsarea was not even under Demetrius, but under the Patriarch of Antioch, and these provincial and patriarchal boundaries as well as episcopal relations were only finally authoritatively adjusted by the Council of Nice.55 In the second place, the Metropolitan of Cæsarea, who always exercised more than ordinary episcopal functions, which were afterwards approved and sanctioned by œcumenical councils,56 deemed it not a usurpation of power to impose hands on Origen without the direct consent of his bishop, inasmuch as he was personally acquainted with the subject of the sacrament, morally certain of his piety and learning. If we add to those reasons the surrounding circumstances stated in the reply of S. Alexander of Jerusalem to Demetrius, it becomes patent that neither Origen was to blame in the premises nor Theoctistus for the exercise of his jurisdiction and powers. Demetrius had given Origen commendatory letters on his departure for Greece, and, on the strength of these commendations, Theoctistus and S. Alexander conferred on him holy orders. His services had been valuable as a layman; they would become still more valuable as a cleric, and, actuated by those pure motives, they ordained him.

Now, is it historically true that in the year 230, or previous to that time, there were any such canons framed by the church as excluded eunuchs from the reception of holy orders? It will be difficult to come across statutes of this nature in canon law or ecclesiastical history. We will find such acts of discipline framed years after the death of Origen, but none previous to that epoch.

The other accusation, that he was ordained without the permission of his bishop, has a weaker foundation even than the preceding one. According to the practice of the church in our day, every candidate for the sacred ministry who is not a religious must be ordained by his own bishop (titulo nativitatis, domicilii, beneficii, seu familiaritatis prout accidit), or possess the written consent of his own ordinary, if ordained by another. Origen, viewed from a modern stand-point, contracted an irregularity ex delicto; but, judged in the century in which he lived—the only one in which he must be judged—was as regular in his ordination as the young men who are semi-annually ordained in our provincial seminaries. Origen transgressed no ecclesiastical injunction by receiving orders at the hands of a foreign bishop, because it was only under S. Anastasius that this restriction was placed on aspirants to the priesthood. The [pg 120] Council of Nice, embodying the canons of Arles, Ancyra, and Gangres, passed laws prohibiting clerics from attaching themselves at will to different churches and dioceses; this prohibition affected clerics alone, and in no way referred to laics, who were at perfect liberty to be ordained by any prelate upon testimonials of worthiness. It was only during S. Ambrose's time that this abuse became offensive, and that the Roman pontiff deemed it proper to eradicate it. To this end, in the year 400 a canon was enacted by the pope, which forbade any prelate ordaining the subjects of another, unless such subjects had permissive letters bearing the signature of the bishop who had authority over them. From this sprang dimissorial letters. Indeed, whatever view an impartial and competent person takes of the whole affair, Origen and the saintly bishops who ordained him appear innocent, and seem to have acted with the best intentions. Nevertheless, the decision arrived at by Demetrius' council was that Origen should be dismissed from the theological school, upon which his learning had reflected so much glory, and that he should also withdraw himself from Alexandria, retaining, however, his priesthood.

Origen, anticipating the result of the council “assembled by the care of Demetrius,” quietly retired to Cæsarea. Matters did not end here. The immense amount of writings that the unwearied industry of Origen had contributed to the literature of the church offered a wide field in which his adversaries might search for something reprehensible. His works would form in themselves a rare library, had the fall of empires not entombed a large portion of them in their ruins. No less than six thousand books did his indefatigable application produce: “Sex millia Origenis tomos non poterant quipiam legere.”57 In the copying, revision, and compiling of these manuscripts, he employed twenty, at other times twelve, but always more than eight, amanuenses. As this article has no reference to his writings, their merits, or the influence they exerted upon church learning, we must make this cursory allusion to his gigantic labors sufficient for our present purpose. It will lay before the reader the great mass of matter his enemies had at hand to examine, the possible mistakes that might have crept into his works by the carelessness of so many secretaries, the possible corruptions they might have suffered at the hands of heretics or jealous rivals. Not a finger could be raised against his spotless and ascetic life in the council; the teacher of martyrs and companion of saints, his character was irreproachable.

Demetrius, not unlikely hearing of the warm reception extended to Origen in Palestine, convened, after a short interval, another council. The works of Origen were subjected to the sharpest examination. One instinctively inquires why Demetrius, if he were simply actuated by zeal for the preservation of ecclesiastical discipline and the purity of revealed truth, did not introduce those serious charges in the former council. To resort to the non-publication of the Periarchon and Dialogues at the time of the first convocation of bishops, in order to remove the suspicions that point to the malice of Demetrius, is an ingenious special plea, unsupported by facts and testimonies. S. Jerome, [pg 121] studying this question learnedly, defends Origen and censures Demetrius. Why did the Patriarch of Alexandria, next in hierarchical honor to the Bishop of Rome, permit Origen for over a quarter of a century to expound within his own hearing the sublime dogmas of Christianity, if his conceptions of those dogmas were radically false? Can we suppose that the few months between the assembly of the two councils were spent by the bibliophilist in composing a work that would give the lie to the glorious achievements of thirty years? Or can we allow the conviction to settle in our minds that he, so remarkable in virtue, would deliver in the pulpit one doctrine, and write in his books another? Will we find fault with saints and illustrious doctors of the church, who, by the nature of their high calling, are bound to avoid false teachers, for extending to Origen the warmest hospitalities, or acknowledge, with Eusebius of Cæsarea and S. Pamphilus, the severe and unjustifiable measures adopted by Demetrius? Whatever secret motives guided Demetrius in the prosecution of the inquisition, his course, disapproved of by his contemporaries, has never secured a sincere advocate of ordinary importance. The errors which he imagined he had detected in the writings assumed, in the eyes of Demetrius' council, sufficient gravity to cause the deposition and excommunication of Origen.

Never did an imperial edict, suddenly proclaimed in the midst of peace, sanctioning the indiscriminate massacre of Christians, produce greater consternation in the church than the announcement of Origen's deposition. The report of the fall of the great Tertullian had scarce died away, when the faithful were filled with alarm at the momentary expectation of its echoes being taken up by the fall of Origen, and resounding throughout Christendom. But there was a vast difference between these two great men. Quintius Tertullianus, while the superior of Origen in eloquence, style, and strength of language, was at the same time his inferior in the sacred sciences and in humility, the safeguard of Origen's genius. The one blended with Christianity the elegance and wisdom of the pagans, the other the beauty and inspiration of the prophets. Both the brightest ornaments of the church in their day, they no less adorned her sanctity by their lives than enriched her treasures by their genius. Tertullian, a pagan by the prejudices of birth and education, unaccustomed to religious authority, could not endure the correction of superiors; and wounded pride, inflamed by impatience and an ambitious nature, gave way to impious belief, and Tertullian, the fallen genius, dwindles into a fanatical heretic. It was not so with Origen. Having received information of the action of the council, with real humility equalled only by that of the meek Fénelon, Origen wrote58 to Alexandria that he had never taught such doctrine as was imputed to him, and, if contained in his works, it was through the machinations of heretics. Then follows, in the same document, a clear and orthodox exposition of his belief upon the contested points—an exposition that will satisfy a modern theologian, with all his precise distinctions and scholastic definitions. As long as this monument of antiquity, this spontaneous proof of his adhesion to apostolic truth, this undeniable [pg 122] evidence of the absence of all pertinacity, exists, so long will those to whom his memory is dear love to look upon him as sincere in his protestations and sincere in his faith. Here was the rule of his belief, and according to this rule his works should be interpreted: “That alone must we believe to be the truth which differs in nothing from the ecclesiastical and apostolical tradition.”59 A noble rule of faith, truly Catholic and orthodox! Words appropriate for an Origen, who caught up, as it were, the traditions of the apostles, and echoed them into Nicene times. What cause have we of refusing credence to Origen when he tells us that the errors attributed to him were the interpolations of heretics? Every intelligent reader of history knows that his works were corrupted, shamefully corrupted, at the close of the IVth century. In substantiation of this, we have only to refer to the learned Rufinus and S. Jerome. Each of these translated into Latin the Periarchon of Origen and many other works of the same author; and what do we find? Why, S. Jerome accuses Rufinus of altering, inverting, suppressing the sense of the original; and, in turn, Rufinus charges Jerome with malicious perversion of the meaning of the learned Alexandrian, wilful corruption of the text, and personal jealousy of the fame of Origen. S. Augustine, an intimate friend of S. Jerome, used his influence to reconcile those two great personages disputing about Origen; and from his letter to S. Jerome, it appears to us that his sympathies were with Rufinus. Indeed, in the first ages of the church, it was no uncommon thing for great men to have not only their works interpolated, but entire books circulated under their name, S. Cyprian60 complained that works that he had never seen were issued in his name. S. Jerome61 testifies that the letters of S. Clement, Pope, were interpolated, as well as the writings of S. Dionysius and Clement of Alexandria; the same trustworthy author was very much annoyed that the people of Africa in his day were reading a supposititious volume bearing his name. We see no reason, then, why heretics would not tamper with Origen's productions, when they had the audacity to corrupt such public and sacred documents as those we have mentioned, some of which were read in the religious assemblies of the people. It is the misfortune of exalted persons to be cited as authorities for opinions they never maintained. Indeed, when we perceive how the teachings of men amongst us are misrepresented, notwithstanding the assistance of the press, the telegraph, and other modern detectives, we can understand with what facility opinions could have been accredited to Origen which were not his. Well might S. Jerome with the works of Origen scattered around his room, perhaps under his very elbows, write: “O labores hominum! semper incerti; O mortalium studia! contrarios interdum fines habentia.”62

The acts of Demetrius' council, we are informed, were forwarded to S. Pontianus, whose short pontificate of a few years spent in exile, as well as the still shorter reign of his successor, S. Anterus, which lasted only a month, was absorbed in the discharge of duties more vital to the church than the Alexandrian [pg 123] inquisition. Ere Rome took any steps in this matter, or sanctioned the proceedings by her silence, the discussion ended by the death of Demetrius, 231.

It is probable that Origen indulged in conceptions or hypotheses not altogether in accordance with Catholic doctrine; but we must keep before our minds the circumstances in which he was situated, the persons with whom he disputed, and the noble aim he had in view. The philosophy of Aristotle, whom Tertullian calls the “patriarch of heretics,” was very unpopular in Alexandria at the opening of the IIId century. The neo-Platonic system was the prevalent philosophy of the day at Alexandria. The issue of the day was, Is the religion of Christ philosophical? Can it with safety be subjected to logical rules? Does it not contradict the reasonings of Plato? To meet this issue, so important to the spread of the Gospel among the enlightened class, Origen had recourse as much as was possible to the tenets of the Platonic school for arguments. With Platonic philosophers he had his controversies; and his language, the more Platonic it was, the more power it exerted; the more he reconciled revelation with reason, in their estimation, the more entered within the pale of the church. Just as in our times able writers use the popular issues, because the most intelligible and taking, to dissipate the clouds of ignorance that bigotry has thrown around the public mind in regard to Catholicity, to show the natural compatibility of the church with all legal forms of government, her inexhaustible resources for meeting the requirements of society, and her sacred and impartial maintenance of true liberty; so, too, did Origen turn to advantage the doctrines of the schools in demonstrating the love of the church for sound philosophy, her adaptability to the sciences, and her divine mission as regenerator of the world. This tincture of Platonism pervading his early productions, combined with the mysterious figures under which Eastern nations convey sacred truths, the allegorical style, and the Discipline of the Secret, which was in active force, rendered Origen obscure, and his works susceptible of doubtful interpretation.

Though his admirers go so far as to exculpate him from every error, we are not prepared to accompany them to that distance. We are willing to concede that Origen may have advanced some erroneous opinions, but error without contumacy does not entail the sin of heresy, which is a wilful rejection of any revealed truth authoritatively proposed. “I may fall into a mistake,” says the learned S. Augustine, “but I will not be a heretic.” The fathers of the church were only men, subject to human weakness, liable to err. The doubtful and obscure speculative hypotheses of the Alexandrian's fertile imagination, then, should in no way darken the splendor of his genius or belittle his devotion to Catholic truth. F. Petau, his declared enemy, followed by Huet, who gave his learning to this controversy, refuses to believe Origen obstinate. Halloix, Charles Vincent de la Rue, Tillemont, Witasse, Ceillier, and other erudite scholars, who studied with care and impartiality this whole matter, unite in the emphatic declaration that Origen “died in the bosom of the Catholic Church.”

This is the verdict of great men [pg 124] in modern times. It was also the verdict of the century in which he lived—the IIId—as may be seen in the apology of S. Pamphilus, composed in defence of Origen's orthodoxy, and extant in the works of S. Gregory Nyssen; also in that beautiful monument of antiquity, the panegyric over Origen by S. Gregory Thaumaturgus, given in full in the works of Gerard Vossius. This verdict was confirmed in the IVth century by the catalogue of orthodox ecclesiastical writers, published by S. Gelasius, pope, among which is the name of Origen; and in the following century, in a profession of faith drawn up by Pope S. Hormisdas, and sent by Germanus, Bishop of Capua, to be signed by the Patriarch of Constantinople, the heretics condemned by the church are enumerated, but in this enumeration we can discover no allusion to the great Scripturist.

Indeed, it has always been a source of surprise to us how Origen, a fallible creature, a man like other men, unaided by any divine assistance, could have written in several thousand volumes so much truth, and so little error. There were but few Encyclical Letters, no Index, no decisions of Sacred Congregations, no Syllabus, in the days of Origen; and yet his enemies will measure the length of his definitions with theirs, compare his expressions with the theological niceties of the present, and, should a word be wanting or a synonymous one substituted, exclaim: “There is an error; Origen is a heretic!” The body of infallible definitions from popes and councils which we now possess did not exist at this early epoch; to write then orthodoxically, to justify the Christian belief in the Trinity, to explain the hypostatic union, the generation of the Son, and the procession of the Holy Ghost, to expound the Scripture and the other sublime mysteries of religion, and escape with one or two mistakes, was simply marvellous. Thus Origen, born in the true faith, reared in a religious atmosphere, educated under pious men, the intrepid defender of truth and meek retractor of error, the teacher and companion of saints, the prisoner for Christ, has impressed on his life, in golden letters, the best defence of his orthodoxy. And if the saintly Origen be distinguished from the abominable Origenians; if the allowances due to the age in which he lived be accorded him, an injustice to the works of Origen—a valuable legacy to posterity—will be removed, and the injury done to a reputation obscured by the malice of some and the misapprehension of many others will in part be repaired.63

Social Shams.

There is no axiom more fraught with meaning than the old Scripture promise, “The truth shall make you free.” But there is also no fact better authenticated in the civilized world of to-day than the practical nullification of this very promise. We speak as regards things human; for in spiritual matters, the home of truth is, to our belief, a fixed one, and the road to it staked out by a divine leader, that has power to find an unerring path in what otherwise seems but an ocean of shifting sand. We propose to apply this axiom to social life, and it is our complaint that it is not free. The pivot on which “society,” properly so called, turns is conventionality—a polite term for untruth.

The original Christian ideal of society was of course based on charity. It has been truly said that a perfect Christian is instinctively a finished gentleman. Courtesy is but an adaptation of charity; and the height of good-breeding (recognized as being the faculty of setting every one at his ease, and of saying the right thing at the right time to the right person) must answer to the Christian principle that to wilfully wound your neighbor in the slightest degree is a sin. But all this, call it tact or charity, as you will, is not in itself inconsistent with truth. The French have a proverb that Toute vérité n'est pas bonne à dire—“Every untruth is not necessarily expedient to all men;” but even that is not a declaration of war against the principle of truth in the main. Yet what is the reality, the thing constantly before our eyes, the fact of which no one can doubt who has ever lived beyond the strictest limits of home—nay, beyond the limits of his own mind? One in a thousand fulfils the ideal of Christian courtesy, while the other nine hundred and ninety-nine wear the regulation-mask prescribed by fashion. Some wear it of iron, so that, in the intercourse of a lifetime, you would never feel that you knew them any better than on the first day of acquaintance; some only of wire, so that the natural personality behind it is but partially hidden even from perfect strangers; some of silk, so cunningly painted that it betrays you into thinking it nature, until, by repeated experience, you discover the imposture. Again, some wear it as the women of Constantinople wear the yashmak, so filmy as only to veil, not to conceal, the features. Lord Lytton, in his romance, A Strange Story, speaks of the “three women” which exist in the single personality of every woman; this applies to men almost equally. There is, he says, the woman as she really is, the woman as she thinks herself to be, and the woman as she appears to the world—the conventional woman. This is by far the most curious product of natural history, or, more appropriately, of the history of mechanics. The human being under social manipulation is a study for philosophers. Conventional standards of human beauty, such as the compressed [pg 126] foot of the Chinese lady, or the artificially stimulated rotundity of form among the women of some of the Central African tribes, the staining of the finger-nails with henna among the Persians, etc., are as nothing and involve no deformation or suffering compared with that among the wholesale machine-products of civilized society.

Spiritual systems of penance have sometimes been impugned for aiming at subduing nature: taming the passions, restraining the expression of strong emotion, weaning the body from innocent indulgences, and so forth. But is there any more barefaced destroyer of nature than “society” as at present constituted? Are there any penances harder, any restraints stricter, than those imposed by our conventional code? The spiritual struggle with nature is voluntary, and aims at subduing our lower nature, only the more to honor the intellectual principle, and render its exercise freer from clogging and degrading influences. The conventional struggle with nature, on the contrary, is a compulsory one, into which you are thrust by others in early and unconscious childhood; it is, moreover, a deceptive one, as it tends to produce mere appearances—not to tame passion, but restrain its outward expression; not to elevate the mind, but to give it the semblance of those gifts most profitable in the social estimation of the day. It does not tend to make man supernatural, but unnatural. It takes from him even the freedom of the savage, without giving him in exchange the freedom of the Christian. It aims not at virtue, but at decorum. Its morality skips the whole of the Ten Commandments, but insists upon what facetious Englishmen sometimes call the eleventh—i.e., “Thou shalt not be found out.” It has rites and ceremonials of its own, more arbitrary than the law of the land, and, in the same breath, more lax; it has beliefs and formulas more binding outwardly than those of any religion; it has its own oracles, its own language, its own tribunals. It is a state within a state, condoning many moral delinquencies, exalting some into meritorious deeds, smoothing others over as pardonable follies. Where it is not wicked, it is inane or spiteful. Slander and gossip are its breath of life, except in the few instances where intrigue sweeps away such second-rate passe-temps.

Yet its wickedness is a subject that touches us less than its stupidity; for it is less of a daily experience, and has more denouncers to lash it. We also know less of its brilliancy than of its meanness; for the latter is visible in the smallest gathering and in the most insignificant place, while the former exists but in half a dozen great capitals, and even there only among one or two circles or strata of society. Paris and Vienna have their dull and respectable society, as well as other places, and they are by far the most numerous, and, we will venture to say it, the meanest. Downright license seems, strangely enough, to carry with it a certain reckless bonhomie which, while it is far from Christian charity, yet has many outward signs of it. The most abandoned are often found to be the most generous, or even philanthropic, while the pharisaical little-mindedness of many eminently “respectable” members of society is a constant reproach to the faith on which they pride themselves. The “milk of human kindness” is often [pg 127] scarce amid “saints” of a certain school. Noli me tangere is their motto, and an appropriate one, indeed; for you might tap their hearts till doomsday, and never draw from them one drop of the generous wine of sympathy.

Not that all persons whose path of life crosses your own by the chances bred of social conventionalities are of this type; many are generous, kind-hearted, impulsive; but it is part of the indictment we bring against “society” that its rules so smother this amiable individuality as seldom to allow it to be revealed to you save by some chance occurrence. You may have a “calling acquaintance” with a woman apparently frivolous (though obviously good-natured), and whose mind you judge to be probably as shallow as her conversation. Some sudden misfortune comes upon you, and, of all your acquaintances, this is, perhaps, the only one who will blossom into a friend. In emergencies, her native good sense and affectionate heart burst their artificial bonds, resume their proper place, and flow out in deeds of refined and considerate kindness. She will prove to have presence of mind, delicacy of heart, an active power of sympathy. This is the sort of woman you would choose to have by your dying-bed, or to whom you would consign the care of your children under unhappy circumstances, whether of poverty or absence—the woman whose nerve would not fail her in a hospital, and who would march boldly into a prison with bright looks and cheerful words, ever thinking of others before herself. But had it not been for an untoward accident, you might never have distinguished her from the herd of ordinary morning-callers. She goes through her part in society as glibly and cheerfully as your gray parrot, who is ever ready to repeat his lesson when the proper cue is given him, or as readily as your pet lap-dog, which has no objection to stand on its hind legs in a corner, and beg as long as you choose to hold the titbit up before it. What chance have you of recognizing a soul behind all that mass of conventionality? About as much as you would have of seeing the “angel imprisoned in the marble” in a sculptor's studio, or as much as Dante had of knowing the tormented souls hidden in the trunk of those grisly bleeding trees of the Inferno.

The more frequently and familiarly you mix with the world, the more your path is strewn with shattered ideals; for it is almost impossible to retain an ideal of anything which you see daily as a misshapen and blurred reality. Practical experience seems to coarsen and cheapen everything, and there never was yet a more melancholy truth than that of the old adage, “Familiarity breeds contempt.” Professional life as well as domestic furnishes lamentable instances of this. In commerce, where it is very difficult for poetry and ideals to find room, the reality is hardly obnoxious to the thoughtful looker-on; for what refining influence could be expected from the perpetual jar and clash of engines, the constant chaffering, the feverish life, of the exchange? It is the realm of purely earthly, material influences, and naturally dwarfs the sympathies, while it concentrates the thoughts on one narrow point of selfish interest, if pursued for its own sake. But in the learned professions, whose aims are intellectually superior, and whose special province it is to elevate the human [pg 128] mind above selfish and individual interests, leading it, on the contrary, to the contemplation of abstract principles, and to the furtherance of the public weal, the ideal should be more apparent. And yet, in most cases, it is not so. There is no reverence left for a pursuit the trivial details of which are grown too familiar; petty jealousies take the place of scientific or philosophic emulation; man's innate vanity soon narrows the circle of interest round the ego, and subordinates the progress of the world to personal advancement. There is scarcely anything less venerable in a man's eyes than the particular branch of knowledge in which he is most proficient; and if it be with him a hobby, the love he bears to it is rather a shadow of the good opinion he holds of himself than a genuine devotion to science in the abstract. Of course, there are exceptions, numerous and honorable, but such are the plain facts in the ordinary, every-day experience of which life is in the main composed. “No one is a hero to his valet.” Home life is another ideal destroyed by society, with its arbitrary rules and its hard, practical axioms. The peace and holiness of home are rudely jarred by the demands which fashion makes on the time of its members. We have sometimes been tempted to think that this would be a very pleasant world to any one who could go through it as a spectator only. To act a part in it yourself means to subject yourself to one disenchantment after another. You see a family group at a distance—say through a street-window in a large city, or on the porch of a country villa. Old and young are mingled together; there may be beauty among the girls, there is refinement in their surroundings; they seem as thrifty as they are comfortable, for some are reading and some sewing: perhaps the tea-table is spread and housewifely treasures displayed; as a picture, it is perfect. But as a drama? Are you quite sure that you would like to see the real state of mind of each person there? If so, prepare yourself for almost inevitable disappointment. It will not be a safe investigation, and the ideal you may have formed will probably come out of the trial as an angel might if he trusted himself to the rough handling of common men.

No real happiness can exist in a life of perpetual excitement; and this a fashionable life can hardly fail to be. There is an intoxication of the mind as well as of the senses. The whirl of so-called pleasure never satisfies, but stimulates. More is required, and yet more, till, like the drunkard, you are a living paradox, never at peace unless in an atmosphere of excitement, just as he may be said to be never sober—or at least capable—unless when drunk. In the whirl of society, the mind withers; there is no time for thought, for study, for application. How many young girls there are who tell you candidly, “Oh! I have no time to practise my music. I used to do so four hours a day; but since I am in society, I can never find an hour to myself.” Then you inquire into this multiplicity of engagements, and you find—perhaps some religious occupation, some charitable work? Oh! no; only a call to be returned, cards to be left, a new toilet to be tried on, a little shopping, and a drive in the park. Pressing business, truly!

In great cities, during the season of balls and parties, a girl's life is one unbroken round of dissipation [pg 129] two-thirds of the day, and recuperation for coming “pleasure” during the remaining third. At the end of four or five months of this life, vitality is half extinct, the cheeks are pale, the mouth drawn, the eyes violet-circled; and against all this what prize is there to set? A bubble burst, a shadow vanished! These continual festivities, beginning late, ending in the early dawn, when the poor are just waking to their toil, and servants of God are rising to praise him—these repeated gatherings called “society” entirely upset the routine of domestic life. Instead of the blithe, healthy face sparkling at the head of the breakfast-table, there is a jaded, weary countenance, pale with a floury paleness, or flushed by late and disturbed slumbers; instead of the brisk tread and ringing voice that cheer the home, there is the listless step of the worn-out dancer, the peevish tone that tells plainly of bodily fatigue. In the evening there is no time for a cosy gathering round the hearth, a quiet game or chat, the reading aloud of some interesting book, or the simple delights of old-fashioned national airs. The dressing-room absorbs all that time—the choice of flowers or jewels takes long; the last finishing touches to the toilet must not be given in a hurry. The event of the day is about to begin; and so it will be to-morrow and the day after, and for an interminable tread-mill of days. If there is innate talent, there is no time to develop it; or, if it is cultivated at all, that, too, is distorted into a mere social “accomplishment,” the sole object of which is to add to the value of the possessor in the social market. The champion piece of embroidery is framed and pointed out as the work of the daughter of the house; the solitary basket of wax flowers is displayed in a conspicuous manner on an elaborate étagère; the water-colors are studiously hung in the best-lighted part of the drawing-room; the overture of William Tell is invariably called for on the slightest provocation, and played off indiscriminately before the least appreciative as well as the most artistic of the family's visiting list. And, by the way, what more egregious sham can there be than the conventional interest in music so universally professed? It is a matter of course to exclaim, “Oh! I dote on music”; and, on the basis of this broad assertion, what ludicrous exemplifications one is condemned to listen to! One will add, “Oh! yes, and I do so love Strauss' valses”; another will tell you there is no music like the bagpipes, and no dance like an Irish jig or an old-time Virginia reel. One gushing young lady will call the “Maud Valse” and the “Guards' Polka” “perfectly divine,” while her sentimental friend will murmur that “Home, Sweet Home” is her favorite. With many people, a collection of ballads is identical with the whole science of music; their sympathies and comprehension can go no further.

To many, again, music stands for comic songs and Christy's Minstrels. If an instrumental piece takes more than five minutes to get through, people begin to shift their feet and whisper to their neighbors; of course, when it is over, they will turn round and sweetly simper: “Oh! do play us something more; that last was so lovely.” In ninety-nine out of a hundred houses where you are doomed for your sins to hear music, you hear trash. It is hardly worth criticising, either in the choice or in the execution, and, one [pg 130] would therefore think, hardly worth telling a lie for. And yet this conventional admiration, what is it but a lie pure and simple?

To return to our belles and their murdered home-life. Not only is their time so mortgaged that they have none left for the joys of the family hearth, but they have none to spare for self-culture. A woman's education does not close on the threshold of the school-room. Every advance made later by voluntary application to study is a greater stride than all the compulsory teaching she receives in her school-life. If society materially interferes with this self-development, it has a heavy responsibility to bear. Each mind thus stunted, crude, and unevenly balanced reduces the sum total of usefulness in this world, and adds to the dead-weight of shiftless beings whose room would be decidedly better than their company in the scheme of human advancement. A frivolous, fashionable man or woman is a monster upon earth, a being whom nature certainly does not recognize, and whom religion reprobates.

The most satisfactory reflection whereby to dispel the effect of this dismal picture is this: the thing carries its antidote with it to all but hopelessly narrow minds. The pleasures of dancing within an area of a yard square, and of listening night after night to the same insipid gallantries and insincere congratulations, cannot fail to pall after a time. A French author says that after the age of thirty, a woman of any account does not dance; she leaves this pleasure to those who have no other.64 As with all pleasures which address the senses rather than the intellect, a surfeit often proves a cure. You have tasted all the delights to be got from certain things, and the sameness at last begins to pall. There could be no more effectual check on the levelling spirit of the age than a voluntary renunciation for a time on the part of the possessors of wealth and power, and a temporary enjoyment of these honors on the part of those who envy them. How soon should we see the harassed artisan fly from the post he once coveted, the working-girl tear off the finery she envied, the millionaire pro tem. entreat his coachman to change places with him! Those who, in the midst of their grinding toil, envy the man in broadcloth, the woman in her barouche, whom they pass and repass day by day, quite leave out of the scales the weight of inner anxiety, grief, or often only ennui, which burdens the rich and fashionable. If they could tell how this one's heart is devoured by jealousy, how that one's home is rendered gloomy by his too plodding ambition, or unhappy by his wife's irritable temper! If they could guess how that sickly, white child, seated among its furs in that dark, handsome clarence, causes sleepless nights and heavy fears to that anxious mother in velvet robe and seal-skin cloak! If they only knew the secret remorse for ever gnawing at the heart of this exquisite of the clubs, whispering the name of a girl once happy and innocent—a name now to him the synonym of a crime; or if they could tell the thoughts of the substantial merchant, as he turns away with heavy steps from a counting-house which, the more astounding is its financial success, the more it resembles, in all but in name, a [pg 131] gambling-den! And, above all, did they but know how often the sad votary of fashion, in some moment of long-repressed but untamable natural emotion, cries out for the freedom of the poor and their robust health! That is the saddest part of this grim masque—no one is contented, no one believes in himself or in his fellow-man; it is a drama in which the actors know full well that when the foot-lights are put out and the curtain of night falls, they will no longer be what they seem. So the gigantic sham grows day by day, stifling nature, burying the intellect, blurring the moral sense, fossilizing the whole being. Outward shapes of humanity remain, but, by some fell enchantment, the spiritual essence is sucked away, and an automaton, skilfully contrived, represents what once was a man.

Even pleasure no longer lurks in its outward forms when “society” has thus worked its will on men. The real enjoyment is gone, but its dismal appearance must be assumed. Not to shock the world—your world—the flavorless fruit must be eaten with a good grace, the graceful draperies of social decorum must be hung on the skeleton. The wheel goes round, and it is so long since you have trusted to your own feet for guidance that you must needs keep hold of the conventional support. It is very difficult to win back your independence once it has been surrendered. The world—your world—is a pitiless task-master, and does not pension off its former servants. If you leave it, you do so at your own risk; and if you can conquer no position which merit and your own individuality are enough to gain, you may resign yourself to the rôle of a dummy. We are not sure that some of the happiest people on earth are not, socially speaking, dummies. But when you come to think of it, what a strange, magnetic power has the little circle that forms your world! When a lady has crowded from five to six hundred guests in her narrow drawing-rooms, she sees before her all the persons who, to her, constitute society. Of these, perhaps one-third are of hazy position; they are but outsiders, candidates for the social honors which will only be bestowed fully and ungrudgingly on their grandchildren. Their opinion is not of much value. When you dissect the remaining thirds, you mentally check off many a respectable and amiable person as incapable of forming any independent opinion; others you secretly stigmatize as gossips, shallow-minded, or spiteful; and the circle of responsible people becomes gradually narrower and narrower. Hardly a score do you credit with sound judgment and discriminating sense. But these are precisely the judges you do not fear, unless your conscience pricks you. They are generous and large-minded; they stand apart from the crowd, with wider sympathies and larger appreciation; they see beyond the present, and unconsciously you find yourself classing them as exceptions to the rule. They do not form the impalpable social tribunal, then? It must be, therefore, the mediocre company of gossips. Search a little into your consciousness or your memory, and you will doubtless find it is so. A recent novelist gives an apt illustration of the relative proportion, in the eyes of an old English country gentleman, between his county, England, and the world. A diagram contains, first, a large, irregular outline representing the county; [pg 132] a round ball ten times smaller typifies England, and an infinitesimal point in space denotes the whole civilized world. This is the way we all look at things. No doubt it is instinctive. To us, “the world” consists of a hundred old women, eminently respectable and unctuously compassionate, who gossip about our private affairs over their tea and hot rolls. This is the core of that dread tribunal which we tremble to offend. It is indeed a hard tyrant, if it can succeed in chaining us to its car, after the pleasures which it dispenses have lost their flavor for us. But, unfortunately, half mankind acknowledge this species of bondage, and we must presume voluntarily, or at least passively.

Were it not that this thraldom is so unspeakably sad, it would seem such a farce, if looked upon dispassionately from without! One might almost liken a ball or great official reception in one of the capitals of fashion to the mediæval Dance of Death. The scene is brilliant with deceptive gaiety; the whole surface of society ripples with smiles; the maskers all wear their brightest garments and their stereotyped badges of mirth. There, in the doorway, stands a lovely woman, in rose-color from head to foot—a cherub's face enshrined in a sunset cloud, so perhaps an artist would fancy. She smiles bewitchingly, and coquets with her fan, while talking to a gray-bearded hero from India. But she has made up her mind to sacrifice her honor to her love; tomorrow, at dawn, she will leave her husband's home and her baby's cradle; and, poor victim! she is panting under the weight of this wretched secret even while she listens to old-world gallantry from her fatherly admirer. Not far from her stands another fair form, not more pure in outward semblance, hardly less beautiful—a gifted woman, a true wife, smiling and conversing as calmly as any one in the room; but she knows that she has a fatal internal disease, and that at any moment death might suddenly overtake her. Not to alarm her husband, she joins in every festivity, carrying her secret with her as the Spartan did the fox who was gnawing at his bosom. Amid the whirl of the dance, you perhaps single out that young girl, fair, fresh, seventeen. She is not as happy as she seems; her eyes roam shyly around; there is one whom she both longs and dreads to see, for she is not sure whether she will not find him by the side of her school friend, now her rival. And among the men, how many, beneath their masks, bear sorrowing or anxious hearts! That elderly man, so calmly listening to a fluent diplomate, knows that to-morrow it will be noised abroad that he is bankrupt—utterly ruined. When he leaves this gay scene to-night, it will be for the railway, which will bear him out of the country in a few hours. Yonder pale man, who wears his regulation smile so listlessly that you cannot help likening it to a garment loosely hung, is here in the interest of a friend, and is waiting an opportunity to speak a word of cordial recommendation to a ministerial acquaintance, formerly a college friend, now a power in the cabinet. His heart is heavy with a private grief; his child lies dangerously ill at home, and his poor distracted wife needs his comfort and support; but, true to his word, he forgets himself for an hour or two, that he may not miss the golden opportunity on which [pg 133] hang the hopes of his friend's whole future. In the centre of the dance, the tall form of a Life-guardsman is prominent; to-morrow he will have disappeared from the world, and only his intimates will know that he had long determined to enter a Catholic seminary, and study for the priesthood. He did not want his decision discussed beforehand, and took the best means of silencing curiosity by appearing the gayest of the gay. Every one here to-night has a long record oppressing his heart—something that makes the present scene quite secondary in his thoughts, and that causes in his breast a bitter feeling of reaction against the mockery of which he forms a part. And this is the thing called pleasure! How little we know of the people with whom we spend our lives—those that touch our hands daily, and speak to us commonplace words of courtesy! Surely the bees in their hive, the ants on their hill, the beavers and prairie-dogs of a “village,” know each other better than we do our next-door neighbors! We cut the thread of a guilty reverie by some observation about the weather, or we laugh the unmeaning laugh that supplies the place of an answer, perhaps inconvenient to ourselves, and this laugh jars on the tenderest memories of a sorrowful past uppermost just then in our neighbor's mind. There is something appalling in all this—the tragedy lies so near the surface, and we tread upon it so often!

The trivial aspect of society is oftener still before us—the inanity of morning calls, the gossip of a provincial town, the petty local interests that absorb three-fourths of mankind. Why, we wonder, should general conversation invariably breed gossip, while a tête-à-tête sometimes elicits real information and rational interchange of ideas? The same person who in a company of five or six has nothing but commonplace remarks to offer, often opens out in private though yet only ceremonial conversation, and startles you by original opinions and valuable suggestions. The French are perhaps the only people who shine in mixed conversation; they have the talent of causerie—a thing that with us hardly exists; the very word is untranslatable. A Frenchwoman can be sparkling where we can only be dull; she can dance on a cobweb, while we should break down on a cart-rope. Gallic vivacity can make even the details of the kitchen amusing, while we should be insufferably prosy on the same subject.

How well we remember the ponderous magnates of our neighborhood in the county! The stately morning calls, the inevitable topics of local interest, the solemnity of that “quarter of an hour” which we were fain to liken to that rendered famous by an old author. Unfailing resources, O Court Journal! the royal visit to such and such a place, the marriage of so-and-so, etc., etc. Then the flower-garden and the poultry-yard (hereditary hobbies with English ladies), the agricultural show, the coming election. And then the formidable ordeal comes to an end, probably to the great relief of both parties. Neither of the two cared for the subjects discussed or for the interlocutor discussing them; but etiquette demanded the waste of fifteen minutes, and the laws of society are as those of the Medes and Persians. In a lower rank of life, the proprieties are perhaps still more rigidly enforced, and the only [pg 134] difference would be in the choice of topics. George Eliot's inimitable gossip in The Mill on the Floss describes that to a nicety, and indeed, although written in England, might do duty almost as well anywhere else. The quality of the house linen, the antiquity of the silver spoons, the solemn conclave over a new bonnet, and the delinquencies of the maid-servant—such would be the staple. In every case you see the mask is on, it fits close, and no form of “society” is disregarded!

Staying for a few days at a friend's house is a terrible trial in polite society. You are never a moment off duty; you have to change costumes as often as an actress in a play where the “unities” are “nowhere”; and, above all, if you are a woman, you have the dismal prospect of three hours' morning talk with a bevy of your own sex, your hands meanwhile engaged in some useless piece of fancy-work. The topics of conversation may be guessed, their range not being very extensive; of course, somebody's marriage or probable engagement is discussed, silks and laces are made up into imaginary toilets with surprising rapidity, the history of some refractory scholar and the details of the clothing club are next drawn upon, and it is very seldom that the talk glides into any interesting or rational channel. It really is a pity that people will persist in talking of each other and not of things. So much might be altered for the better in society, if conversation were not so exclusively personal. Mutual improvement is a thing altogether overlooked in the civilized world. Even men succumb to gossip; for what is the staple of club-talk? So-and-so has “sold out,” and gone into a less expensive regiment; such an one seems very attentive to Miss So-and-so; such another was deeply offended because he was not asked to Lady So-and-so's party; the shooting in Lord C——'s preserves is confoundedly bad this year; Mr. A—— thinks of contesting the next election at B——. Interminable waves of gossip flood the world from the club as from the boudoir, though the latter certainly does by far the most mischief.

