Chapter V (31)

I would have cried for help, but my voice was no louder than that of a sobbing child. But my feeble cry awoke others, and groans and shrieks arose on all sides. The wounded, thought succor was coming, and all who could cried piteously. And I heard, too, a horse neigh painfully on the other side of the hedge. The poor animal tried to rise, and I saw its head and long neck appear; then it fell again to the earth.

The effort I made reopened my wound, and again I felt the blood running down my breast. I closed my eyes to die, and the scenes of my early childhood, of my native village, the face of my poor mother as she sang me to sleep, my little room, with its niched Virgin, our old dog Pommer--all rose before my eyes; my father embraced me again, as he laid aside his axe at his return from work--all rose dreamily before me.

How little those poor parents thought that they were rearing their boy to die miserably far from friends, and home, and succor! Would that I could have asked their forgiveness for all the pain I had given them! Tears rolled down my cheeks; I sobbed like a child.

Then Catharine, Aunt Grédel, and Monsieur Goulden passed before me. I saw their grief and fear when the news of the battle came. Aunt Grédel running to the post-office to learn something of me, and Catharine prayerfully awaiting her return, while Monsieur Goulden searched the gazette for intelligence of our corps. I saw Aunt Grédel return disappointed, and heard Catharine's sobs as she asked eagerly for me. Then a messenger seemed to arrive at Quatre-Vents. He opened his leathern sack, and handed a large paper to Aunt Grédel, while Catharine stood, pale as death, beside her. It was the official notice of my death! I heard Catharine's heart-rending cries and Aunt Grédel's maledictions. Then good Monsieur Goulden came to console them, and all wept together.

Toward morning, a heavy shower began to fall, and the monotonous dripping on the roofs alone broke the silence. I thought of the good God, whose power and mercy are limitless, and I hoped that he would pardon my sins in consideration of my sufferings.

The rain filled the little trench in which I had been lying. From time to time a wall fell in the village, and the cattle, scared away by the battle, began to resume confidence and return. I heard a goat bleat in a neighboring stable. A great shepherd's dog wandered fearfully among the heaps of dead. The horse, seeing him, neighed in terror--he took him for a wolf--and the dog fled.

I remember all these details, for, when we are dying, we see everything, we hear everything, for we know that we are seeing and hearing our last.

But how my whole frame thrilled with joy when, at the corner of the street, I thought I heard the sound of voices! How eagerly I listened! {622} And I raised myself upon my elbow, and called for help. It was yet night; but the first grey streak of day was becoming visible in the east, and afar off, through the falling rain, I saw a light in the fields, now coming onward, now stopping. I saw dark forms bending around it. They were only confused shadows. But others beside me saw the light; for on all sides arose groans and plaintive cries, from voices so feeble that they seemed like those of children calling their mothers.

What is this life to which we attach so great a price? This miserable existence, so full of pain and suffering? Why do we so cling to it, and fear more to lose it than aught else in the world? What is it that is to come hereafter that makes us shudder at the mere thought of death? Who knows? For ages and ages all have thought and thought on the great question, but none have yet solved it. I, in my eagerness to live, gazed on that light as the drowning man looks to the shore. I could not take my eyes from it, and my heart thrilled with hope. I tried again to shout, but my voice died on my lips. The pattering of the rain on the ruined dwellings, and on the trees, and the ground, drowned all other sounds, and, although I kept repeating, "They hear us! They are coming!" and although the lantern seemed to grow larger and larger, after wandering for some time over the field, it slowly disappeared behind a little hill.

I fell once more senseless to the ground.

--------

The Old Religion;

Or, How Shall We Find Primitive Christianity?

We Americans, generally, have got the name of being the most "go-ahead" people on earth. We are always looking out for "the last new thing," and, when we have got it, we try to sail past it, to do something better. We have tried our hands at everything under the sun; we have had our fair share in original invention, and when we have not invented we have brought out the last improvements. Amongst other things, we have tried our hands at the manufacture of religions, and if man could have made a religion, there is not a doubt that we should have succeeded. As it is, we worked the religious element with considerable originality. We have made tracks which no other people have ever thought of, and our imitations of religion have been a prodigious success.

But, in truth, the great majority of thinking people in this country have always remained deeply convinced of the truth of the old original Christianity as the work of God's revelation to man, not as the result of human thought. As a revelation, they know it must have been given once for all as a heavenly treasure, to be preserved in its antiquity to the end, not to be improved upon and adapted and remodelled by human ingenuity. {623} Hence, as a people, we are convinced of the claims of the Christian religion upon our allegiance, and understand moreover that not "the newest thing in religions," but the "veritable old religion," is not only the best, but is the _only truth_; our strength in life, our hope in death; the only thing we have to seek after, if as yet we have not found it, the pearl of priceless value, the purchase of our admission into heaven.