We are told that “no man can serve two masters.” In all relations in life this is eminently true. Intellect and Mammon scarcely agree better than God and Mammon. The proper atmosphere of intellectual life is peace, and a student's career should be blameless in morals as well as tranquil in experience. Fashion and society forbid this; they necessitate loss of time, and unsettle the even balance of the mind. For one who values his calmness of spirit and his health of body there is a golden rule, which, if he weigh all external pleasures by it, will infallibly secure him the peace he needs: No pleasure is safe but that which leaves no regret behind it on the morrow. Who has not felt the wretched sensation left by pleasures not fulfilling this condition? Who does not remember the feverish pulse, the troubled dreams, the vague uneasiness, the sickly apathy that follow on a night spent in violent and unnatural amusement? One wiser than our generation has said:

“The desires of sensuality draw thee abroad; but, when the hour is past, what dost thou bring home but a weight upon thy conscience and a dissipation of heart? A joyful going abroad often brings forth a sorrowful coming home, and a [pg 135] merry evening makes a sad morning.”65

These words, written centuries ago, contain volumes, and are not less applicable now than in the middle ages.

We often hear it said that man is a gregarious animal. He needs companionship, and clings to his kind. This it is that induces that more stirring life which distinguishes the city from the province; which quickens the perceptions and enlarges the sympathies. But the perfection of the intellectual life is not found in cities. The world-wide influences that stir great centres have locomotive powers that are superior to the channels of human contrivance. It needs not the friction of mind with mind to originate great ideas or engender great deeds. The companionship needful for men of talent lies not in the social circle, but in the library. As Ruskin has said in one of his lectures, we should each of us be proud of being admitted to the friendship of some great poet, artist, or philosopher; and yet we neglect that inner communion which is open to us at any moment with the spirits of all the departed heroes of the mind, whose choicest thoughts are stored on the shelves of our libraries. It is true that the straitened circumstances of many a scholar keep him chain-bound within the limits of great, black, smoky cities; for, since he cannot possess individually the literary treasures that are the necessary food of his intellectual life, he is obliged to slake his thirst at the common fountain of the public libraries and lecture-rooms. But we were speaking rather of the ideal, the perfect scholarly life, which implies a combination of pursuits. The mind which looks to the highest products of ancient and modern thought for its legitimate pabulum can never be but half satisfied with anything less than perfection in its accessory surroundings. Such a mind is naturally allied to a sensitive and imaginative organization, and the coarse contrasts between the peaceful study and the common street-sights of every large city must necessarily be painful to it. Even so the petty gossip and “storms in a tea-cup” of a rural centre; for all that is mean and small is foreign to that calm atmosphere in which sages and poets live. Those sages, those poets, in their day, may have lived, it is true, among the turmoil and strife of small interests; but death and the lapse of time seem to have bereft them, in our eyes, of any such disenchantments; we see them transformed and idealized, and we gladly aim at reproducing, not their commonplace lives, but their spiritual existence. This existence still survives, and it is to this that we wish to ally our own. For this perfection of lofty companionship, the solitude of a country life is most conducive, but it must be a solitude of leisure, of freedom from conventionalities, and, unluckily, of at least some degree of wealth. This latter condition is fulfilled in so few cases that our ideal remains but too often unrealized in this work-a-day world, yet none the less is it the true and only dignified ideal of the intellectual life. The instinct of those born with a spark of genius will bear us out in this assertion; no miser longs for wealth more thirstingly than a book-worm. There is an innate sympathy with the outward beauties of nature which distinguishes the scholar even more than it does the gipsy.

But, as a crowning condition to the enjoyment of these beauties, he must be free from the common cares and interests of men; he must walk in a higher sphere than those whose sympathies cannot mingle with his; he must walk alone in spirit, even though his body may jostle the unthinking crowd. Have we made our scholar a misanthrope? Yes, if thereby is meant a hater of society, with its shams and its stage-like scenery; no, if you understand thereby a hater of humankind. But be sure of one thing: a man learns to love men more the less he sees of them, and the more, by their absence, they leave him his charitable estimate of their probable good qualities. No doubt the earth itself looks fairer from the standpoint of a fixed star than it does to-day to any toiling wayfarer on its rough pathway.

To S. Joseph: On The Day Of My First Mass.

Odd Stories. VI.—King Ruli.

Once upon a time there was, on this side of the Hartz Mountains, a secret place, where, touching a hidden spring, you found yourself in a trice between immense walls of rock, whence a mysterious person, dressed in red from top to toe, took you into a great cavern, the first of a series of vast caves filled with hogsheads and tuns of wine and beer, and lighted up in such a manner that the brilliant stalactites with which it was hung sparkled and flashed like the most precious gems in a jeweller's dream. The awe inspired by this scene hardly left you a moment to observe that the nose of your guide was even redder than his body, when you were ushered through another secret door into the domain of a grand old castle, the battlements of which, covered with moss, overlooked a pastoral valley and its white flocks, and seemed to rule the landscape, notwithstanding the presence of many other castles, as if it were the house of a monarch. And so it was. Here dwelt King Ruli, the patron of minnesingers and jolly cavaliers—that stalwart king whose brow, and beard, and port were the very signs of genial majesty. Pleasure ruled the board where he sat; and when the juice of the Weinberg warmed up in the blood of the lords and minstrels in Weinbergland, the ten noble companions of King Ruli swept the mystic chords of the harp, and with voices free sang in echoing strain their merry roundelay:

To sounds of cheerful thoughts like these each royal night wore on, while the castled lords of hill and valley feasted at the king's table, and made merry over jest and story, to the clinking of many glasses and in the pleasant uproar of many voices. Seated in his chair at the head of the table, he drank from a great flagon of crystal, or smoked from a pipe as long as his body, the bowl of which required a page-in-waiting to support it, lest, in a drowsy moment, it should drop from the mouth of the king. Below him were ranged the ten minnesingers, who smoked from one immense bowl of tobacco, having long stems that led to all their mouths, whence issued a volume of smoke, which, as it rose around the great burning bowl, was like the fume of a conflagration; and thus betimes the merry minnesingers sang:

No king could resist such flattery as this, and it was with truth that his minstrels pictured him standing, and, in a tone of majestic joviality, wishing the health of the whole company:

Late in the night the sound of song and story made for the gentle monarch a lullaby, and his head rested on his bosom in slumber, as he laid down his flagon. Had his chief minstrel then tickled his great ear, it would not have waked him up; and so, seeing that the king had filled himself with slumber as with the drugs of Morpheus, his lieges sang:

But as night after night of song and wine went by, the king grew older and older in his cups. Little he saw or cared that new revellers, new minstrels, new lords, had one by one taken the places of old ones, and that the speech of the new-comers was loud and hoarse, and their song ribald and discordant. Those who remained with him of his old friends and retainers had gradually imbibed the character of the latest revellers, and their potations were deeper and their jests broader than ever. Once in a while the king groaned and complained that his beer was too bitter; but they so flattered his jokes, and praised his beard, and spoke of his noble brow, and his royal blood, and his glorious voice, that he sang and roared as of old, and swallowed his beer without further complaint. On such an occasion as this it required the cynical courage of the minstrel Knipfenbausenstein to sing, as he did, from the end of the hall, which he had just entered after a long absence:

The minstrel doubtless had in mind the ten companions of the king, who, being no longer able to keep up with the stalwart Ruli in the vigor of his potations, had cried out as with one voice against their sovereign, declaring that his beer was bitter beyond endurance, and his pleasures a gilded despotism. For this offence the king, swearing roundly that they were traitor knights, who knew not how to be moderate drinkers or loyal feasters, consigned them to his darkest wine caverns, where they were doomed to dwell in empty hogsheads for many a year.

Now, after a life of good living, the rare old king sat in his great velvet-cushioned chair, warming his legs, which were rather swollen, and his feet, which were encased in large slippers, before a fire sufficient to cook an ox. Glided to his side his eldest child, the queenly Hermengilde, and said softly: “Alas! sire, and hast thou not heard that my first-born has killed young Siegbert of Bierhalle, in a drunken brawl, and wilt thou persist in these foolish feasts?”

“Tut, tut, silly girl! This feasting hurts not thy fasting. 'Twere better to kill his man in drink than sober; and, tut, tut! we must not grieve for ever, child. Wine is for the drinking, and life for the living. Heaven send thee luck!” With this the jovial king took a draught from his flagon.

Ere he had smoked his pipe, the fair Joanna, second princess of the blood, whose wont it was to fill the king's pipe with affectionate care, said to him musingly: “Methinks it is the night when our brother Max fell over into the chasm and was killed. Ill befits that its peace be marred by roysterers whom, say they, he had most to blame for his death.”

“What! and have ye turned dames [pg 139] of the cloister, that ye seek to make crows' nests of my beard and gray hairs? Umph! my lady counsellors; and ye would have no more wine drank because rocks are steep! Did not sober Hans fall into the well, and ere thou wast born? Ay, but a brave lad was Max, and a merry one. A glass to his memory!”

The king was unaware, as he thus spoke, of the near presence of a reverend and noble matron, whose face bore marks of care and grief. It was the queen Roxalana. A child of tender years ran from her side to climb her grandsire's knee, but, seeing that the royal flagon stood in the way, exclaimed: “O grandfather! that horrid drink!” The king, with a majestic motion, waved the child away, and she returned in tears to the side of the mute queen.

“So, my lady, queen of woebegones and nurse of whimperings, thou art here to tease thy lord and trouble his gout. 'Tis well. Train the brats of the land to do imps' work to their fathers, and make your daughters have long faces; but have a care, goodwife, lest an old man's patience be too weak for this old maid's gossip. Pray, what new worm is in thy brain, that thou tellest we must not drink the cup of our fathers?”

Not long after this scene, a loud clash of arms was heard in the court, and the debauched minnesinger, Wittekind, staggered into the hall, his face stained with blood as with wine. The king's guests had just drunk their tenth glass, when a crowd of rioters, armed to the teeth, rushed in upon them, and, breaking glasses right and left, proclaimed the downfall of King Ruli. With a bitter and heavy heart, the king recognized among the crowds who now drank to his perdition many of his old revellers; and, seizing a favorable moment, fled totteringly into the wine mountain. There, to his great surprise, he found that all the tuns and hogsheads of wine and beer which had been stored away were quite empty. Once more he joined his ten companions locked up in the wine caves, lamenting bitterly that the wine of his life had gone to lees, and much tormented by the man in red, whose nose was like fire.

Epigram. The Widow's Mites.

Old Versus New.

One pleasant afternoon, in the autumn just passed, I lay stretched out lazily on a mow of new-mown hay, in a large, old-fashioned country barn.

It was still redolent with that odor peculiar to hay newly cut, having been placed in the barn but a few hours before.

In the work of cutting, raking, and storing, patent machines of every description had assisted; and, lying there cosily enjoying the effect, I had plenty of leisure to think upon the cause.

With my mind full of reflections on the wonderful improvements of the age, and vague thoughts of labor-saving machines, it was not long until I was off in a sound slumber, to which a hearty dinner had by no means indisposed me. I was soon in the theatre of dreams, and the first actor whose voice I heard was an old scythe. Apparently, the peg on which he hung was rotten, and, giving way, let the old fellow fall with a shock that seemed to stir up what little life yet remained in him; for I soon heard, in a queer, cracked voice, the following complaint:

“Well, here I am at last! Hung up on the wall years ago, like an old coat that's put aside for a rainy day, my master couldn't even see to it that I had a safe peg; but, hanging me on that old rotten thing, I've got a fall that my poor bones won't be the better of for a month to come.”

With that, one of the patent mowers, showing his polished teeth, gruffly asked: “What are you growling about? What's that you're saying about the master?”

“It ill suits you,” said the scythe, “to put on airs, though you are rubbed and polished, and, drawn by a dashing team, ride about on wheels. Upstarts always assume great importance, and the latest converts are the most zealous partisans; when you have served the master as long and as faithfully as I have, you may have some right to maintain his cause.”

“Why,” said the mower, “you're quite a preacher, to be sure; pray tell us what cause you have for grievance? Is it, forsooth, because your peg gave way you are so highly incensed? Even if you did get a fall, I think you ought to be grateful that you are housed high and dry, and not left out in the rain to rust.”

“My fall is a small matter indeed,” said the scythe, “compared with my other wrongs. When I see you, with your gay paint and glittering teeth, eating up the food that I enjoyed for years; when I see fair meadows of clover, and valleys filled with golden grain, all given over to your rapacious maw, and I, I who once received all this as my just right, allowed but the little scraps that grow around a stump—when I see all this, my temper is tried to the utmost at the injustice that is done me.”

“Yes,” chimed in an old and well-nigh toothless rake, “you may well complain of the scanty share that is doled out to you; I [pg 141] too, hang here neglected, and, when I am taken down, get equally tough morsels for my poor teeth.”

Whereupon several hoes, filled with deadly hate against their enemies of the plough family, now took courage, as they heard the boldly uttered words of their companions, and, speaking up with one voice, said: “We likewise have reason to complain of our master. There was a time when we were thought fit for any labor; we turned up the earth to support the potato-vines; we loosed the earth around the corn; and that splendid vegetable, the cabbage, was tended by our trusty blades; now we are deemed fit for scarce anything but to clean out manure, to scrape offal from the yard, and, in fact, do all the dirty work of the place.” It seemed as if the spirit of rebellion was abroad; for at this, the flail that hung idly on a spike followed with a long speech.

“You have all,” said the flail, “good reasons for being indignant with the master of this farm; my friend, the scythe, may justly complain of the rich harvests given over to his rival, the patent mower; our old companion, the rake—an exceptional rake, by the way—may consistently inveigh against the master for giving him in his old age naught but the hardest morsels of food; and our worthy associates, the hoes, may well be indignant, and look with contempt and scorn on the foul legacy bequeathed to them—a legacy which hoes of their stamp should disdain to embrace. But he has treated none of you so cruelly as he has treated me; forced into a disagreeable union with what he calls my handle, battered almost to pieces in battering out his grain, I yet respected him for the care he took of me in the months when I was useless to him. But now he has new-fangled machines to do his work, and, uncared for and unnoticed, dust covers me so completely that I can scarce open eyes or mouth. Base ingratitude has been my portion, and I certainly may be excused if I feel displeased, ay, enraged. I may be pardoned if I seek not simply redress, but revenge.” As the flail ended, a deep murmur of assent filled the whole place; and the patent mower, who had kept strict silence since his last question to the scythe, now spoke up.

“My worthy friends,” said he, “I am indeed very sorry to be, with my companions, the innocent cause of all your troubles. I have listened to your complaints, and cannot deny that they are, in the main, just. But you should know that the master seeks only his own comfort, and, whatever care he takes of us, it is only to relieve himself from labor. As I reflect upon your present position, I see myself similarly situated; for the time will come when I and my associates will have to stand aside for newer and more vigorous servants of toil.

“The master, too, will one day find himself in the same condition. He also will become old, and will look around on younger and heartier hands doing his work; and, as he grows still older, he must suffer many a slight, for the world wants nothing it cannot use.

“Now that the period of your usefulness has gone by, strive to become reconciled to your fate; murmur no more, accept your lot with resignation, be satisfied with the work you have done, and patiently wait for the end.”

Curious to hear how the malcontents would take this bit of philosophy, [pg 142] I leaned over to catch the first word; but, leaning too far, I slid off the mow, and falling, not on the floor, fortunately, but on some bundles of straw, was rudely awakened to find that I had been asleep some hours; for evening had come on, and it was now so dark in the barn that I could see nothing of the bold disputants of my dream.

Hastening to the house, I amused the family by the recital of this contest of the old against the new; and, profiting by my dream, I have since resolved to accept the mower's advice, and be always reconciled to time's changes.

New Publications.

The history of the Society of Jesus is rich in abundant materials of untiring interest. The Blessed Peter Favre's apostolic career was short, having been but of seven years' duration, yet crowded with astonishing results. The particular fact most strikingly brought into view in this Life is the one which of all others is the most shameful for the Reformation—viz., that it had no intellectual or moral origin or character, but sprang merely from the sins and vices which had so frightfully corrupted a vast number of all classes of Christians in the miserable XVIth century. F. Favre saw this clearly, and often said that if Luther himself could have been brought to sincere contrition and repentance for his sins, his errors in doctrine would have disappeared without any argumentation. Accordingly, he set himself to preach like a missionary, to exhort and win persons to a reformation of life, and to labor with wonderful success to convert sinners to God, as the shortest and surest way to check the progress of heresy.

The present volume is, like all those which have preceded it, carefully and neatly prepared as a book of choice reading for persons of cultivated spiritual and literary tastes.

Mr. Seton is a nephew of the celebrated foundress of the American branch of the institute of the Daughters of Charity, and a brother of the Rt. Rev. Monsignor Seton. He served with honor as an officer of one of our New York regiments during the late war, and since that time has especially devoted himself to the study of early New England history, which he has illustrated by his historical novels. Our first impression respecting the merits of a previous novel by Mr. Seton, in which he took great pains to depict the manners and customs of the early Puritan inhabitants of Connecticut and Massachusetts (the Romance of the Charter Oak), was not very favorable. We have since been disposed to think that we did not duly appreciate the skill and talent of the author, and have found other persons, well qualified to judge of such matters, who have considered the Charter Oak as a remarkably successful effort of its kind. Both that novel and the present one are characterized by a marked realism, like that of a certain Dutch and Flemish school of painting. Probably they do present a more correct and faithful picture of those old times than that given by writers who have more idealism and romance in their delineation, like James F. Cooper. We confess to a taste, [pg 143] nevertheless, for these more romantic authors. And, speaking in cool criticism, we think a novelist, in following the highest principles and ends of his art, ought to idealize more than Mr. Seton is disposed to do. He has a broad sense of the humorous and ridiculous in commonplace characters and actions. The absurdities and trivialities of common life are too faithfully represented in his pages, and there is frequently a degree of coarseness in the description of vulgar persons which is disagreeable. Yankee children, however, devour Mr. Seton's stories with avidity, which is a good proof of their naturalness. And, putting aside the peculiarity which we have noticed, the story lately published, The Pride of Lexington, is, even more than the first one, a composition of real originality and power, establishing fully the author's ability as a historical novelist. The battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill are well described; the heroes, and especially the heroine, of the story, with the plot of private incidents and events that make the filling up of the historical scenes, are interesting; there is much genuine comic humor in the by-play, especially in the episode of Billy Smith and the black coon, called “the parson,” and we are quite sure that the genuine, unsophisticated children of the by-gone generation of New England forefathers, if they get hold of The Pride of Lexington, will pay the author the tribute of an oft-repeated and delighted perusal.

F. de Ravignan was undoubtedly an orator. The impression which he made upon his hearers is enough to justify us in making this assertion. The orator must be heard; when his words are written, their fire is gone, and they no longer burn. In the case of F. de Ravignan especially, there must have been much in the magnetism of the man, in his earnestness, in his deep religious feeling, in the firm conviction and strong love, shown in the manner in which he spoke; for in his printed conferences and sermons we do not find great eloquence or beauty of diction or depth of thought. There are none of those bursts of passion, of those profound thoughts and comprehensive views, in which a whole subject is condensed into a single phrase, as strong as it is striking, which we so often meet with in the conferences of Lacordaire. Nor yet is there that stately flow of language, at once simple and majestic, that evenness of style and unbroken sequence of thought, which characterize the discourses of F. Felix. And yet neither Lacordaire nor Felix excited greater enthusiasm or made a profounder impression in the pulpit of Notre Dame than De Ravignan.

If he had not the depth and comprehensiveness of thought of the one, or the sonorous diction and lofty manner of the other, he must have been, in some respects at least, a greater orator than either. The conferences contained in the volume now before us were preached to the “Enfants de Marie,” in the Convent of the Sacred Heart, in Paris, during the years 1855, 1856, and 1857. They were not written out by F. de Ravignan, but were compiled by one of his hearers from notes taken at the time of their delivery, and are, we think, equally as good as the conferences preached in Notre Dame from 1837 to 1846, which were published in four volumes shortly after his death. They are simply familiar discourses to ladies in the world on the most important subjects connected with their duties as Christians; in which we find all the best qualities that distinguished F. Ravignan as a preacher—sincere piety and much earnestness, united with delicacy and refinement both of thought and language. He does not inveigh against the vices of society, but rather seeks to describe the beauties of the Christian life; to show its dignity and responsibilities, its perfect harmony with the highest aspirations of the soul and the soundest dictates of reason.

The name of F. de Ravignan will of itself be sufficient to obtain a wide circulation for this English version of his conferences.

This book is quite a storehouse of curious and valuable information—just the kind of matter that would be overlooked by the civil historian, and which the reverent [pg 144] chronicler (alas! an almost extinct species, now) alone would be apt to take cognizance of.

It doubtless surprised many intelligent readers to find what interesting facts even a cursory investigation would bring to light, while reading what our “Looker-Back” saw while in London. This work is a treat of a similar character. It is constructed on the plan of an itinerary, and divided into nine “walks,” in which the most notable localities are looked at from an archæological point of view, re-peopled by the actors on the stage at the respective dates, and reanimated by the deeds then being performed.

We are doubtless indebted to the famous romance of Eugene Sue for these notes of the Wandering Jew, in which this extraordinary personage, after his ceaseless journeyings for more than eighteen hundred years, finally turns up as an author, and, surprising as it may seem, a defender of the Jesuits.

The first part of the little volume is devoted to S. Ignatius. The Wandering Jew had seen him on two occasions—first in Spain, in his hot youth, with his light, graceful form clad in a page's rich attire, with the plumed cap and velvet mantle, the hawk upon his wrist, the hounds following at his heels, whilst his foot seemed hardly to touch the ground as he walked; and again, at Rome, he saw him in his old age, arrayed in the flowing gown of the priest, with the calm of deliberate wisdom on his high forehead, advancing with a sweet and awful majesty to the altar.

“I loved and revered him then,” says the Jew, “albeit a stranger to his communion; and I cannot recall the memory of that marked and expressive countenance, whether in the gallant boy or the venerable and saintly old man, without feeling some interest in the fate of that illustrious order which he alone created, and which still bears the impress of his character and genius.”

The remaining chapters are devoted to The Spiritual Exercises, “The Constitutions of the Order,” “The Missions and Schools of the Jesuits,” and, finally, to answering some of the charges which Protestants and infidels have brought against the Society. There is a very good chapter on the Provincial Letters, in which Pascal, with a wit and power of sarcasm surpassed only by the artful unfairness with which he treats the subject, has sought to make the whole order responsible for the extravagant opinions of some few Spanish and Flemish Jesuits.

The author, who is evidently not a Catholic, has written with great fairness and good sense, and we most willingly recommend his book to our readers.

We have been asked to notice this book. But how are Catholics to regard it with favor, when, before they have read far in the poem of “The Red Flag,” they come upon a passage containing an insult too gross and slanderous, we should have thought, for even Exeter Hall? We forbear to quote the words. Suffice it to say that the author, ignoring the martyred archbishop and priests, represents the church as gloating over the execution of the communists in Paris.

Affectation, verboseness, and sensuous description characterize these poems as works of art; while the metre of “The Red Flag” is in the worst taste, and the lyrics are spoilt by all sorts of quirks and the clumsiest divisions of stanzas.

The Catholic Publication Society has in press, and will soon publish, The Life of St. John of the Cross, 1 vol. 12mo, and The Farm of Muiceron and Madame Agnes, in 1 vol. 8vo.

The Coming Transit Of Venus.

This year, 1874, bids fair to be memorable in the annals of astronomy. A subject which has long occupied our students of that venerable and now gigantic science is gradually passing from their closets and their scientific discussions into reviews and newspapers, and is forcing itself on the attention of the world at large. At first sight the matter seems a very trivial one. On the 8th of next December, keen eyes in certain parts of the world may, if the sky be clear, and if they look closely, notice that a small, dark spot, a mere speck, will flit across the face of the sun. Examined through a telescope, it is seen to have an appreciable diameter—about 1'. It is not half as interesting to look at as ordinary solar spots, with their jagged edges, their umbra and penumbra, their changing forms, and their whirling faculæ. It has not, as they seem to have, some vague connection with the magnetic disturbances, the auroral lights, or any other atmospheric changes of this sublunary world of ours. It simply passes across the sun in something less than six hours, leaving no trace behind, and producing, so far as would appear, no appreciable effect of any kind. It occurs but rarely—twice in a century; in some centuries, not at all. Small as it is, it can be foretold and calculated beforehand. Except as a verification of such calculations, ordinary minds might think it singularly unimportant—scarcely more important than the gleam in the heavens at night of an occasional and isolated falling star, which glides along its shining path for an instant, and then disappears never more to be seen.

Yet for the last ten—we might, with more truth, say for fifty—years back, the best astronomers have been preparing to observe, with unequalled care, the passage of that little black spot. Some have again and again gone over the records of the observations made in 1761 and 1769, when it was last seen, criticising what was then done, distinguishing what was well done from what they judge to have been faulty, [pg 146] and tracing these faults back to their sources—either to the imperfection of the instruments used, to personal errors, or to mistakes or omissions of the observers themselves. In the observations now to be made, all these sources of error will, as far as possible, be excluded. Others have spent years in patiently going over the long calculations connected with those observations, detecting and eliminating any errors they find, and introducing such corrections as the subsequent advance of astronomical science demands. The amended results thus obtained are ready for comparison, at their proper value, with the additional and, it is hoped, better results to be obtained from the observations of next December. Still others have used, and are now using, their utmost skill in constructing instruments of hitherto unequalled excellence for the great occasion. Besides great improvements in the instruments known in 1769, they have devised others, perhaps more valuable, and of a character then not dreamed of. Others, again, have devoted months to the nicest and most intricate calculations of the movements of the earth and the planets, in order to know in full time beforehand what special stations on the surface of the earth will, that day and at the required hours, afford the most eligible positions from which to make the desired observations.

Finally, governments have been appealed to, to aid in preparing the means and in bearing the expense; and they have responded. Every civilized nation is acting in the matter. Russia leads off with, as we are assured, twenty-seven stations, mostly on her own territory, all duly provided with instruments and observers. France, England, and Germany will have ten or a dozen each. Austria will have her quota. Belgium, Holland, Denmark, and Italy will establish stations and send observers and instruments. Even distracted Spain is at least talking of it. From the Western World, the United States will send eight corps. Nor will Brazil, Peru, and Chili prove laggard. The whole civilized world seems to move in this undertaking with a singular unanimity, doing what only governments can do. Many of the stations must be in bleak and inhospitable lands beyond the confines of civilization. They will be furnished with all that is needful, and thousands of miles of telegraphic wires will be stretched to put them in connection with the observatories of Europe. Other stations will be on distant islands in mid-ocean. Thither national vessels will bear the observers and their instruments. It were well for the world if governments would manifest such generous rivalry in doing good when other and more important interests than those of astronomy are in question.

What, then, is that little black spot which they are so anxious to examine as it passes across the sun next December? How comes it to be of such importance that all these mighty efforts are made to have it fully and correctly observed? To what great results, scientific or other, will a correct knowledge of everything about it lead the world?

That little black spot is the planet Venus, then passing directly between the earth and the sun, and producing an homœopathic solar eclipse, just as, under similar circumstances, the moon might produce an annular or a total solar eclipse. As ordinarily seen in her [pg 147] character of morning or evening star, Venus shines more brightly and joyously in the heavens than any other star. But on this occasion the whole of her illuminated half is turned towards the sun. Towards the earth she shows only her dark, unillumined half, which even looks darker by contrast with the bright face of the sun, on which it is projected. This passage across the sun is called the transit of Venus. If the observations are successfully made, they will give us the means of ascertaining with sufficient precision what as yet is not so known—the actual distance of the earth from the sun.

This knowledge is all-important in a scientific point of view. From it we can deduce the distance of every other planet of the solar system. With it we can carry our survey beyond that system into the stellar world. The distance of our earth from the sun—the orbital radius of the earth, is, for the astronomer, his unit of measure—his yard-stick, as it has been termed—when he would estimate or measure stellar distances or velocities. Any error in it is multiplied millions of times in such surveys. Any uncertainty or reasonable apprehension of error about it casts a cloud of embarrassment over almost every portion of the newly acquired domain of astronomy. No wonder, then, that no effort is spared to secure as soon as possible, and in the easiest and most certain way we know of, an accurate solution of the question. This, more than anything else, is the spring of the whole movement.

The earth, as all know, revolves, as do the other planets, round the sun, not precisely in a circle, but in an oval or ellipse not differing much from a circle. The length of our year, or time of one complete revolution of the earth around the sun, is 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 49.657 seconds.

Inside the earth, and next to us, among the planets, comes Venus, revolving around the sun in her elliptical orbit in 224 days, 16 hours, 48 minutes, and 42 seconds.

Were both orbits on the same level, in the same plane, Venus and the earth would come to be in the same direction or line from the sun as often as Venus, moving on her inner and shorter course, and more rapidly, would overtake the more sluggish earth. Such conjunctions would happen once in every 584 days nearly; and every such conjunction would show a transit, and Venus could be seen between the earth and the sun. But the orbits, though both around the same sun, are not on the same level. That of Venus is somewhat tilted up or inclined, so that one-half of it lies above the level of the earth's orbit, and the other half sinks correspondingly below. The line where the orbits cross or intersect each other is the nodal diameter, the only one common to both orbits. Venus overtakes the earth regularly, but ordinarily elsewhere than on or in the immediate vicinity of this nodal line. The planet then, in her apparent journeying from one side of the sun to the other, generally seems to pass near that luminary, either to the north or the south of it. But whenever, as sometimes happens, Venus overtakes the planet on the line of the nodes, either as she is descending on her orbit on one side, or ascending on the other, then the planet is seen to pass across the sun, and there is a transit. It is not necessary that Venus should be precisely on the line uniting the earth's centre to [pg 148] the sun's centre. The apparent size of the sun, 32' in diameter, and the size of the earth, and the smallness of the angle of inclination between the orbits, all combine to give a little latitude in the matter. The earth arrives punctually every year at one end of this line in June, and at the other in December. The astronomical question is, When will Venus be there also at the same time? To answer requires a calculation which appalls. First, there is the planetary velocity proper of Venus, varying according as in the various parts of her elliptical orbit she is nearer to or further from the sun. Then there are the influences of planetary attraction—the earth and the other planets acting on Venus, accelerating or retarding her movements, and tending sometimes to draw her to one side of her orbit. Then there is or may be question of that nodal diameter shifting its position, and trying, as it were, to swing round the circle of the earth's orbit. When all these calculations have been made, the diurnal movement of the earth must be taken into account, and the geography of her surface must be duly studied, to determine finally when the transit will take place, across what portion of the sun's face the planet will be seen to travel, and from what portion of the earth's surface that transit can be seen, and where in that portion stations for observing it can be placed with the greatest probability of success.

It is a fearful sight even to look over a seemingly endless series of pages all bristling with serried columns of figures, broken every now and then by mysterious formulas of higher calculus, like a group of officers commanding a brigade. Mathematicians and astronomers may delight in them; we shall be satisfied to take the results.

The transits of Venus go in pairs eight years apart. There can be only one pair to a century; some centuries will have none. The pairs occur alternately in June, as Venus descends from the upper to the lower half of her orbit, and in December, as she ascends again from it. Thus there were transits in December, 1631, and December, 1639. A second pair occurred in June, 1761, and June, 1769. A third pair is near at hand, in December, 1874, and December, 1882. The next century will have none. The fourth pair will appear in June, 2004, and June, 2012.

So much on the character of that dark little round spot, the passage of which across the sun hundreds of astronomers, with all manner of telescopes, spectroscopes, and photographic instruments, will watch, examine, measure, and record, as they see it sweeping on in its course on the 8th of next December. What will be the special purpose animating observers as they view the transits of 2004 and 2012—if, despite the prophetic and apocalyptic Dr. Cumming, the world lasts till then—no one can now tell. Astronomy by that time may be advanced as far beyond the present state of the science as the present state surpasses the state of two centuries ago. It is probable that new and, to that generation, most interesting questions may have then arisen, which they will strive to solve by their observations of the transits—questions now perhaps undreamed of. But at present our astronomical world is deeply impressed with the advantage and necessity of definitely ascertaining the distance of the earth from the [pg 149] sun. This is the paramount, though by no means the only, purpose of all this expenditure of time and skill and money in preparing for, in making the observations, and afterwards in laboriously working out the results.

How, by merely looking never so attentively at an object whose distance you do not know, as it stands in a line with, and perhaps far in front of, another, likewise of unknown distance, you can tell how far off that second object is, may seem as difficult as the king's requirement of the prophet first to tell him the dream he had forgotten, and then to explain its meaning. It might seem almost an impossibility; but a few words will explain how the difficulty is turned by availing ourselves of other data.

When two planets, as is the case with the earth and Venus, both revolve in elliptical orbits around the sun, in virtue of the law of gravitation, then their respective times of orbital revolution are to each other as the cubes of their respective mean distances from the sun.

This is one of the laws of Kepler. It was announced by him as the wonderful result of seventeen long years of calculations. He took the data given by the observations of Tycho Brahe and of others, and those made by himself. He tried, by every imaginable form of arithmetical supposition, to combine them together somehow, and under the form of some mathematical law. This was his last result, perhaps the most surprising result of hard plodding, long-continued labor in the field of science. All honor to his memory. There are few discoveries in the mathematics of astronomy to be compared to this and the other laws of Kepler. He established them as experimental facts. The mathematical reason of them he did not learn.

Since his day, gravity has been discovered to be the bond which binds the solar system together, and its laws have been studied out. The differential and integral calculus, also discovered and perfected since his day, has enabled the scholar to grapple with intricate questions of higher mathematics, which, without its aid, would have remained insoluble. Availing themselves of the laws of gravity and of the aid of the calculus, astronomers have been able to give us a mathematical demonstration of Kepler's laws, which, from being mere isolated facts or numerical coincidences, have passed into the realm of scientific truths.

Now, we know the length of our own year—365.2422414 days; we know also the length of the year of Venus—224.70048625 days. If we divide the former by the latter, square the quotient, and then extract the cube root of this quotient, we shall obtain the number which indicates the proportion between the two mean distances. Applying this, we learn that if the distance of the earth from the sun be taken as 100,000,000 miles, the mean distance of Venus will be 72,333,240 miles. And consequently, when they are in the same direction from the sun, and supposing both to be at their mean distances from that luminary, the distance between them must be, according to the same proportion, 27,666,760 miles. It is obviously enough to know the actual value of either of those three distances to learn very easily the other two. The observations of the transit are intended to ascertain the last and smaller one. How this is done, and what [pg 150] difficulties are to be surmounted in doing it, we shall see further on. Just now we will remark that supposing the observer to have ascertained to the very furlong this distance, during the transit, between the planets, he must still do much before he can apply his proportion. That holds good only for the mean distances. There are only two points in the orbit or ellipse of each planet around the sun which are at the mean distance from that focus. Were those points for both planets to be found on the lines of the nodes, the matter would be easy. But it is not so. In June, the earth is approaching her greatest distance; in December, she is nearing her smallest distance from the sun. A similar embarrassment exists for the orbit of Venus. But the astronomer can bravely grapple with this double difficulty. He has learned the eccentricity and consequent shape of each ellipse, and he can calculate how far, proportionately, the actual distance of either planet, at any given point of its orbit, exceeds or falls short of the true mean distance. Such calculations have to be made for the earth and for Venus as they will stand on the 8th of next December. When this is done, the astronomer is at liberty to make use of the actual distance learned by observation, and to apply the Keplerian formula.

But perhaps the question suggests itself, why take all this trouble of a circuitous route? Why not measure the distance of the sun directly, if such things can be done at all? If it is possible to measure the distance of Venus by observations, surely the sun, which has an apparent diameter thirty times as great, and which can be seen every day, and from any accessible point of the earth's surface, gives a far ampler field for such observations. If we have instruments so delicate as to disclose to us the presence in the sun of iron, copper, zinc, aluminium, sodium, manganese, magnesium, calcium, hydrogen, and other substances, surely it will be possible to determine that comparatively gross fact—its distance from the earth. And, in truth, what becomes of the lesson we learned in our school-days, that the sun was just ninety-five millions of miles away from us?

And yet, strange as it may seem to those unacquainted with the subject, it has been found impossible to decide, by direct observations, the actual distance; and the distance usually accepted was not derived from such observations. As for our lately acquired knowledge of some of the constituent substances of the sun, that is derived from the spectroscope, which as yet throws no light on the question of distance.

How do we ascertain the distance of bodies from us? Practice enables us to judge, and judge correctly, of the distance and size of things immediately around us almost without any consciousness of how we do it. But if we analyze the process, it will be found that we do it chiefly by using both eyes at the same time. They are separated by an interval of two and a half to three inches. As we look at an object near to us, the rays from each visible point of it must separate, in order to enter both eyes. The images thus formed on the retina of each eye differ sensibly, and we instinctively take cognizance of that difference. Speaking mathematically, the interval is a base line, at each end of which a delicate organism takes the angle [pg 151] of the object viewed, and our conclusion is based on our perception of the difference between them. Ordinarily, we estimate distances by the cross-sight thus obtained. When, however, the body is so far off that the lines of light from it to the eyes become so nearly parallel that the eyes fail to perceive the minute difference between the representations formed on the retina, then we must recur to the results of past experience, and judge, as best we may, of the distance from other data than that given us at the moment by our eyesight. Thus a sailor at sea judges of the distance of a vessel on the horizon from the faintness with which he sees her; for he knows that the intervening atmosphere absorbs some of the light, so that distant objects are dim. He judges from the fact that a vessel of the form and rig of the one he is looking at is usually of a given size, and a certain distance is required to cause the entire vessel to look so small, and certain portions, the size of which he is familiar with, to become indistinguishable. He is guided, also, by the amount to which, on account of the earth's curvatures, the vessel seems to be sunk below the horizon. These are data from experience. It is wonderful with what accuracy they enable him to judge. A landsman by the seaman's side, and without such aid, could give only the most random guesses as to the distance of the vessel.

That we really do make this use of both eyes in judging of the distance of bodies near us will be evident if we bandage one eye and try to determine their distances, only using the other. It will require caution to avoid mistakes. We knew an aged painter, who had lost the sight of one eye, but still continued to play, at least, with his brush. He had to use the finger of his left hand to ascertain by touch whether the tip of his brush, loaded with the proper color, was sufficiently near the canvas or not. If he relied on his eye alone, it often happened that when he thought it near, not the eighth of an inch away, it failed in reality by an inch and a half to reach the canvas. He would ply the brush, and, noticing that the color was not delivered, would smile sadly at what he called his effort to paint the air. So long as he had retained the use of both eyes, this mishap, of course, had never occurred to him.

When a surveyor desires to ascertain the distance of a visible object which he cannot approach, he must avail himself of the same principle of nature. He measures off on the ground where he is a suitable baseline, and takes the angle of the object from each end of it, not vaguely by his unaided eyesight alone, but with a well-graduated instrument. It is, as it were, putting his eyes that far apart, and taking the angles accurately. From the length of the measured base-line and the size of the two angles he can easily calculate the distance of the object. In taking such measurements, the surveyor must make his base sufficiently large in proportion to the distance sought. If the base be disproportionately small, the angles at the extremities will not serve. Their sum will be so near 180° that the possible errors which are ever present in observations will more than swallow up the difference left for the third angle, and the distance is not obtained. In our excellent Coast Survey, which, in exactness of working, is not surpassed anywhere in the world, the bases [pg 152] carefully measured may be five or seven miles long, and angles under 30° are avoided when possible.

From such measuring of distant objects on the surface of the earth, the passage was easy to an attempt to measure the distance of heavenly bodies. How far is the moon from us? It was soon found that a base of ten miles or of a hundred miles was entirely too short to give satisfactory angles. The moon was too distant. A far larger base was required. Suppose two places to be selected on the same meridian of longitude, and therefore agreeing in time, and situated sixty degrees of latitude apart. The distance between them will be equal to a radius of the earth. At each station, and at the same hours, the angles are taken which the moon makes with the zenith, or, better still, with some star near it, coming to the meridian at the same time. In such a case, the angles are, satisfactory. The base is large enough. The result of such observations, and of others which we need not dwell on, is that, when nearest to us, the centre of the moon is distant from the centre of the earth 222,430 miles; when at her greatest distance, 252,390 miles. These numbers are based on the fact that the equatorial radius or semi-diameter of the earth is 3962.57 miles. This value, however, may in reality be a quarter of a mile too short. The mean distance of the moon is roughly stated at 60 semi-diameters of the earth.

When observers essayed to apply to the sun the same procedure which had proved so successful in regard to the moon, they encountered disastrous failures, partly because the base, even the largest practicable one, was found to be comparatively very small; partly because, when the sun shines, no star is visible near by from which to measure an angle; and also because the atmosphere is so disturbed by the rays of solar heat that, when seen through a large telescope, the sun's edge is quite tremulous. Hence a very large element of uncertainty is introduced when angles are taken with the zenith. No astronomer would look with confidence on the result obtained under such circumstances. Two hundred years ago, their instruments were much less perfect than those we now have; yet, even with our best instruments, to-day, too much uncertainty remains. That mode of ascertaining the sun's distance has been abandoned.

Ancient astronomers, long before the invention of telescopes, and before the discovery of the Copernican system, devised an ingenious method of getting some light on the distance of the sun. It is attributed to Aristarchus of Samos. They reflected that, when the moon appeared precisely half full, this arose from the fact that the sun and the earth were at right angles to her; the sun illumining the half turned to him, and the plane of division between the illumined and unillumined portions extended stretching directly to the earth. They conceived the three bodies to stand at the angles of a right-angled triangle, of which the distance of the moon from the earth was the base, and the distance of the sun was the hypothenuse. Hence they had only to measure the angle at the earth, which they could do, and then take into account their estimate of the moon's distance, to arrive at the result sought. The plan is ingenious, and taught them that the sun was at least twenty times further off than the moon. But their estimate [pg 153] of the moon's distance was altogether wide of the mark. They had no means of correctly estimating it. Moreover, even keen eyesight is a bad judge of whether the moon is precisely half full or not. The error of half a dozen hours would give a large mistake. Even with instruments such as we have, it cannot be precisely determined by direct observations; for the surface of the moon, as developed in a powerful telescope, is so uneven, jagged, and volcanic that the division between light and shade is a line too uneven and broken to be determined except by guessing at its mean course.

Another method has been also used in these later centuries. Kepler's law applies to all the planets. The planet next outside the earth is Mars, whose mean distance from the sun is about one-third greater than that of the earth. It periodically happens that Mars is in opposition—that is, is precisely on the other side of the earth from the sun. In that case, he makes his nearest approach to our planet. Cannot his distance from the earth be then observed and determined, so that he will give us the means of calculating by Kepler's formula the distance of the sun? It was tried, and with some success. The base-line was found large enough; the observations were made at night, when the atmosphere is comparatively quiescent, and when fixed stars may be seen in the vicinity of the planet, to aid in taking the requisite angles. Yet, as in the case of Venus, there are, as we have stated, subsidiary calculations to be made on account of the eccentricity of his orbit and his varying velocity. In the case of Mars, these variations were too full of anomalies to allow confidence in the calculations. When afterwards these anomalies were understood to proceed from interplanetary attraction, they were so complicated that their numerical value almost escaped calculation. The whole subject has been gone over in our own day under the light of more perfect observations, and with the aid of the highest calculus. We doubt, however, if even now the results are sufficiently established to warrant a calculation as to the sun's distance to which reasonable exception may not be taken.

Anyhow, this method cannot compare, either in facility of calculation or in accuracy of result, with the method of determining the solar distance by observations for the transit of Venus.

Of the theory and mode of such observations we will now say a few words.

In 1677, while Halley, the great English astronomer, was at St. Helena, for the purpose of observing and cataloguing stars south of the equator, he observed a transit of Mercury across the face of the sun, and, from his efforts to measure its positions and movements, was led to believe that a transit of Venus could be so accurately observed and measured as to yield a precise and definite determination of the sun's distance. From the knowledge he had of the movements of Venus, he knew that there had been a transit of Venus in 1631, as Kepler had predicted, although no eye in Europe had seen it; and another in 1639, which had been observed, but, of course, not for this purpose, which in 1639 was yet unthought of. The next transit would be in 1761. He could not hope to live to see it. But he did the next best thing. He studied out all the conditions of the question, published his plans, and made all the preliminary [pg 154] calculations required, so as to aid in securing, as far as possible, good observations and good results when the time came.

As the year 1761 was approaching, the scientific world was astir, pretty much as it is now. Halley's computations were again gone over, and such corrections and improvements were introduced as the advance of astronomy since his day warranted and required. Governments gave their aid and supplied means liberally. One hundred and twenty positions had been carefully chosen, and the best results were confidently expected. The grand problem was about to receive a final and definite solution. The error in the ultimate result would certainly not exceed one-fifth of one per cent.

The astronomers were doomed to a sad disappointment. Wars then waging prevented some of the most important positions from being occupied by the observers. It was bitter for a well-appointed party to sail for months and months over two oceans, only to see a hostile flag floating over the port they were about to enter. Sadly they sailed away, and could only see the transit from the rolling deck of their ship. Cloudy weather rendered other positions valueless. And even where everything seemed to promise success, an unforeseen phenomenon interfered to mar their work. The astronomer might have his best telescope duly mounted, and directed to the proper point of the heavens, and carefully adjusted; his eye might be glued to the instrument, as he watched on one side of his field of vision a portion of the circular edge of the sun's disk, and on the other the round, black spot gradually approaching. As they drew near, his hand was raised to give the signal; his assistant stood ready to mark the very second when the two edges, coming nearer and nearer, would at last just touch. They hoped to seize the time of that first contact so accurately as to escape even the one second of error or doubt which Halley thought unavoidable. Vain hope! Before the contact, while Venus was still distant about two-thirds of her own diameter from the edge of the sun, a dark streak or band seemed to interpose between them like a black cushion or wedge. As they pressed against it, the curved outlines of their edges seemed to be pressed back or flattened, as if by the resistance of the cushion, and to lose their normal shape. There was a pause in the onward movement, a quivering, a struggle, and then, by an irregular, convulsive jump, like that of two drops of water coalescing into one, Venus was seen to have already entered some way on the disk of the sun. The discomfited and astonished observer was forced to record that his uncertainty as to the precise time of the contact was not of one second only, but of at least twelve or fifteen seconds. Was it the defect of the instrument, or the fault of his own eye, over-strained by long use, by the brilliant light, or by his intense anxiety? Or was there some unknown atmospheric cause at work producing this band? Anyhow, he might hope that other observers would be more fortunate than he had been. Again he was in error. Everywhere the same unexpected and puzzling phenomenon appeared. There was trouble in the astronomical world. The fault was generally thrown on the instruments. But whatever the cause of the mishap, there was some room for consolation. They would soon have another opportunity, and [pg 155] might make another trial. In 1769, only eight years off, there would be another transit, and by that time some means would certainly be devised for escaping the evil.

In 1769, the stations were as numerous, the governmental aid fully as great, the instruments, they said, more perfect, and the observers, we may be sure, as earnest and as careful as before. Perhaps they were more skilful because of their previous experience. But again all in vain. The same evil reappeared. The resulting uncertainty was even greater. It was held to reach fully twenty seconds. When they undertook to calculate, from such observations, the distance of the sun, some made it not more than 87,890,780 miles, while, according to others, it reached 108,984,560 miles, the majority finding intermediate values. On the whole, it did not appear that there was much improvement on the estimate made by Cassini a century and a half before, that it was not less than 85,000,000 miles. Again and again were the records of the observations studied, scrutinized, and weighed, and the calculations based on them repeated and criticised. Finally, in 1824, Encke, after several years of special study of them, summed all up, and gave, as the best result attainable, 95,274,000 miles. The scientific world, hopeless of anything better, seemed for a time to acquiesce. Some even upheld the estimate of Encke as “so successfully determined as to leave no sensible doubt of its accuracy.”

But, despite this, its accuracy has since been impugned, and on very strong grounds. It was known that light travels from the sun to the earth in about 8 minutes 13 seconds. Experiments carefully and ingeniously made by Arago, Foucault, and Fizeau show that light travels with a velocity of nearly 186,000 miles a second. This would give the distance of about 91,400,000 miles.

The irregularities of the moon and of Mars have been studied out and calculated on the theory of interplanetary attraction modifying the attraction of the sun. Though the results vary somewhat, yet they all tend in the same direction. Leverrier found 91,759,000 miles; Hansen, the Dane, found 91,659,000 miles; Airey, the Astronomer-Royal of England, whose earlier opinion of Encke's estimate we quoted above, has changed his opinion, and now proposes 91,400,000 miles.

A fact in practical optics, calculated to affect some observations rather seriously, has been discovered within the last few years. It is this: When a white body is viewed on a dark ground, its size is exaggerated by some illusion of our vision; and, on the contrary, a dark body seen on a bright ground appears smaller than it would were the ground of a dark color, differing from that of the body only as much as is required to render them distinguishable. Now, in the transit, a dark body is seen on an intensely bright ground. It becomes necessary, therefore, to bring in a correction which will compensate for the error arising from this optical illusion. This has been done by Stone, who studied out the whole matter, arrived at certain modes of correction, applied them to Encke's calculation, and maintains that the true result of the observations of 1761 and 1769 should be 91,730,000 miles.

Thus all seem to agree that the sun's distance must be less than 92,000,000 miles, and that Encke's [pg 156] estimate was too great by 3 or 4 per cent.

This is the stage at which our astronomers now take up the question, and aim to obtain a yet more definite and precise result. Will they succeed? They are full of confidence now; what they will say after their observations we may know a year hence.

Some of our readers may like to know what is the course followed in making the observations and in calculating the results. We will give a slight account of the chief points, sufficiently detailed to enable one with an ordinary knowledge of trigonometry to understand how the conclusion is reached.

The astronomers will follow two methods, known as those of Halley and of Delisle. They each require two suitable stations, so far apart on the surface of the earth as to give a satisfactory base-line. In fact, the further apart, the better, all things else being equal. For Halley's method, the two stations lie as nearly north and south as may be. For Delisle's, they lie east and west.

Let us suppose two such stations to be chosen on or nearly on the same meridian of longitude, and 6,000 miles apart. From each of these stations the planet is seen to traverse the disk of the sun, like a dark spot moving steadily across an illuminated circular dial-plate. The lines as seen from stations so far apart are sensibly different. What the observers first seek to know is the apparent distance between these lines, the angle they form, when seen from the earth. Were both visible at once from the same station, through the same telescope, it would not be difficult for a skilful observer to measure the angle directly. But at each station only one line is seen, if, indeed, we may properly give that name to the course of the dark spot that passes on and leaves no trace behind. Each observer must determine correctly the position of his line on the face of the sun, in order that it may be afterwards compared with the other line similarly determined at the other, and the apparent distance between them is then determined by calculation.

How to determine the true position of such a line is the delicate and difficult task. One mode is to take the measurements in two directions on the face of the sun, northward and eastward, from the position of the planet to the edge of the solar disk. This must be done for a number of positions which the planet occupies successively as it moves onward. But such measurements are very hard to be obtained with the desired precision. The edge of the sun, viewed in a large telescope, appears always tremulous, on account of the action of solar heat on our own terrestrial atmosphere. The better and larger the telescope, and the brighter the day, the greater and the more embarrassing does this tremulousness appear. Such measurements are difficult, and are open to too much uncertainty.

There is another mode, which, if successfully used, is far more accurate. The lines or paths which the planet, viewed from the observatories, is seen to follow are chords across a circle—largest when they pass through the sun's centre and become diameters, smaller as their course is more distant from the sun's centre. Being both due to the motion of the same body moving at what we may hold to be a uniform velocity, their lengths must [pg 157] be proportional to the times required for tracing them. Being chords, a knowledge of their relative lengths determines with accuracy their position on the circular disk of the sun, and consequently their distance apart. Hence the importance of catching, with the utmost exactness, the beginning and the ending of the transit. The first exterior contact is noted when the circular edge of Venus just touches the circular edge of the sun; then the first interior contact when the entire little, dark circle of Venus is just fully on the sun. Midway between the two, the centre of Venus was just on the edge of the sun. Similarly, the second interior contact and the second exterior contact, if accurately and successfully observed, will show the instant of time when the centre of Venus passed off from the sun's surface. It was, as we saw, in making these delicate observations, that the observers of 1761 and 1769 failed, to a great extent, on account of the mysterious appearance of the black band, of which we gave an account. Will this embarrassing phenomenon again make its appearance next December? If it be due, as some think, to an aberration of sphericity in the lenses of the instruments, it may not be seen. For our telescopes are far more perfect than those of 1769. If it is due, as others maintain, to an interference of light in the observation, a more delicate manipulation of the instrument may, it is hoped, avoid it. If it is due to some optical illusion in our own eye, it will, of course, appear again, and must be grappled with. The observers now being trained at Greenwich, in preparation for the grand day, have a facsimile of the sun and Venus, which are made to move in such manner as to give as exact a representation of the transit as is possible; and they practise observations on this artificial transit. It is said that even in this fac-simile the black band has shown itself, and that one important lesson now being learned is how to judge of the instant of contact, despite of this obstacle.

There is, however, a still better safeguard—the use of photography. The transit will record itself more minutely and more accurately than any ordinary observations for measurement could do. Various plans will be used. One proposed is to have one hundred and eighty prepared and highly sensitive plates along the circumference of a suitable wheel made to revolve regularly by clock-work. During three minutes, these plates come, one every second, successively into position to receive and record the images of the transit, as the planet for those three minutes is entering on the sun. Other plates, at stated and accurately measured intervals of time, will similarly record its regular progress across the sun; and another wheel, with one hundred and eighty other plates, will record the successive changes each second for the three minutes occupied by its exit over the sun's border. These are all, of course, negatives on glass. From them any number of impressions can be taken, in the usual way, for general distribution among the scientists. In order that such impressions may still serve for the finest measurements, despite of any variations of expansion, contraction, or warping which the atmospheric changes may produce, a system of fine, spider-web lines is placed inside the telescope, producing on the photograph itself a network of fine lines, some running north and south, others crossing them east [pg 158] and west. These lines are at equal distances apart, and serve admirably for measuring the position of the planet on the solar face. If the photographic sheet should become quite distorted, these lines would show it; for they would of course follow the distortion, and yet, after that distortion, they would still guide us to accurate measurements. It is hoped that this means and the many other photographic devices to be used will secure a degree of accuracy far beyond what Halley anticipated and would have been satisfied with.

The spectroscope comes in also to aid in determining the contacts with the utmost precision. The light of the solar photosphere, or body of the sun, when made to pass through the prisms of a spectroscope, spreads into a continuous band of various colors, and crossed by many faint, dark lines. Other bodies, raised to a certain heat, and emitting light, give a spectrum of a totally different character. We see only bright upright lines. There is no continuous band or spectrum of prismatic colors. Now, just outside the solar photosphere, and between it and the chromosphere, is a layer of solar atmosphere which gives just such upright, bright lines. This was first discovered not many years ago during a total solar eclipse, when the direct light of the photosphere was cut off by the interposing moon. Knowing what to look for, the astronomers have since been able so to manipulate their telescopes as to catch these bright lines, even when there is no eclipse. They find them, of course, as they examine, a narrow ring apparently encircling the sun, and immediately around his circumference. Now, when the moment of the beginning of the transit is at hand, the spectroscope is turned to the precise point where Venus will touch the sun's rim, and these lines are clearly brought into vision. So long as they shine, the way is open for the light of that narrow layer or belt to reach the earth. The instant their bright flash disappears, the observer knows that the planet has so moved as to intercept the rays of light, and is just in contact. Their reappearance, at the proper time, on the other side of the sun, will indicate the instant when Venus will have quitted the disk and the transit is over.

It is confidently expected that by some one or by all of these methods the uncertainties of 1761 and 1769 will be avoided, and that the instants of the commencement and the conclusion of each line of the transit may be so accurately determined that for neither of them will the error as to their duration exceed one second. Did the time occupied by Venus in making the transit, as seen from one station, differ from the time as seen at the other by only one minute, the uncertainty of one second would be less than two per cent. But, in fact, the times will differ by fifteen minutes, and, by skilfully choosing the places, a difference of twenty minutes may be obtained. In that case, the error or uncertainty would be less than one-tenth of one per cent. For the present, the scientific world will be satisfied with that degree of exactness.

Let us return to our supposition of two stations north and south, 6,000 miles apart. The two lines of transit, as seen from them, are separated about 35 of an arc. This is as the lines are seen from the earth. If we recur to Kepler's proportion, as stated before—that the distance of the earth from the sun [pg 159] is to the distance of Venus from the sun as 10,000,000 is to 7,233,324—we can make use of a trigonometrical calculation, and easily ascertain that those same lines on the sun, seen by an observer on Venus, would appear about 48-½" apart. Moreover, the lines from the sun to Venus, forming this angle, cross each other at the planet, and, if prolonged, will reach the two stations on the earth. Hence, since opposite interior angles are equal, this (48-½") must be the angle at which the same observer on Venus, turning towards the earth, would see the two stations. We arrive thus at a triangle, in which the base is known—6,000 miles; the angle at the vertex on Venus is also known—48-½"; and the angles at the base are easily ascertainable. A simple calculation leads to the distance of Venus from the earth—about 25,300,000 miles. Again, applying Kepler's formula to this number, we obtain as the result, for the earth's distance from the sun, about 91,450,000 miles. If we give here only rough approximations, we are, after all, as near the truth as the astronomers of to-day can boast of being. In a minute calculation, subsidiary but important points are to be brought in, complicating the calculation and influencing the result.

After this statement of the general character of Halley's method, we may be brief in our notice of the yet more beautiful mode of Delisle. He proposed it before the transits of the last century. But its efficiency so entirely depends on an accurate knowledge of the longitudes of the stations, and the longitudes of distant stations were then so uncertain, that it could not then be used with success.

In this mode, two stations are necessary, east and west, or, rather, along that line on the earth's surface from all points of which the transit will show the same line on the solar disk. The further apart the stations are, the better; for the base between them will be larger. To know the distance between them, we must know their longitudes as accurately as their latitudes. From the longitudes we ascertain with precision the difference of time between them. At one of those stations, the first exterior contact is seen, and the exact time is noted. As Venus moves on, the shadow of this first contact flies along that line of the earth's surface like the shadow of a cloud in spring traversing the fields. It is only after the lapse of a certain length of time that the contact is seen and timed at the other station. This certain length of time is the key to the solution. It may be determined by observations on any one or on all the contacts, or by the observation of any other points of the transit examined and timed at both stations. It is obvious that the contacts, being the most unmistakable in their character, will be all used to check and control each other; the more so, as they serve also, as we saw, for Halley's method. The most careful use of the telescope will be supplemented by the photograph and the spectroscope.

Let two such stations be chosen which, by their longitudes and latitudes, we know to be 5,000 miles apart. It will be found that the transit, or any special point of it, will be seen at the second station about three minutes of time later than at the first. This means that the shadow of Venus travels 5,000 miles in three minutes on the earth's surface or at the earth's distance from the sun. Applying Kepler's formula, we find that, to [pg 160] produce this effect, Venus herself must have travelled about 3,860 miles in those three minutes. There-fore in 224.7 days—her solar year—she would travel about 416 millions of miles, supposing that, during the transit, she was moving at her mean velocity. This, then, is the length of her periphery of her orbit around the sun. Observations have determined its shape. Now that we know its size, it is not difficult to ascertain what her mean distance from the sun must be. It is about 66,300,000 miles. From this, the usual formula leads us to the earth's distance from the sun—91,650,000 miles. We merely indicate the salient points of the process, and that with summary numbers. An astronomer would enter into minor questions: how far the earth had travelled in her orbit during those three minutes, and what had been the special motion of the second station during the same time, on account of the diurnal revolution of the earth on its axis. He would carefully establish the proportion of the distances between the sun and Venus and the earth, during the transit, to their mean distances as contemplated in Kepler's law, and he would compare the velocity of Venus at that time with her mean velocity. Other points, too, would have to be brought in, complicating the whole process to an extent that would soften the brain of any one but a calculating astronomer.

In Halley's method, the effort is to obtain two transit lines on the sun as widely apart as possible. For that purpose, the stations must differ in latitude as widely as possible. In Delisle's method, on the contrary, the longitude becomes of primary importance. The latitude can be easily determined. Hence, in the last century, Halley's method was almost exclusively adopted. But now we can use both; for we have better instruments and better star catalogues, and can determine longitudes by astronomical observations much more accurately than could ordinarily be done a century ago. In addition, we have now almost faultless chronometers. Besides all these means, we have, and will use to a great extent, the grand American invention of determining the longitude by the electric telegraph with an accuracy which leaves nothing to be desired.

While each method requires at least two stations, a greater number would support and control each other, and allow us to take the average result of a greater number of observations. Four stations at the corners of a large quadrangle on the surface of the earth might give two sets of stations for each method. But this year the stations may be nearer a hundred.

Careful preliminary studies have already determined on what portion of the earth the transit will be visible. The most available points will be turned to account for stations. We say available; for, unfortunately, much of that space is occupied by oceans, while astronomical stations must perforce be situated on firm land. Some of the best points, too, seem almost inaccessible. Still, there is a vast line of posts determined on in the northern hemisphere, and quite a number, to correspond with them, in the southern. Beginning at Alexandria, in Egypt, the line stretches northward and eastward through Palestine, Georgia, Tartary, Middle Asia, and Northern China to Yeddo, in Japan, perhaps to Honolulu, in the Sandwich Islands. Along a great part of this line, the Russian [pg 161] telegraphic wires will give exact longitudes, thus affording a fine field for the use of Delisle's method. In the southern hemisphere, the line may be set down as commencing near the Cape of Good Hope, bending southeastwardly to the lately discovered Antarctic lands, passing south of Australia, then turning upwards towards the equator, and terminating at Nukahiva, in the Sandwich Islands, in the South Pacific Ocean. Along this line, at Crozet Island, at St. Paul's, at Reunion, at Kerguelen Land—further south, if the southern summer will have sufficiently melted the snows and driven back the ice-barrier to allow the observers to land and work—at Campbell Land, in New Caledonia, and in other places, stations will be established, between which and corresponding stations in the northern line Halley's method may be used.

Time, learning, skill, energy, money, everything that man can give, will be devoted to ensure success in the astronomical work to be done on the 8th of December next. Such earnestness commands respect, and wins our sympathy and best wishes.

May the day itself—the festival of the Immaculate Virgin Mother—be an augury of success! Astronomers, as a body, are less infected with the virus of modern scepticism and materialism than any other class of our scientists of to-day. On the contrary, not a few, standing in the front rank among them, are devout children of the church. Some of their chiefs are even numbered among her clergy. They will not omit on that day to invoke the blessing of heaven and the intercession of their Holy Mother. May their fervent prayers be heard, and may He who “has ordered all things in measure and number and weight”66 bless and give success to their labors!

Yet they can only look for an approximation to the truth, not the truth itself. They will see more clearly than before how the heavens declare the glory of God. But there will remain obscurity and uncertainty enough to teach them humility in his presence. For “God hath made all things good in their time, and hath delivered the world to the consideration of the sons of men, so that man cannot find out the work which God hath made, from the beginning to the end.” This was true when the inspired Ecclesiastes wrote, and is still, and must ever be, true. The history of the progress of physical sciences is practical, tangible evidence of it. Each generation has to correct the mistakes and discard the errors of a preceding generation, and must acknowledge the uncertainty of much that it continues to hold or boasts of having discovered.

No greater absurdity is conceivable than that of a man puffed up with pride because of the little knowledge he has gained—little indeed, though he may think it a great deal—who sets his intellect against the infinite wisdom and the revelation of God. The more man really knows, the more conscious he becomes of his own failures in many things, and of the vast extent of his ignorance.

The Veil Withdrawn.

Translated, By Permission, From The French of Madame Craven, Author Of “A Sister's Story,” “Fleurange,” Etc.

“The one thing worth showing to mankind is a human soul.”—Browning

The Principles Of Real Being. V. Intrinsic Principles Of Complex Beings.

The primitive beings of which we have treated in a preceding article imply nothing in their constitution but what is strictly necessary in order to exist in nature; and therefore they are physically simple—that is, not made up of other physical beings, though they are metaphysically compounded, because their intrinsic principles are so many metaphysical components. Those beings, on the contrary, the entity of which is not strictly one, besides the three principles common to all primitive beings, involve in their constitution other components, either physical or metaphysical. Such complex beings are either substantial or accidental compounds. We propose to investigate in the present article the general constitution of substantial compounds, then of accidental compounds; and lastly we shall inquire into the principles of the attributes and properties of complex, as well as primitive, beings.

The Butterfly.

From The French Of Marie Jenna.

The Farm Of Muiceron. By Marie Rheil.

From the Revue Du Monde Catholique.

Fragment Of Early English Poetry.

To Those Who Get Their Lyvyne By The Onest Craft Of Masonry.

Self-Education.69

Words the most familiar, and which convey to the mind the most clearly marked associations of ideas, very frequently grow vague and obscure when we seek to limit their meaning by accurate and scientific definitions. When we attempt to define that which is complex, or to make a generalization of facts of diverse natures, we find it extremely difficult to avoid including more than we intend, or leaving out something that should be embraced.

This will become evident to any one who will take the trouble, for instance, to examine into the various definitions of life which have been given by philosophers and scientists.70 Still, they all agree, however widely they may differ in their views concerning what life is in itself, that the law of growth applies to all living beings. This is true, not of physical life alone, but of intellectual and moral life as well. What I have to say on this subject at present relates more especially to intellectual life, which consists in the union of the intelligent principle with the objects submitted to it, and which it apprehends as true—that is, as being in reality what they seem to be, and resulting from this, as good or beautiful.

Truth is the harmony of thought with things.71 Intellectual growth is a continual approach to the perfect harmony of thought with things, which, however, to the finite mind, is unattainable; and this fact constitutes one of the great charms of the cultivation of the mind.

The nature of the human intellect places limits to mental progress, though they are not assignable in any given case, but may be indefinitely extended. That there are limits, however, you will readily perceive by reflecting that we do not possess even one idea which does not, either in itself or in its postulates, contain something which transcends all human comprehension.

What, let us ask ourselves, is the law of intellectual growth? The condition of all growth is effort. Life is a struggle in which lesser forces are overcome by greater. This is true of the individual as of the race. It is only by effort, by the exertion of power, that we live and consequently grow. Labor, then, is the law of intellectual as of all progress.

Before going further, let us examine [pg 199] into the obstacles which tend to prevent improvement of mind.

These are to be sought for either in the circumstances which surround us or in ourselves. We are to such an extent the creatures of circumstances that, when these are unfavorable, it is almost impossible that we should make great head-way.

As occasion makes the thief, it is also required to make the scholar. In the first place, leisure is essential to mental culture, since education is a work of time and of labor. We therefore look for little or no cultivation of mind in those who lead lives of manual toil, and who, during the brief moments allowed for recreation, are so fatigued as to be incapable of sustained mental effort.

Here and there an individual from this class, of remarkable gifts, and endowed with great energy and will, surmounts the obstacle, and, having risen to a higher level, succeeds, by perseverance and industry, in making very considerable intellectual progress. But, as a rule, all will admit that it would be absurd to look for much mental training in men who work ten or even eight hours a day in factories and mines, or in tilling the soil.

Intercourse with educated men is of the greatest advantage in the work of self-education; and where this is wanting, intellectual progress will rarely be found. The presence of highly developed and gifted minds has a magnetic power which creates emulation, awakens admiration, and stimulates to effort. Hence we find the great men of the world, whether philosophers, poets, statesmen, orators, or artists, in schools and historic groups.

Books, too, are required; but to this part of the subject we shall return.

The obstacles to mental growth within ourselves are of various kinds. Some have their origin in the body, some in the intellect, others in the will.

Infirm health, the love of ease, and excessive fondness of eating and drinking are generally incompatible with intellectual growth; and yet some of the greatest minds have wrought through feeble bodies, whilst many literary men have indulged to excess in the pleasures of the table, though always to their own injury.

The literary man, it may be well to remark, is not necessarily the thoroughly educated man; very often, indeed, he has nothing of the true man except the talent for letters. Vain, selfish, conceited, restless, a fickle friend, an unfaithful husband, the mere man of letters, poet, novelist, or scribe, is too often a caricature on human nature.

There are in the mind itself obstacles to mental progress which vary with the peculiarities of the individual. There are weak minds, slow minds, inattentive minds; in fact, all minds are in different degrees subject to these defects, and it is only relatively and by comparison that some are said to be feeble, whilst others are strong. Education supposes these weaknesses, and it is its aim to correct them. Obstacles to intellectual growth may exist also in the will; since the mind, under the influence of inordinate passion, is incapable of the deliberation and sustained attention which are required for calm and serious thought.

These, briefly and imperfectly stated, are, it seems to me, the chief difficulties with which those who seek to improve their minds have to contend.

They are not imaginary, but they are not so great as to frighten men in your condition of life. For you, young gentlemen, the obstacles of circumstance do not, I may say, exist. Your occupations leave you a few hours out of the twenty-four, which you are free to devote to study; you may enjoy, if such be your desire, the conversation of men of thought and learning, whilst books of all kinds are within your reach. I may add that, in a great metropolis like this, you possess special advantages. Here you have the best of everything. Where there is the greatest demand for the most perfect, thither will it gravitate by a law as universal as that of attraction. To this city, from two worlds, come the best orators, the most learned men of science, the finest singers, the most accomplished actors, for the same reason that the fattest beeves, the choicest wines, and the most costly fabrics are sent hither—that is, because there is a demand for them. On the other hand, life in great cities has its intellectual dangers. There is here so much of the mere noise of life that most men find it difficult to dwell within themselves, to receive as welcome guests thoughts that do not concern the business or the pleasure of the hour—difficult not to be drawn into the whirlpool of human passion, where men eddy round and round, shouting, rushing, struggling, in wild confusion, forgetful of themselves, forgetful of truth. In a great commercial centre, too, we are apt to become the victims of the prevailing opinion which attaches honor and respect to wealth before all things; and I know of nothing more hurtful to intellectual growth than the absorbing pursuit of riches or that narrow disposition of soul which causes men to fawn upon the rich, even though they have nothing but money. That it is of importance to every one to think correctly, to possess a trained and cultivated mind, I need not attempt to prove. The harmonious development of our faculties in accordance with the principles of eternal wisdom is, I may say, the great work of life; for the proper training of the intellect necessarily involves the cultivation of the moral faculties. Of the necessity and priceless value of such education there can be no diversity of opinion among enlightened, men. Nor wealth nor place can give to man the dignity which is derived from the perfection of his own powers. We are greater than whatever ministers to our wants and vanities.

Another consideration which you will permit me to present to your attention, as suggestive of salutary thought in connection with the benefits to be derived through an association like yours, is this: no man who has done nothing more than go through a college course, it matters not how brilliant he may have been, can rightly be called educated. Education is the work of the man, and not of the boy. The best that school-training can do is to teach the boy how he should study when he has become a man. Though there will generally be found a certain refinement, correctness of expression, and intelligent appreciativeness in those who have made a collegiate course, yet, if this be not followed up by the study of the man, they will be found to possess neither mental strength nor logical accuracy.

Before entering upon the direct treatment of the proper method to be pursued by those who seek to [pg 201] improve their minds, allow me to say a word of the work of preparation, which is twofold, intellectual and moral.

We should prepare the mind for the reception of truth by freeing it from all those opinions which rest upon no other foundation than prejudice. There are personal prejudices, family prejudices, national prejudices, prejudices of childhood, prejudices of old age, prejudices of men, prejudices of women, all of which tend to prevent the view of things as they are in themselves, by directing the mind, in an undue manner, to their relations to ourselves.

Personal prejudice inclines each one to think too well of himself, his talents, his acquirements; it is that, in a word, which makes it almost impossible that any power should

It is the great obstacle to self-knowledge and the fruitful source of error, warping the judgment and perverting the will. It creates within us a tendency to deceive ourselves concerning whatever we love or hate.

National prejudice is another very common phase of this universal weakness. How few men are capable of forming just and fair opinions of the manners, customs, and opinions of foreign nations! The infirmity of even great minds is, in this respect, lamentable; above all, this is an original sin of the English people; for they—if I be not myself under the influence of the prejudice which I condemn—are the most narrow and insular, in their self-conceit, of all the peoples of the earth. It is next to miraculous that an Englishman should judge fairly of the Irish, the French, the Italians, or the Americans; and this unfortunate defect of the national mind has been stamped upon the literature of the country.72

Americans, more, probably, from the force of circumstances which were not under their control than from any other cause, are less narrow in their nationalism, though by no means free from prejudice. In the past, at least, we were too often guilty of the folly of looking upon our form of government as ideal, forgetting that no form of government should be considered in the abstract, or as good or better, except relatively to the circumstances to which it is applied.

Then, we, a young people, affect contempt for antiquity, and become superficial, and lose veneration.

It is not necessary that I should enter further into this part of the subject.

There is, I have said, a work of [pg 202] preparation which directly concerns the moral nature. As the mind is to be freed from prejudice, the will is to be taken from beneath the yoke of passion. It is through the will that the intellect is warped by prejudice. He who is the slave of passion will rarely have an honest desire to improve his mind; and, even where this exists, the tyrant into whose hands he has surrendered his soul will deprive him of the power. Sensual indulgence produces a deterioration of the nervous system, which, of course, causes a corresponding degeneracy in the intellectual faculties. How can there be a love of excellence without self-respect, and how can a man who habitually violates the sanctity of his nature respect himself?

“Nothing,” says Cicero, “is so injurious, so baneful, as lust, which, were it stronger or of greater duration, would extinguish the very light of reason. It prevents thought, blindfolds the eyes of the mind, and can have no society with wisdom.”

“I will simply express my strong belief,” says Faraday, one of the greatest men of science of this century, “that that point of self-education which consists in teaching the mind to resist its desires and inclinations until they are proved to be right, is the most important of all, not only in things of natural philosophy, but in every department of daily life.”

The assent of the mind is, in a marvellous manner, subject to the power of the will. How readily we give credence to what flatters our vanity, or is, from whatever cause, agreeable to us!

We easily persuade a man that what he wishes to do is right, but usually labor in vain when passion pleads against us.

In this undoubted psychological fact is found the hidden cause of the infidelity of many young men. They do wrong, and passion seeks to justify their conduct to their intelligence, which becomes the tool of the perverted will.

Or, if you prefer to take another view of the subject, I will say that what the French call l'interiorité—the habitual dwelling with one's own thoughts—is an essential condition of mental growth. But this is painful to the sensual man, who has violated the sanctuary of his soul, and can consequently no longer dwell there in peace.

What pleasure can the father find in the bosom of his family, when he has betrayed the wife whom he swore to love, and has brought shame upon the name which his children have received from him?

To him, then, who wishes to begin the life-work of self-improvement I would say: Seek to have a large mind, from which no narrowing prejudice shuts out the full light of truth; have a pure heart, with the strength to love all that is right.

Then, I ask of him the will to work and to persevere in labor. Labor is the great law of progress, the necessary condition of all improvement. He who wishes to be an educated man must have courage; he must consent to see himself forgotten for a time, overshadowed by the easy-won reputations of those of his own age, who will wear their honors full-blushing, whilst all his life is still concentred in the bud that wraps it close and nurtures it.

Is it easy, in the fresh-blown flower of manhood, in the enthusiasm of a newly-found liberty, when fair hands hold out the cup of pleasure, when bright eyes and smiling lips woo [pg 203] to indulgence—is it easy, then, to choose rather silence and solitude, a life of toil more earnest and not less regular than the enforced labor of the college? And yet this must be. There is no royal road to science.

I have heard the question—you have asked it yourselves—Where are the young men who go forth year after year from our colleges? What becomes of them? We never hear of them. Is not something wrong? They cease to study, they cease to grow, and are lost in the crowd.

But your presence, young gentlemen, assures me that you have not ceased to labor, and that you do not intend to cease to grow.