The question, therefore, as between Christians, narrows itself to the simple issue, Which is the old religion, and what was primitive Christianity?

But, again, we may narrow the question still more. All admit, as beyond all doubt, that there is one church, and one only, which is historically in possession of the old religion. Other churches in this country have their history, and we know when each began; some are not as old as the Declaration of Independence, none are older than the era of the Reformation, 300 years ago. The Catholic Church stands alone in her ancient descent and undaunted lineage amongst the churches of the modern creation. "True," it is answered, 'the Catholic Church is _the old church_' In the line of her bishops she can, no doubt, trace her descent until, as Macaulay says, 'history is lost in the twilight of fable.' If _she_ cannot count name by name the long succession of her pontiffs up to the apostles, there is certainly no other church that can put in the shadow of a claim to apostolic succession. But ancient as she is, she is not old enough to be primitive, and we should hardly think that any educated Catholic would venture to stand up before the public and say honestly that he believed, and was ready to give proof, that the Catholic Church of the present day and primitive Christianity are identical."

Such, strange as it seems to Catholics, is very much the attitude of the educated Protestant mind, when least prejudiced toward the church. Protestants, even of this class, do not know that the identity of the Catholic religion and primitive Christianity is a first principle with us, and has always been so, centuries before Protestantism was heard of; that this is the one only basis on which the Catholic Church rests her exclusive right to "teach all nations," and has always rested it. Disprove the justness of this claim, and you have reduced the Catholic Church to the level of one of the sects. So ancient and world-wide a challenge can only seem new and strange to Protestants, because they do not know even our first principles, still less the reasonings on which they rest. But clearly it cannot be rash and foolhardy in us to put forward claims to which the intellect of the vast majority of Christians, for nearly twenty centuries, has given in its adhesion. But to come to our own age and to facts of our own experience which meet us at every turn, we hear every day and have heard for the last thirty years, here and in England, and in all other Protestant countries, of great numbers of conversions to the Catholic religion. Amongst them there have been many of the leading minds of the day, high-classed men, the flower of the universities, now holding eminent positions in different walks of science and literature, at the bar, in the senate, and in the church. {624} To name Dr. Newman as the leading intellect amongst recent converts to the Catholic Church, is to name one who possesses a more than European reputation, nay, who is as well known on this as on the other continent for acuteness and accuracy of thought, sobriety of judgment, and indefatigable research into every question involving the history of Christian antiquity, primitive belief and practice; and such men are but a reproduction, in our day, of the same type which we find in all those other men of high moral and intellectual endowments who, from the days of St. Augustine, have brought to the service of the church the mental powers which had been trained in the camp of her enemies. What do all such conversions involve but the emphatic admission, on the part of such converts, that the Catholic religion has made out her claim to identity with primitive Christianity?

Perhaps we, in this country, are more than others averse to bowing down to the authority of great names. Still it cannot be denied that _peritus in arte sua_, the man who has made any art or science his particular study is and always must be an authority. We may examine a question for ourselves, or try an experiment in physics, but we must admit that the chances are a hundred to one that, after having tried it, we shall find only the predicted result. It is in this sense that we have brought forward the authority of majorities, and of great names in the present question, not as deciding the matter, "What is the truth?" but as justly producing on the minds of unprejudiced persons a strong presumption in favor of the justness of such conclusions. If it be said that the undoubtedly great minds which have embraced the Catholic religion are no proof, or even presumption, that the Catholic religion is true, we reply, Be it so; they do, however, afford a strong presumption of the sincerity of such converts when, as is generally the case, it can be shown that they embraced the Catholic faith against the force of early prejudice and to their own temporal loss. And it affords also a strong persuasion that the reasons which they had for the change of religion must have been weighty, since they wrought conviction in the minds of men well capable of judging of the force of argument, and who knew also all that could be urged on the other side. In fact, the argument in favor of the Catholic religion, drawn from the fact of the great and good men who have in every age embraced it, is similar to that which is very commonly brought forward in favor of the general evidences of Christianity, from the fact of their having wrought conviction in the mind of St. Paul or of Sir Isaac Newton.

The large number of conversions taking place every day amongst ourselves, not merely of the unlearned but even more in proportion, of the more educated and the more morally elevated, and the special weight which the submission of persons specially eminent for moral and intellectual gifts carries with it, ought to have, and indeed are found to produce at least this effect on sensible men, that it makes them pause to consider, and try to assign a sufficient reason for such conversions. Anyhow, whether any reason good or bad can be assigned for this movement, it is a _fact_, to which no one who enters into society can shut his eyes. Conversion to the Catholic religion is like an epidemic; there is no neighborhood or profession, scarcely a family in any class of society in which conversions to the Catholic Church have not taken place. I enter a railway car or a steamboat; I go to a dinner party; I stand up with my partner at a ball; and, in the pauses of the busy hum of voices or of musical sounds, I become aware that my opposite neighbors are actually discussing with interest, attacking or defending, the Catholic religion.