Permit me, then, to present to you a few suggestions concerning the proper method of study. We do nothing well except what we do with system and order. Set apart, therefore, stated times for the improvement of your minds, and suffer not a slight circumstance to interfere with this arrangement. And now I feel that I must be brief, when the subject which I am treating most requires development. How to study and what to study are problems which engage the attention of the profoundest thinkers of our age, the adequate solution of which can be found only in a perfect philosophy of education, which possibly has not yet been written. Without aiming, then, to be either deep or thorough, I shall strive to be practical. To study, as I have already intimated, means to work with the mind. The mind grows by union with truth, by the assimilation of knowledge, which never takes place except by direct application of the thinking subject to the object thought. This continued application—in other words, attention—is difficult; it wearies the mind, it fatigues the body. To read is not to study. Some of the most indolent men I have ever known, intellectually indolent, were passionately fond of reading. To read requires no mental effort, and demands merely that sort of attention necessary to form a vague notion of each sentence as it passes through the mind. A man may read all the books in the Astor Library, and acquire hardly more knowledge than there will remain water in a sieve through which a stream has been pouring. Indiscriminate, inattentive reading confuses the mind, and, if persevered in, begets a mental habit incompatible with clear and accurate thinking; and the important thing, from an educational point of view, is not so much to get knowledge as to strengthen and develop the intellect, that it may be prepared to grapple intelligently and successfully with the problems which greatly concern or interest us as rational beings.

But you will readily understand that it is far from my thought to wish to dissuade you from cultivating a fondness for reading. On the contrary, this, if you have it not, you must acquire, if you hope to make progress in the work of self-education. Read, then, but read intelligently, thoughtfully. One should read at his writing-desk, pen in hand, taking note of new and striking thoughts, of graceful and forcible modes of expression; bringing the author's ideas into the presence of higher truths, of principles that are fixed; rejecting what is false, assimilating what is just. Better still, write yourselves. Do not imagine that I have the faintest [pg 204] desire to encourage you to become authors; there would be fewer and better authors if men were in the habit of doing what I would have you do. Write, not that others may read your thoughts, but that they may become clear to your own minds.

“I confess,” said S. Augustine, “that by writing I have learned many things which nothing else had taught me.” You will recall to mind the apothegm of Bacon: “Reading makes a full man, talking a ready man, and writing an exact man.”

I have no hesitation in saying that, of all means of mental culture, writing is the best, as well for extending and deepening the intellectual faculties, as for giving them justness and polish.

Do I propose to you to go back to the drudgery of task compositions? Such is not my thought.

I suppose you to be interested in certain subjects, of which you wish to get at least a tolerably thorough knowledge. You take the authors who have treated most exhaustively of these matters; you read them, you study them; you apply your own minds, in sustained thought, to the facts and principles which they give you. And here precisely lies the difficulty; for you will find that, when you will have acquired the power of sustained thought, you will be able to master almost any subject.

Now, to get this mental habit, nothing will aid you like writing. I do not believe that any man who has never translated his thoughts into written language is able to think profoundly or correctly. Do not, however, misunderstand me. One may write negligently and thoughtlessly, as he may read with indolence and inattention. Put your hand to the pen, and begin to meditate upon the thoughts that fill your mind. Should you, for weeks and months, not write one sentence for every hour you hold the pen, do not be discouraged, and, above all, be persuaded that this time has not been lost. Think neither of style nor of the reader; give all your attention to truth and to your own soul. The style is the man. Write out the life that is within you. Keep what you have written, and after months and years, in looking back, you will perceive that you have grown steadily, increased day by day in intellectual vigor and refinement; and there will always be special worth in words written, not to please the vulgar crowd, not to propitiate a false and intolerant public opinion—written to gain neither applause nor gold, but for God and truth, and the dignity of the human soul.

“There is nothing,” says Seneca, “however difficult or arduous, which the human mind cannot conquer, and assiduous meditation render familiar. Whatever the soul demands of itself it obtains.” But how are you to learn the secret of assiduous meditation, to acquire the habit of retaining difficulties in mind, to be considered and reconsidered, to be taken up at the leisure moment, and laid down as deferred but not abandoned?

As the soldier takes the sword, the painter the brush, the musician his instrument, the mechanic the tools of his trade, each to perfect himself in his art, so he who wishes to learn how to think must take the pen and do honest work.

I shall conclude this part of my [pg 205] subject with a quotation from Sir William Hamilton: “The primary principle of education is the determination of the pupil to self-activity—the doing nothing for him which he is able to do for himself.” This principle is applicable to every stage of the mind's development, and in it will be found the secret of success in the great work of self-education.

The student, I have said, should cultivate a fondness for intelligent and thoughtful reading; for in books chiefly all human knowledge is treasured up.

“Many a man lives a burden to the earth,” says Milton; “but a good book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.” But only a few books are good. The great mass of those that are written fall upon the world dead, or at best survive but a short time.

We are about to celebrate the centennial anniversary of our national existence, and, in the hundred years of our life, we have made many books. How many of them will be read in the next century? A dozen? Hardly.

There is the Augustan age, the age of Leo X., the Elizabethan age, the age of Louis XIV., the age of Queen Anne, all remarkable for literary excellence and the number of great writers whom they produced, and yet you can count on your fingers the really good books that each has bequeathed to us. And this, too, is worthy of remark: a considerable portion of the books that survive are saved by style alone, and not on account of more solid worth. Books which have the inductive sciences as their object can, from the nature of things, live but a short time, since these sciences, being in a state of continuous development are constantly outgrowing their own conclusions, and the treatises of even the ablest observers are superseded by those of men who, with less genius, have more certain and numerous data.

Works of imagination, poetry and romance, may meet with temporary success, without possessing the higher qualities, from the fact that they describe a mental, moral, or social phase of existence whose chief interest lies in its actuality. When this is past, the literary efforts called forth by it die. In fiction, only the very best is worthy of study.

And here is a case in point, in which we should know how to rise above prejudice—the vulgar prejudice of the insipid and intellectually indolent society of our day, in which it is considered the proper thing for a man of culture to read each worthless production that happens to have a run.

Persons of intellectual aspirations should, as far as possible, associate with their superiors in knowledge and elevation of thought, and should exclude the common herd from intellectual companionship.

There is at least an aristocracy of mind, to which neither gold nor title can give admission, but only kinship of spirit, smitten with the love of high thinking. What Tennyson has written of a different union may be applied to that of mind with mind:

Allow me, in this connection, to [pg 206] say a word of periodical literature.

A book can wait for success; the best books have not been understood by the generation for which they were written; but a newspaper or magazine must succeed at once, or fail utterly, since its life is necessarily ephemeral. Hence the great probability is that it will be guided, not by principle, but by policy; that it will aim, not to uphold truth, but to flatter the prejudices of its readers. If it is the organ of a party, it must defend its interests blindly; and hence, whenever argument is attempted, it will be found to consist of little else than special pleading and sophistry. But since the average newspaper-reader is not fond of logic, the partisan organ will deal rather with men than with principles; and the whole basis of this procedure is double-dealing—untruth erected into the dignity of a principle. Its business will be to whitewash its friends, and besmear its enemies. When its party is out of office, it will swell with indignation at the public corruption, and will use what are called the argus eyes of the press to discover things which do not exist; but when the spoils are in the hands of its friends, it will devote itself to covering up their misdeeds. There is also what is called the independent press, which generally has less of principle than that which is avowedly partisan. It in turn affirms and denies everything, plays fast and loose, palters in a double sense, and, with a seeming honesty, is most unfair, lending all its influence to persuade men that there is no such thing as truth, and that morality is only cant.

There are yet other heads of indictment that may be brought, without injustice, against the press. Its columns are filled with details, more or less minute, of all the horrible and disgusting crimes which disgrace society, with sins against the decencies of life, with coarse personalities, and advertisements which are an opprobrium to human nature.

This, I must confess, is a one-sided view of the question; it is, however, the view which my subject forces me to take in treating of the means of self-education.

Though it would be absurd to ask you not to read newspapers, it would, in my opinion, be wholly unwise to counsel you to make use of them to any great extent as aids to true cultivation of mind. We grow, morally and intellectually, by association with that which is above us, and not by contact with what is low; and it is not by filling the mind day by day with what is startling, corrupt, sensational, or at best only of passing interest, but by lifting it up into the higher and serener atmosphere, from which the trivial and transitory value of these things is perceived, that it will gain in depth and power.

Except in the line of study which belongs to one's profession, the wisest rule is to confine ourselves to the works of really great minds, which we should not merely read, but study.

In connection with practical self-education, I consider the “conversation evening,” as described in your Report for 1872, excellent. In intellectual pursuits, as in other things, association gives increase of power and the means of progress. The contact of mind with mind develops the latent fire, and strikes into life the slumbering thought. Mind becomes supplementary to mind; and the intercommunion of souls, which constitutes the purest [pg 207] friendship, becomes also the source of the highest pleasure.

I know that the value of mere intellectual cultivation may be exaggerated, and that, in point of fact, the men who, in our day, deny God, insist most upon the developed mind's self-sufficiency.

“In the writings of our great poets,” says Strauss, after having rejected God and the soul, “in the performances of our great musicians, we find a satisfying stimulus for the intellect and the heart, and for fancy in her deepest or most sportive moods.”73

Indeed, there is a danger in polite education which we should be most careful to avoid. The love of poetry and music, of the fine arts in general, has, I think, a tendency to make us unreal and visionary, because it separates feeling from acting. We may have high thoughts, fine sentiments, and pleasurable emotions, and yet lie slothfully on our couch. But life is for action, and to this end thought, sentiment, and feeling should all conspire. If science and philosophy be our favorite pursuits, we may acquire inveterate habits of analysis which, by drying up the fountains of feeling, and isolating the intellect from the heart, will convert the mind into a storehouse for abstractions and lifeless formulas. This tendency of the study of science will give us a satisfactory explanation of many of the intellectual errors of the present day.

From abstraction, only the abstract, the unreal, can be inferred, and hence the new philosophy of atheism does not affirm being, but merely the phenomenon.

The exaggerated importance which this age has attributed to mere intellectual cultivation has, amongst other results, produced what may be called over-education—an excessive activity of brain, which threatens to enfeeble the physical health of modern peoples by abnormally developing the nervous system.

I have referred to these dangers, not for the purpose of insisting on them, but rather that I might have an opportunity to say that they are not to be greatly dreaded by us. The church gives us fixed principles of faith, certain rules of conduct, which will prevent the love of literature from taking from us that deep and practical seriousness of mind which is inseparable from the true Christian character, whilst she guides us with an eye that sees the light of heaven through the dark mazes of philosophy; and the fear of over-education should certainly not trouble us.

The educated Catholics of this country seem to be fast sinking to a low level of mediocrity, above which no man has the power or the courage to raise his head. Where are the men, lay or clerical, who give promise of becoming worthy to be the successors of Kenrick, of England, of Hughes, or of Brownson?

And yet never was there an age or country in which men of might, able to do battle for the truth, were more needed. If we sink out of the intellectual life of the American people, we shall be passed by and forgotten.

Permit me, then, young gentlemen, before concluding this hastily-written address, to exhort you to be ambitious, not of success, but of excellence, which is its own reward. He who is worthy to succeed can despise success. After the noble [pg 208] resolve to be true to God, to one's self, and to one's fellowman, I know of no higher aim in life than to grow in intellectual strength.

Older men than you might say that my words smack something too much of the savor of youth, which is “a bubble blown up with breath, whose wit is weakness.” But with you, enthusiasm, I am sure, need not plead for pardon. Even to have dreamed of deeds of high emprise and noble endeavor, of victories won on the foughten field, is something; and to the young should belong hope, which is not only the charm of life, but also its strength.

Without the living hope of something better, man falls back upon himself, in impotence, like a bird whose wing is clipt. He who wishes to do much must hope for still more.

Hope gives the conviction of strength; it is confidence, and confidence is power. Have faith and hope in God and in yourselves; and, above all, believe that the highest wisdom consists in tender love for the religion of Jesus Christ. Guard yourselves against a life of indulgence, which is incompatible with generous ambition and is destructive of character. Yield not to the fascinations of a literature which flatters human weakness and pays court to the senses instead of speaking to the soul. Be not cynical, be large-hearted, since the true view is the generous view. Give the homage of admiration to every great man, whether he be a hero, a genius, or a saint.

When you see Napoleon on the battle-field, and look into his eye, and behold there the soul of the war-god that looks and conquers, forget for the moment his tyranny and selfishness, and let your soul shout unto his presence a shout of living enthusiasm, even as the war-cry of his own unconquered veterans when, in the battle, he rode amongst them in strength and majesty, like unto the archangel when he beat into hell the rebellious powers of heaven. When you stand in the Roman forum, and see Cicero arise and take into his hands the enchained hearts of his hearers, and play upon them, as the harper sweeps his fingers over the trembling chords of the lyre, till it shouts or laughs or wails, sighs like the zephyr, sings like the seraph, curses like the demon, let your soul also be attuned to the thrilling accents of his divine eloquence.

When you behold young Xavier, surrounded by the most brilliant audience that fame could attract, suddenly, after a burst of applause, stop, reflect a moment, then quit that scene of triumph, and, clothed in simple garb, turn his eager steps toward the East, where millions dwell who have never heard the name of Jesus, and there, strong in the power of divine love and super-human self-sacrifice, cause every knee to bend to Jesus and every tongue to bless his holy name, until at last, still seeking for some soul in darkness lying, on a barren isle, far from man or beast, alone, with the ocean before him, the desert around him, and God within him, he breathes out his great soul in the words of a confidence certain of itself: “In thee, O God! have I hoped; I shall not be confounded for ever”—when you behold all this, lift up your hearts to God, and ask him to give you, too, the strength to be Christians.

On The Wing. A Southern Flight. II.

It is true indeed that he does eat, the prince of the ancient name, and exquisitely beautiful little town, of Monaco. But it is food that would give an indigestion to any man with a conscience. The prince has reserved to himself of his lovely tiny principality very little more than his large palace and the surrounding gardens. The rest is let to the keeper of a gambling establishment built and organized on a very magnificent scale, and standing, with its hotel and several gay shops, in the most exquisite Italian gardens that imagination can picture—veritable gardens of Armida, with terrace above terrace, flights of white, gleaming steps, handsome balustrades, and all the glorious flowers and foliage of far-distant and still more sunny regions. They command a view of unspeakable beauty. They are full of all the sweet, peaceful suggestions of lovely nature, heightened and enhanced by the order and arrangement of subtle art. As I wandered up and down the marble stairs, and from beneath the shade of eucalyptus, palm, mimosa, tamarisk, and cypress, into the sunny walks bright with flowers, my heart sank within me at the dreadful thought that all this had been brought together for no other purpose than to minister to human passions of the worst kind, and to accumulate sordid gains by trading on vice. Games of chance may not, in themselves, be wrong. Far be it from me to assert that they are. But if the chronicles of Monaco could be truly written for only one season, we should look on this beautiful scene, where God's best gifts in bountiful nature have been used to decorate and adorn it to the utmost, as simply one of the gates of hell, and probably one of its broadest and largest. The moon was riding through a pure expanse of spotless blue, her reflection dancing on the rippling sea with silver footsteps, as we passed down the flights of broad stairs from terrace to terrace to join the night-train to Mentone. The journey took us barely twenty minutes; and we were silent and depressed. We had seen no startling sight: all was perfectly decorous and calm. A slight click, click, very occasionally, as the heaps of gold had been piled on the tapis vert, and a subdued, muffled noise, hardly perceptible, as the croupiers dragged forward the gains and the losses of silent figures that sat or stood around the numerous gambling-tables—that was all. Hours passed. People came and went with noiseless tread and controlled countenance. No man committed [pg 210] suicide in our presence. No woman shrieked at her loss or laughed at her success. Outwardly, it was calm, silent, and intense. But there is a wordless language which speaks from one human soul to another, and which, whether we will or no, reveals something of the inner state and the unspoken secrets. The very air teemed with these secrets. And as I passed out into the quiet night, I wondered whether perhaps in hell there will be the same decorous silence, without the exterior beauty, and all the fire of anguish be hidden beneath the outer garb—so entirely did it seem that, to many, it might be but one step from this to that.

The rusticity of Mentone was a relief after the sort of nightmare to which we had so needlessly subjected ourselves at Monaco. It was carnival time, and the peasantry were making merry. A motley crew came pouring down the only street worthy of the name, in fantastic dresses, making hideous sounds through huge horns, shouting and dancing. They had two bears with them, which, I afterwards heard, in their frolic they had let loose, to the alarm of quiet folks. For myself, I scrambled up a steep, narrow, and very dirty vicolo,76 part of which was composed of broken steps, glad to be out of their way. And so, climbing higher and higher, I found myself at the parish church, where there was an Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, and where the noise of the masks and merry-makers could not penetrate.

As I am far from intending to give my kind readers anything of the nature of a guide-book—a task for which I am utterly unqualified—I will not weary them with an account of how and by what route we found ourselves at the San Marco Hotel at Bologna, the City of Arcades, the capital of jurisprudence, whence came many an astute lawyer, reared in its celebrated university, which has also given the church six sovereign pontiffs, and amongst them the witty and learned Benedict XIV. To Bologna we owe the great school of painting founded by Francia, which boasts of the Caracci, Domenichino, Guido, and his pupil Guercino, besides many others. We thought ourselves unusually accurate and learned, when, on arriving at the Accademia, we asked the surly guardian which way we ought to turn to get to the Pinacoteca; and not till we had, in a more roundabout form, told him we wanted to see the pictures would he condescend from his stolid dignity to tell us where to go. The Francias alone, the S. Cecilia of Raphael, or the Martyrdom of S. Agnes by Domenichino, would be worth a yet longer journey to behold. And the Head of Christ Crowned with Thorns, drawn in crayons by Guido, with stains of damp on the paper, and some slight discoloration from age, leaves an impression on the memory surpassing, to my mind, all that artist's finished paintings. Bologna has set an example our more liberal times, as we are apt to think them, seem unwilling to follow, and are doing so but slowly and grudgingly. The learned ladies [pg 211] who aspire to equality with the other sex might come here in a body, raise the now declining glories of the university, and fill those comparatively empty halls. Bologna has known female lawyers of eminence, and doctors, and at least one surgeon and anatomist of the gentler sex, and has done homage to their learning and merit. Might it not be as well to take advantage of a university so large-minded, and once so celebrated?—convinced, as we are, that if the ladies took the lead, the gentlemen would follow.

We had had the honor many years ago of knowing Cardinal Mezzofanti, so celebrated as a linguist. He was a Bolognese, and had been librarian of the university here, and, when we knew him, occupied an important post in the Vatican library. At that time he had mastered something like forty languages. He told us that, a short time previous, he had been informed there was a poor sailor come to Rome from some out-of-the-way part of the world—Lapland, I believe—who spoke a dialect no one could understand or make anything of; and that the man, being a Catholic, wanted to go to his Easter duties. The cardinal sent for him, and made him discourse in his presence. In two days his eminence was quite ready to hear his confession, and could talk with the man in his own tongue with fluency.

Through the cool, shady arcades of beautiful Bologna we wandered to the Piazza Vittoria Emanuel, which formerly was known by the more honorable name of Piazza del Gigante. The crowd was so great that we could hardly make our way past the groups of peasants and well-to-do farmers, in their warm, brown cloaks, all talking and gesticulating, with apparently nothing else to do. There was a market going on, but not one which seemed of sufficient importance to justify so large a crowd, and which probably collects there daily, about mid-day, out of the abundant leisure which pervades Italian life, even in its most industrious forms. We visited the shrine of S. Dominic, and were long engaged in admiring its extraordinary beauty. The saint died at Bologna in 1221. He was in England when the vision was granted him which revealed to him that, before the next Feast of the Assumption, his earthly career would be closed, and, on arriving at Bologna, had forewarned the students at the university that he was about to leave them. Shortly after, he went to Venice on the affairs of his order. He returned to the monastery of S. Nicholas, at Bologna, in the great heats of the last days of July. The following morning he celebrated his last Mass, and said Office in choir. He then complained of headache, but refused to take any further repose than was obtained by sitting on a sack of wool which happened casually to be at hand. Finding his suffering increase, he sent for the novices, to give them his last exhortation, summing up all in these simple words: “Be filled with charity, keep humility, and observe voluntary poverty.” In the hope that a purer air might benefit their beloved father and founder, they carried him to the Church of S. Mary of the Mount. But the journey, brief as it was, proved rather to have aggravated his condition. Once again he addressed the assembled brethren; and finding that there was some idea of burying him there, instead of in his own monastery, [pg 212] he entreated to be taken back to S. Nicholas, that he might, as he expressed it, be buried beneath the feet of his brothers. They wanted to change his clothes, but discovered he had no others but those he wore. Brother Moneta therefore lent him a habit. He had received the last sacraments at S. Mary's of the Mount; and finding that his disciples, in the excess of their grief, were delaying to read the prayers for the dying, he was the first to beg they would commence. While they prayed around him, his lips silently repeated the words; and when they came to the sentence, “Come to his assistance, ye saints of God. Come forth to meet him, ye angels of the Lord, receiving his soul, and offering it in the sight of the Most High,”77 he lifted up his hands toward heaven, and at the same moment gave up his pure soul to God.

It was at noon, on Friday, the 6th of August. Thus he reached his home five years before his companion in arms in the warfare of the great church militant, S. Francis of Assisi, who was six years his junior. The last words of the holy dying are ever precious to the Christian world; and it is to be remarked that those of the canonized saints have most frequently been taken from Holy Scripture or from the liturgy of the church. S. Francis died repeating the 141st Psalm; thus his last words were, “Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name: the just wait for me, until Thou reward me.”

The greater part of our journey to Bologna from Genoa had been through a highly cultivated but flat and uninteresting country. The contrast was great on the railway from Bologna to Florence, with its forty-five tunnels, its sudden turnings and windings, the beautiful valleys of the Apennines, and the mountains themselves looking as if the giant hand of nature had crushed them like rose-leaves, and then flung them down with all the crinkles in them. You look below on fertile fields and beautiful little towns nestling on the sides of green hills, with gardens and meadows smiling in the sunshine. As you are attempting to realize the lovely scene before you, the relentless engine is bringing you nearer to rugged rocks, with hanging woods and fringes of the golden broom. A black cavern yawns in front of you, and in a second you are plunged in darkness. Away you are hurried, with grind, and puff, and roar, regretting the sunny picture from which you have so suddenly been snatched. Just as you are recovering from the shock, again you emerge on a scene as beautiful as the last; and again are you doomed to lose it, almost before your dazzled eyes have recovered from this unnaturally rapid succession of day and night, and which reminded me of a certain planet, where, as astronomers assure us, the inhabitants, if there be any, are exposed to the vicissitudes of several days and nights in the course of our comparatively leisurely space of four-and-twenty hours. I have always ventured to hope they were not also condemned to dress and undress each time; otherwise I think many of them must be tempted to follow the example of that poor gentleman who cut his throat, leaving a paper [pg 213] on the table in which he stated that it was the constant buttoning and unbuttoning which had been too much for him.

Nothing can exceed the beauty of the view as the plain of Tuscany opens before you. We had seen it two-and-twenty years ago, before any railroads were there to cut short the delights of travelling. We had gazed long and lingeringly from out the windows of our travelling-carriage, while the setting sun left his last kiss on the mountain heights, and the evening mists gathered below. I, for one, had never seen it since. But sometimes in my dreams that view had come back to me, and, when I awoke, it Was still there. Sometimes the phantasmagoria of the mind had suddenly unfolded it before my memory without my being able to say when and where I had painted that picture on my brain. And now I saw it again; and suddenly all those broken recollections seemed to gather themselves together, and unroll before me, while my soul whispered, “Here is the reality of what for so many years has haunted you, and which you have so often been tempted to believe was a trick of your imagination. It is a fact; and you can recall it and put it together, piece by piece; as you will do, far more perfectly, the broken and half-forgotten fragments of your life when the barrier of death is passed.”

The only other wide expanse which has left the same impression on my imagination, waking and sleeping, is the view from the beautiful viaduct at Aricia, as it first burst upon me—the vast campagna and the crimson lights of the setting sun.

This was our first visit to Florence since the government had taken possession of the Dominican church and monastery of San Marco, and opened the latter as a museum to the public in 1869; so that my old jealousy that Frank could gaze at those wonderfully lovely angels of Fra Angelico was now at an end. I do not think there is a cell without some exquisitely devotional painting by the monk-artist, whose every picture is an embodied meditation and a prayer. We paused long in the two cells where Savonarola had lived and studied and suffered. The old question forced itself upon me as to what had been the real character of that grand, imposing figure, which fills so large a page in the history of Florence—the hard-featured reformer, the man of relentless will and burning eloquence. Where was the little rift in the flute which jarred that celestial music? Where was the flaw in the gem which spoiled its intrinsic value? And which was the snare in his life which prevented his growing on into heroic virtue? His gifts and graces were immense, and, at one time at least, so supernatural that they seemed at once the guarantee and the pledge that he would die a saint in the highest acceptation of the word. Frank, who has read a great deal about him, written by all sides, is persuaded that it was a form of spiritual pride and dependence on himself that ruined all. Of course, at this distance of time, and judging only from existing documents, no one can say when precisely this began—when the annihilation of self first gave place to an inner complacency; when that heart, covered, as before, with the rude hair-shirt, began to throb with a secret sentiment of personal satisfaction in the graces [pg 214] God had given. It must have been long, if ever, before those set, stern features began to betray that another spirit had entered into the soul of the ascetic monk, which gradually was tarnishing the purity of his spiritual life. But when the end came, and he bowed to death in its most dreadful form, hurried on by the malignity of his enemies—who, having once laid their hand on their prey, feared lest the mercy of Rome should be enlightened to arrest its own mandate—can any doubt that the man who had done so much in a holy cause, and had so decried the pomp and pride of life, found all the graces attached to a great and accepted sacrifice?

We hurry from Florence. And though I might linger over my pages, and make my story more full of information, and possibly of interest, I yet refrain from anything that may trench on the character of mere sketches, which alone I aim at. Frank forms one of a deputation to the Holy Father, and he was to reach Rome by a certain day. We arrived long enough before that date to establish ourselves in a house in the Ripetta, overlooking the yellow Tiber. Charon, mild, modern, and a Roman, ferries his boat just beneath our windows. The rope is fastened to a stake on our balcony, and makes a creaking noise as the boat crosses the river, to which we are so habituated that we think it musical. Charon wears a glazed hat, and affects a nautical air quite uncalled for, considering his limited navigation. For the moderate fee of one half-penny he conveys his passengers to and fro across the classic river. Landed on the opposite shore, we pass along a narrow lane, on one side limited by a high wall, on the other by a green bank paved with violet-leaves. Modern violet-leaves, but doubtless descendants of those that fell beneath the coulter of Cincinnatus' plough along these Quintian fields that early morn when the anxious senate went to call the half-naked hero to another and less peaceful field, and bade him cross the Tiber (where we have done), and turn his plough-share into a sword against those ever-recurring Volsci and Æqui. Let the violets grow, O warrior ploughman! and in a few brief days thou shalt return to find the little purple flowers ready to hail thy triumph. Shall we see Racilia behind the tall vine-poles, bearing the toga that is to cover the brawny shoulders of the noble laborer? Or have these familiar idyls of our early life lost their charm in the sterner and more assured memories of Christian Rome?

The narrow, violet-bordered lane leads into wide fields and to the fortifications of the Castle of Sant' Angelo. We are outside the gates of the city. The white walls of Rome stand glittering in the sunshine to our left; to our right lies the green, undulating Campagna; and before us are the heights of Monte Mario, pine-crowned.

S. Michael, poised in mid-air, sheathes his avenging sword above the huge round tower that was the tomb of Hadrian, and by turns the hiding-place of the popes or the prison of their enemies.

Darkly looming against the blue-white sky, the bronze figure of Rome's guardian angel for ever holds his weapon half-way out of his scabbard, like the suspended threat of an avenging power.

Dark-browed Roman women are hanging out inconceivable colored rags that surely never can have served for human raiment, to dry on the wooden rails that mark our [pg 215] road. They are jabbering, in harsh and femininely shrill tones, their curtailed patois of the Roman tongue; and the lark, in advance of the season, is carolling overhead in the motionless air and in the quivering light of the mid-day sun. We re-enter the city by the Porta Angelica, and are standing on the fields of the Vatican, where stood Nero's circus and Nero's gardens. Of all the characters of the heathen Roman Empire, none comes more prominently forward as the very type of human depravity and accomplished wickedness than that of Nero. He seems the embodiment of evil heightened by a versatility of talent and varnished by the gloss of a false poetic sense that makes him the exact opposite to all that produces heroic virtue in its greatest charm, as well as its highest glory, among the Christian saints. His was the poet nature debased to the lowest sensuality and the meanest vanity. And in the mystic saints, is there not ever something of the poet nature carried to its most subtle expression and its utmost elevation in the ascetic purity and tender devotion of a S. Francis or a S. Gertrude? There is a wonderful sequence in the low-lying, half-hidden events of the church's history. There is a marvellous counterbalancing of good against evil, as though the providence of God had (if we may use the expression) taken pleasure in substituting light for darkness, and beauty for ugliness; selecting in each the exact counterpart of the other, and placing them in juxtaposition. And so it is in this spot, which most brings to our recollection the lavish and foul luxury of Rome's artist emperor, the degraded being who was by turns actor, poet, musician, wrestler, or coachman, but fiend always! There, where the horrid pomp of his midnight revels was lighted up by the living and burning forms of the meek martyrs of the church—there we now have the grandest monument of the faith for which those martyrs died that ever has been, or probably ever will be. And the great saints, the pillars of the church, the founders and foundresses of her armies of religious orders, stand now, sculptured in cool marble niches along the aisles of that gorgeous Basilica which stands on the very ground of Nero's infamous gardens. There, too, was another “Potter's Field,” in which to bury strangers; for the clay soil on which S. Peter's is built had served in the old Roman manufactory of bricks and earthenware. The potters had excavated numberless caves on the slopes of the Vatican hills, where subsequently the Christians concealed themselves, and, as in the other catacombs of Rome, celebrated the divine mysteries and buried their dead. It is said that S. Peter himself, on his first journey to Rome, baptized many in these very catacombs—many, probably, who later on had received that other baptism of blood in the ghastly revels of Nero's gardens, and whose remains were gathered together secretly by the brethren, and buried in the caves of the “Potter's Fields.” And now the strangers have become possessors; the holy dead have consecrated what might well have been called another “field of blood”; and the successors of S. Peter sit in reverend state and govern Christendom on the very spot where the first Bishop of Rome celebrated in secret the first Masses Rome ever witnessed. The grain of mustard-seed has indeed become a great and goodly tree, and the [pg 216] birds of all nations and all ages lodge in the beneficent shadow of its branches.

The whole history of the Basilica of S. Peter, whether the first that sheltered the relics of the apostles, or the present more magnificent one, built from the designs of Bernini, and completed by Michael Angelo, teems with facts of this nature.

The old roof of S. Peter's was covered by Pope Honorius I. with the gilt bronze tiles that had roofed, some historians say the temple of Romulus, others that of Jupiter Capitolinus, possibly of both; as though the first founders of pagan Rome, the Romulus and Remus of history and legend, were to pay tribute to the founders of Christian Rome, the great apostles SS. Peter and Paul, whose blood cemented the walls of the early church, and over whose sacred relics that venerable roof was to hang; or, as if the false Jove, dethroned and vanquished by the fisherman, were stripped of his splendor to do honor to the true God. The tiles have been removed elsewhere now, but the fact still retains its touching import. And the like is carried out in the present Basilica; for the Pantheon, raised to the honor of its myriad of demon gods, gave up the bronze of its portico at the command of Urban VIII., that out of it Bernini might fashion that wonderful work, the Baldacchino over the high altar. Wonderful work! that, as we gaze at it, never weary and ever admiring, we ask ourselves in what way the mind of the architect78 wrought when he brought forth this splendid design. Did it come to him at once, like the one grand idea ruling all the cadences of action in a Greek play? Or did he build it up, piece by piece, in his soul, and touch and retouch the beautiful image like the finished diversities of an idyl? We incline to the first, for that is most like inspiration, and the Baldacchino of S. Peter's must have been an inspiration.

As we pass beneath the deep shadow of the great colonnade of S. Peter's into the vast piazza facing the Basilica, it is like stepping from the mazes of a forest out into the sunny plain. Almost catching the diamond spray of these ever-joyous fountains, we mount the easy steps, so dignified in their gradual ascent, and pass into the gallery of the façade with the same awe-struck feeling we have experienced when suddenly we have found our frank glance come in unexpected contrast with the deep, scrutinizing gaze of a dark eye and the overhanging solemnity of a thoughtful and heavy-laden brow. And first the bass-relief before us tells us the history of the church. Christ delivers the keys to S. Peter, who, kneeling, receives the tokens of his high office. At either end of the long gallery are the equestrian statues of two great imperial defenders and benefactors of the church: Constantine the Great still gazes on the labarum that appeared to him in mystic form not far off on that very hill of Monte Mario, pine-crowned, and where now stands a church in commemoration of the event—an event which turned the City on Seven Hills, the Babylon of the prophecies, the woman drunk with the blood of the martyrs, into the Eternal City, the port of the church's bark, the patrimony of S. Peter, and the home of all Christian hearts—the city of which a great and royal sufferer once said; “J'ai trouvé [pg 217] que Rome est l'endroit où on peut le mieux se passer du bonheur.”79 Here all sorrow is ennobled, all grief is sheltered. The great King of the church is himself “the Man of Sorrows,” and here his Vicar reigns!

At the very entrance we pause to ponder over as touching an elegy as ever was written in memoriam; and the grief it portrays is that of the other great defender of the church, whose equestrian statue meets us on the left end of the gallery—Charlemagne mourns for Adrian I.

“I, Charles, write these verses, weeping for my father! Yea, my father, my dear love! These verses are my lamentation for thy loss. Be thou ever mindful of me, whose memory seeks thee dwelling with Christ in the blessed region of heaven. The priests and the people loved thee with a great love, and all with one love, best of shepherds! Great friend! I mingle in one our names and our illustrious titles. Adrian and Charles—emperor, I; and father, thou!”

In the history of nations, as in the life of individuals, there is a not unfrequent repetition of events bearing the same type though not the same in fact. They give a characteristic coloring to the biography of the individual or the history of the people. The events and the man react on each other. But this is especially true, and in a far deeper sense, with the history of God's church. When the Israelites came out of Egypt, they spoiled the Egyptians. They carried away as a tribute the treasures unwillingly conceded by their former masters. The Christian world, on the conversion of Constantine, stepped forth from the darkness and despotism of paganism, and Charlemagne, as if in commemoration of this antitype of that deliverance, endowed the church of S. Peter with rich tributes from Egypt for the benefaction of the clergy, and for the lighting and repairing of the great Basilica. Human governments are generally ungrateful; but the church is a divine government, though carried on through human agents, and gratitude is one of her virtues and one of her most distinctive attributes. Constantine and Charlemagne are not forgotten. Their statues guard the entrance of S. Peter's, as erstwhile their power guarded and endowed the see of Peter. Nor shall even the weaker sex fail of the tribute liberally paid to loyalty and devotion. There is something sublime in the gratitude depicted in the monument to the Countess Mathilda, who holds in her hands the mitre and the keys, as though to suggest the idea of consigning them to the protection of the great mediatrix of the incorrigible Emperor of the West, Henry IV., and who had sheltered in her own dominions the great S. Gregory, and done so much to increase the patrimony of the church. A royal father giving his crown and sceptre into the hands of a favorite child could not more touchingly portray the loving appreciation of the sovereign pontiffs towards one who had been so true to the church's cause. And time has no effect in diminishing the gratitude of that church which is built upon a rock, and where all is enduring, any more than it has in diminishing the glory of the saints; for it was Urban VIII. who erected the monument in S. Peter's to the spiritual daughter of the great Hildebrand, Gregory VII.—a grateful memory of [pg 218] more than six hundred years' standing!

We have often heard people complain of a sentiment of disappointment on first entering S. Peter's. It has been accounted for by the fact that the perfect proportion and harmony of the whole, producing therefore no startling contrasts, fail to effect so sudden an impression on the mind as would be the case were the harmony less absolute. To this it may be replied that some minds are more alive to impressions of harmony, and others to those of contrast. We can best speak from experience, and we all agreed that nowhere had we felt such a sense of completeness and its consequent repose fall upon our souls as when we pushed aside that heavy leathern portal, and passed within the precincts of S. Peter's. I do not remember ever to have done so, though I have probably been there fifty times, without an involuntary pause as I first entered; and before approaching the holy-water stoups, supported by white marble boys of six feet high, who carry a large marble shell between them, and, everything being large in proportion, fail not to look like infants, in spite of their real size. The first chapel to the right as you enter is the one in which a large number of very valuable relics are kept in rich reliquaries, and which are only shown to the public on certain days. These are distinct from the great relics of the Passion, which are exhibited to the crowd from the loggia in the dome on either side of the high altar during Holy Week. I used to be attracted to that chapel, which is otherwise less striking than many of the others, by the Pietà of Michael Angelo. In my father's house in England we have that same Pietà, said to be an original. It is on a smaller scale and unfinished; at least the head and features of Our Lady always gave me that impression. Not so the figure of Our Lord, which is full of the sad tenderness of death. The utter supineness of the limbs and of the arm, which has fallen off Our Lady's lap, and hangs down; the beauty of the worn face; the wonderfully graceful and yet manly hands, pierced, like the feet; the general position of the whole body, like a broken flower flung on the Mother's lap—are full of the deepest religious feeling and pathos. But it is difficult thoroughly to appreciate it where it stands in S. Peter's. It is over the altar, and one had need do as I used to do at P——, when a child, to be able to appreciate all the details. I used to go alone, when I was sure of not being caught, down the dark, dreary passage which led to the dark, disused chapel, on the damp, marble pavement of which stood this supposed original of the Pietà. Then getting a chair from a bath-room in the vicinity of the chapel, I stood upon that, so as to bring myself nearly on a level with the head of Our Lady, and thus be able to look down, as she does, on the dead Christ supported on her knees.

How often in S. Peter's I have wished I could do the same with the undoubted work of Michael Angelo, and trace again in every line the pathetic beauty of suffering and death, as, with eyes full of tears, I had done in early life! The Pietà at S. Peter's has the same absence of real beauty in the face of Our Lady with the one at P——; the same long upper lip and want of finish. It also gives a like impression with all other pietàs, in [pg 219] which the Mother is represented as holding her Divine Son on her knees—a thing which in reality would be impossible. No woman could support on her knees the dead body of a full-grown man. Michael Angelo, whose idealism was always under the control of his marvellous anatomical drawing, was too conscious of that not to endeavor palpably to counteract what probably, as he was working at the group, he felt to be an invincible objection. He has certainly made it look possible in his Pietà, but he has done it at the expense of beauty and congruity. The Blessed Virgin's lap is enormous; her whole figure looks powerful and gigantic, while that of the Saviour is undersized in proportion.

I have often paused in the space opposite this first chapel, across the nave, to watch some fifty little urchins learning their catechism. Merry little creatures they seemed to be, all more or less in the négligé attire of Italian beggar life, picturesque in color and dilapidated in texture. Sparkling black eyes and gleaming white teeth were their chief and never-failing beauty. They sat on low forms, or rather they leant upon them, lay upon them, scrambled over them, waiting for their instructor, who always seemed long in coming. When at last he did arrive, a faint semblance of order was established. The little creatures shouted forth the answers in a sort of loud sing-song, nudging each other all the time, swinging their little, naked, well-bronzed legs, and keeping up some perennial jokes all the time with each other, but little in unison with the words they were repeating. I cannot say that their demeanor seemed at all to affect the stolid gravity of their priestly instructor, or even to try his patience. He simply ignored it. He appeared to have no eyes nor ears for any sound but the well-known monotony of the responses. It is to be hoped something may come back to them of it all when they are old enough to think. For myself, I could only reflect on what a strange reminiscence it would seem to me to have learnt my catechism beneath the dome of S. Peter's. To these little, careless mortals, it was only a part of their everyday life.

The niches, filled with colossal statues of the founders and foundresses of religious orders, embellish the walls on all sides; and probably all Catholics look out for some special saint as they wander through the Basilica. We used particularly to salute S. Teresa and S. Frances of Rome; the latter attended by her guardian angel. These statues produce a grand effect, being all of white marble, standing in niches of many-colored marbles and rich carving, though they are far from all having artistic merit. There are still some niches empty. Who will fill them? What saintly founders or foundresses of new orders does the future of the church still reserve for us? Or will the last day come, and find those niches empty still? With the exception of the four statues under the dome, they are (and must always be) canonized saints and founders of orders.

I have heard of people whose great ambition was to be buried in Westminster Abbey. I knew one pretty bride, of high rank and youthful ambition, who was married in the Abbey because she was persuaded that her husband would be a great statesman, and that his grateful country would bury him there. But I never heard of any [pg 220] one who dreamed of filling one of the empty niches in S. Peter's. On first entering the church, one sees the many lamps burning round the Confessional of S. Peter, as the high altar is called. They seem to pour an orange-colored glow all around. You stand or kneel against the marble balustrade, and look down on the kneeling figure of Pius VI. before the tomb of his greater predecessor. It is a beautiful, restful image of perpetual prayer, and is one of the few works of Canova I have ever really admired. Against the marble balustrade there hang some wooden frames containing an indulgenced prayer and hymn to S. Peter and S. Paul in Latin. I once had a curious illustration of how a trifle may strike a stranger, while it escapes the notice of one in the habit of seeing it constantly. I never went to S. Peter's that I did not say that prayer at the tomb of the apostles; for it must be remembered the relics (not all of them) of S. Paul lie here, as well as those of S. Peter. I had had occasion to insert them in a manuscript, which fell into the hands of a certain very learned Capuchin, who holds a high post in his order, and in connection, also, with the Sovereign Pontiff. He surprised me by asking me where I got those prayers and hymns. He had never read them before, in the many years he had lived at Rome in the venerable convent of his order, and might have seen them fastened by a small chain to the spot where he must so often have knelt. Perhaps the fact that in every church in Rome you will find an indulgenced prayer printed up somewhere as an incentive to devotion, may have led to his not particularly noticing the one at S. Peter's.

Frank used to tell Mary he never knew any one so greedy of indulgences as she was. She always looked out for these short prayers; she never went to S. Peter's without kneeling, as she passed the priests in their confessionals, to receive the little tap from the long wand they have in front of the confessional, and to the receiving of which an indulgence is attached. He used to tell her laughingly that he did not understand how she had the face to disturb the priest saying his Office, and oblige him to lift his eyes from his Breviary, and detach the long stick as she knelt a yard or two distant. We have seen her unblushingly obtain three raps in succession with all the devotion possible; and then, when she and I were looking another way, Frank would strive against his natural British undemonstrativeness, and kneel for the little blow, getting up again with a shy blush. Mary and I never took any notice. We knew that the small act of humility, which, among the childlike Italians, came almost as a matter of course, cost him far more than it did us, and therefore had more merit. The Romans have a harmless superstition that if you are leaving Rome, and are anxious to return, you will not fail to do so if you deposit some small coin in a safe place. I had done so the last time I had been there; and, sure enough, I was back again to claim my money. But though I could remember the part of the church beneath the statue of S. Juliana where I had dropt it into a crevice, I never could find it again. However, that did not matter, since the charm had worked successfully. A draught of the water from the fountain of Trevi is said to have the same effect. I drank a cupful once in pure jest, and have been to Rome four times [pg 221] since; but something more powerful than the hidden half-pence or the fountain of Trevi has lured me back again. There is, I believe, no spot in the world where everybody gets to feel so at home as in Rome, outside the land of their birth and the roof that shelters all their domestic affections.

In the same place where I had hidden my little coin I remember a scene which filled my imagination with interest and admiration. It was Holy Thursday. The high altar was being stripped of all the ornaments, and washed with wine, to the mournful chanting of the choir; the daylight was fast declining, though still some rays of the setting sun stole through the yellow-tinted windows below the dome; and the Grand Penitentiary was seated in his violet robes on a raised platform, in a crimson velvet chair, with no partition between him and the low stool to his right, on which the penitents were to kneel. There were several steps, covered with cloth, to mount from the pavement of the church to the seat of the prelate; and at some distance from these was a temporary railing to prevent the crowd from approaching within hearing of what should pass between the penitent and the priest. We stood among the crowd. The penitent was a man of about thirty years of age, with coal-black hair and beard, deep, dark eyes, and regular features. It was very curious to hear the remarks of the bystanders; and they were very characteristic of Italians, born to the faith. Most of them were praying aloud, in brief ejaculations, that God would grant him perfect contrition. The women especially were exclaiming: “Ah! poverello, ma piange!”80 Two priests passed through the crowd, and paused a moment, with a smile of indescribable benevolence and satisfaction that a big fish had been caught in Peter's net, and was being drawn to land. The confession lasted a long time. The man never for a moment shifted his position; but by degrees the venerable prelate bent his ear closer and closer to the poor penitent, and his countenance showed a mixture of compassion and tenderness quite paternal. The man's forehead almost touched the priest's shoulder, as he poured forth his long history of error and shame. At length the priest's hand was raised to give the absolution, and a murmur of relief and congratulation ran through the crowd of spectators. The hand rested on the man's head before he rose from his knees. He came quickly down the steps. The crowd parted to let him pass. He can have seen none but smiling and happy glances all around him, if he cared to look up; but all silently made way for him, and in a moment he was lost in the multitude, absolved and released from the burden of some “reserved case.” Of course there were many conjectures as to who and what he might be. Some said he had been a bandit; others that he was a priest who had broken his vows, and made this confession in public as an act of greater humility; for of course it is not imperative to carry all reserved cases to the Grand Penitentiary, nor need the penitent wait for Lent to get absolution. Nevertheless, the prelate with power to absolve all reserved cases (of which murder is one) occupies that raised confessional throughout Lent for certain hours of the day. Mary was so overcome at the piety and charity of the crowd in the [pg 222] warm interest they evinced, and observed so often that it must be delightful to be thus prayed for while making one's confession, that we began to apprehend she would mount the platform herself, had not Frank timely observed to her that, in all probability, she had no reserved case on her conscience!

By this time the shades of night were closing in. The lights were all extinguished. The altars stood bare and cold. The dark crowd swayed in dense masses towards the open doors. The light of the moon struggled pale and wan through the high windows where the setting sun had lately thrown a golden glow. The vast cathedral echoed to the steps of the departing crowd, and we turned towards home, more deeply impressed with the desolation expressed by the Holy Thursday ceremonies in S. Peter's in the stripping of the altars than with many others more generally remarked.

It was night before we reached our apartment in the Ripetta.

Mary's bedroom overlooked the river, and in the morning she could see S. Peter's bathed in the rosy light of the rising sun, while flights of white sea-gulls came up the river with the early tide to feed upon the refuse which had been thrown into the water. They came swooping down, with their glittering plumage flashing in the sunshine, and, dipping low, would snatch some dainty morsel from the swift water, and mount up, in graceful, curving flight, to repeat the same again and again. As the port was close to our house, no doubt it was an advantageous position for both the breakfast and supper of the gulls. They always returned in the evening, but at no other hour in the day. At night we could see lights in three windows of the Vatican. They were always there, and always at about the same hour they disappeared. One day, when Mary was calling on Cardinal Antonelli he asked her where we were living; and on her describing the position, and how she could see S. Peter's and the Vatican, and specially those three windows, he told her the lights were from his own apartment. His eminence is very fond of flowers, and has a garden in Rome, in which he takes great pleasure. They were talking of flowers, and he observed to Mary that she would find very much the same flora throughout Europe, though not of course equally distributed. Mary objected that she had never seen the little common yellow primrose of our English woods, in that part of Italy. “Nevertheless, you will find we have it,” was his reply. And not long after, on our way to Viterbo, we saw its starry blossoms by the roadside, and hailed it as an old friend, dearer to our hearts than even the graceful pink cyclamen, which from the position of the petals reminds me of a pretty, blushing child with her hair all drawn back from her forehead.

What memories crowd upon me as I recall these trivial incidents! What happy hours have I spent beneath that deep-blue but not unclouded sky, with the warm breeze perfumed by the breath of violets in the Doria Pamphili Villa! The great stone pines, with their soft, unceasing sighs; the large willows dropping their bright-green flexible wands into the clear water; the violet anemones, with here and there a large crimson one, or a yellow tulip lighting up the soft green grass like a sparkling gem; the violets, not bashful and hidden shrinkingly beneath their leaves, as in [pg 223] our colder climes, but lifting their little dark-purple heads high in the air, to drink the light and leave a perfumed kiss on every breeze that floats; soft masses of white cloud sailing slowly over the blue ether, and casting dappled shadows on the long grass. In the distance is S. Peter's and the Vatican, with fields of broken ground in many tints of yellow and green and red between it and the stone balustrade against which we lean. It appears, from this point of view, to be quite outside the city, and to stand alone and untrammelled by meaner buildings. Behind us is a dense avenue of venerable ilex, and but now we were visiting the Colombarium, the other side of the road, and moralizing on the pagan practice of cremation, as compared with the hallowed Christian sepulture—it must have been so difficult to realize that the little handful of ashes in the urn had anything to do with the dead wife or child or father, that they had loved, embraced, and conversed with!

Again, I remember a day when we were living at Capo le Case. I took Ann with me, and we set out for a long walk regardless of the flight of time. We directed our course to S. John Lateran. On our way, we paused at San Clemente, where we had several times visited the subterranean church under the guidance of the kind and learned F. Mullooly. Few, perhaps, have ever noticed, in a church which presents so much else to interest them, a small picture, the head of S. Catharine of Sienna, over an altar at the bottom of the church, on the right hand. It is modern, and by a Dominican artist whose name is unknown to me, and probably to all save the brothers of his order. Nevertheless, I have never seen devotion more exquisitely depicted than in that sweet, sorrowful face, with the tears standing in the large, uplifted eyes. Through the open door of the church penetrated the scent of large masses of Banksia roses that hung over a wall in a garden nearly opposite. Untrained, untrimmed they flung long wreaths to the wind, and lay in cloud-like bunches of soft, creamy white. As we passed by the door of the hospital of the Salvatore, two Sisters stepped out into the sunshine, on some errand of charity for their sick and aged patients. We then visited the Basilica of S. John Lateran, “the mother and head of all churches.” The gigantic statues of the apostles have a very imposing effect, in spite of their many artistic faults, more so, perhaps, than the equally faulty statues at S. Peter's. Then we wandered into the large piazza in front of the cathedral, and looked beyond the gates and crumbling fortifications of Rome upon the Alban hills. The long avenue of trees leading to the church of Santa Croce di Gerusalemme were coming into leaf; so were the group of trees to our right, by the low wall of the piazza, on which grew tufts of fern and yellow-blossomed oxalis. We sat on the steps, and ate some hot chestnuts I had bought by the roadside, getting, at the same time, a pinch of salt from a dark-browed matron, with a yellow kerchief across her ample bosom, and a silver dagger in her hair, who sold cigars in a little wooden booth. It was enough to be alive on such a day and in such a scene, with the easy liberty of Italian life and the total absence of “Mrs. Grundy.” There was no one to see us (save a few beggar-women) sitting on the steps of the grand [pg 224] portico, and scattering the skins of our chestnuts on the pavement at our feet, while we silently drank in the balmy air and rejoiced in the beauty of the view before us. Ere we returned, we visited the Scala Santa, and looked long on Giacometti's beautiful group of the Kiss of Judas. The evening was closing in when, wearied but satisfied, we reached our home. But if these remembrances are full of light and warmth, not less pleasing are those of our moonlight drives the year that we remained in Rome till the middle of July, and every evening used to visit the Colosseum, or S. John Lateran and Santa Maria Maggiore, stopping to gaze long upon the cold silver light, so sharp and sudden on every curve and shaft, on architrave and entablature, on capital and plinth, while the dense shadows lurked behind like black stains of unfathomable darkness. Then we would drive to S. Peter's, and after crossing the bridge of Sant' Angelo between the angels, each holding an instrument of the Passion, we would look across the dark river to see the covered balcony of the house where Michael Angelo was an honored guest, and had introduced the young Raphael to the small circle of favored ones who met nightly under that roof. There, too, Vittoria Colonna probably came to increase the charm by her wit and beauty, while Michael Angelo nourished those sentiments of pure and profound veneration for her great merits which made him bitterly reproach himself after her unexpected death, because he who had never breathed one word of love to her while living, had dared to press a kiss on her marble brow when cold in death. What noble sentiments, what lofty times! And yet in many things how unseemly would some of their practices appear to us? For it was in the Church of San Silvestro al Quirinale that they used to meet after Vespers, to converse and laugh and jest together. We look across the river to mark that house. It is dark and silent now. No lights gleam from the windows. Half-defaced frescos still cover some of the walls, but it is let from top to bottom to several families of the very poorest of the people.

But I must pause. Rome is inexhaustible, whether in her classic, her Christian, or her artistic treasures; besides the charm of social intercourse, the delight of varied society, and the equal ease and splendor which may be found in the interior life of her princely palaces. Nor can I close this chapter without speaking of one whose presence, though now confined within the walls of his own palace, makes Rome so doubly dear to the true Catholic. The days are gone when our afternoon drive might be gladdened by the pleasure of finding the well-known crimson coach and magnificent black horses checking our progress, while we hastened to descend and kneel where he would pass, that we might catch a glance, perhaps a smile, and certainly the blessing, of the venerable old man in whom we recognize the Vicar of Christ. We had been admitted to more than one private audience, besides witnessing several of those receptions in which hundreds of people of many nations knelt to kiss his feet, and to hear that sweet, clear voice utter words of exhortation and encouragement. This last time we had entered the Vatican with sad and altered feelings. It was no longer a gala-day, that on which we were to [pg 225] visit the universal father of Christendom. We were going to condole with an august prisoner, a father defrauded of his rights, a sovereign deprived of his possessions. We all felt depressed and inclined for silence. The Pope had been indisposed, and, as we were kept waiting a long time, we began to fear His Holiness would prove unable to receive us. Our spirits flagged with every second that we were left in expectation, till Mary began to look so pale I feared that she was ill. At length, however, we perceived a stir among the crimson-liveried servants who were in attendance in the vestibule; presently the curtain at the end of the long gallery where we stood was drawn aside, and once again our eyes beheld him who is ever present to our thoughts, and whose name is breathed in so many prayers. The first feeling that filled our beating hearts, as we looked on his saintly and venerable face, was joy to feel that he was still amongst us; that despite increasing years, and the increasing malice and hatred of his enemies, his eye had not dimmed or his strength failed him. This impression was increased with every word he spoke. It was like the dawn which promises the perfect day, no matter how dark the night has been. “The people imagine a vain thing!” He is still with us—he, the father of his people! He may be ours for years to come. He may see the day-spring of the church again. He may live to witness her triumph. And should it be otherwise—should that white head be laid low before the triumph of the church over her enemies—will he see it less, will he share it less, because he has gone before? Impossible! The church militant and the church triumphant are one. But our hopes go further; or rather, they are more human. We believe that Pius IX. will live to see the end of confusion and the beginning of peace; the downfall of falsehood and oppression, and the restoration of himself (and others) to all their rights. May God grant it!

There Was No Room For Them In The Inn.

Antar And Zara; Or, “The Only True Lovers.” I.

An Eastern Romance Narrated In Songs.

By Aubrey De Vere.

F. Louage's Philosophy.82

The design of F. Louage in compiling this little text-book is most praiseworthy, and one which we are especially bound to commend, as it is an attempt to carry out a plan we have repeatedly and earnestly advocated in this magazine, of furnishing good text-books of philosophy, written in the English language. The credit of originating this purpose belongs, so far as we know, to the Christian Brothers. The good work had, indeed, been begun by Mr. Brownson, in translating the Fundamental Philosophy of Balmes. Nevertheless, as this is not precisely suited for use as a text-book, the preparation of such a text-book remained a desideratum; and our attention was first called to the practical need of one or more of these text-books by a letter to the editor from the Superior of the Christian Brothers at Baltimore, urging the great necessity of translating some one of the Latin manuals, or preparing a new one. This demand was the occasion of our mooting the question in these pages, and since that time the demand has been supplied by three different publications. One of these is the translation of Balmes' admirable Treatise on Logic, brought out under the auspices of the Christian Brothers; another, the first part of F. Hill's Philosophy, which has been highly commended both in Europe and in this country, and a third is the work now under notice.

We have delayed noticing this text-book by F. Louage for a long time, simply from a feeling of reluctance to express, without obvious necessity, the judgment which we formed on first perusing it—that it is very far from being a successful effort, and, moreover, that it contains a philosophical doctrine which cannot be safely taught in our Catholic schools. We shall proceed by-and-by to establish the justice of both these criticisms; but, beforehand, we wish to offer a few preliminary remarks explaining the past and present attitude of The Catholic World in respect to soundness of philosophical doctrine.

It is well known that a number of doctrinal decisions on philosophical topics have been promulgated by the reigning Sovereign Pontiff, which have made the true sense and teaching of the church on several important points much more clear and definite than it had previously been to a large number of sincere and learned Catholics. For a long time, some of these decisions—those, namely, concerning ontologism—were not universally known, and their import had not been sufficiently discussed and explained to give a certain and distinct direction to those who, like ourselves, in this country, had not been au courant with the affairs which brought about these decisions. Philosophy has been generally, and more especially in England and the United States, in a miserable and chaotic state until a comparatively brief period, during which a more [pg 232] wholesome tendency has been awakened. The worst and most dangerous errors have been those which have sprung from the sensist school. As a natural consequence, those whose Catholic belief has led them to reject these gross errors, being unacquainted with the scholastic philosophy, have been inclined to throw themselves back on Platonism, and to welcome any system of philosophy which put forward a high ideological doctrine in which the necessary and eternal truths, the immutable principles of first and final cause, the being and attributes of God, and all natural theology, were professedly exalted to their due supremacy, and placed on a basis unassailable by a mean scepticism and materialism. The very same took place in the instance of Cardinal Gerdil, of Malebranche, and of others, at a former period; and F. Ramière, one of the most successful opponents of ontologism, has lucidly explained how this is precisely the reason that the said system has appeared in a captivating light, in our own day, to a number of minds to which scepticism and materialism are especially odious. This may explain the fact that we have taken a more decisive and explicit stand in regard to several important philosophical doctrines, since the more thorough examination of the differences between the ancient and received teaching of Catholic schools, and the various modern theories, have convinced us of the great importance of adhering closely, not only in respect to the substance of doctrine, but even in respect to form and the use of terms, to that philosophy which has a Catholic sanction. Within the limits defined by positive, explicit authority, this adhesion is, of course, obligatory on the conscience in the strictest and gravest sense. In a former article on Dr. Stöckl's Philosophy, we have explained our position, which is that of the best and most approved European authors, in regard to this obligatory doctrine, so far as relates to ideology. Beyond this, we respect, of course, the liberty which the church concedes. Her positive sanction has been given to the scholastic principles, method, and doctrine, only in general terms. While, therefore, we advocate the adhesion to scholastic philosophy, as the only safe and really scientific way of procedure in education, we do not close our eyes to the fact that there are several important topics in respect to which discussion is not only allowable, but really necessary. The best philosophical writers living, who are in the main disciples of S. Thomas, differ very much from one another in regard to questions of this sort. Kleutgen, Liberatore, Sanseverino, Tongiorgi, Ramière, and Stöckl may be cited as the most distinguished modern expositors of the doctrine commonly taught in Catholic schools; and the differences among these are well known. A very able writer, who is now publishing a series of articles in this magazine, and who happily combines a profound knowledge of mathematics and physics with his deep metaphysical science, departs, in some instances, from all these, and strikes out a path for himself, in which we are sure that every philosophical reader will watch his progress with the greatest interest. Personally we are disposed to favor the stricter Thomistic doctrine so ably elucidated by Liberatore and Stöckl, and to prefer text-books of a similar method and doctrine; yet we should not think we were authorized to censure as unsound, [pg 233] in a theological sense, any philosophical work, merely because it might deserve, in our judgment, to be criticised on purely scientific grounds, or to condemn as absolutely unsound, in a purely philosophical sense, a work essentially in accordance with the scholastic system, on account of any particular opinions of its author on topics of difference among Catholic teachers of acknowledged scientific eminence and authority.

We are sorry to be obliged to say that, in our judgment, F. Louage's work cannot be exempted by the most impartial criticism from either theological or philosophical censure for radical unsoundness on most important points, and besides this, that it cannot stand the test of even literary criticism, and is, therefore, wholly unsuitable for use as a text-book in Catholic schools. We give the author full credit for good intentions, and attribute his failure to accomplish his laudable undertaking simply to the fact that he has attempted a very difficult task, in which very few have achieved a remarkable success, without having duly estimated its arduous nature, and made the requisite preparation for coping with the formidable obstacles in the way of a happy issue.

We are bound to sustain the judgment we have pronounced by solid proofs and reasons, in view of the great importance of the subject to Catholic teachers and pupils, and this duty we shall now endeavor to fulfil, in accordance with the sentiment of the trite old philosophical adage:

And, first, we think that the author has underrated the average aptitude of our young men for philosophical studies. We have not the pleasure of knowing F. Louage's pupils or their literary attainments; but we presume that they are not worse off than the pupils of other Catholic colleges, where the philosophical education receives a far greater development than his “text-book for the use of schools” seems to warrant. We know, of course, that the literary instruction hitherto given in the public schools of this country is too light and superficial to serve as a fair preparation for philosophical pursuits; and we admit that even our Catholic schools and colleges, though certainly superior to most public institutions of a like kind, may yet complain in some measure of the same evil; but, notwithstanding this, we believe that those among our youths who feel any inclination to dedicate themselves to the study of philosophy have sufficient ability to master ten times as much of philosophical matter as F. Louage's text-book contains.

A book which pretends to embrace logic, metaphysics, and ethics within the narrow compass of about 220 small pages of clear type cannot be styled “a course of philosophy”; and when it claims to be “designed as a text-book for the use of schools,” it tends to give abroad a very wrong idea of the present condition of Catholic education in America. If our boys cannot have anything better than the superficial philosophy the “text-book” of the reverend author furnishes, we would say: Let them forsake philosophy, and be satisfied with the Catechism of the Christian Doctrine. Let them remain undisturbed in their humble simplicity, and do not foster in them the vain thought that they are superior to others, only because they have [pg 234] learned by heart a few philosophical phrases, which they would be embarrassed to defend, and even to explain.

The London Tablet, November 22, 1873, remarks that our author “does not go very deeply into anything.” This remark is true. Many important philosophical doctrines are not even mentioned by him; his book says nothing about universals, nothing about the essential constituents of being, nothing about real and logical distinction, nothing about simplicity and composition, nothing about quantity and quality. We do not think that any one can aspire to the honor of being a philosopher without a clear and distinct knowledge of these subjects, and of the many momentous questions connected with them.

Again, the “text-book” is altogether silent about creation, its true notion, its possibility, its reality, and its final end—a silence which is all the more remarkable, as every one knows how pertinaciously this Christian and philosophical dogma is attacked every day by the adepts of the rationalistic schools. The “text-book” ignores cosmology altogether; and therefore it does not even allude to any theory concerning the constitution of bodies, the nature of matter, the laws of physical causation, or the conditions of natural phenomena. Neither is anything said in particular about the origin of the human soul—a subject concerning which many ancient and modern errors should have been pointed out and refuted; nor anything about that important truth that the soul is the form of the body; nor anything about the scholastic view of the origin of ideas—a view which the author should not have silently passed over, but was obliged to refute before concluding, as he does, in favor of the exploded ontologistic system.

In his theodicy we have sought in vain for any mention of a positive conservation of creatures, or of God's immediate concurrence with all creatures in their operations. We only found a few remarks, altogether unsatisfactory, on the “influence” of God over the free actions of man. The “text-book” is equally deficient in ethics, where the whole discussion about the ultimate end of man is entirely forgotten, although it is unquestionably one of the cardinal points of moral philosophy. Natural rights are not even mentioned; habits, virtues, and passions are likewise absolutely ignored.

We might go on enumerating other deficiencies of the “text-book”; but as we have other things more important to notice, we will only point out in general that scarcely any modern error is directly impugned, and scarcely any of the plausible arguments advanced by modern thinkers against such capital truths as divine providence, human liberty, etc., are answered or even hinted at. We cannot be surprised, then, that Dr. Brownson regards this “modest work” as “simpler and more easily understood by the English reader ignorant of Latin and the scholastics” than F. Hill's work. It is clear that it must be so; for, when all things difficult are set aside, what remains must be just as easy as any “reader ignorant of Latin and the scholastics” can desire. But “the fact is,” as the London Tablet very wisely observes, “that such books as this are a mistake. We have had plenty such as this from France before, their use in [pg 235] schools and colleges being pernicious, as we can testify; because they create either a slovenly or a sceptical habit of mind. Either a lazy student sees difficulties and questions suggested, and he takes no trouble to get the things explained to him, or a clever, active-minded boy is induced to dub logic and metaphysics humbug, and to ruminate on his own imaginings and wayward reasonings.”

An elementary course of philosophy, to be really useful, should be nothing less than an accurate summary of some complete standard work already accepted and recognized by good philosophical and theological authorities; so that the student may know that, in case of need, he can, by referring to the latter, solve the doubts and difficulties now and then arising from the incompleteness and brevity of the former. We have many such courses of philosophy in the Latin language. They are the work of patient writers, who carefully collected and methodically condensed in their books the learning and the wisdom of centuries for the benefit of those who needed an introduction to the philosophical discipline. Any student who can make use of such Latin books perceives, while going through his course of philosophy, that he is brought into constant relation with the most eminent thinkers of the classical philosophical ages, knows that their works are always accessible to him, and is gratified to think that their recognized authority affords him a solid guarantee against the subreption of fallacious doctrines. When such conditions as these are realized, it is evident that an elementary course of philosophy may be very useful indeed. But such is not the case with an English course of philosophy designed as a text-book for those who do not understand Latin. Such a text-book cannot refer the English student who knows nothing but English to other complete and approved works of philosophy; for we have none such in our language.

It seems to us that before we can employ a good English text-book of philosophy for the use of schools to the best advantage, we must be provided with a great, sound, and exhaustive philosophical work in our own language, to which the student would refer for all those questions and difficulties which cannot be sufficiently explained in an elementary course. We think that even F. Hill's English Elements of Philosophy, excellent as it is, needs to be supplemented by a higher English philosophical work. Those of his pupils who cannot consult the Latin volumes of the schoolmen may frequently remain in doubt as to the proper settlement of many important questions which their professor did not judge necessary or possible to examine thoroughly in his valuable book; and we have no doubt that all professors of philosophy will agree with us that such a great English work as we suggest—a very arsenal of good philosophical weapons—is one of the greatest necessities of our time and of our country. Without it, all our philosophical efforts are doomed to be more or less insufficient and unsuccessful.

And now, let us come to another consideration. If any book needs to be extremely correct in its expressions and definitions, surely elementary text-books for beginners must be so; for, if the foundation is wrong, what is built upon it cannot be right. Now, we are sorry to say that F. Louage's Course of [pg 236]Philosophy teems with false notions and incorrect expressions. Dr. Brownson openly rejects the author's definition of philosophy, of being, of existence, of possibility, of essence, of science; and in the main he is evidently right. Yet, while we admit with Dr. Brownson that “the science of the supersensible” is not a good definition of philosophy, we do not adopt his own definition, “the science of principles”; because we know that the true definition of philosophy is “the science of things (supersensible or not) through their highest principles.” Nor do we agree with him that F. Louage's definition of being—“that which exists or may exist”—is incorrect; for, although what may exist, but does not exist, is no thing in the real order, yet it is something in the ideal order, as an object of thought; and therefore F. Louage's definition of being is perfectly correct.

His definition of possibility, as “the agreement of the attributes which constitute a being, in such a way that its existence does not involve any contradiction,” we do not approve, not exactly for the reason adduced by Dr. Brownson, that the non-existent has no attributes, but because the definition considers the attributes as “constituents” of being (which they are not), and because the word “agreement” should either be replaced by “non-repugnance,” or at least qualified by the epithet “intellectual,” referring to the divine intellect, in which all possibilities are ideally contained.

That “the essence of a being consists of the collection of its essential attributes,” as the author of the “text-book” says (p. 7), is certainly a great error. The attributes of a being are not the material components of its essence, nor do they precede the essence; it is, on the contrary, from the essence itself that all the attributes flow. The essence of any given being is nothing else than “the ratio of a given act to its term,” as has been clearly established by a writer in The Catholic World, March, 1874, and the attributes of any given being are nothing else than different aspects of the actuality of its essence.

It is no less erroneous to say that “a genus is a collection of beings having one or more attributes common to each” (p. 8). This definition might be admitted in natural history; but, in philosophy, genus is not a collection, nor is it conceived by composition, but by abstraction. Genus is usually defined to be “a ratio which can be found in many things, and be predicated of each of them when an incomplete answer is given to the question What is it?” To confound the universal with the collective is inexcusable, we think, in a “text-book” of philosophy.

“A species,” says the author, “is a collection of beings belonging to one and the same genus, but having particular and constitutive properties” (p. 8). Same remark as above: Species, in philosophy, is not a collection, but is “a ratio which can be found in many things, and be predicated of each of them when a complete answer is given to the question, What is it?” Species, like genus, is a universal.

“Being, the most general genus, is divided into two species, corporeal and incorporeal beings” (p. 8). No philosopher of good reputation has ever considered being as a “genus.” It is known that “being” is above all genus, and accordingly is called “transcendental.” [pg 237] If “being” were a genus, nothing could save us from pantheism.

“Science ... is objective, when we consider it as existing in the object contemplated” (p. 9). Can science be considered as existing in the moon?

“Art is the application of science to external things according to determined rules” (p. 9). If so, then all artists and artisans should be men of science; which, unhappily, is not true. Art is usually and rightly defined as Recta ratio factibilium—“a right method of making anything” with or without the application of science.

“Logic is the first part of philosophy—the part which treats of the first efforts of the human mind to discover truth” (p. 17). We think that apprehension, judgment, and reasoning, which are the proper object of logic, are no efforts of the human mind, but very natural and spontaneous operations.

“An idea may be considered as existing either in the mind or out of it” (p. 18). It is very improper to give the name of idea to anything out of the mind, as words, gestures, and other outward natural or conventional signs.

“Ideas are, first, either true or false. They are true when they conform with their objects, false when they do not. But since this conformity is always with the objects as represented in our minds, and not as they may be in reality, we may, with this explanation, admit the opinion of those who pretend that there are no false ideas” (p. 20). This explanation has no grounds. Ideas are never compared with the objects as represented in our minds. Such a comparison would have no meaning; for the object as represented in our minds is nothing else than a subjective form identical with the idea itself. When philosophers say that there are no false ideas, they mean that ideas always conform to their object as it shows itself. This is the common and true doctrine. Even the author himself, probably forgetful of what he had said in this passage, teaches, a few pages later, that “we cannot err in perceiving or in feeling” (p. 23).

“An idea is distinct when it can be readily separated from any other idea, ... and is confused when the object cannot be distinctly determined” (p. 21). We believe that ideas are called “distinct,” not when they can be readily separated from one another (a thing which we cannot even conceive), but when they represent distinctly their object in all its particulars. In the contrary case, they are called “confused.”

“The extension of an idea signifies the whole collection of the individuals which the same idea embraces” (p. 21). This is false. The extension of an idea is the range of its universality; and we have already remarked that universality is not a collection of individuals. Moreover, it is comprehension that “embraces” whatever it comprehends, while extension embraces nothing, but only “reaches” potentially the terms to which it extends, inasmuch as the idea is applicable to them.

“When, in order to form a species, we collect several individuals having common properties, we perform an operation which is called generalization” (p. 22). This is very wrong. Generalization, says Webster, “is the act of reducing particulars to their genera”; and this cannot be done by collecting individuals, but only by leaving aside whatever is individual, [pg 238] and retaining that which is common.

“When the mind, after having compared two ideas, declares their consistency or their inconsistency, it makes a judgment” (p. 23). The mind properly compares, not the ideas themselves, but their objects as cognized. Two ideas may be found consistent, and yet no judgment be made. Thus, I see that the idea of whiteness is consistent with the idea of paper; but does it follow that my mind judges the paper to be white? Not at all. It might as well judge the paper to be green; for the idea of green is no less consistent with the idea of paper. It is therefore evident that the mind in judging does not declare the consistency or inconsistency of two ideas, but affirms the mutual inclusion or exclusion of two objective terms as apprehended.

“Nothing is more obscure or less useful than such classifications (of categories)” (p. 24). The author should have been loath to condemn what all great philosophers have praised. He might have considered that classification, as in all the other sciences, so also in philosophy, brings clearness, and that clearness is very useful.

“Reasoning is said to be immediate when no comparison is needed” (p. 30). How can there be reasoning without the comparison of two terms with a third?

“Method is that operation of the mind, etc.” (p. 44). Method is the order followed in the operation; the operation itself is the use of method.

“Induction ... is an operation of the mind inducing us to affirm, etc.” (p. 46). Why “inducing us”? It is the conclusion that is induced, not ourselves.

“The criterion of certitude is the sign by which certitude is perfectly distinguished from error” (p. 52). We remark, that there are criteria of truth, but not properly of certitude. Certitude is the firm adhesion of the mind to the truth made known to it, and needs no criterion, because it certifies itself by its very existence. The author says that “certitude is at the same time a state and an act of the mind. As a state, it may be defined to be a disposition by which the mind tends to adhere firmly to the known truth” (p. 50). But this is a great mistake. First, the act of adhering to truth is an act of judging, not an act of certitude. Secondly, the state of certitude is not a disposition by which the mind tends to adhere to truth. So long as the mind tends to adhere, there is no adhesion, and therefore no certitude. Certitude is the rest of the mind in the known truth.

“Reason is a perception” (p. 62). It is superfluous to remark that reason is a faculty, and no perception is a faculty.

“Consciousness cannot be deceived, although it may deceive” (p. 62). How can consciousness deceive? And if it can deceive, on what ground does the author immediately add: “Hence consciousness gives true certitude”?

“The evidence of senses is that invincible propensity which induces us to refer our sensations to the bodies which, according to our conviction, have been the cause of them” (p. 63). We observe, that our propensity cannot be our evidence. Our evidence must be objective, whilst our propensity is a subjective disposition. The evidence of senses is the evident perception of an object acting on the [pg 239] senses. The invincible propensity is nothing but the necessity of yielding to that evidence.

“Common sense is nothing else than that general knowledge of first notions or principles which is found in all men” (p. 65). Common sense, according to Webster, is that power of the mind which, by a kind of instinct or a short process of reasoning, perceives truth, the relation of things, cause and effect, etc., and hence enables the possessor to discern what is right, useful, or proper, and adopt the best means to accomplish his purpose. This definition, or rather description, is wonderfully correct. That kind of instinct, in fact, which the Scotch philosophers wrongly consider as blind, is really nothing less than a short process of reasoning, which carries evidence within itself. Reasoning, when formal—that is, when its premises and its conclusion present themselves distinctly and in a logical form, as in the scientific demonstration—carries within itself what may be styled reflex evidence; and, when informal—that is, when the conclusion and its grounds present themselves as implied in one another without assuming the formal shape of an argument—it carries within itself what may be called direct evidence; and because it is in this second manner that men commonly acquire their first convictions, this shorter and informal process of reasoning is called reasoning of common sense. Accordingly, common sense is not merely “a general knowledge,” but a source of general knowledge, extending to all conclusions that are evident but informal, and especially to moral dictates, such as “Good is to be done,” “Evil is to be shunned,” “God is to be honored,” etc., which in fact have ever been known by the special name of judgments of common sense—sensus naturæ communis.

“The laws of nature, considered individually, are contingent” (p. 76). Would they cease to be contingent if they were not considered individually?

“Metaphysics literally means above nature, and nature here signifies the material world” (p. 81). These two assertions do not agree with the common notion of metaphysics, and have been refuted in The Catholic World for December, 1873.

“Special metaphysics has been called pneumatology” (p. 81). Pneumatology is only a part of special metaphysics. Every one knows that cosmology and anthropology belong to special metaphysics no less than natural theology.

“In this dissertation (ontology) we consider being as abstracted from existence” (p. 81). Ontology does not consider being as abstracted from existence, but considers being as such, and therefore as existing either in the order of things, or at least in the order of ideas. It is as impossible to conceive being as abstracted from existence as to conceive a circle as abstracted from rotundity.

“Some existence must have existed before any possibility” (p. 84). We do not like the expression “existence exists,” as we would not like this other, “velocity runs.” Moreover, possibilities are co-eternal with God; it is therefore incorrect to say that some existence must have existed before them.