{625}

Going into town by the cars the other day, I met my uncle Joe in a brown study. "Good morning, sir! why so gloomy?"

"Why, John, my eldest son, has become a Papist, sir; sorry for it; a good, steady lad, but he has got into the hands of the priests, sir; I fear it is all up with him. I suppose he will shave his head next, leave his boots at home, and turn out like one of those bare-footed friars we used to see in Belgium last fall."

"Well, but, uncle," say I, "it cannot be helped, you see; you would not have the boy, as you call him--though he is two and twenty if he is a day--go against his conscience and remain a nominal Protestant to please you." "No, sir," he replies, "you have me there; I stand up for the principle of liberty of conscience, sir. Yes, sir, liberty of conscience. I know all about it, civil and religious liberty, which the fathers of our glorious republic established once and for all time as the palladium of our constitution. But how the boy can fancy the Catholic religion to be true, and make a matter of conscience to join it, that is my puzzle, I can tell you."

"Well, but my dear sir, it is no flattery to say to you, your son is no fool. He knows what he is about; for his age, there is not a more promising young fellow at our bar; only last week old Judge Davis complimented him for the way in which he had taken a very complicated case in equity and literally turned it inside out and held it up for inspection. He is not a child; he has cut all his teeth, and is not one to be led by the nose by any man, be he priest or lawyer--you don't walk round a Yankee lawyer in a hurry."

"Well, that is true," said my uncle. "He has as sound a head as any lad I know, and at school and college he was always well up. Whatever has turned his head to Papacy? Do you know I sometimes think it is what they call a _monomania_--like the man who was sensible enough in everything else but mad on one point, and thought he was a pump; and another took to his room and could not be got to go out because he thought he was made of glass, and would not stand jostling in the streets. Then think of Joanna Southcote, Joe Smith, and the rest. My word! there is no end of the aberrations of the human intellect."

"Well, sir," I replied, "I don't think that will hold water, for you and I know a dozen sensible, first-rate men who have turned Catholics; no fanatics, but cool-headed men of business, good neighbors, good husbands, honest men. There is Mr. A., Judge B., General C., within the present year. They are not men to make a serious change, which they know would set every one talking and criticising them, unless they knew well what they were about, and could give reasons for the change and stand a little criticism."

"Well, that is nothing but common sense," he replied; "still I am puzzled, I can tell you, to think why they did it."

"Well, my dear sir, I think I can tell you why they did it. Because they found out that it was the old original religion, after all."

"Well, you do astonish me. I do believe you must have turned Catholic yourself, by the way you speak."

"That's a fact uncle! You see, we have not met for more than nine months. I was led, through the conversion of a very dear friend of mine, to examine into his reasons, and the result is, that I became a Catholic just before last Christmas."

{626}

"I am glad I met you to-day," he rejoined, "for to tell you the truth, I was very much cut up about this business. I have not seen John since he did it. I thought I should have to meet him to-day, and I fully intended to cut up rough with him over it. And so, Philip, you are a Catholic; let me look at you; well, I wonder how you felt when you went down on your knees and told the priest everything right away--but I suppose they did not get you up to that point, did they?"

"As for that," I replied, "set your mind at ease. I went to confession like any pious old woman, and when it was over, I never felt so light and happy since I was a boy. I felt as if I had got rid of a load, like Christian, in the _Pilgrim's Progress_, when his heavy burden fell off at the foot of the cross of Christ, and rolled down into his sepulchre, to be buried out of sight for-ever."

"Ah! well," said he, "if one could really believe in it, and was sure it was all true, I grant you. But I tell you what, I want to have some more talk about these matters. You see, I know nothing except by hearsay against the Catholic religion, and so I have no right to pronounce an opinion--but you can't deny that they have a bad name. Go into any of our churches and hear what they all have to say against the Catholics. I don't believe one half of it; it is clear out of the question that good moral men, with all their wits about them like many we know, could be Catholics if one half of the things said against them were true. Anyhow, they have got a bad name and there is no denying it."

"That is true enough," I answered; "but do you remember of whom it was said, 'As for this sect, it is everywhere spoken against,' and that Christ tells us that in those days he, the great teacher of truth, was called by those who did not believe in him, 'Beelzebub;' that is, they actually gave out that he was the devil! And then he goes on to say, 'If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more those of his household;' and I suppose in those days there were sincere, zealous men, of whom Saul was one, who took up this cry and repeated it, and so it came to be very generally believed."