“Principle is that which contains the reason for the existence of something.... Cause is that which produces something, or which [pg 240] concurs in the production of something” (p. 85). These definitions are very vague and unsatisfactory, to say the least.

“The condition is the difficulty to be conquered in order to obtain the effect” (p. 86). By no means. Is the presence of the object a difficulty to be conquered in order to see it?

“The end ... has been improperly called the final cause” (p. 87). Why “improperly”?

“Modification ... is the substance appearing to us with such or such determined form” (p. 89). Quite absurd. Modification is not the substance, but the accidental form itself, no matter whether appearing or not appearing to us.

“Modification cannot exist without substance, nor substance without modification” (p. 90). This proposition is too universal. Would the author admit modifications in the divine substance?

“Some authors divide infinite into the infinite actu, or the actual infinite, ... and the infinite potentia, or the potential or virtual infinite, which can be infinitely increased or diminished. But certainly this division cannot be accepted, since the infinite and a substance which can be increased are two terms involving contradiction” (p. 91). What the author calls “some authors” are all the schoolmen. We put to him the following question: Will the human soul have a finite or an infinite duration? If finite, it must have an end; but, if it has no end, it cannot but be the contradictory of finite—that is, infinite. Yet this infinite duration is successive; it is therefore not actually, but potentially, infinite. Hence the division of the schoolmen can and must be accepted. The author thinks that the potential infinite is not infinite, but indefinite; but surely what has no end is infinite, not indefinite, although it is conceived by us indefinitely, because it transcends our comprehension. The indefinite is not that which has no end, but that of which the end remains undetermined.

“That we have in our mind the idea of the infinite is certain.... Evidently it has been placed in our mind by God himself, since the finite could not give the idea of the infinite” (p. 91, 92). We undoubtedly have a notion of the infinite; but the author gratuitously assumes that this notion is an idea placed in our minds from without, while the fact is that such a notion is not an idea, but a concept of our mind, or a result of intellectual operation. Of course, the finite cannot give us the idea of the infinite; but from the finite we can, and we do, form a concept of the infinite. This is the true and common doctrine. We cannot undertake to give in this place a refutation of ontologism; we only remark that the ontologistic theory is so generally repudiated that it should not find a place in a text-book for the use of schools.

“A material being is one which is essentially extensive and inert” (p. 92). If so, how can the author consider as “more acceptable” the view of Leibnitz, that “a monad is essentially unextensive”? (p. 93).

“Spiritual substance is quadruple—namely, God, the angels, the human soul, and the soul of the beasts” (p. 93). The soul of the beasts spiritual!—a nice doctrine indeed for the use of schools. Nor is this an oversight of the author; for we find that he endows beasts with intellect also (p. 170). [pg 241] What shall we say, but that we live in an age of progress?

“The properties of a being are those parts which constitute the being” (p. 93). We have already observed that the being is constituted by its principles, and not by its properties.

“A being is true when it agrees with its own attributes” (p. 94). It would be more philosophical to say that a being is true when its constituent principles agree with one another.

“A bad action or a sin is something merely negative” (p. 95). False. The physical action is positive, and its sinfulness is not a negation, but a privation, as theologians know.

“We may define relation, in general, to be a property pertaining to a being when compared with another being” (p. 95). This is a wrong definition. Relation can hardly be called a property. Distance and time are relations; yet no one would dream of calling them properties.

“Identity is the perseverance of a being in the same state” (p. 96). The author should have said “in the same entity”; for a mere change of state does not destroy identity.

“Space is virtually (potentia) infinite, using the word infinite, as we have before explained, in the sense of indefinite. It is also immense and infinitely divisible” (p. 97). The author might have considered that immensity is infinity; and therefore, if space is immense, it is infinite, and not indefinite.

“Time is the duration of a being, or the permanence of its existence” (p. 97). Without successivity there is no time; and therefore the definition of time given by the author is essentially defective.

“Duration without an end ... is the same as immortality” (p. 98). If the earth is to last without an end, shall we call it immortal?

“Perfections are modifications of beings” (p. 107). This proposition, as understood by the author, who extends it to all the perfections of contingent beings, is evidently false.

“The Scotists teach that there is a real distinction among God's attributes” (p. 115). By no means. The Scotists would never have taught such a gross error. They taught that the distinction between God's absolute attributes was a formal, and not a real, distinction.

“For God, the interior acts are those whose object is himself” (p. 123). There are not many interior acts in God, as the author implies, but one permanent act only.

“It appears difficult to reconcile the immutability of God with his liberty. Three systems have been formed for this purpose, but they are not satisfactory” (p. 124). If the author had considered that God's liberty is all ad extra, and not ad intra, he would have seen that he had no right to qualify as he does the theological solution of the present difficulty. Each of the three solutions is satisfactory, at least in this sense: that each of them sets at naught the objections of the opponents. This is all we need. As to which of the three solutions is the best, it is not our duty to decide.

“Immensity means the same as omnipresence” (p. 130). This is not true. Omnipresence is relative, and its range is measured by the actual existence of creatures, as it does not extend beyond creation; while immensity is absolute, and transcends all created things.

“S. Thomas says that God also sees future free and contingent [pg 242] things in their essence—that is, that he sees them in his eternal and immutable decrees” (p. 133). Does the author mean that S. Thomas considers the essence of contingent things as equivalent to the eternal and immutable decrees?

“But Molina and his disciples contend that with such a system (S. Thomas's) it is impossible to defend human liberty” (p. 133). Here Molina and his disciples are represented as the decided adversaries of the Angelic Doctor. It is not fair. The author should have remembered that S. Thomas's doctrine is variously explained by various writers, and that it is possible to be a follower of S. Thomas without being a Thomist in the usual sense given to this word.

“Veracity consists in this: that a being can neither deceive nor be deceived” (p. 134). Shall we deny the author's veracity because he has been sometimes deceived?

“Justice is the attribute according to which we give to others what belongs to them” (p. 135). Justice with us is a virtue, not an attribute; with God, justice is an attribute, but does not consist in giving to others what belongs to them; it consists in giving to others what the order of reason demands.

“Providence is, therefore, a continuous creation” (p. 137). The mistake is evident. It is conservation, not providence, that is thus defined.

“The action of God upon us during life is constant, and this is what we mean by his providence” (p. 137). This is another mistake. The author confounds the notion of providence with that of concursus.

“In regard to its wrong use (of liberty), God cannot have an immediate, but only a mediate, influence on man's actions, in the sense that he has granted liberty of which a bad use is made against his suggestions. His sanctity forbids that he should act immediately in that case” (p. 138). Not at all. God immediately concurs to all our actions, whether good or bad, as every theologian knows, inasmuch as they are physical actions; and concurs neither immediately nor mediately to their badness, because their badness is nothing but a privation, and therefore requires no efficient cause.

The author misrepresents (pp. 138, 139) the doctrine of the Molinists concerning the influence (concursus) of God upon our actions. He says that this influence, according to the Molinists, “is positive and direct, but not on our will,” and “consists in affording a concourse of circumstances the most suitable for the determination.” The author may have found this interpretation of Molina's doctrine in some old book; but it is known that the Molinists have always admitted God's influence “on our will,” though they never admitted the physical predetermination; and it is no less certain that none of them maintain that “a concourse of circumstances” suffices to explain God's influence on our free actions.

We are afraid that the reader must be tired of following us in this enumeration of philosophical, theological, and historical mistakes, and we ourselves are tired of our irksome task. Indeed, the psychology and the ethics of our author are open to as much criticism as the rest of the work; but what we have said abundantly suffices to justify our opinion that F. Louage's text-book has no claim to adoption in Catholic schools. Accordingly, we [pg 243] shall omit the detailed examination of the last 86 pages of his work. But we cannot conceal the fact that we have been much surprised and pained at the open profession of ontologism made by the author in his article “On the Nature and Origin of our Ideas.” That Dr. Brownson, in his Review, should try to show that his own ontologism can be philosophically defended and does not fall under ecclesiastical condemnation, we do not wonder. He is not a priest; he does not write for school-boys, but addresses himself to educated men, who can sift his arguments, and dismiss with a benign smile what they think to be unsound; and, after all, he takes great care to screen himself behind a newly invented distinction between ideal intuition, and perception or cognition, based on the assumption, honestly maintained by him, that “intuition is the act of the object, not of the subject.” But with our “text-book” the case is very different. F. Louage makes no distinctions, and takes no precautions. He declares unconditionally that “God is present to our intellect, and seen by it,” and that “all rational ideas come into the mind by the intuitive perception of the simple being, or of God,” and that, “in a word, all rational ideas, after all, are nothing else than the idea of the simple being (God) considered in itself” (p. 156). Can the author be ignorant that this doctrine coincides with the doctrine which, on the 18th of September, 1861, the Roman Congregation of the Holy Inquisition has declared to be untenable (tuto tradi non posse)? The reverend author believes that “this doctrine has been held by S. Augustine, S. Anselm, S. Bonaventure, Bossuet, and many others”; but we doubt whether this fact, even if it were well established, would afford him sufficient protection against the Roman declaration. We presume, in fact, that S. Augustine, S. Anselm, etc., are better known and understood in Rome than in America. But, waiving all discussion on the subject, we cannot but repeat that a text-book for Catholic schools must not teach as “the true doctrine,” and not even as a probable doctrine, what the Catholic Church shuns as unsound, unsafe, and untenable. This “true doctrine,” nevertheless, he says, is “a mere hypothesis”!

And here we stop. We have given sixty passages of F. Louage's book, by which it is manifest that his course of philosophy is as sadly deficient in philosophical accuracy as it is glaringly incomplete in its survey of the philosophical topics. It is to be regretted that a man of his facility in writing has not devoted himself to some subject more congenial to his talents. Such books as this are a mistake. A philosophy which is not precise in its definitions nor deep in its bearings can only do harm. Such a philosophy will certainly not enable the young student successfully to uphold truth, nor make him proof against sophistry, nor afford him any guidance whatever in after-life. It will, on the contrary, lay him open to temptation and seduction, as it will open his eyes to many objections which he has not the power to solve. Indeed, unpretending common sense is safer for individuals and for nations than a superficial philosophical training. A sad experience shows this to be a fact. It was shallow philosophy that most powerfully aided the spread of rationalism and infidelity in France, Germany, and other European nations. America needs no such thing.

We need thorough and comprehensive philosophical teaching in accordance with the tradition of the schools which have been formed and directed by the highest ecclesiastical authority, and which shall be conducted by men thoroughly competent for the task. The only fruit our youth can gather from any other system will be noxious in its effects both on their minds and their morals. Yet, as we cannot remain idly waiting and doing nothing until the perfect system of education descends from heaven, we cannot dismiss this important matter without a few more remarks upon the practical course to be pursued under our present disadvantages.

In the first place, we renew our recommendation of F. Hill's text-book for all classes which cannot make use of a Latin manual, and are capable of understanding the above-mentioned treatise. Professors who understand the Latin language can prepare themselves to elucidate and supplement the text by their own lectures and explanations. Those who read French will find in the translation of F. Kleutgen's Philosophie der Vorzeit into that language an exposition of scholastic philosophy, with a refutation of modern errors, which will be of the greatest utility. Those who read German are referred to the works of Dr. Stöckl, and those who read Italian to San Severino83 and the admirable treatise of Liberatore—Della Conoscenza Intellettuale. It is a pity that these works of Kleutgen and Liberatore could not be at once translated into English, while we are waiting for the coming man who will give us a great original work. The Catholic Unions which are so devotedly pursuing “studies” in respect to education, or some other society of young men anxious to promote their own intellectual culture, could not do better than to provide for the necessary expense of making and publishing these and similar translations. The English language is poorly provided with works of this kind. If the study of Latin must be excluded from the education of so many of our intelligent and cultured young men, or so superficially pursued as to be practically useless, it cannot be too earnestly recommended to them to learn the French, German, and Italian languages, or at least one or two of them, that they may have access to their rich and abundant stores of Catholic literature, contained not only in books, but in the periodicals, which are conducted with an ability and extended over a range of subjects far beyond what our own have yet attained. This last remark applies especially to the French periodicals. The best works ought, however, to be translated into English, and the only obstacle to this desirable work is the expense, which at present effectually hinders its being done, except for very popular and salable books.

Something ought to be done to enable young men who discover at a later period, when they are already engaged in the business of life, the defects of their education, to supply these in some way. The manly and sensible letter of the alumni of the Dublin Catholic University to the Irish bishops expresses a want felt not only by young men in Ireland, but also in England and America. These young Irishmen point out two notable defects in their collegiate instruction—a defect [pg 245] of instruction in physical science, and a defect of instruction in the science of Catholic doctrine. The Irish bishops, and the English bishops also, are beginning energetic and wise measures for the improvement of higher education for Catholic young men. At present, there seems no immediate prospect of similar measures being undertaken in this country; but, as a practical substitute, we venture to suggest to Catholic Unions and other societies that courses of lectures would partly supply that lack, which is felt by so many, of the more regular and systematic instruction which they did not receive at college.

In respect to the actual instruction at present given in schools, there remains one other important point to be noticed. It is a regular part of the plan of study in our academies for young ladies, to give them lessons in philosophy during the last two years of their course. After a short course of pure logic, which presents no special difficulty, the pupils of the academies under the Ladies of the Sacred Heart—which may be taken as a specimen, we suppose, of other schools of similar grade—have two lessons a week in what is called “mental philosophy,” and another lesson in ethics, during two years. The early age at which the pupils graduate, which is usually about the completion of their eighteenth year, and the many branches of study they are expected to pursue, make it impossible to give more time to these lessons. F. Hill's text-book seems to be too difficult for use in these schools under the present circumstances. Some might think it would be better to drop the study of philosophy altogether in young ladies' schools, and cite in their own favor what we have said above of the mischief of superficial instruction in this science. But, in the first place, if we were to give this counsel, there is no probability that it would be followed; and our own acquaintance with the intellectual condition and wants of this very interesting and important class of young people induces us to think, that they cannot be relegated entirely to the catechism class, and really require instruction in these higher branches of mental and moral science. We would like to see the experiment of using F. Hill's Philosophy fairly tried with these classes, before it is rejected as too difficult. If an easier one is found to be necessary, the only thing to be done is to try to make such a text-book, which shall be solid, accurate, sufficiently comprehensive, and yet written with a lucidity of style and explained with an appositeness of illustration, by examples, which will make it intelligible both to the teachers and the pupils. A difficult task, certainly, and requiring a very unusual combination of high intellectual capacity and science with tact and skill in the adaptation of style and manner to the condition of the juvenile mind. Yet is it not equally difficult to make a good catechism? If it is feasible to produce such a text-book, we think there are classes of boys for whom it would be as useful as for female pupils. There are unquestionably women, as well as men, who need and are capable of a much higher intellectual discipline than that which is possible for the generality; but we see no way for such persons to obtain what they desire, except by their own private reading, aided by the advice of a learned and judicious counsellor, unless some change were made in [pg 246] the present system by providing a longer course and more advanced instruction for a select class of pupils.

This leads us to remark that the religious women who are dedicated to the work of higher instruction need themselves better preparation for their elevated and important task than they can at present receive in convents. Beyond their previous education in the convent-school, which prepares them only to give what they have received, they can at present proceed no further, except by private study, for which both time and proper books are lacking. Lectures by learned priests, which advanced pupils might attend, would be the most effectual means of giving this training. And as the principal object of these higher studies is not a mere intellectual culture, but education in the principles and doctrines of the Catholic religion, there is need of more thorough doctrinal, and we might even say theological instruction in convent-schools, from priests who can devote a large part of their time and labor to a truly pastoral care of this choice and precious portion of Christ's flock—religious women and the young girls under their maternal care. There are many things to be amended and improved in all departments of Catholic education. Emendemus in melius quod ignoranter peccavimus.

Easter.

Grapes And Thorns. Chapter XI. A Harvest of Thorns.

By The Author Of “The House of Yorke.”

One of the greatest severities in the imprisonment of a criminal is, probably, that he can no longer see the wide earth nor the free skies, so that not only is his body cramped, but his mind is thrown back on itself, and forbidden to send out those long tendrils which can sometimes shoot through the eyes, and fasten on distant objects, when those near by are repelling. Moreover, the universe itself becomes to him like another prisoner, and he can scarcely believe that the large, smooth creation sails uninterruptedly on its way when he sees of it but one little spot for ever shut in by the bars of his cell.

Mr. Schöninger's window in the jail had been low, giving him a sight of the street not far away; but his cell in the prison was higher up, and separated from the window by a passage. Sitting or lying down, therefore, he saw only a small square of sky; and standing, the topmost line of a blue hill became visible. Only one other earthly object was in sight; and as time passed by that became still less and less of earth, and assumed a variable but always supernatural character: it was the stone Christ that stood on the church not far away. He could see all of it but the lowest hem of the robe; and as it stood there, surrounded by air alone, above the narrow line of the distant hill, it seemed an awful colossal being walking in over the edge of a submerged world. At morning, when the sky was bright behind it, it darkened, the lineaments of the face were lost in a shadow that was like a frown, and its garments and its hands were full of gloom. At one season there were a few days when the risen sun at a certain hour surrounded the head with an intolerable splendor, and then it was an image of wrath and judgment. It wore quite another character on bright evenings, when, the setting sun shining in its face, it came, white and glowing, down the hillside, with arms outstretched, full of irresistible love and invitation. To see this image, he had to stand at the grated door of his cell. When sitting or lying down, there was no view for the prisoner but a square of sky barred off by iron rods; and as the earth rolled, his view travelled with it, day after day going over the same track in the terrestrial sphere. At evening a few pale stars went by, afar off, and so unaware of him that they were like distant sails to the shipwrecked mariner, hovering on the horizon and disappearing, each failure a new shipwreck to him.

One morning, when he opened his eyes just as day was beginning to flicker in the east, he saw a large, full star, so brilliant that it trembled in the silvery sky, as if about to spill its brimming gold. It was so alive, so intelligent, so joyous, that he raised himself and looked at it [pg 248] as he would have looked at a fair and joyful face appearing at the door of his cell. Surely it was like good tidings, that glad star in the east! He got up, and, as he rose, there rose up whitely against the sky the Christ of the Immaculate Conception, seeming almost transparent in that pure light.

The prisoner knelt on the stone floor of his cell, and lifted his hands. “God of my fathers,” he said, “deliver me! for I am turned in my anguish whilst the thorn is fastened!”

It was the first prayer he had uttered since the night of his arrest, except those outcries which were more the expression of anger and a devouring impatience than of petition. Having uttered it, he lay down again, and tried to sleep. He dreaded the thronging thoughts and tormenting pains of the day, and there was a tender sweetness in this new mood which he would fain have kept and carried off into sleep. To keep it by him, he called up that story suggested by what he had just seen, the star in the east and the Christ. He did not believe it, but he found it soothing. It came to him like David's song to Saul, and, though but a mythical story, as that was but a song, it kept down the tigers of anger and despair which threatened to rise and tear him.

It was his own Judæa, which he had never seen, indeed, but which was to him what the fountain is to the stream—the source of his being. How fair and peaceful was that silent night that overhung, unbarred by iron bolts, free from horizon to horizon! The holy city was sleeping, and by its side slept Bethlehem. Within a stable a fair young matron had just laid her newly-born child on its bed of straw, while Joseph, his Jewish brother, ministered to both, feeling sad and troubled, it must be, that those so dear to him were so illy cared for at such a time. The ox and the ass looked on with large, mild eyes, and warmed the air with their breath. It was poor, but how peaceful, how tender, how free! The open door and windows of that poor stable were to him more beautiful than the barred and guarded portal of a Herod or a Cæsar.

Yet with what a blaze of glory the Christian church had surrounded this simple human picture! The poor man who had been able to give his family no better shelter than a stable was held by them more honored than Herod or Cæsar; and cherubim, bright and warm from heaven, like coals just from a fire, drew near to gaze with him, and burned with a still white light above his head. They called this matron a miraculous mother, they showered titles over her like flowers and gems, they placed the moon beneath her feet, and wreathed the stars of heaven into a garland for her head.

How terrible and how beautiful was this Christian legend! The Jew had abhorred it as a blasphemy, and his blood chilled as he suffered his thought to touch one instant the awful centre of this strange group—the Babe to whose small hand these idolaters gave the power to crush the universe, on whose tiny head they placed the crown of omnipotence. It was useless to try to sleep. The soothing human picture had blazed out with such an awakening supernatural glory that he could not even lie still. He rose again, and stood at the door of his cell. The star had melted from sight, the peaceful, [pg 249] cloudless morning was spreading over the sky, and where the feet of the Christ stood on the hill-top the beams of the sun were sparkling. Beautiful upon the mountains were the feet of Him who brought good tidings.

“A Christian would call it miraculous,” he muttered, looking at that light; and he shuddered as he spoke. But that shudder did not come from the depths of his soul, where a new light and peace were brooding. It was like the clamor and confusion outside the doors of the temple when the Lord had driven forth the money-changers, and was less an expression of abhorrence than a casting out of abhorrence.

The Jew did not know that, however, nor guess nor inquire what had happened in his soul. He scarcely thought at all, but stood there and let the light steep him through. Some dim sense of harmony stole over him, as if he heard a smooth and noble strain of music, and for the first time since his imprisonment he remembered his loved profession, and longed to feel the keys of a piano or an organ beneath his hand. His fingers unconsciously played on the iron bars, and he hummed a tune lowly to himself, without knowing what it was.

“How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of Him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace!”

Then, catching himself idle and dreaming, he turned away from the grating, took a book from the table, and began to read.

This book had been to Mr. Schöninger an intellectual substitute for that spiritual consolation which he had not. Finding early in his imprisonment that his mind was working itself into a frenzy over the horrors of his position, and injuring him physically more even than confinement did, he had begun the study of a language with which he was entirely unacquainted, and, whenever he found his thoughts accomplishing nothing profitable, he turned them resolutely to this study, and bent them, with the whole force of his will, to learning dry rules and regulations. The discipline had saved him much, but it had not prevented his growing thin and haggard, and loathing food, and almost forgetting how to sleep.

But on this morning study did not seem so much a refuge as a task. The prisoner lifted his eyes now and then from the book, and looked outward to the sky, and then dropped them again, still in a dream, and wondering at himself. So might the sea have wondered when its waves sank to rest beneath the divine feet of the Lord passing over.

How many times during those terrible months he had striven to produce a perfect calm in his own soul by calling up stoical thoughts, and all in vain; or, if not in vain, the only effect had been a temporary and enforced calm.

Nor was it unworthy a manly and reasonable character that such an effect as he now experienced should be produced by something which, apparently, appealed only to the artistic or the marvellous. Every soul has its beautiful gate; and if truth, walking about outside, should choose to enter by that vine-wreathed portal, and reach the citadel by way of gardens and labyrinths, instead of approaching by the broad avenue of reason, who shall say that it is not as well? Besides, in the artist, that gate stands always open.

It was those same sunbeams, shining on the hill-top, and speaking to the lonely prisoner of a dawn of hope and joy, which to Annette Gerald's eyes had flashed like the two-edged sword by whose lightnings the first sinners in the world had fled out into the desert. But this sorrowful daughter of Eve missed one of the consolations of our first mother; for Eve could lament aloud, and call on all creation to weep with her; but this later exile must take up her misery as if it were a delight.

She went about smilingly, making preparations for this little journey she had announced her intention of taking.

“But you needn't put everything in order, just as if you were never coming back again,” her mother said. “I'll see to things.”

She was sitting in Annette's chamber, and watching her at work.

“Well, mamma, just as you please,” the daughter answered gently, and touched her mother caressingly on the shoulder in passing.

A lock of Mrs. Ferrier's dark hair had fallen from the comb, and was hanging down her back. Annette paused to fasten it up, and, as she did so, caught quickly a pair of scissors near, and severed a little tress.

“What in the world are you cutting my hair for?” exclaimed Mrs. Ferrier, who had witnessed the operation in a looking-glass opposite.

Annette laughed and blushed. She had not meant to be detected. “I'll tell you when I come back, mamma. You shall see what I am going to have made. It will be something very wonderful.”

She turned quickly away, and bit her lip hard to keep down some rising emotion. She had seen a single thread of silver in that dark-brown tress, and the sight, touching at all times—the mother's first gray hair—brought with it the poignant thought that white hairs would come fast and thick when her mother should know what this journey meant.

“What are you taking all those common dresses for?” Mrs. Ferrier asked. “They are hardly fit to go to the mountains with.”

“Oh! we do not mean to be gay and fashionable,” was the light reply. “We want to have a quiet time by ourselves.”

“But you have got your jewel-case,” the mother persisted. “I don't see what you want of diamonds with a shabby black silk gown.”

In spite of the almost intolerable thought that after these few hours she would probably never see her mother again, Annette found this oversight irritating. Yet not for anything would she have spoken one word that was not dictated by respect and affection. The only way was to escape now, and make her preparations afterward, and for that she had an excuse.

“By the way, mamma,” she said, “I want to see F. Chevreuse, and this is just the hour to catch him at home. Won't you take your drive now, and leave me at his house? Wouldn't you just as lief go out before lunch as after? You and I haven't had a drive together for a long time.”

And then, when she was alone, she made haste to put into her trunks all those common, useful articles which fitted her present needs, and the few souvenirs too dear to leave behind, and the valuables, which might some day be [pg 251] sold, if money should fail them. She had scarcely turned the key on them, when her mother came in again, pulling on her gloves. “I want to speak to F. Chevreuse myself,” she remarked, “and I will go in with you.”

Annette said nothing, but dressed herself hastily. It really seemed as though every obstacle were being placed in her way; yet how could she be impatient with her poor mother, whose heart was so soon to be smitten, through her, by a terrible grief, and who would soon recall in bitterness of soul every word and act of this their last day together? And, after all, she had no desire to talk with the priest. What could she say to him? All that was necessary was written, and she could not ask his blessing nor any service from him, nor even his forgiveness. The one thing he could do for them was to denounce them, set the officers of justice on their track, and make their lot worse than that of Cain, since the earth was no longer wide and wild, but close and full of watching eyes and prating tongues. The world seemed to her, indeed, oppressively small, having no least nook where the restless, curious traveller did not penetrate with his merciless pen, for ever ready to sketch all he heard and saw to gratify the equally restless and curious people at home.

“Is it a confession you have to make?” Mrs Ferrier asked, as they approached the priest's house.

They had been driving along in silence, and at this question Annette started and blushed violently. “Dear me, mamma!” she said, in answer to her mother's look of astonishment, “I was off a thousand miles, and you gave me such a start when you spoke. Yes, it is a confession. You can see F. Chevreuse first, and I will go in after. You need not wait for me. I am going to walk out to the convent to Sister Cecilia a few minutes. The walk will do me good; and afterward I would like to have you send the carriage there for me.”

The excitement under which she was laboring led her unconsciously to assume a decided and almost commanding tone, and her mother submitted without any opposition. Annette certainly did not look well, she thought; and, besides, she was going away. This last consideration was one of great weight with Mrs. Ferrier, for she looked on railroads and steam-boats as infernal contrivances expressly intended to destroy human life, and never saw persons in whom she was interested commit themselves to the mercies of these inventions without entertaining mournful apprehensions as to the probable result. Moreover, Annette had been very sweet and fond with her all day, and was looking very beautiful, with that wide-awake glance of her bright eyes, and the crimson color flickering like a flame in her cheeks.

“I think, dear, on the whole, I won't go in to-day,” she said. “It might take too long; for this is his busy time of day. To-morrow will do as well.”

Annette only nodded, unable to speak; but in stepping from the carriage, she laid her small hand on Mrs. Ferrier's, and gave it a gentle pressure.

“That girl grows prettier and sweeter every day,” said the mother to herself, as her daughter disappeared within the doorway. “And how black velvet does become her!”

Father Chevreuse knew well that no ordinary errand could have brought Annette Gerald to his house, and it was impossible for him to meet her with the ordinary forms of civility. Scarcely any greeting passed between them, as he rose hastily at her entrance, and waited for her first word. She was, perhaps, more collected than he.

“Are you quite alone here?” she asked.

He led her to the inner sitting-room, and closed the door after them, and even then did not think to offer her a chair any more than she thought of taking one.

“We have told mamma that we are going away this evening for a little journey, and she expects us to return in four weeks. John knows all about our affairs. At the end of four weeks, he will say something to you, or you to him, whichever you please, and at that time you will open and use this packet.” She gave him an envelope carefully sealed, with the date at which it was to be opened written on the outside. “If anything should happen to you in the meantime, some one else must open it; but care must be used not to have it read before the time.” She paused for an answer.

“You need not fear,” the priest said, taking the packet and looking it over. He thought a moment. “I will write also on this that, in the event of my death, it is to be opened by F. O'Donovan or by the bishop of the diocese.”

He went to a table, wrote the directions, and then gave them to Annette to read.

“It is a private paper of mine,” she said, after reading and giving it back; “and I have the right to say when it shall be read. I give it into your hands only on the condition that my directions shall be complied with.”

He bowed, understanding perfectly that the words were intended as a future shield for him.

“At the same time, you will open this also, which is yours,” she added, and gave him a paper roll sealed and tied, but without any direction.

F. Chevreuse shrank a little, took the roll, then let it drop from his trembling hand. The cold and business-like manner of his visitor and his sympathy for her had kept his thoughts fixed on her; but here was something which brought his mother's image up before him with a terrible distinctness. It was impossible for him not to know that this little package was what she had died in trying to save. Tears blinded his eyes. The last evening he had spent with her came back like a vision; he saw her face, heard her voice, saw her kneeling before him for his blessing.

Making an effort to control and hide his emotion, he stooped to take up the package he had dropped; and when he looked up again, his visitor had left the room, and was walking quickly to the street door. For one moment he stood irresolute; then he hurried after her. But she had already gone out, and either did not or would not hear him call her back.

The sight of her going away so, wrung all thought of selfish grief out of his mind. He went back into the room, and watched her as she walked swiftly up the street. So innocent, so generous, so brave as she was, yet of all the sufferers by this miserable tragedy, with one exception, the most unhappy! The grief that must fall upon the mother of the guilty one no one could [pg 253] fathom; but the mother of a criminal can never hold herself surely innocent of his crimes, since a greater holiness in her own life, a wiser care in his training, and a more constant prayerfulness in his behalf might have saved him; but the young wife was, of all people in the world, the most innocent and the most wronged.

How light and graceful her step was. Who would not think that it betokened a light heart? She met an acquaintance, and stopped for a word of greeting, and the friend came along afterward smiling, as though at some merry jest. Passing the house of another friend, she nodded and kissed her hand to a child in the window, with how bright a face the priest, who had seen her self-control, could well guess.

“Is there nothing I can do, nothing I can say, to help her?” he asked himself, turning away from the window. “It is cruel that one so young should bear alone such a burden! What can I do? What can I do?”

He searched in vain for some means of help. There was none. For what she should do her own wit or the advice of others must suffice; and for words of comfort, they were not for him to speak to her. Her manner had shown clearly the distance which she felt must lie between them, and there was no way but for him to accept that position. He could pray, and that was all.

By the time he had come to this conclusion, Annette Gerald had reached the convent, and was greeting Sister Cecilia.

“I have only two words to say to you, dear Sister,” she said, “and those may seem very childish, but are not so in reality. Lawrence and I are going to make a little journey, which may last about four weeks, and poor mamma will be lonely. Besides that, she will worry. She hates to have me go away from her. Will not you be very kind to her, if she should come to you? Oh! I know you always are that; but recollect, when you see her, that I am really all she has. A son does not count for much, you know, especially when he is a young man. Very few young men are much comfort to their mothers, I think. Tell F. Chevreuse the very first time you see him that I said this to you, but don't tell any one else. And now, dear Sister, I have but a little time, for we start this evening. If there is no one in the chapel, I would like to go in a while. People have got so in the habit of wandering into the Immaculate, and looking about carelessly, that it is no longer pleasant to go there.”

The same air, as of a person gentle, indeed, but not to be detained nor trifled with, which had impressed F. Chevreuse in his visitor, was felt by the Sister also. She rose at once, saying that there was no one in the chapel, and would not be for some time, all the Sisters being engaged, unless Anita should go in.

“Anita has not been well?” Mrs. Gerald remarked with absent courtesy.

“No; she has not been the same since that terrible trial,” the nun sighed.

Annette Gerald's face lost its absent expression, and took a somewhat haughty and unsympathizing look. “Is that all?” she inquired in a tone of surprise.

“But, you know,” expostulated the Sister, “Anita's testimony was of the greatest importance. Besides, [pg 254] the scene was a most painful one for her to be dragged into. She is such a tender, sensitive creature.”

Annette had paused just inside the parlor-door, and she had evidently no mind to let the subject drop indifferently.

“My dear Sister,” she said with decision, “I am truly sorry for your sweet little Anita; but I think it wrong to foster the idea that there are certain sensitive souls in the world who must be pitied if a breath blows on them, while others are supposed to be able to bear the hurricane without being hurt. A great deal of this shrinking delicacy comes from a selfish watching of one's own sensations, and forgetting those of others, and a great deal from being pampered by others. You remember, perhaps, an old myth, which I have half forgotten, of a Camilla who was fastened to a lance and shot across a stream. She was a woman soft and weak, perhaps, but she had to go. Now, in this world there is many a woman who has all the miserable sensitiveness and delicacy of her kind, but with that there is also a will, or an unselfishness, or a necessity which transfixes her like a spear, and carries her through all sorts of difficulties.” For one instant a flash of some passion, either of anger, impatience, or pain, or of all mingled, shot into the speaker's face, and seemed to thrill through all her nerves. “Oh! it is true in this world also,” she exclaimed, “that unto him that hath shall be given. The happy must be shielded from pain, and those who cry out at the prick of a pin must be tenderly handled; but the miserable may have yet more misery heaped on them, and the patient find no mercy.”

“My dear lady!” expostulated Sister Cecilia, when the other paused, quivering with excitement.

“Oh! I do not mean to speak harshly of your sweet little Anita,” interrupted Mrs. Gerald, recovering herself; “I was only reminded of others, that is all. But even to her I would recommend thinking more of the sufferings of others and less of her own.”

“It is precisely that which hurts her,” replied the Sister, a little displeased. “She thinks of the sufferings of others, and, fancying that she has caused them, breaks her heart about it.”

Annette made a motion to go, and had an air of thinking very slightingly of the young novice's troubles. “She merely did her duty, and has no responsibility whatever,” she said. “The child needs to be scolded, and set about some hard, wholesome work. It would do her good to work in the garden, and spend a good deal of time in the open air. A person who has been taken possession of by some morbid idea should never be shut up in a house.”

Sister Cecilia suffered her visitor to pass on without saying another word. She was surprised and deeply hurt at the little sympathy shown their household flower and pet, yet she could not but perceive that, in a general way, much that had been said was quite true.

Passing by the chapel-door shortly after, she saw Annette Gerald on her knees before the altar, with her head bowed forward and hidden in her hands. Half an hour afterwards, when Mrs. Ferrier's carriage came, she was still in the same position, and had to be spoken to twice before she was roused. Then she started and looked up in alarm.

“Your carriage has come,” whispered the Sister, and looked quickly away from the face turned toward her, it was so white and worn. In that half-hour she seemed to have grown ten years older.

“Must I go now?” she exclaimed, with an air of terror, and for a moment seemed not to know where she was. Then murmuring an excuse, she recalled herself, and, by some magic, threw off again the look of age and pain. “You need not call Sister Cecilia, only say good-by to her for me,” she said. “I have really not a moment to spare.”

This Sister was almost a stranger to Mrs. Annette Gerald, and was quite taken by surprise when the lady turned at the door, and, without a word of farewell, kissed her, and then hurried away.

“Drive to the office, John, for Mr. Gerald,” she said; and no one would have suspected from her manner that she trembled before the man to whom she gave that careless order.

Lawrence came running lightly down the stairs, having been on the watch for his wife, and John, holding the carriage-door open, winked with astonishment at sight of the bright greeting exchanged between the two. He could maintain a cold and stolid reserve, if he had anything to conceal; but this airy gayety on the brink of ruin was not only beyond his power, but beyond his comprehension.

Stealing a glance of scrutiny into the young man's face, he met a glance of defiant hauteur. “You need not go any further with us, John,” Lawrence said. “We shall not need you. Jack, drive round to Mrs. Gerald's.”

And John, with his coat down to his heels—a costume in which nothing would have induced him voluntarily to take a promenade—was forced to walk home, comforting himself with the assurance that it was the last order he should have to obey from that source. Perhaps, indeed, he would not have obeyed it now, had they not driven away and left him no choice.

The sun was declining toward the west, and touching everything with the tender glory of early spring, when they drew up at the cottage gate, the sound of their wheels bringing Mrs. Gerald and Honora to the window, and then to the door.

“We can't stop to come in, Mamma Gerald,” Annette called out. “We are going off on a little visit, and only come to say good-by. Isn't it beautiful this afternoon? The trees will soon begin to bud, if this weather continues.”

The two ladies came out to the carriage, and Mrs. Gerald caught sight of her son's face, which had been turned away. It had grown suddenly white. She exclaimed: “Why, Lawrence! what is the matter?”

“Oh! another of those faint turns,” interposed his wife quickly, laying her hand on his arm. “He has no appetite, and is really fainting from lack of nourishment. The journey will do him good, mamma. We are going entirely on his account.”

“Oh! yes, it's nothing but a turn that will soon pass away,” he added, and seemed, indeed, already better.

“Do come in and take something warm,” his mother said anxiously, her beautiful blue eyes fixed on his face. “There is some chocolate just made.”

“We have no time,” Annette began; but her husband immediately opened the carriage-door.

“Yes, mother,” he said. “I won't keep you waiting but a minute, Ninon.”

The mother put her hand in his arm, and still turned her anxious face toward him. “You mustn't go to-night, if you feel sick, my son,” she said. “You know what happened to you before.”

“But the journey is just what I need, mother,” he answered, trying to speak cheerfully. “Of course I won't go if I feel unwell; but this is really nothing. I have not quite got my strength up, and, as Annette says, I have eaten nothing to-day.”

Those little services of a mother, how tender and touching they are at any time! how terrible in their pathos when we know that they will soon be at an end for us for ever! How the hand trembles to take the cup, and the lip trembles to touch its brim, when we know that she would have filled it with her life-blood, if that could have been saving to us!

“Sit here by the fire, dear, while I get your chocolate,” Mrs. Gerald said, and pushed the chair close to the hearth. “There is really quite a chill in the air.”

She stirred the fire, and made the red coals glow warmly, then went out of the room.

He looked round after her the moment her back was turned, and watched her hastening through the entry. The temptation was strong to follow her, throw himself at her feet, and tell her all. He started up from the chair, and took a step, but came back again. It would kill her, and he could not see her die. He would let her live yet the four weeks left her. Perhaps she might die a natural death before that. He hoped she would. At that thought, a sudden flame of hope and of trust in God rose in his heart. He dropped on his knees. “O my God! take my mother home before she hears of this, and I will do any penance, bear anything!” he prayed, with vehement rapidity. “Be merciful to her, and take her!”

He heard her step returning, and hastily resumed his seat, and bent forward to the fire.

“You look better already,” she said, smiling. “You have a little color now. Here is your chocolate, and Annette is calling to you to make haste.”

She held the little tray for him, and he managed, strengthened by that desperate hope of his, to empty the cup, and even smile faintly in giving it back. And then he got up, put his arm around his mother's waist, in a boyish fashion he had sometimes with her, and went out to the door with her so. And there he kissed her, and jumped into the carriage, and was driven away. It never occurred to her, so sweetly obedient had he been to her requests, and so expressive had his looks and actions been, that he had not uttered a word while he was in the house nor when he drove away. He had accepted her little services with affection and gratitude, and he had been tender and caressing, and that was enough. Moreover, he had really looked better on leaving, which proved that her prescription had done him good.

How Annette Gerald got away from home she could not have told afterward. Her trunks were sent in advance, and she and her husband chose to walk to the station in the evening. Some way she succeeded in answering all her mother's charges and anxious forebodings. She promised to sit in a middle car, so as to be at the furthest point from a collision in front or rear, [pg 257] and to have the life-preservers all ready at hand in the steamer. She took the basket of luncheon her mother put up, and allowed her bonnet to be tied for her and her shawl pinned. And at last they were in the portico, and it was necessary to say good-by.

“My poor mamma! don't be too anxious about me, whatever happens,” Annette said. “Remember God takes care of us all. I hope he will take care of you. Whenever you feel disposed to worry about us, say a little prayer, and all will come right again.”

The darkness hid the tears that rolled down her cheeks as she ended, and in a few minutes all was over, and the two were walking arm-in-arm down the quiet street.

“This way!” Lawrence said when they came to the street where his mother lived.

It was out of their way, but they went down by the house, and paused in front of it. The windows of the sitting-room were brightly lighted, and they could see by the glow of the lamp that it stood on a table drawn before the fire. As they looked, a shadow leaned forward on the white curtain. Mrs. Gerald was leaning with her elbow on the table, and talking to some one. They saw the slender hand that supported her chin, and the coil of her heavy hair. They saw the slight movement with which she pushed back a lock of hair that had a way of falling on to her forehead.

Annette felt the arm she held tremble. She only pressed it the closer, that he might not forget that love still was near him, but did not speak. There was nothing for her to say.

“Let's go inside the gate to the window,” he whispered. “Perhaps I can hear her speak.”

She softly opened the gate, and entered with him. The moonless night was slightly overclouded, and the shadows of the trees hid them perfectly, as they stole close to the window like two thieves. Lawrence pressed his face to the sash, and listened breathlessly. There was a low murmur of voices inside, then a few words distinctly spoken. “And by the way, dear, I forgot to close the blinds. Oh! no, I will close them. Don't rise!”

Mrs. Gerald came to the window, opened it, and leaned out so close to her son that he heard the rustle of her dress and fancied that he felt her breath on his cheek. She was silent a moment, looking up at the sky. “The night is very soft and mild,” she said. “Those children will have a pleasant journey.” One instant longer she rested there, her hand half extended to the blind, then she sent upward a word of prayer, which brushed her son's cheek in passing. “O God! protect my son!” she said.

Then the blinds were drawn together, and the son was shut out from her sight and sound for ever.

“It is our signal to go,” Annette whispered to her husband. “Come! We have no time to lose.”

He held her by the arm a moment.

“Isn't it better, after all, to stay and have it out here?” he asked desperately. “I'd rather face danger than fly from it. Running away makes me seem worse than I am.”

“You have no longer the right to consider yourself,” she answered, with a certain sternness. “I will not submit to have a convict for a husband. I would rather see you dead. And your mother shall not visit you in a felon's cell. Besides, no one is to be profited by such a [pg 258] piece of folly, and you would yourself repent it when too late. Come!”

He said no more, but suffered himself to be drawn away. He could not complain that his wife treated his heroic impulses with a disrespect amounting almost to contempt, for he could not himself trust them.

After having closed the window, Mrs. Gerald returned to her place by the fire. A round table was drawn up there between two armchairs, in one of which Miss Pembroke sat, knitting a scarf of crimson wool. The shade over the lamp kept its strong light from her eyes, and threw a faint shadow on the upper part of her face; but her sweet and serious mouth, and the round chin, with its faint dent of a dimple, were illuminated, her brown dress had rich yellow lights on the folds, and the end of a straying curl on her shoulder almost sparkled with gold. Her eyes were downcast and fixed on her work, and crimson loop after loop dropped swiftly from the ivory needles scarcely whiter than her hands.

“As I was saying,” Mrs. Gerald resumed, “six months of the year they were to pass with Mrs. Ferrier have gone, and next fall they will have an establishment of their own. It will be better for both of them. I am sure Annette will make a good housekeeper. Besides, every married man should be the master of a house. It gives him a place in the world, and makes him feel his responsibilities and dignities more.”

“Yes, every one should have a home,” answered the young woman gravely. “It is a great safeguard.”

Mrs. Gerald leaned back in her chair, and gazed into the fire. There was a smile of contentment on her lips and an air of gentle pride in the carriage of her head. As she thought, or dreamed, she turned about the birth-day ring her son had given her, and, presently becoming aware of what she was doing, looked at it and smiled as if she were smiling in his face.

“I never before felt so well contented and satisfied with his situation,” she said, her happiness breaking into words. “His marriage has turned out well. They seem to be perfectly united, and Lawrence is really proud of his wife; and with reason. She is no more like what she was when I first knew her than a butterfly is like a grub. She has developed wonderfully.” She was silent a moment, then added: “I am very thankful.”

She drew a rosary from her pocket, and, leaning back in her chair with her eyes closed, began to whisper the prayers as the beads slipped through her fingers.

Miss Pembroke glanced at her, and smiled faintly. It was very pleasant to see this mother happy in her son, yet how trembling and precarious was her happiness! This woman's heart, which bruised itself in beating, was always ready to catch some fleeting glory on its springing tide; like the fountain, which holds the rainbow a moment among its chilly drops.

While one woman prayed, the other thought. She had often dwelt upon this subject of women's lives being wrecked from love of friend, husband, or child, and the sight of Mrs. Gerald had been to her a constant illustration of such a wreck. These thoughts had troubled her, for she was not one to judge hastily, and she did not know whether to pity or to blame so ruinous a devotion. Now again the question floated up, and with it the wish to decide once for all before [pg 259] life should thrust the problem on her, when she would be too confused to think rightly. She was like one who stands safe yet wistful on shore, looking off over troubled waters, and Mrs. Gerald and Annette seemed to her tossing far out on the waves. She even seemed to herself to have approached the brink so near that the salt tide had touched her feet, and to have drawn back only just in time.

Gradually, as her fair fingers wove the glowing web, a faint cloud came over her face, and, if it had been possible for her to frown, that deeper shadow between the brows might have been called a frown. Her thoughts were growing stern.

“Were we made upright, we women, only to bend like reeds to every wind?” she asked herself. “Can we not be gentle without being slavish, and kind and tender without pouring our hearts out like water? Cannot we reserve something to ourselves, even while giving all and even more than our friends deserve? Cannot we hold our peace and happiness so firmly in our own hands that no one shall have the power to destroy them?”

Each question as it came met with a prompt answer, and resolution followed swiftly: “Never will I suffer myself to be so enslaved by any affection as to lose my individuality and be merged and lost in another, or be made wretched by another, or to have my sense of justice and right confused by the desire to make excuses for one I love. Never will I suffer the name which I have kept stainless to be associated with the disgrace of another, and never will I leave the orderly and honorable ways of life, where I have walked so far, to follow any one into the by-ways, for any pretext. Each one is to save his own soul, and to help others only to a certain extent. I will keep my place!”

That resolute and almost haughty face seemed scarcely to be Honora Pembroke's; and she felt so surely that her expression would check and startle her companion that when she saw Mrs. Gerald drop the rosary from her fingers, and turn to speak to her, she quickly changed her position so as to hide her face a moment.

Mrs. Gerald's voice had changed while she prayed, and seemed weighted with a calm seriousness from her heavenly communion; and her first words jarred strangely with her young friend's thought.

“How uncalculating the saints were!” she said. “Our Lady was the only one, I think, who escaped personal contumely, and that was not because she risked nothing, but because God would not suffer contempt nor slander to touch her. He spared her no pang, save that of disgrace; yet she would have accepted that without a complaint. How tender he was of her! He gave her a nominal spouse to shield her motherhood; it was through her Son that her heart was pierced, and the grief of a mother is always sacred; and he gave her always loving and devoted women, who clustered about and made her little court. She was never alone. But she is an exception. The others were despised and maltreated, and they seemed to be perpetually throwing themselves away. I do not doubt that those saints who never suffered martyrdom nor persecution were still, in their day, laughed and mocked at by some more than they were honored by others. They never stopped to count the cost.”

Miss Pembroke felt at the first [pg 260] instant as though Mrs. Gerald must have read her thoughts, and her reply came like a retort. “It is true they did not count the costs,” she said; “but it was God whom they loved.”

“Yes,” Mrs. Gerald replied gently, “that was what I meant.”

She was too closely wrapped in contentment to perceive the coldness with which her companion spoke. It seemed to her that all her cares had floated away, and left only rest and sweetness behind. She no longer feared anything. There comes to every one some happy season in life, she thought; and hers had come.

When, the next day, she received a note from her son, which he had written from their first stopping-place, she was scarcely surprised, though it was an unusual attention.

It was but a hurried line, written with a pencil and posted in the station-house.

“My darling mother,” he wrote, “if you should find your violet-bed under the parlor window trampled, blame Larry for it. He saw his mother's shadow on the curtain when he was on his way to the station last night, and took a fancy to go nearer and peep through the window. But he didn't mean to do any harm then, nor at some other times, when he did enough indeed. Forgive him for everything.”

Mrs. Gerald immediately went out, letter in hand, to see what marks had been left of this nocturnal visit; and, sure enough, there, on the newly-turned mould, was the print of a boot—well she knew her son's neat foot—and, on the other side, a tiny and delicate track where Annette had stood! But not a leaf of the sprouting violets was crushed.

Miss Pembroke smiled to see the mother touch these tracks softly with her finger-tips, and glance about as if to assure herself that there was no danger of their being effaced.

“Such a freak of those children!” she said gaily. “Do you know what I am going to do, Honora? I mean to sow little pink quill daisies in those two foot-prints, and show them to Lawrence and Annette when they come back. It was a beautiful thought of them to come to the window, and it shall be commemorated in beauty. The ground is nearly warm enough here now for seeds. When they come back, the tracks will be green. I wish flowers would blossom in three weeks.”

Mrs. Ferrier also heard that day from the travellers.

“I have a particular reason for asking you to be very careful about my letters,” Annette wrote. “Don't let any one see or know of them. I will tell you why presently. We are very well. Write me a line as soon as you receive this, and direct to New York. We shall not stop there, but go right on out West, probably. And, by the way, if you should wish ever to hear from Mrs. Gerald's relations, seek in New York for a letter directed to Mrs. Julia Ward. Say nothing of this now. I will explain.”

“And why should I wish to hear from Mrs. Gerald's relations?” wondered Mrs. Ferrier. But she said nothing. The secret was safe with her.

Meanwhile, the travellers had lost no time on their way; and three days from their leaving Crichton, they were on the ocean. Every stateroom and cabin had been taken when “Mr. and Mrs. Ward” [pg 261] went to the office of the steamer; but the captain, seeing the lady in great distress on account of the sick friend she was crossing the ocean to see, kindly gave up his own stateroom to the travellers.

It was quite as well for him to do so, indeed; for the very day they started a storm started with them, and he was too faithful an officer to desert his post on deck. So all night long he watched, courageous and faithful, over the lives committed to his care, while underneath his two special guests lay helpless and miserable, counting his footsteps, as sleepless as he. The engine throbbed beside them, like a heavily-beating heart, the long waves lashed the deck, the wind sang and whistled through the ropes, the steamer creaked and groaned.

“I have brought bad luck to the ship, Annette,” said her husband. “If I were overboard, the storm would cease.”

“In the first place, my name is Julia,” was the answer from the lower berth. “In the next place, there is nothing mysterious in this storm; it is simply the equinoctial gale, which has been threatening for days. I knew we should have it. In the third place, your being overboard would make no difference whatever in the weather. Are you sick?”

Annette knew well that a little chilly breeze would best blow away her husband's vapors.

“I am sick of lying here,” he said impatiently. “The rain must be over, unless it is another flood. I wonder how it looks out?”

He drew aside the curtain, and opened the window. The rain had ceased, but the wind still blew, and a pale light was everywhere, shining up through the waves and down through the clouds. As the steamer rolled, Annette, lying in her lower berth, could see alternately the gray and tumbled clouds of air, and the gray and heaving sea, which was less like moving water than a ruined, quaking earth, so heavily it rose and fell.

Lawrence Gerald, closely wrapped in furs, knelt on the sofa, and looked out, humming a tune that seemed to be for ever on his lips since his wife had first sung it to him, so that she was sometimes half sorry for having suggested it to him. A few words broke out while she listened:

His thoughts seemed to be so haunted by the image of that cold and peaceful slumber that his wife trembled for him. He had not the enduring strength to bear a long trial, but he had that fitful strength which prompts to desperate deeds.

“I can see cities built and destroyed yonder,” he said. “There are white towns between dark mountains, and little hamlets up in the crevices; they grow, and then they are swallowed up. It is like a great earthquake. When the world is destroyed, it will perhaps look like that, pale and ashy.”

“Suppose we should go up on deck, and see what it looks like,” said Annette suddenly, anticipating the wish she knew he would have expressed. “It will be a change after our three days' imprisonment, and we may think the stateroom a pleasant refuge when we come back.”

They escaped the crest of a wave that leaped over the rail after them, and reached the wet and slippery deck.

“We mustn't speak to the officers,” [pg 262] Annette whispered, seeing the captain near them.

He passed them by without notice, and they hurried on to the shelter of the smoke-pipe, where the heat had dried the planks; and here, holding by ropes, they could look over the rail and see the long streaks of pale blue, where the foam slid under the surface of the water; see the gigantic struggle of the sea, and how the brave ship pushed through it all straight toward her unseen port.

Nothing is so perfect a figure of life as a ship on the sea, and one can hardly behold it without moralizing.

“Suppose that this ship had a soul of its own, instead of being guided by the will of other beings,” said Annette; “and suppose that, finding itself in such a woful case, it should say, ‘I see no port, no pole-star, no sun, nor moon, and I doubt if I shall ever see them again. I may as well stop trying, and go down here.’ Wouldn't that be a pity for itself and for others?”

“But suppose, on the other hand,” returned her husband, “that the ship had got a deadly thrust from some unseen rock, and the water was running in, and it could never gain the port. What would be the use of its striving and straining for a few leagues further?”

“We know not where the haven of a soul is set,” said Annette, dropping the figure. “God knows, for he has set it, near or far; and it may be nearer than we think. It is scarcely worth while for a man to lose his soul by jumping overboard at ten o'clock, when he may save it, and be drowned too, at eleven.”

Lawrence drew back as a great wave rose before them. He had only been playing at death; the reality was quite another thing. Chilled and drenched with spray, they hurried down to their stateroom.

It was a weary journey. After the storm came head-winds, and after the head-winds a fog, through which they crept, ringing the fog-bell, and stopping now and then.

Mr. and Mrs. Ward did not appear once among the passengers, even when everybody crowded up to catch the first glimpse of Ireland, and they were the last to appear when the passengers prepared to land at Liverpool. They had been a fortnight from home, the storm having delayed them two days, and they knew not what might have happened in that time. A telegram might have sped under the waves in an hour while they toiled over them, and just at the moment of escape their flight might be intercepted.

To Be Continued.

Dante Gabriel Rosetti.84

It is not difficult to understand the title which has been bestowed upon Mr. Rosetti of the “Poets' Poet.” His volume is full of delicate rhythmical experiments—winding bouts of melody with subtle catches of silence interspersed—which alternately pique and satisfy. No brother of the craft could fail to obtain valuable hints from these studies. But Mr. Rosetti is no mere word-poiser; he is an artist in the highest sense of the word, whose canvas teems with a thousand nameless lights, which as they cross and disappear make all the difference between the real and the unreal.

During the two years or more that Mr. Rosetti's volume has been before the English-reading public on both sides of the Atlantic, it has been frequently reviewed. Perhaps the best justification of the present review is that, over and above purely literary merits, Mr. Rosetti has peculiar claims upon the interest of Catholic readers, to which we would draw attention.

We gather from the brief notice at the beginning of the volume that many of these poems were composed twenty years ago, yet, if we except the occasional appearance of a single poem in the pages of a magazine, Mr. Rosetti has published nothing before. We can hardly believe that even the barbarians of twenty years ago can have combined against his publishing, like Mr. Bazzard's friends in Edwin Drood, and so we must suppose that he was fain to wait for the severest of all criticisms—that passed by a middle-aged man upon the productions of his youth. And now, having altered something and burnt more—had he waited, he would have found old age more indulgent—he publishes the remnant, all of which, he tells us justly enough, is mature, for which his mature age is sponsor.

It would be far easier to estimate Mr. Rosetti's position as a poet had he written more. Nor is this precisely a truism; for one feels at once that what he has given us is most precisely and emphatically a selection. Every one of his poems, whatever else it may be, is at least a cunning piece of artist's work in this or that particular style, with a distinct flavor of its own and true to itself throughout. If you know, and care for, the old Scots ballad, you will at once appreciate the specimen he gives you. If you object to the coarseness which shades the tenderness of “Stratton Water,” your criticism is unlearned. As well complain of the peat flavor of a “Finnan haddie.”

Poets who sing because they must sing, who pour into trembling ears great heterogeneous floods of song, the reflection of their many moods, things beautiful and rather beautiful, and plain and very plain; all the thousand-and-one scraps which have something clever in them, or illustrate something, or with the composition of which something interesting, whether pleasant or painful, is associated—take, for instance, any chance volume of Wordsworth or Browning—may be in the long run our benefactors, but they have no claim upon the ready-money of thanks; they charm, perhaps, [pg 264] but they often also bore. If a man whose imagination has not been left out is bored by Mr. Rosetti's volume, it is time for him, according to the Turkish proverb, to put his trust in God—his wine is running to the lees, his roses wither. And this is true although the generations of poetic taste are so short-lived that almost before a man has reached the mezzo camino, and certainly before he has lost his sense of life's enjoyments, he is apt to find himself somewhat out of harmony with the poetry of the day. Mr. Rosetti is no prophet of a new theory of art or master of a new phrase-mint, but rather a merchant whose cargo tells a tale of every port at which he has touched.

It is natural to compare, even if only to contrast, any new poet with Mr. Tennyson, as the poet who has had more immediate, sensible influence than any other upon the taste of his day; and although there is a prejudice against comparisons, it is difficult to see how they can be avoided if one is to do something more than point and ejaculate. In the present case, there is at least sufficient resemblance to suggest comparison. Amongst living poets these two are pre-eminently artist-poets, who finish their work and hide well away all their literary shavings. They are almost the only living poets who never go on talking till they can find the right word, and who never stammer.

There is not a scrap of either of these poets that, for the refined work there is in it, it would not be a shame to burn. Again, they are like in this, that they have an intense sensuous appreciation of the medium which they use, which seems to belong rather to the art of the painter or the musician than to that of the poet. It would not be difficult to make a color-box of Mr. Tennyson's favorite words, literary formulas for cool grays and bits of scarlet. On the other hand, Mr. Rosetti's art is rather that of the musician than the painter; he produces his effects rather by subtle changes of manner than by the color of single words, although his choice in these too is exquisite. His modulations remind one of Crashaw's lines in “Music's Duel”:

And so, having drifted into points of difference, we will continue. They are unlike because, although both affect the quaintnesses of mediæval art, the laureate has done little more than utilize, for poetic purposes, the antiquarian and art knowledge of a gentleman of the period with a turn that way. But Mr. Rosetti is a mediæval artist heart and soul; and, though it may not be literally true that he has no end beyond his art, he would certainly feel that he was doing evil that good might come of it if he sacrificed a point of art to any object whatsoever.

Mr. Tennyson's pictures of the middle-age, beautiful and lifelike as they are, are the less true for their somewhat formal flourish of antiquity, whereby they give themselves, as it were, a modern frame. Of course, Tennyson's knights are not modern gentlemen in the sense that Racine's Greeks are French courtiers, but anyhow they are the realized aspirations of modern gentlemen of culture and refinement, and measures of fashionable reaction against the spirit of the day.

I think the consciousness that he wants a loosely-fitting mediævalism, or, so to speak, the armor without [pg 265] any particular quality of man inside, makes Mr. Tennyson affect the hybrid mediævalism of the Round Table in preference to the genuine strain of the old chroniclers. His mail-clad knights always remind us somewhat of a common scene in a marine aquarium—a whelk-shell inspired with an energy not its own by the intrusion of a hermit-crab, who, having disposed of the original occupant, manipulates the shell at his pleasure.

It may be urged, with some justice, that a poet is no mere collector of old china and old lace. He gathers to himself of all precious things, to frame for his thought such vehicle as he wants; but he has no duties to his materials that they should be in keeping with one another or with themselves, provided they minister to his design. Yes, but it must be remembered that both these poets belong to a school which owes its success to the religious observance of such duties, even though self-imposed; and it must always remain true that the more a poet can afford to borrow wholes instead of parts or aspects, and these plead the poet's cause each in its own tongue, not his, the greater is his triumph. I am not indicating any failure on the part of Mr. Tennyson when I speak of his Arthurian poems as a splendid masque. He knows where his strength lies. He has chosen his legend as a man might choose an antique wine-cooler for his wine; but the liquor inside, though superlatively good, is not hippocras or metheglin, but port and sherry. On the other hand, if we turn to Mr. Rosetti's treatment of mediæval subjects, “Dante at Verona,” “Sister Helen,” “The Staff and Scrip,” we find that his mediæval figures live, indeed, with the intensest kind of life, but that that life, from its woof to its outermost fringe, is stained with the color of its own day and country. It is this union of purism and vitality which is Mr. Rosetti's distinguishing characteristic.

It is now time for us to examine some of Mr. Rosetti's poems in detail. “The Blessed Damozel,” the first poem in the volume, were it not for its title, would be perfect; but we confess that the ultra quaintness of the title is the one point in the mediæval dress which does not, to our mind, harmonize with the Catholicity of the subject.

The subject would be trite enough in many hands. A young man has lost his love, and dreams of her night and day, until at length the soul of his imagination pierces that heaven into which she has been received ten years ago:

With the calm, unhesitating realism of Fra Angelico, he paints his lady leaning out towards him “from the gold bar of heaven,” with stars in her hair and lilies in her hand; and the outline is so clear and firm, so free from the mist of modern sentimentalism, that the paroxysm of doubt which breaks in at the end of the fourth stanza, and which for a moment makes the radiant vision tremulous, is really wanted to remind us of the abyss which the imagination is spanning:

“The tides of day and night” alternate far down in the abyss beneath her feet, where the earth is spinning about the sun “like a fretful midge.” If any one is tempted to doubt if the heavens of modern science, with their [pg 266] vast distances and harmonious order, are more poetical than the star-spangled cope upon which the Chaldean shepherds gazed, let him read this poem. The simple imagery with which Mr. Rosetti clothes the abysses of heaven seems, without destroying their immensity, to render them visible:

Again:

He sees that she is looking for him, and then she speaks, not to him, for she sees him not, but of him, of what their life in heaven will be when he has come—for he must come, she says. And again, as she talks of the life in heaven, it is Fra Angelico in words; lush meadow-grass, so soft to road-worn feet, and golden-fruited trees, and tender intercourse from which all the acerbities and conventionalities of life are banished; an atmosphere in which the freshness of morning and the peace of evening are woven into one eternal day, which, as he says elsewhere, “hours no more offend.” How thoroughly Dantesque in its homely sublimity is the conception of Our Lady and her handmaids at their weaving:

We hardly think that this poem of Mr. Rosetti's strikes a single false chord even to Catholic ears. The utmost that can be said is that the blessed soul is too absorbed by her longing for her earthly love. But then the heaven of theology is an assemblage of paradoxes which faith alone can knit together; and, in its entirety, wholly without the realm of art. In this poem we have one aspect of the life of the blessed, “securus quidem sibi sed nostri solicitus,” as S. Bernard says, presented to us most vividly in the only colors an artist's pencil can command—those of earthly love. But this love is serene and pure, and, despite its intensity, free from all pain and impatience. The passion is supplied by the refrain in the earthly lover's heart, as in his touching commentary upon the confidence of her “we two” will do thus and thus when he comes:

Having ended her description of heaven's mysterious joys:

But soon the smile fades away as the angelic convoy glides past, for he is not there—

If it be objected that this is too gross a violation of the state in which all tears are wiped away, I answer, first, that there are tears and tears; secondly, that if anthropomorphism is allowable in our realizations of God, à fortiori is it allowable in our realizations of those who, although they are raised above the estate of humanity, are still human. Again, even the angels of Christian art have a prescriptive right to tears, and is it not written, Isai. xxxiii. 7, “Angeli pacis amarè flebunt?”

And now we will say what we have to say of perhaps the most wonderful of all Mr. Rosetti's poems, which somehow, for more reasons than one, suggests itself as a pendant [pg 267] to “The Blessed Damozel.” He has called it “Jenny,” and Jenny is the name—neither French nor Greek will mend the matter—of a young prostitute. We freely confess that there are two or three lines in this poem which we heartily wish Mr. Rosetti had never written; but, take it as it stands, few will be disposed to deny that it is a very real sermon against lust, all the more impressive because it is indirect. The story, such as it is, is this: A man, young but not in his first youth, who has been for some years settling down to a student's life, throws his work aside one evening, and goes off to one of his old haunts. Having spent half the night in dancing, and being smitten with Jenny's youthful beauty, he goes home with her. She, poor thing, utterly tired, falls dead asleep at supper, and he, watching her, falls to moralizing, half cynically, half tenderly, upon innocence and lust and destiny, until at last the pity of it all wholly possesses him and kills every other thought. And so musing till early dawn, till

he slips some gold pieces into her hair, and goes with the half-expressed hope that, as God has been merciful to him, so he will be merciful to her also.

What first touches him is her evident longing for rest:

The girl herself, beyond her youth and beauty, is nowise better than her fellows, and so she individualizes a larger pathos, and is in some sense a more touching representative of the victims of man's lust—

He is penetrated by the contrast between the fate of this poor girl and that of his cousin, just such another girl in natural disposition—

but in the guarded atmosphere of her home, with every point in her character blooming into good.

Many a man would be fain to listen to such a sermon who would reject any other. For the preacher is no missionary in disguise, but a fellow-sinner converted in the presence of his sin, if we may call it conversion; at least, beaten down and overwhelmed by the colossal horror and pity of it, as a wild beast is tamed by a prairie-fire.

Many beautiful things have been said by non-Catholic poets of Our Blessed Lady. Indeed, a very pretty book might be made of these Gentile testimonies, from Milton, Cowley, Crashaw (before his conversion), Wordsworth, Keble, and many others. It would seem that Parnassus is as one of the high places of Baal, where the Spirit of the Lord rushes upon the poet, whose eyes are opened and he must needs bless her whom he that blesseth “shall also himself be blessed, and he that curseth shall be reckoned accursed,” and he cries, [pg 268] “How beautiful are thy tabernacles,” O Mary, Mother of God, “as woody valleys, as watered gardens near the rivers, as tabernacles which the Lord has pitched as cedars by the water-side.” But with Mr. Rosetti it is something more than this. One is tempted to fancy that with his Italian name he must have really inherited an Italian's devotion to the Madonna. His poem “Ave” is neither more nor less than a meditation upon the joyful, sorrowful, and glorious mysteries of Our Lady's life, and it breathes a devotion as tender and sensitive—in a word, as Catholic—as though it had been written by F. Faber. We shall venture to transfer the whole of it to our pages, for we cannot otherwise justify what we have said, and part of its specific beauty is that it is in one breath:

Mr. Rosetti certainly does not affect classical subjects. There is nothing in his curious Treasury at all corresponding to those most exquisite of all Mr. Tennyson's poems, “Ulysses” and “Tithonus.” In the few instances in which he does handle classical legend, it is always its quaint reflection in the mediæval mind that attracts him, as in “Troy Town,” but he is at home everywhere. “Eden Bower” and “Sister Helen” are like and unlike enough for comparison. They are both monologues of deadly sin; the first is spite, the second hate, set to music. The conception of Lilith in “Eden Bower” is a monstrous waif of rabbinical tradition. She is a sort of woman-snake, supposed to have been Adam's first wife before the creation of Eve, and in her jealousy of the wife who supplanted her is found the origin of her conspiracy with the king-snake of Eden which brings about the Fall. The poem is one prolonged musical but most diabolical chuckle of Lilith over the immortal mischief she is about to perpetrate. She is indeed all the while coaxing the serpent to help her, but her tone throughout is one of assured triumph. The woman and the fiend are interwoven with marvellous subtlety—a fiend's colossal blasphemy and a woman's petty spite. The fiend does not shrink from declaring open war against heaven.

The woman thus in anticipation stabs her rival with her husband's cowardice.

How she wriggles and gasps and hugs herself at the thought of the woe she is to bring upon her victims, gloating over every detail of their desolate exile, and forecasting the death of one son and the damnation of another. Lilith after all is a fiend, and, as a creation of art, a fiend is a creature that lives and revels in wickedness as a salamander was supposed to inhabit fire, with a keen sense of pleasure and without moral responsibility; but in “Sister Helen” we have something much more dreadful because more human—“Hate born of Love”—hate that has devoured all love, even love of self—the hatred that is despair. A ruined girl, dwelling in a lonely tower with her little brother, seeks vengeance upon her seducer after the mediæval manner, by consuming his waxen image before the fire. And now upon the third night she is nigh upon its achievement, for the wax is wasting fast. The child takes a child's interest in the little figure that was once so plump, but through which the flame is now shining red. He prattles about it, but understands nothing, nor yet that there is anything to understand. His sister coaxes him out into the balcony to look out and say what he sees, for she knows what must come. And one after the other the brothers and father of the dying man ride up in the wild night and implore her mercy, at first that she will save his life, and then that at least she will forgive and save him from his despair, that body and soul may not perish. There is something simply appalling in the way in which each entreaty, as it comes to her repeated by her little brother's voice, is slain by the calm, ruthless, sometimes ironical comment in which she conveys her refusal.

All entreaties are useless, the death-knell sounds, and the riders turn their horses—

One is tempted to say of Mr. Rosetti as was said of his patron Dante, “Lo, he that strolls to hell and back at will.” We speak advisedly of his “patron Dante,” for his devotion to his great namesake is of the intensest kind. Almost the longest poem in the volume is “Dante at Verona,” in which every conceivable detail in the poet's painful exile at that court is dwelt upon with a solicitude that reminds one of an early Christian sponging up a martyr's blood. To appreciate the poem thoroughly, one ought to share with Mr. Rosetti in the intimacy of the great Florentine. There are, however, many exquisite bits of description in it that must come home to every one. Surely the Gran Cane's jester will live for ever:

We cannot of course pretend to catalogue all Mr. Rosetti's beauties. But for the sake of quoting one stanza, we must say a word of the “Staff and Scrip.” A knight vowed to defend wronged innocence, finds himself, whilst returning from Palestine, in the land of a fair lady, which her triumphant foemen are ravaging, and where all hope of resistance is dead. He goes out on her behalf, and conquers and dies. This is the description of his return on the night of his victory:

Nearly a third of Mr. Rosetti's volume consists of sonnets. Now, a sonnet should be grave but not heavy. It must have a severity tempered by sweetness like the breviary character of the Venerable Bede. It must linger meditatively; it must not loiter, or fumble with its meaning. It must be sinuous, never headlong; feeling its rhymes delicately, not falling upon them; for these are less rhymes than the most prominent of many assonances, upon all of which the rhythm hangs. Indeed, the texture of the sonnet resembles more that of blank-verse than that of any other metre we possess. Without denying the perfection of some two or three of Milton's sonnets, and perhaps in a lesser degree of about as many of Wordsworth's, we may be permitted to say that among our sonnet-writers Milton, as a general rule, is too fierce and headlong, as Wordsworth says of him, in words of praise which to our ears suggest blame. In his hands, “the thing became a trumpet”; whilst [pg 271] Wordsworth has too poor a vocabulary for a composition in which every word ought to tell. Shakespeare's sonnets are only sonnets in name. They do not fall into two, or rather one and a half, like an acorn and its cup, but are simply short poems of three independent stanzas of alternate rhymes, the whole concluding with a rhyming couplet. The Elizabethan writers who used the genuine sonnet—Sidney, Spenser, Drummond, especially the last—attained, we cannot help thinking, to a more exquisite use of the sonnet than either Milton or Wordsworth, although the beauty of their sonnets is somewhat marred by the twanging effect of the concluding rhyming couplet to which they persistently cling. Many of Mr. Rosetti's sonnets strike us not only as beautiful poems, but as very finished specimens of the sonnet. He seems to have attained to the Italian delicacy of the best of the Elizabethan sonneteers, without loss of originality and force. He is, however, perhaps rather too fond of fretting the melody of his lines by a harsh emphasis, which, effective enough in a liquid medium like Italian, is rather trying to the naturally broken music of the English tongue. An example of this may be noted in the sixth line of the following very beautiful sonnet. He has called it “Inclusiveness”—a title with which we venture to quarrel, for the phenomenon described is not a quality of anything, but a fact or law; we would substitute, in spite of its technical flavor, “Introsusception.”

Here is an exquisite vindication of one of the least popular of the condemnations in the Syllabus—that of non-intervention.

It is called “On the Refusal of Aid between Nations”:

Mr. Rosetti has adopted, as we have already indicated, more fully than a Catholic could approve, a principle which is obtaining a very dangerous prominence amongst the rising generation of English poets, that art is justified of her children—that to the artist all things are chaste. Thus inevitably there are some lines one could wish unwritten, and more that one would not have every one read. Yet for all this the ethos of the book is chaste and noble, nor do we know any poet by whom purity is more honestly appreciated and worshipped. The volume is a remarkable example of the extent to which a love of the Madonna and the ascetic inspiration of Dante can counteract and restrain the growing sensuousness of English poetry.

If Mr. Rosetti is sometimes obscure, it is not that his touch is ever otherwise than delicate and precise, but because his art is rather the art of the musician than of the painter. His changes of key, so to speak, are so [pg 272] swift and subtle, and the harmonies with which the theme is clothed are so manifold and so quaint, that his compositions have sometimes the difficulty of a sonata of Beethoven, and require considerable familiarity before their proportions can be grasped. Indeed, we must confess that there are passages the meaning of which we despair of ever grasping with any precision; we must be content to accept them as a sort of hieroglyphic, for splendor or purity, like the scroll and lily-work of a mediæval goldsmith. This is the more provoking, as obscurity is not here, as often in Mr. Browning's poems, covered by an oracular use of certain crabbed expressions, which at least indicate the nut that is to be cracked, but coexists with a diction consistently pure and flowing.

Although we have compared Mr. Rosetti's art to that of the musician rather than to that of the painter, we have been told that he is a painter of a high order. Anyhow, his fondness for painting is proved by the number of sonnets which he has made upon pictures, ancient and modern. We cannot more fitly conclude our review than with his sonnet, “For our Lady of the Rocks, by Leonardo da Vinci”:

For Ever.

Visit To An Artist's Studio.

I do not know if, outside his own small circle of patrons and acquaintances, any one has heard of the artist Van Muyden. Yet hidden talent is none the less a divine gift because few know it; it gives a more pathetic interest to a life to know that it is a life harassed with care, vexed by non-appreciation, hampered with poverty. Perhaps Van Muyden is only obscure because he would not lower his art to suit the dealers' terms or the public taste. When I visited his studio, he was settled in a small house in the suburbs of Geneva, Switzerland. His own appearance was striking: the supple form, not very tall, but very spare; the large eyes that seemed to dart through you and search your soul, the high forehead, wrinkled and bald, told of a man with an intellect higher than that of his fellow-men, an ideal enthroned beyond the region of which they know the bearings, and of the cares with which they can sympathize. He was a man past the prime of life, eager and enthusiastic—eccentric, perhaps, as the world's estimate goes; but who is not?—I mean amongst those whose characteristics are worth studying at all. He wore over his vest and trowsers an old brown dressing-gown, suggestive of the appearance one is used to connect with mediæval scholars and seers. His forte is not landscape-painting, and, indeed, he seemed lost at Geneva, despite the southern beauty of its environs, for Van Muyden's predilections were evidently for the representation of the human kind. But then, if it was man that he loved to copy, it was not broad-cloth man, sleek, respectable, decorous, well-off, but man as you find him in Italy or Spain—picturesque as his scanty surroundings; an unconscious artist, a born model; man imbued with the spirit of the sun-god; man carolling and trilling without effort, believing himself born to sing like the birds; man in himself a study, a picture, a statue, a marvel.

Van Muyden explained his theories very freely, and they were well worth listening to.

“In the north, you see,” he said, “an artist is forced, if he wishes to be truthful, to copy a thousand pitiful details of upholstery. Such pictures are called genre; and this realistic, mathematical accuracy, utterly destructive of the picturesque, is lauded to the skies; but, good God! could not a Chinese do as well with his wonderful imitative faculty, altogether apart from the feeling of art? The North makes up for the picturesque by the comfortable; what a compensation for the artist! But modern art has more [pg 274] to contend with than vitiated taste or the loss of that free and natural life which in simpler times was more conducive to artistic inspiration; we have to struggle on without a school or a standard of taste. We no longer have those centres where the traditions of art were religiously kept; those high-priests who gathered round them numerous and docile disciples, as of old the Athenian philosophers in the groves of Academe. Even in Italy, in Rome itself, no such centre can be found. A young artist has to make his own solitary way, pursue his ideal alone, keep up his enthusiasm by his own unaided exertions, and probably find neither patron nor master to care for his works or guide his attempts.”