"That's true, again," he answered; "but here we are, at your place, and I must go on to my office to get my letters. But after business I hope you will not dislike a little more talk on these matters; so you must go back with me to Linfield." It was agreed, therefore, that we should go home together, and that I should stop a few days at his country place, a few miles out of town.

We met accordingly by appointment, and were soon seated together in his carriage, and before long free from the noise and turmoil of the city, and driving along the quiet country roads, with the sights and sounds of harvest all around, and nothing to distract our converse on grave topics. "Well," he said, "your last words have been on my mind all day. Because so many speak against the Catholic religion, and it has got a bad name, that is no proof that it is not right. The Jews said worse of the early Christians and of our Lord himself.

"Then there is another thing you said, that what made you a Catholic was, that you came to see that the Catholic religion and primitive Christianity are identical--so I understood you. Am I right in this?"

"Certainly," I replied, "that is precisely my proposition; stated in that form, the whole question is put, as it were, in a nutshell."

"Just so," he answered, "if that were proved. So now tell me just how you proved it to yourself."

{627}

"With all my heart, sir," was the reply. "Then see here, we must first lay down our definitions of what I mean by primitive Christianity, and what I mean by the Catholic religion."

"Certainly," he assented.

"Primitive Christianity, then," I continued, "is soon settled. By it I mean the religion taught by the apostles to their disciples, and by those disciples taught to others, and so on--the religion of the New Testament."

"Very good," he broke in; "no one can find fault with that, only we have always been taught that the religion of the New Testament, a primitive Christianity, was substantially the same as Protestantism, so that it never struck me till this moment that there was any fair doubt that the primitive Christians were Protestants, all but the name; and of course we know that the name was not given them at that day."

"All right! We will see about that later on," I continued. "Now let me tell you, in as few words as I can, what I mean by a Catholic."

"Well, I am all attention," he said.

"By a Catholic, then," I continued, "I mean a Christian who is a member of that vast, world-wide society which is generally known and called, by friend and foe, the Catholic Church, the spiritual head of which is the Bishop of Rome. This church, or united body--for you know the word church is the same as _ecclesia_ in Latin or Greek, and means 'an assembly,' or 'united body'--this united body we call catholic, or universal, because it has always vastly outnumbered all other divided bodies of Christians, whether taken singly or all put together. The number of Catholics in the world is usually stated to be two hundred millions; of Russian, Greek, and Oriental schismatics about ninety millions, and Protestants of all denominations about seventy millions. This vast united body, as it has always borne the name of Catholic, so is it the only body of Christians that can be called the catholic or universal church, if we attach any meaning to the word as a definition of the visible church, such as we find set down in the Creed, 'I believe in the Catholic Church.' However, as the name Catholic is sometimes claimed in some indefinable sense by other bodies of Christians, those to whom it belongs of right, and by the force of terms, have no objection, for the sake of distinction, to the term sometimes applied to them, of Roman Catholic, meaning merely the _real_ catholics; that is to say, those who, though universal, or spread everywhere, are yet united in one visible society, through being all in communion with the Bishop of Rome; being Roman in their centre of unity, and Catholic in their world-wide circumference.

"Thus the Catholic Church, alone of all Christian bodies, bears, as it it were, written on her forehead, that mark of unity divinely impressed by her Heavenly Founder and preserved by the power of his dying prayer, as a perpetual note of her heavenly origin. 'I pray thee, O Father, that they may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.'

"I think that you will admit that the old church founded by our Lord was to have on her these marks of unity and universality, and that these marks are to be found on no church at the present day but the church Catholic."

"Yes," he replied after a moment's reflection, "I think this may fairly be admitted; but unity is not all that our Lord prayed for; in the same prayer he said, 'Holy Father, keep them in thy truth,' and we say that the old church fell away, and that it no longer teaches the essential truths of the gospel, or has obscured them by false doctrines."

{628}

"Well, let that pass for the moment," I replied. "We will see later on whether you will continue to maintain these propositions. I will now state the principal points on which we are agreed with Protestants, and afterward the distinctive points on which we differ from them. And I think you will admit that the points on which we are agreed with you are precisely every one of those points which you would consider to be the great essential, fundamental doctrines of the gospel. We believe, then, in the unity and trinity of God, three coequal persons, one in substance, and in the incarnation of God the Son, who became the Son of Blessed Mary, ever Virgin, of the substance of his mother according to his manhood, as he had been from all eternity God the Son, of one substance with the Father--God of God. So we believe and hope for redemption and grace, to do good works acceptable to God, and which he will reward amply and solely from and through Christ our Lord, and in prayer, love, repentance, obedience, and holiness, as conditions of our salvation through him. And we believe that eternal perdition and endless woe will be the lot of those 'who neglect so great a salvation.' We believe also that all Holy Scripture is written by divine inspiration, and when studied and rightly understood, by aid of God's Holy Spirit, is most profitable for instruction in all Christian perfection. In a word, Catholics believe all that religious Protestants consider to be of the essence of true religion; and they also reject every tenet or position which can clash with these paramount truths of revelation. A Protestant, therefore, in becoming a Catholic, has to give up nothing which he believes essential in religion. No doubt he would have to add to his faith certain other truths which at present he does not hold, because he has not come to see that they are parts of revealed truth."

"I have not lost a word," he replied, "of what you have been saying. I confess it is quite a new light to me, that all these doctrines which you have stated are part and parcel of the Catholic faith; but, my dear Philip, I cannot help fancying that all Catholics are not like you, for I have always heard that they denied or obscured nearly every one of these doctrines."

"As for these statements of doctrine not being the authorized teaching of the church, I can only say that you will find them all stated fully by the authorities of our church in the canons and catechism of the Council of Trent, and stated briefly in every child's catechism. Yet, notwithstanding, as you say, Protestants generally seem to think that they know our religion better than we do ourselves; although they seldom read our books, they insist on denying that we really _do_ hold these points which we profess to hold in common with them; but I think you will admit that we ought to be allowed to know our own creed best. It is a wonder that they do not rather rejoice to believe that we have so many points of faith in common, and those the very points in which they consider the essence of true religion to consist. It seems as if they had an instinctive feeling that the strength of their position would be broken up if once if should appear that the differences between themselves and the old religion were on but few points, and those such as they do not consider the most essential."

{629}

"Well, anyhow," he rejoined, "whatever be the reason, there is a strong prejudice on both sides; Protestants are as strongly convinced that you are in the wrong as you Catholics are convinced that you are right. One or other of us must be wrong; and if we assert that you are wrong against such a strong conviction on your part, and one that has subsisted for so many ages, and been held by such a vast majority, why, we are forced to admit that our strong conviction against you is no argument that we are in the right. But you can't deny that such a strong conviction as ours must have some foundation in reason."

"Just so," I answered, "I do not deny it at all. These same reasons seemed so convincing to me once that I could not have believed that any reasoning could have convinced me that I was mistaken. I will just touch on some of the reasons which weighed most with me against the Catholic religion. From my own experience I am convinced that the difficulty Protestants generally feel, in admitting that Catholics really _do_ hold all that they deem to be essential, arises chiefly from this, that it seems to them clear and evident that certain other doctrines which we hold, such as the merit of good works, the invocation of Saints, the inherent efficacy of Sacraments, Purgatory, the real Presence, and the sacrifice of the Mass, the use of images, pictures, and relics, the Immaculate Conception, and devotion to the Blessed Virgin, and perhaps other doctrines and practices, _must_ necessarily interfere with the mediatorial office of Christ and with the worship of God, and be impious or idolatrous."

"Well," he answered, "you have given a long list enough, and it makes me feel all over just as I was before I met you. I declare, to my dying day I never could take in all those things; and I can't see how you, or any sensible man, could come to believe them. Nay, don't tell me you believe them. Why, your church can't expect it of an American citizen, whatever may be the case with Frenchmen and Spaniards, that have been, as one may say, brought up to it, and had it bred in the bone. I am sure I could easier turn Jew and go back to the old original religion of all than become a Catholic."

"Have a care, my dear sir," I answered; "make no rash statements. I once thought as you do now. I can't answer all objections against these doctrines in one breath. Give me time, and I am not afraid of going into them one after the other. But I can't attempt it now; and now, as we are getting near home, just walk your horse along this shady bit of road, and I will finish for to-day. Now, with regard to all these doctrines which seem so strange and repugnant to you, let me say, as an honest man who once thought and felt as you do now, but who has come by God's grace to see things differently--let me say, as one who knows that he must answer for his every word before Christ's unerring tribunal, that there is not one of those points which is not capable of being shown in no degree to interfere with the supreme prerogatives of our divine Lord and only Saviour, and which is not capable of conclusive proof. Would to God that Protestants, instead of reading and hearing only what is said against us, would hear and read what we have to say for ourselves. These early prejudices, this 'human tradition,' which 'they have received to hold,' would be dispersed like the morning mists before the sun.

"The general answer that I would give to such objections is, read Catholic books, and you will find that all these allegations are as old as Protestantism, and that they have been answered a hundred times over."