The artist was surely right; for the great schools of painting were to art what the religious orders are to the church—centres towards which a vague vocation may be directed and find its true mission, with brethren to share its enthusiasm and superiors to guide its aspirations. Most of his pictures were Italian scenes, some domestic, but mostly treating of the monastic life. The cool cloister, with its ilex or orange-trees seen cornerwise through the railings; the old portico, with a monk seated in meditation on the fragment of a sculptured pillar: the noon-day siesta; the begging friar coming home with his sack of food; the preacher starting meekly, staff in hand, for the distant station where he is to preach a Lent; the novice arranging the altar; the monk digging his own grave in the sunny cloister, or washing the altar-plate in the sparkling fountain, etc. etc.—such were chiefly the subjects chosen. Why? He was not a Catholic, this artist; but it seems to have come to him intuitively that there is more room for artistic expression and artistic liberty in things pertaining to the old church. His own studio was as perfect a picture as any he could have painted; a treasure-house of antiquities carelessly displayed. It was lighted by two immense windows, one of which was shaded by a sort of slanting tester, throwing the light on the easel in the middle of the room. Between these windows stood a nondescript piece of furniture in carved oak, very black and old—a species of secrétaire, with an “extension” holding a small washing-bowl, surmounted by a dolphin's head, which was crowned for the nonce with a scarlet berrétta. Large jars of old porcelain were placed here and there, either on the ground or on substantial étagères, and two corners of the room were filled with high chests equally carved, on whose capacious tops rested a medley of distaffs, horns, helmets, old swords, a spinning-wheel, and a confused mass of tattered garments or drapery, dingy and time-stained, crimson cloaks, blue tunics, purple veils, etc. An array of pipes, hooked into the wall for security, stood on the high mantel-piece, together with one of those common brass kitchen lamps in use at Rome, with four projections enclosing wicks, and whose shape has never been altered since the days when Nero rode in the arena and the Christians went calmly to the stake. On the unoccupied spaces on the wall hung the artist's pictures, some few representing touching family scenes (all Italian) strewed among the monastic subjects. Right in the centre of the ceiling hung a movable apparatus, in which was placed a lamp—modern, alas! This came down quite close to the easel, and gave all the light required [pg 275] for night-work. A carved table with curiously-twisted legs, and two high-backed mediæval arm-chairs covered with tapestry, completed the furniture, besides a green baize stage for the models. This reminded me of the palco used for preaching in Italian churches, even when there is a proper pulpit; some of my readers may remember these miniature stages, raised about five feet from the floor, and on which the excited orator can promenade like a lion in his cage while hurling his burning periods at his awe-stricken listeners. Van Muyden has a wife and nine children, which fact we ascertained through the reply to a question prompted by the enormous quantity of under-linen hung out to dry on the balusters outside the studio. We did not see Mme. Van Muyden, and were thankful we did not; for such a reckless display of household secrets must argue a woman whose appearance would frighten romance out of the veriest sentimentalist that ever lived. So we speculated in silence on this domestic guardian of the artist's peace—an excellent and worthy woman, no doubt, a capital house-keeper, a careful mother, a faithful wife, but scarcely a help-mate, a companion, a Beatrice, to her husband. How few men of sensitive nature, high-strung character, aspiring organization, have fit wives! Why is it that they generally take a fancy to peculiarly unsuitable women? Is it that they are so soft-hearted that they cannot resist the attraction of the first pretty face they see, or so rapt above the reach of common interests that they form, as it were inevitably, an incongruous union, and only wake up to find themselves irretrievably tied to a showy slattern, or a plodding, unappreciative housewife? What perverse fairy casts her spell on the poor artist's marriage-day, and makes of the chime of his wedding-bells the knell of his possible fame?

Poverty is the safest ladye-love for an artist, as one of Dante's friends was always telling him. Artists and scholars are the Francis-of-Assisiums of the intellectual world, and the same bride as that spiritually wooed by the heroic voluntary beggar, is the most fitting companion for them. With her, at least, they can enjoy the perfect freedom from care which alone makes want supportable; they can throw around their destitution that halo of romance which the prosaic details of a household invariably strangle out of existence. But in the early choice of a wife more hopes go down, more aspirations are smothered, than those whose aim is worldly success and the favor of the great. The ideal is the victim par excellence; for the struggling artist, tied by his own hasty imprudence to a woman of inferior mould, soon feels the spark of genius die within him; the incentive to “do and dare” has dwindled down to the necessity of “earning and eating.” A woman with uncomprehensive soul peevishly reminds him at every moment of the world of matter, without even offering him the compensation of a blind and admiring worship of his talents in his own peculiar sphere; in short, he is a living example of the adage, “A man that's married is a man that's marred.”

Far be it from me to bring this reproach on any particular individual; but such was the train of thought naturally induced by the unsightly array of house-linen hung like delusive flags of truce on the balusters of the artist's home. Early marriage is undoubtedly [pg 276] best for the generality of men in the world, but it is intellectual ruin to artists. Let us wish them the rare fortune of a wife that will be a real helpmate to their higher and better selves, a staff to lean on up the thorny road to Parnassus, and then recommend early marriage; but unless such exceptions be found, let them beware of the fate typified by the prosaic decoration of Van Muyden's abode at Geneva.

Visions.

A Word For Women.

By One Of Themselves.

It has been urged that women should refrain from writing for the public, and busy themselves with interests more strictly within their own domain than those of literature. The demand might claim respectful notice, if all women would give heed to it. Since they will not, is there any reason why those who employ their pens in the production of sensational stories and other demoralizing works should have the field all to themselves? Or is it right that others of equal ability should shrink from entering it in defence of religion and morality?

The space is ample for all combatants. Our learned and venerable doctors, stern champions of truth, who keep their logical and polemical lances ever poised to strike the foe, to demolish error, and force conviction upon minds firmly closed against less cogent weapons, need not fear being jostled by humble handmaidens of the same mistress, who have ventured within the lists. These may do good service, also, with a large class whom their telling blows shall fail to reach.

Our women and youth, who will read and be influenced for good or evil by “feminine literature,” cannot be amused with metaphysical discussions that gain an attentive hearing from men of philosophical tastes, or even by moral essays and reflections, however excellent and edifying.

Unfortunately, it is not a question of forming the tastes of readers. Alas! these are already formed by a vitiated literature, flowing from a godless system of education, and carrying the poison through the whole length of its course.

The only question is, Where shall the antidote be found, and how administered? Certainly not in moral lectures that will not be read, or in fiction of the goody-goody sort.

Our only hope—and it is a bright one—for the future of our young Catholics lies in the blessed awakening—effected by the clear tones of that infallible voice which never, in any age, gave forth an uncertain sound—that is causing schools for Christian culture to spring up through the whole length and breadth of our country. But what for our children of a larger growth, whose tastes are already perverted?

We think it is unquestionable that, as the daughters of the first Eve, according to the flesh, have aided powerfully in commending the forbidden fruit to the lips of a deluded public, so the daughters of the second Eve, according to the spirit, may do much to remedy the consequences of the fatal banquet.

There are certain influences exercised almost exclusively by women. There are certain subjects to the consideration of which the flexibility of her nature enables her to bend her efforts with graceful success, and to far better purpose than the “stern masculinity” of man's heart, head, and pen can compass.

Well, then, if women may write, [pg 278] it behooves them to treat of such matters, and in such manner, as shall secure readers. For our people must and will read. Right or wrong, it is a necessity of the age. From the abodes of wealth and leisure, in the metropolis of fashion, to village homes and rural firesides, our people must and will read. Happy for them if the nourishment their fevered imaginations so morbidly crave be at least harmless! A highly-seasoned sensational literature has stimulated the craving to a degree of frenzy, if not to actual organic disease; happy, indeed, for them could such mental pabulum, such agreeable viands and cooling fruits, be furnished and accepted as would gradually assuage the wild thirst for excitement, until wholesome correctives should become palatable!

To secure success in tilling the field from which so desirable a harvest is to be gathered, the most conscientious writers must be content, however they may deplore the necessity, to sharpen their plough-shares in the camps of these Philistines of literature. With no blunt implement can the soil be compelled to yield such harvest.

We may furnish entertaining and edifying biographies, and gain a few readers. For this department women are by nature peculiarly fitted, if they will guard against the tendency to exaggeration which is their besetting sin. But for one reader of such a book there will be fifty, even among Catholics, who will prefer the demoralizing trash in cheap newspapers and dime novels to the best biography that can be produced.

Truth should be presented in a sharp and, to use a phrase of the times, taking way which shall compel a hearing. The popular absurdities and glaring depravities of this “enlightened XIXth century” should be set forth with vehement energy and convincing force.

It is no shadow, but a real, all-pervading, soul-destroying power with which the Christian athlete of this day is brought into close conflict. The foe must be met by an attitude as firmly hostile to its evil enticements as it assumes against all good influences. “Beating the air” will win no victory. Seeking to compromise or modify the stern principles of eternal truth held and proclaimed by the Catholic Church from first to last will only ensure defeat.

If our women join in the struggle to resist the forces of infidelity which threaten to overwhelm our sons and daughters in temporal and eternal ruin, and, in their zealous enthusiasm, step beyond the sphere of domestic privacy and humble retirement that is happily their own; if some literary Judith even throws off for the moment the delicate tenderness of her sex, and seems to pass the limits of female decorum to strike off the head a leading Holofernes, let us not cry, Out upon her for such unwomanly act! Let us reflect that it would have been more in accordance with her nature and inclination to have remained quietly in her sequestered home and at her ease, if she could have forgotten the fearful interests that were at stake.

What woman could look on with apathy when husband, brother, or child was exposed to certain death, from which her strongest effort might possibly snatch the dear one, or listen to the remonstrance that it was unbecoming and improper for a woman to put forth such effort, and that it must prove a very [pg 279] feeble and faulty one at the best? And shall we ask her to fold her hands in ease, and remain silent in fitting retirement, when the souls of her beloved are exposed to eternal death? No; it is her inalienable right to speak and act when by word or deed she may possibly rescue souls.

Should sentiments of mere human feeling, and affections from which it is most difficult to detach the heart of woman, enter into, imbue, and even control the means she uses to promote interests dearer than mortal life, she has nothing to fear but the critics. Her heavenly Judge will never condemn her for using such weapons as he has endowed her withal in his holy cause.

Honey is sometimes better than vinegar, feminine sentiment often more effective than masculine wisdom, and fervor always to be preferred to apathy.

We need not fear that the Catholic woman will be carried too far by her fervent zeal in resisting the “spirit of the age.” She can never be led into the mistakes of the so-called “strong-minded.” Our vigilant and loving mother, the Holy Catholic Church, arms her daughters with invulnerable shields against all fanaticism. She holds also in her hands the power to sanctify all influences by which souls are attracted to her embrace; to transmute all metals into gold.

If an appeal to the sentimental and emotional element in the heart of a stranger to her fold has drawn the wanderer to her maternal bosom, her gentle, all-prevailing inspiration soon condenses feeling into principle, and the romantic visionary stands clothed in the panoply of a martyr.

If fitting words bravely spoken have called hither a soul from the slough of transcendentalism, spiritism, free love, or from the ranks of the “strong-minded,” there is no fear that it may prove less docile to the genial influence than that of the dreamer, or fail to be speedily invested with all the delicate attributes and simple dignity of the true woman.

All honor to the Catholic women in our own country and in Great Britain who are striving, each in her own way, to promote the interests of a sound and truly Catholic literature. When there were but few of these in America, our sisters beyond the Atlantic reached their hands across the great waters to rescue souls. It will be known only at the great accounting day how many they first attracted to the consideration of eternal verities. From that time they have increased in number, and have continued to enrich British Catholic literature by their contributions, while encouraging their American co-workers.

A feminine Catholic literature may not be faultless, and yet gain numerous readers, and prove a power for good, not only within the church, but beyond her pale. Women are human, and therefore liable to imperfection.

When we notice the faults of female writers, we must not forget the difficulties which encompass them. Few American women who write are exempt from a multitude of vexatious household cares, or even from kitchen drudgery. Many are oppressed with poverty, have no power to earn a subsistence but by the pen, with helpless families dependent upon their literary exertions. Among the most favored, scarcely one can be found who has not some invalid—a husband, parent, [pg 280] or child—who requires her attentions by night and day. It may be safely asserted that such literary leisure as men devoted to these pursuits ordinarily enjoy is unknown to American women. With all their disadvantages, the marvel is, not that their performances should be imperfect, but that they have really accomplished so much under the shadow of the crowding cares and duties which surround them in their various domestic relations.

Let them take courage, then, and persevere in their laudable efforts, striving diligently to make the productions of their pens more and more perfect. And to this end let them bestow their cordial smiles and most graceful bows of acknowledgment upon their best friends—the critics who will take the pains to examine and pass honest and intelligent verdicts upon their productions. Acute criticism is the purging fire of literature, without which it would soon become overburdened with nonsense. As the friend who kindly admonishes us of our faults is entitled to the warmest corner in our hearts, so the critic who frankly sets forth the defects of any production may justly claim the most sincere gratitude of its author.

New Publications.

This pamphlet is worth reading by all who are interested in hospitals. The need of reformation in this branch of philanthropic work is only too well proved. The gentlemen and ladies who interest themselves in the care of the sick poor merit both honor and gratitude. All that is written or done, however, by the most zealous and disinterested persons who seek to accomplish their end outside of the Catholic Church only adds to the evidence that the church alone is competent to deal with great social evils and miseries. The state is cold, selfish, and merciless, except so far as it is Christianized. Mercenaries are always lacking in the qualities necessary to secure a truly faithful and charitable care of the sick and miserable. Division among those who are seeking to carry out the precepts of Christian charity, and the want of organization and of religious institutions among those who are out of the one true church, paralyze their efforts. It is only Christian unity which can give the proper remedy for this lamentable state of things, and without Catholic faith and obedience this unity is impossible. Religious orders are alone capable of carrying out great works of charity, and they cannot exist and flourish except in the Catholic Church. If modern society does not return to the bosom of the church, its evils are incurable, however much individuals may do in a partial way. Nevertheless, these partial and imperfect efforts ought to be encouraged; and during this past winter we have had occasion to admire and rejoice in the outflow of a stream of beneficence upon our suffering population in New York which has relieved an immense amount of misery. In so far as the special subject of this pamphlet is concerned, it is obvious that the erection of a new Bellevue Hospital is imperatively demanded, and we trust that it will be accomplished.

We are rejoiced to see that the six-hundredth anniversary of S. Thomas was celebrated with due splendor and solemnity in at least these two places on the American continent. The same was done in private at the college of the Jesuits, at Woodstock. The Quebec pamphlet, besides the two excellent discourses of M. l'Abbé Bégin and the Rev. F. Prior Bourgeois, O.S.D., contains a very remarkable poem by a religious of the Congregation of the Precious Blood at S. Hyacinthe. We tender our thanks for the courtesy of the friend who sent us this interesting memorial of a religious fête which does honor to the taste and piety of the devout and cultivated Catholics of Lower Canada.

The two discourses contained in the pamphlet are of a high order of excellence in regard both to thought and diction. We have accidentally omitted to notice among the other discourses that of Professor Pâquèt, which is fully worthy of the brilliant occasion on which it was delivered, viz., the soirée which took place in the evening in the grand hall of the university.

This story, the epoch of which is placed during the reign of Henry VIII., is almost worthy of Lady Georgiana Fullerton, and its style frequently reminds us of that accomplished writer of fiction. The character of Catharine Tresize is truly beautiful and original. We recommend this story as one of the best which has lately appeared.

The story of the two friends, who are two young Americans converted to Catholicity in Europe, has the advantage of appearing upon tinted paper, in a neat form, suitable to the polished, ornate diction and poetic fancy of the lady author, a near relative of the late Mr. Meline, who was one of our favorite contributors. Miss Meline has a cultivated literary taste and a decided talent for writing stories. She has, moreover, the genuine Catholic spirit of fervent devotion to the Holy Father, and in the present story describes some scenes connected with the invasions of Rome under Garibaldi and La Marmora. We trust Miss Meline will not suffer her pen to lie idle, but keep it busily at work.

Dr. Coxe is a prelate who has always been conspicuous for arrogance and reckless assertion in maintaining the pretensions of the High Church party in the Protestant Episcopal denomination, and for his vituperative and defamatory assaults on the Catholic Church. In this temperate but severe criticism, Bishop Ryan has made an end of his claims to possess episcopal character and mission, and has refuted him out of his own mouth. We trust that this able and valuable pamphlet will not be permitted to go into oblivion, as pamphlets are wont to do, but be carefully preserved and made use of by clergymen and others who have to deal with Episcopalians searching after the true church, of whom there are so many in these days.

Goethe somewhere remarks that many of an author's best thoughts are to be found in his letters to his intimate friends; written, not for the public, not for fame but from the strong desire to communicate that which is most living within him to a kindred spirit.

In the confidential correspondence of great minds there is a yet greater charm. We feel a kind of personal interest in men who have exercised great intellectual power over us; they become our heroes, and we endow them with imaginary qualities, [pg 282] from lack of more certain information concerning them. The minutest details in their lives become to us affairs of moment. How they looked, how they dressed, what they thought about the most trifling subjects, seem to us to be matters worthy of becoming a part of history. There is a still higher interest in the story of the unfolding of a powerful intellect. It contains a lesson in psychology more instructive than any which can be learned from abstract treatises on this subject. This it is that gives the chief value to autobiographies of philosophers, poets, and theologians. Yet an autobiography can never be a mirror in which we may behold the workings of the human mind. It is an after-thought, a reflex judgment, the expression of what men now think they once felt or thought. It does not give us the process of intellectual growth, but a theory concerning what that process must have been; and a theory formed by the individual concerning the flux and reflux of the currents of his own life can never be wholly trustworthy. Autobiography is necessarily subject to all the vices inherent in special pleading.

The truest history of the intellectual and moral development of a man is to be found in his letters to his intimate friends. There we have, not what in after-years he thinks he thought and felt, but what he really did think and feel; and in this view of the matter, the egotism which is always so prominent in letters to friends gives them an additional value. Instead of being offended with the writer for talking so much about himself, we are grateful for the weakness which gives us a truer insight into his character.

These considerations will prepare our readers for a favorable criticism upon the volume before us. Few men have lived to whom we more gladly give the homage of admiration and respect than to Charles de Montalembert; and though we strongly condemn certain words which he uttered when his mind was troubled by suffering and disease, and which, had he lived longer, he himself would have been the first to wish unsaid, he was yet so great a man that we willingly forget that he made this blunder.

These Letters, of which Mr. Audly has given us an excellent English translation, were first published in the Contemporain (June, 1872, to March, 1873).

They run from 1827 to 1830, and, as the work of a youth from his seventeenth to his twentieth year, are of course fresh, frank, and ardent; but they also reveal in the future orator and historian a depth of feeling and a command of language rarely to be met with in one of so tender an age.

They are addressed to M. Léon Cornudet, whom Montalembert calls the friend of his soul, his dearest friend; to whom he is bound by a common sympathy in every noble feeling and high aim; whom nor time nor absence can make him even for one moment forget. What chiefly strengthens him in his faith in the permanency of this friendship is the fact that it is based on religion, which becomes the immortal mediatrix between his soul and that of his friend.

When he travels and contemplates the beauties of nature, his only regret is that his friend is not near him; when he reads a poem, and his soul is borne aloft on the wings of inspiration, he exclaims, “Oh! if he were but here to share my delight.” He never dreams of the future, of battling for religion and freedom, of victories won and defeats nobly borne, that he does not behold his friend by his side; and when, picturing to himself the vicissitudes of life, he imagines that possibly, in spite of his high resolves and strong purposes, he may fail, may be doomed to obscurity and the contempt of the world, he seeks for consolation in the thought that in the heart of his friend he will find a better world.

His friend is, as it were, his other self, which gives to him a twofold life; making him feel always that “joy was born a twin,” and that all who joy would win must share it, and that sorrow, too, longs to pour itself into the heart of love.

This strong friendship—“the only impulse of the soul admitting of excess”—which, like a thread of gold, runs through all these letters, wins at once our sympathy and our confidence.

There is something noble and great in the youth who is capable of such pure and deep love. After all, it is the heart that reaches highest and deepest, and through it man attains to the best.

Of course there is in these letters much that is immature; were it not so, they would not be the letters of a mere boy; but the infinite faith in the possibility of divine realities even on earth, the lofty contempt for what is mean and ignoble, the self-confidence that never doubts of [pg 283] itself, the restless activity that no work satisfies, the boundless craving for knowledge, the freshness of the heart that falls like dew upon every lovely thing, giving it health and beauty—all this so charms and delights us that we have no eye for defects.

“A contempt for life,” he writes to his friend, “is, in my opinion, the finest privilege of youth. As we grow older, the more we cling to a frail existence which becomes a burden to ourselves and to others.”

What has experience that can compensate for the loss of

Young Montalembert, with wealth and noble birth, which gave him the entrée of the highest circles, found no charm in what is called society. His mind was too serious, his ambition too lofty, to permit him to throw away the precious time of youth in frivolous amusements.

“People usually say,” he writes to his friend during the summer vacations of 1827, “that in youth we ought to give ourselves up to the pleasures of society. In my opinion, this amounts to downright absurdity. I should think that in youth we ought to plunge into study or into the profession we wish to embrace. When a man has done his duty towards his country; when he can come before the world with laurels won in the senate or on the field of battle, or at least when he enjoys universal esteem; when, again, he is sure of commanding universal esteem and respect, then I can understand that he has a right to enjoy himself in society, and to mix in it with assurance.”

Montalembert had a passion for labor, which is the only sure road to excellence and power, and which is also the greatest evidence of ability.

We find him, when not yet ten years old, shut up in his grandfather's library, acting as his secretary, helping him in the designs of his geographical maps, and absorbed in the study of the great English orators; and later, at college, giving up his recreations, and devoting fifteen hours a day to the severest mental discipline. By saving five minutes every morning in his cell at Sainte-Barbe out of the time allowed to the pupils for rising and dressing, he managed in one year to translate a whole volume of Epictetus. He spent a portion of the summer vacation of 1827 at La Roche-Guyon, the country-seat of the Duc de Rohan; and though the castle was filled with guests, for whom the duke provided every kind of amusement, this intrepid young worker is able to write the following lines to his friend:

“While you are idling your time away, pray just hear what I shall have read during my month's residence at La Roche: in the first place, all Byron, which is no trifling job; Delolme, on the British Constitution—a capital and highly important work; the whole of the Odyssey, twenty-four cantos, at the rate of one a day; Thomson, Cowper, Pliny's Letters; the Lettres Provinciales; the Life of S. Francis Xavier, by Bouhours, which the duke obliged me to read; three volumes of the Mercure newspaper; and, lastly, the poetical part of the Greek Excerpta.”

Even in Stockholm, whither he went in 1828 with his father, who had been appointed French ambassador to the court of Sweden, he is able, in the midst of the endless and tiresome routine of court etiquette, to devote six or seven hours a day to study. “In the morning,” he writes, “I read Kant, whom I study deeply, not finding him over-difficult in the beginning. At night I plod in detail over Northern history. In the afternoon I devote all the time I can catch to my correspondence, to reading a few German poems and novels, and to certain statistical or political studies.”

Not content with working himself, he seeks to rouse the flagging energies of his friend by pointing out to him' what great things he may be able to do for God and his country. The ruling passion in Montalembert's heart, in these early years as during his whole life, was the love of the church and of freedom.

“Religion, liberty,” he writes—“such are the eternal groundworks of all virtue. To serve God, to be free—such are our duties. In order to fulfil them, we must use every resource, every means, which Providence has placed in our hands.” And again: “I have succeeded in preserving my faith in the midst of one hundred and twenty infidels; I hope that God [pg 284] will not allow me to lose my independence of mind in the midst of half a dozen absolutists.”

And then he pictures to himself the great good which might be accomplished by a writer who, bidding defiance to the prejudices of youth and the public, would raise a bold and eloquent voice in defence of freedom and the church. “What a noble part he would have to play!” he exclaims. “What blessings he would confer upon mankind! What services he would render to religion! Ah! wherefore has not God deigned to give me talent? With what passionate ardor I would have embraced such a glorious future!” Who does not perceive here how the thoughts of the boy were father to the deeds of the man?

No author of our time has written more feelingly or eloquently of Ireland than Montalembert. He was drawn to her by a double attraction—he loved her for her faith, and he sympathized with her because she was wronged. The finest portion of his history of The Monks of the West is that devoted to the Irish saints. Nothing could be more beautiful or more consoling than the noble pages which he has devoted to this subject. As his Histoire de Sainte Elisabeth opened a new path across the vast field of Catholic history, his studies on S. Columba and S. Columbanus called attention to the wealth of religious poetry and Christian example which was suffered to remain buried in the archives of the early Irish Church. In these letters we perceive the first awakening of his love for Ireland, and are able to trace the causes which led him to study the history of that most interesting but unhappy land.

“By reading the admirable speeches of Grattan,” he writes in 1828, “I have discovered, as it were, a new world—the world of Ireland, of her long-sufferings, her times of freedom and glory, her sublime geniuses, and her indefatigable struggles. The universal interest now felt for Ireland, and the remarkable circumstances in which she is placed at present, have tempted me to unfold before the eyes of those Frenchmen who care for Ireland the highly interesting annals and the sundry revolutions of her history. My Irish parentage on my mother's side, my deep knowledge of English, and my acquaintance with several families in that country have confirmed my first ideas on this matter, and I have determined upon writing a history of Ireland from the year 1688, and to do it as soon as possible, in order that it may be published, if that can be done, before the vital question of the emancipation is solved. There is perhaps no country presenting such a plentiful harvest of events equally interesting and unknown.”

Montalembert was in Sweden when he wrote this letter, and he at once sent to England for books, that he might without delay set to work on his proposed history of Ireland. In addition to this, he proposed at the end of the year to visit Ireland itself, that he might consult libraries and make a thorough study of the people and country. This somewhat ambitious project of the youthful Montalembert led to no other immediate results than an article on Ireland in the Revue Française, and a journey to the Emerald Isle in 1830; but to it we are no doubt in part indebted for the eloquent chapters on the Irish Saints in The Monks of the West. His first letter from Ireland to his friend is full of the enthusiasm with which the history of that country had inspired him:

“As for the Irishwomen,” he writes, “they are bewitching. They form the most beautiful female population I ever beheld. But I reserve all my remarks on the country and the people for our conversations in Paris. For the present I must simply beg of you to pray that my passion for Ireland may not become criminal, for it threatens really to lead me astray from the lawful object of my affections; and I am but too often tempted to turn away my thoughts from our France to a country so completely responding to my beliefs, my tastes, and even my most trifling prepossessions.”

He visited the county Wicklow in September, 1830, and wrote to his friend from the “meeting of the waters in the vale of Avoca.” “No, never,” he exclaims, “in France, England, the Netherlands, or even in Germany, have I met with anything comparable to the wild and picturesque defiles of this Wicklow County.... Only figure to yourself the grandest and yet the most lovely landscape; torrents abounding in numberless cascades, struggling to make their way through perpendicular rocks; forests of almost fabulous depths; meadows and swards full worthy of the Emerald Isle; and then old abbeys, modern residences, and lodges built in the purest Gothic style. Place, [pg 285] moreover, in such a landscape, the most pious, most cheerful, most poetical population in the world. Then, again, say to yourself that Grattan passed his childhood here; that he meditated his speeches along these torrents; that one of these residences was bestowed on him by his fatherland, and that therein he lived in his old age; that all these beautiful lands were sanctified and immortalized by the Rebellion of 1798. Well, figure to yourself all this, and you will still have but a faint idea of what I have felt for the last few days.”

As in his eyes Irishwomen were the most beautiful, and Irish scenery the most lovely, he was prepared to admire enthusiastically the men of the country. At Carlow College he dined with the celebrated Bishop Doyle and several of his professors, who, he says, received him with a truly Homeric hospitality.

“I really don't know,” he writes, “which I ought to admire most, the people or the clergy. I feel confounded at the sight of this people, equally faithful—as I said in my article, whilst myself hardly believing it—equally faithful to its old misery and to its old faith, who, of all the possessions of their forefathers, have preserved nothing but their religion, the only relic snatched from the conqueror, without ever allowing themselves to be carried away by the invincible attraction of imitation.... As for the priests, they are all model priests—manly, open, cheerful, energetic. No hypocrisy, no assumed reserve, to be read on their candid and serene countenances; they talk of freedom with all the buoyancy of a Paris school-boy, and of their country, of their dear and unfortunate Ireland, with an accent that would melt a heart of stone. One can see that over their hearts religion and patriotism hold equal sway. Indeed, in order to comprehend fully what patriotism is, one must hear an Irish priest talk of his country.”

It is a mistake to affirm, as has been done, that Montalembert made this journey to Ireland merely, or chiefly even from a desire to see O'Connell.

The great Liberator had indeed fired his young heart with enthusiasm, and he rode sixty miles through a dreary country to have the pleasure of talking with him; but from these letters it is evident that a feeling, higher and more general than any which could be inspired by an individual, however great, had drawn him to the Isle of Saints. At Derrynane he found O'Connell, surrounded by his twenty-three children and nephews, looking like a plain country farmer. “I was struck,” he writes, “but not dazzled, by him. He is by no means the most interesting object in Ireland.”

He heard O'Connell speak, and, in spite of his enthusiastic and impressionable nature, was disappointed.

“He is but a demagogue,” he tells his friend, “and by no means a great orator. He is declamatory, inflated, full of bombast; his arguments are loosely strung together; his fancy is devoid of charm or freshness; his style harsh, rough, and choppy. The more I see of him, the more I hear him, the more I am confirmed in my first opinion—to wit, he is not stamped with the mark of genius or with true greatness. But he defends the finest of all causes. He has before him no mighty antagonist or rival, and circumstances—as is the case with many others—will stand him in lieu of genius.”

We have given our readers but a faint idea of the warmth, and glow, and freshness that pervade these letters; of the frank and unaffected candor with which their youthful author lays open his whole heart to his friend; of the deep spirit of religion and reverence which runs through them; of the noble sentiments and generous resolves which, as from an inexhaustible fountain, well up from young Montalembert's heart. In reading them, we have felt our own heart grow younger and kindle with new fire; we have seemed to catch the accent of the olden time, when men lived for honor, and were glad to die for faith and truth, rather than the metallic tone of this age, “when only the ledger lives, and when only not all men lie.”

We know of no book which we would more gladly see in the hands of our Catholic youth who lack enthusiasm and are without the courage which a noble and high purpose in life can alone give.

They need the education which will lift them above low and petty aims, and cause them to take an interest in things of an unselfish kind. They must learn that worth is more than success, and honor better than wealth; they must be taught to outgrow the narrow, calculating spirit of the huckster and the shopkeeper, the disposition to sneer at enthusiasm and to depreciate high principles of action; and to this end we know of nothing [pg 286] that is likely to contribute more effectually than the example and writings of such men as Montalembert, who devoted the labor of a lifetime to high aims and noble purposes; who loved the truth for its own sake, and freedom, not for himself alone, but for all men; who never worshipped the rising sun or paid court to success, but fought for the just cause without stopping to reflect whether he would win or lose.

“Let us never forget,” said Montalembert, towards the end of his life, speaking to his friend—“let us never forget that Rio, when we were young, cultivated enthusiasm within our souls, and for such a blessing we must be bound to him by the deepest gratitude.” This is a debt which many a Catholic to-day, not in France alone, but throughout the world, owes to Charles de Montalembert.

This work is really beyond the scope of the reviewer or the critic, as it is made up wholly from the writings of a great saint. To every one who knows the works of S. Francis of Sales, it will be a fresh pleasure to see such well-arranged parts of them in an English dress. Père Huguet has had the happy thought of choosing from the saint's spiritual treatises everything that could console the sorrowful, strengthen the weak, and encourage the doubtful. The translator made it a labor of love to put these thoughts within the reach of many millions of English-speaking people. S. Francis has been read and admired by every one, within or without the church; and there is between him and the modern mind a peculiar sympathy which makes him essentially welcome to men of our day. Non-Catholics would call him a thoroughly reasonable saint. Everywhere his counsel will be found on the side of moderation. The “smoking flax” and the “bruised reed” need not fear him; his gentle touch is the very thing they require. The care with which Père Huguet has made this compilation is apparent; for though the sentences that compose one page may, as he says, have been taken from twenty various treatises, they all follow each other in admirable order. The author has also supplemented them with footnotes, consisting of appropriate passages from other spiritual writers, ancient and modern, bearing on the same subjects as those treated of by S. Francis. A few of these notes are signed with no name, and are probably the adapter's own. S. Francis has a wonderful power of expressing spiritual truths in little terse sayings that might well be called proverbs. A few quotations will give an idea of this peculiarity of his style:

“Persecutions are pieces of the cross of Jesus Christ; we should scruple very much to allow the smallest particle of them to perish.”

“It is not with spiritual rose-bushes as with material ones; on the latter, the thorns remain and the roses pass away; on the former, the thorns pass away and the roses remain.”

“It is necessary that all these sentiments should sink deep into our hearts, and that, leaving our reflections and our prayers, we should pass to our affairs sweetly, lest the liquor of our good resolutions should evaporate and be lost, for we must allow it to saturate and penetrate our whole soul; everything, nevertheless, without strain of mind or body.”

Some very beautiful thoughts will be found on death, and the sorrow of the living for the loss of their dear ones; also some merciful and encouraging conjectures on the number of the saved, which S. Francis thinks will be the greater number of Christians.

This volume, containing the literary remains of the lamented F. Buckley, will, we have no doubt, be well received by his numerous friends both here and in Ireland. Though a young man, he had earned a high reputation as a speaker and a writer; and the contents of this volume prove that his reputation was not undeserved.

The subjects of the sermons and lectures are varied and interesting, and are, for the most part, well handled. The memoir of the devoted young priest attached to the volume will be found edifying and instructive, and the whole book [pg 287] we deem well worthy the careful perusal of both clergy and laity.

The devotion to Our Lady of Lourdes has spread so rapidly, and miraculous favors coming from it have become so common, even in this country, that this little book is extremely welcome, and will, no doubt, be very popular. It cannot fail, also, to do much good by making the apparition more generally known, and increasing the love of the faithful for Our Lady, and their confidence in her intercession.

All who are acquainted with other meditations by the lately-deceased and much-regretted Brother Philippe will not need to be assured of the excellence of the present work. We have eighty-two meditations on the Eucharist, admirably chosen and thought out. Among them we are delighted to see one entitled “The Holy Eucharist and the Most Blessed Virgin,” and another upholding “Frequent Communion.”

Subjoined to these meditations are some on the Sacred Heart of Jesus, by the same author. These are twenty-four in number, and will prove of service for instructions and conferences to sodalities of the Sacred Heart.

May our glorious Lady, to whom this volume is dedicated, secure it the reception it deserves. We have never seen anything to surpass these Meditations, which Brother Philippe has left us as a precious legacy.

There are several reasons which incline us to speak favorably of this book of poems. The first, perhaps, is the appearance of its printed pages, which are neatly executed upon tinted paper. We notice, also, that the red on the edges does not rub off on our fingers, which is a great source of satisfaction to one who is obliged to handle new books. On turning the book over, it occurs to us that green muslin does not form a pleasant contrast with red edges; but as we notice a gilded harp and shamrock on the cover, the arrangement of color is perhaps intended to be typical of the sentiments of the authoress.

The book-noticer—for we shall not claim the august title of critic—pauses with instinctive reverence at sight of the works of a poet, and, above all, of a poetess. The rhymes must be either good or bad. If good, how shall he condense the ecstasies, the harmonies, of one volume into the prosaic compass of a notice? If bad, how shall he run the risk of breaking by rude treatment the strings of a lyre which is perhaps just working into tune, or inflict a wound on those gushing hearts which sing with the birds or bubble with the brooks? In the present instance, we are glad to be able to say that the verses are not bad. The writer has talent. While there is no marked or striking originality in the subjects chosen, and not much of deep and moving pathos, there are many well-turned and pretty stanzas, and at times quite a wealth of imagery and illustration. The lines on “The Nightingale,” “To Cashel,” “The Wayside Shrine,” will furnish instances of this; and the volume will be found agreeable to lovers of poetry. The writer deserves to be encouraged. We wish her success in the fortune of her volume.

There is, however, a tone in some of the strains which grates somewhat upon our ears. Although no one suffers from the abuse of arbitrary power as greatly as the holy church, it is not her spirit to seek relief by violence, nor is this permitted to her children, even under oppressive tyranny, excepting when it promises to be a true remedy. There is much more to be feared in these days from the spirit of lawlessness and rebellion than from intelligent submission to governments, even when imperfect in form and unjust in practice. Our Holy Father, while branding with his apostolic eloquence the iniquities of which he is the victim, has forbidden violent resistance, [pg 288] for the time being, to the oppressors of Italy. The Catholics of Germany, under the most diabolical tyranny, have not sought relief by agitating insurrection. And while we do not propose to submit to injustice, or to call bad things by good names, we will never wilfully stain our hands by unnecessary bloodshed. Under these circumstances, the “Hymn to Liberty,” page 39, strikes us as a piece of heated declamation.

Some lines which we have noted at intervals, and which seem to look forward to the emancipation of Ireland as the work of the sword, though highly gratifying to martial spirits, will not wholly commend themselves to those friends of Ireland who are now seeking it by peaceful means, and tread in the paces of the great O'Connell. There is no beauty without truth; and those who lose sight of it, even in minor details, run the risk of a false inspiration. We are glad to notice, on the other hand, several poems in the volume full of Catholic thought and piety. As for the melodies, harmonies, etc., before alluded to, those who wish for them must lay aside our notice and read the book.

The idea of this book is to show that the lovers of the Sacred Heart find in that “masterpiece of creation” an Eden more beautiful than that from which sin expelled us. The various chapters treating of the “Virtues,” will be read with delight by all who are capable of appreciating them. The book is one of the “Messenger Series,” and uniform with the Happiness of Heaven and God Our Father—two works which have been widely read.