{630}

"If we are Catholics, it is simply under God's grace, because we have read for ourselves, and have been satisfied with the Catholic answer on every single point. If I am asked to name any particular works which would be found specially useful--I mean works of a popular character--I would mention Bishop Milner's _End of Controversy; The Faith of Catholics_, by Waterworth; various works of Dr. Newman and Archbishop Manning; _Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost_, and _Rule of Faith_; the works of Archbishop Kenrick; and other works which may be obtained at any Catholic bookstore. But most Protestants, as was my own case when a Protestant, have a strong prejudice against reading Catholic books. I believe the basis of this prejudice (which would be logical enough if its basis were just) is much the same as that which would rightly disincline all religious persons, unless in some way it became a duty, from reading Socinian and deistical writings. They have been accustomed to consider that Catholics have this in common with Socinians and deists, that they all, more or less, reject those doctrines of redemption through Christ which every baptized and thinking Christian feels to be part of the inner life of his soul, which he would die rather than part from. But those who reason thus against the Catholic religion, and are unwilling to examine its evidence, forget that Thomas à Kempis, or the author of the _Imitation of Christ_, was a Catholic, a monk of the middle ages, devoted to every Catholic doctrine. His fourth book on the Eucharist manifests, in every page, his belief in the real Presence, and the sacrifice of the Mass; and he speaks of invocation of saints, purgatory, priestly absolution, and other Catholic doctrines. Yet this work, on account of the pure love of God and trust in a Saviour, which it breathes in every line, is almost as great a favorite with devout Protestants as it is with pious Catholics. Translated from beginning to end by John Wesley, it is to be found as a manual of piety, with his _imprimatur_, recommended by him, in the hands of all his followers.

"The same may be said of the works of St. Bernard, Fénélon, Paschal, all well-known names familiar through translations of their works to all well-read Protestants. Again, the Jansenist writers of the school of Port Royal are, I believe, generally admired by what are called the Evangelical school among Protestants. Yet the Jansenists all held the creed of Pope Pius, laid down at the Council of Trent, and all the distinctive doctrines of the Catholic religion.

"I have spoken before of Dr. Newman as a name honored by all, by Protestants as well as Catholics. No one has written more ably in defence of every doctrine of the church. Could he, who is the author of the lines I am just going to repeat, have written so truly and touchingly of the love of our Blessed Lord and faith in him, if he had held any doctrine which interfered with or overshadowed the supremacy of that Lord and only Saviour?

'Firmly I believe, and truly,
God is three, and God is one.
And I next acknowledge duly
Manhood taken by the Son.
And I hope and trust most fully
In that manhood crucified.
And each thought and deed unruly
Do to death as he hath died.
Simply to his grace, and solely,
Life and light and strength belong.
And I love supremely, solely
Him the Holy, him the Strong.
And I hold in veneration,
For the love of Christ alone,
Holy church, as his creation,
And her teaching as his own.'

_Dream of Gerontius._

{631}

"Now, my dear uncle, you will understand the earnestness of a man who feels that it is beyond the power of words to express the depth of his convictions. These, indeed, I cannot impart to you. I cannot give you the gift of faith. But so far, at least, I feel sure you will go with me, in admitting that the facts I have just stated should lead serious Protestants to admit that they have been wrong in assuming that the Catholic religion, although a great religious fact, majestic for her antiquity, universality, and unity, as all must admit, has yet a mark against her which dispenses them from all search after truth in that direction. My last words shall be those which, though they seemed to St. Augustine to be uttered by the voice of a child, were yet, as he tells us, blessed to his own conversion: _Tolle, lege_'--Take and read.'"

Just as I had finished my last sentence, we drove into the approach to the mansion, where the ladies were already assembled on the lawn, a sign that the arrangements for dinner were completed, and that all were awaiting only the return of the master of the house. So, kindly greetings, inquiries after absent friends in Europe and America, and the other happy little accompaniments of an evening at home in the country in lovely autumn weather, effectually put a stop to all further conversation on the engrossing topics which had occupied us during the morning.

The next day rose bright and beautiful, almost too cloudless and sultry, if we had had a journey before us, and six or seven hours to pass in the stifling heat of ------. But we had agreed to take a day's holiday in the country, and, after breakfast, we strolled out together to the summer-house by the brook, where the daily papers and the last reviews, American and English, were laid out on the library-table of the cool retreat beneath the broad chestnut trees, which served my uncle as his study during the summer months. The other members of the family had their own reading and work to attend to. So we had the prospect of a long forenoon of leisure for reading or conversation. After the news of the day had been read and discussed, we each took up a review and read on pretty steadily for an hour or more. Then my uncle began to light his cigar, and I saw that he was watching when I should have finished the article I was reading, and that he was ready for a chat. When he saw that I was closing the volume, he began: "I have thought a good deal over all you said yesterday. Just give me a memorandum of one or two of the books you spoke of." I pencilled them down on the back of a letter and handed it to him; he put the memorandum into his pocket-book.

"Now," he said, "I should like to hear how you make out that the primitive Christians were Catholics. You know all my family are strict Episcopalians; there was one of them a bishop over in the old country, and we always took great pride in the Church of England; and I know we were always taught, and I've read several books about the old aboriginal British Church, which seemed to me to prove pretty clearly that, up to the year 600, or thereabouts, after Christ, the early Christians in Britain knew nothing of the authority of the Bishop of Rome, and opposed his claims when they were put forward by Augustine on his coming over to convert the Saxons."

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"Well, sir," I replied, "curiously enough, I have just been reading your last number of the _Saturday Review_, which, as we all know, is no friend to Catholics, and I have been much struck by a very able article which, I think, you will find well worth reading. If you will allow me, I will read you a passage which may serve me as a text for what I shall have to say in answer to your question about the British Church, and how I make out that the early Christians were Catholics: 'The distinctive principle of the English Reformation was an appeal to Christian antiquity, as admirable, and probably as imaginary, as the "Golden Age" of the poets.' The writer then goes on to say, 'that the era of the Reformation was before the age of accurate historical criticism. The true method of historical criticism was as yet uncreated, and it is not too much to say that whatever accurate knowledge we now possess of the church of the first centuries, has been obtained within the last fifty years, and that a better acquaintance with the remains of antiquity has convinced us that many doctrines and practices which have been commonly accounted to be peculiarities of later Romanism, existed in the best and purest ages of Christianity.' (_Saturday Review_, 1866.)

"Ah! I should not wonder," he replied, "if they had hit the right nail on the head there; I must read that article--how is it headed?"

"Oh! you can't miss it," I answered, "the title is _Primitive Christianity_.[Footnote 57] Well, then, to answer your question. We argued yesterday as to the great leading doctrines on which Protestants and Catholics are at one, and which all Christians hold as essential. Now for what you would call the distinctive doctrines of the Catholic religion, or as the writer in _The Saturday_ expresses it, 'what are commonly accounted (by Protestants) as peculiarities of later Romanism,' but which we Catholics hold to be no less essential truths of Christianity, part and parcel of the same revelation which teaches us the doctrine of the Trinity and the Incarnation. I will name three which I think you will admit are sufficiently distinctive. We hold, therefore:

[Footnote 57: _Saturday Review_, winter quarter, 1866.]

"First. That for Christ's sake we are to obey the church, which he has made his infallible witness in the world, until he shall come again. 'The church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.' (I Tim. iii. 15.)

"Secondly. That for the same reason we are bound to submit to the spiritual supremacy of the Pope or Bishop of Rome, the successor of St. Peter, whom Christ, who is himself 'THE ROCK,' or sure foundation of his church, left, when he ascended up out of sight, to be the _Visible Rock_, on which he willed to build up his church in unity.

"Thirdly. That God is to be worshipped by sacrifice, and that in place of the _typical sacrifices_ offered to God, from the time of Adam to Moses, and from Moses to the time of Christ in the Levitical worship, he has instituted the _great reality of the eucharistic_ sacrifice of Christ's body and blood, commonly called the Mass.

"Of course there are other doctrines which I might name, but these three are sufficient for my purpose. My proposition is, that these doctrines were as distinctively characteristics of primitive Christianity as they are of the Catholic Church of the present day, or what our friend in _The Saturday_ calls 'Later Romanism.'"

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"Well! go on," he rejoined, "I am all attention. I do not want to raise objection to details. I want to hear your whole argument to the end, then I shall see what I may find to say about it--meantime, I am much interested, and want to see how you make out your points. I like your mode of stating the question; it is straightforward, right up and down, and no mistake, as far as the statement of the case goes, only I want to see how you set about proving it. But, here, I am smoking all the cigars; don't you smoke?"

"Why, bless the man! how can I smoke and talk? There, you do all the smoking, and I'll do the talking just now; and then, when I've done, you may turn on the steam, and I'll do the smoking--turn about is fair play!

"Well, then, learned Protestants are now beginning to admit 'that many doctrines and practices which (at the time of the Reformation) were commonly accounted to be peculiarities of later Romanism, existed in the best and purest ages of Christianity.'

"Now, this is precisely what we Catholics have always maintained; only my proposition is, that the _distinctive features_ of the Catholic religion are precisely those which mark the primitive church and the British Church in primitive ages, centuries before the time when St. Augustine, the first Bishop of Canterbury, came from Rome to convert our Anglo-Saxon forefathers, about the year of our Lord 600.

"Those who delight in the dream of a golden age of primitive Christianity, which was Protestant in all but the name, and only not Protestant in name because, as they imagine, there was then no pope to protest against, take special delight in dwelling on imaginary pictures of an early British Church, and this for a very simple reason, because here they can strike out boldly on the wings of fancy, without much danger of coming to grief against the hard stone wall of historical facts. There is no British writer, of whose works we have any vestige, earlier than the historian Gildas, who wrote about the year of our Lord 550! All they have to rely on for proof of any difference between the British Church and the other churches of Christendom is one single fact, which they learn from the historian Bede, who wrote in the eighth century. He relates that about the year 600 certain British bishops were found differing from the Roman Church on certain points, not of doctrine, but of discipline, and acting with a considerable amount of contumaciousness toward St. Augustine, the Roman missionary and first Archbishop of Canterbury. All this we fully admit, and are quite prepared to account for. But my proposition concerns the British Church, not in the year of our Lord 600, but centuries before, in the early primitive times, from the first conversion of Britain."

"Yes, that is the point; I'm all attention to hear how you make it out."

"Christianity was probably established, partially in Britain, in very early times, possibly in the days of the apostles, not impossibly by St. Paul himself, and, if so, it must have been the same in all essential features as that religion which the apostles and their immediate disciples preached and established everywhere else. History, however, records nothing definite concerning the Christianity of Britain, earlier than the fact related by the historian Bede, that, in the reign of Marcus Aurelius, emperor of Rome, at the request of Lucius, a British king, Pope Eleutherius sent missionaries into Britain. {634} Next, as to what kind of Christianity this was. I shall show that it was sharply marked with the characteristics of the Catholic religion which I laid down just now. Submission to the authority of the Bishop of Rome as head of the church, and a belief in the Real Presence and Eucharistic Sacrifice, commonly called the Mass.

"With regard to the authority of the Bishop of Rome, as Head of the Church, I will quote a well-known ancient writer, St. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons in Gaul, born A.D. 120, martyred A.D. 202. He was a native of Asia Minor, a disciple of St. Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, who was himself a disciple of St. John the Evangelist. He was a contemporary of Pope Eleutherius, and visited Rome during his pontificate, as we learn from the historian Eusebius. Irenaeus is, therefore, a witness of peculiar value, since he was in a position to testify as to the belief of all Christians in his day, as well of the Eastern Church, in which he was trained, as of the Western Church, of which he became a bishop. The presumption is, also, that he taught to others what had first been taught to him by his master, St. Polycarp, and that St. Polycarp taught what he had learned from the inspired apostle. In the work of Irenaeus, _Adversus Hiereses_, (Book III., chap, ii., n. 1 and 2,) which may be consulted in any good library, we find it written. I will read from some short manuscript notes which I have here in my pocket-book, and which I made at the time I was looking into these matters before I became a Catholic.

"'As it would be a long task to enumerate the successions of all the churches, I will point out that tradition which is of the greatest, most ancient, and universally known church, founded and constituted at Rome by the most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul, and which derives from the two apostles that faith announced to all men, which, through the succession of her bishops, has come down to us.'

"Here, let me observe, by the way, in passing, we have the testimony of a great writer, who lived within fifty years of St. John the Evangelist, and was instructed by his immediate disciple, that the Church of Rome was founded by St. Peter and St. Paul. What then becomes of the statement, so often repeated--shall I call it ignorant, or impudent?--that the Bishop of Rome can have no claim to authority as successor of St. Peter, because there is no evidence that St. Peter was ever at Rome in his life?"

"Well, certainly," he interposed, "that statement will not hold water, for Irenaeus is an unexceptionable witness. But I interrupt your narrative. Pray, go on."

"Well, then, to continue what I was saying, before I made this digression, St. Irenaeus goes on in the same passage, 'With this church, (namely, the Church of Rome,) on account of its more powerful headship, (or primacy,) it is necessary that every church, that is, the faithful on every side, should be in accordance, in which church has always been preserved the tradition which is from the apostles. The blessed apostles, then, having founded and built up this church, committed the office of the episcopacy to Linus, of whom Paul makes mention in his Epistle to Timothy. And to him succeeded Anacletus, and after him Clement, who had also seen the blessed apostles, and conferred with them, and had before his eyes their familiar preaching and the tradition of the apostles; and not he alone, but there were many at that time, still alive, who had been instructed by the apostles. {635} To Clement succeeded Evaristus, Alexander Sixtus, Telesphorus, Hyginus, Pius Anicetus, Sater, and to him Eleutherius, who now in the twelfth place from the apostles, holds the office of the episcopate. By this order, and by his succession, that tradition which is from the apostles, and the preaching of the truth, have come down to us.'

"Here then we have the testimony of one who wrote only fifty years after the death of the last apostle, that the existing pope was the successor of Peter in the see of Rome, and there could have been as little doubt about the past as there is now as to the succession of the presidents of the United States or the sovereigns of England during the last century.

"And the testimony of St. Irenaeus as to the authority of the bishops of Rome over the whole church, since we learn from Eusebius, that Irenaeus had offered a firm but respectful opposition to two successive pontiffs, Eleutherius and Victor, on the question of the time of keeping Easter, a point on which some of the Eastern churches as also later the churches of Ireland and Britain, followed a different custom from the church of Rome. St. Irenaeus visited Rome on the matter, and dissuaded the pope from making this question at that time a term of communion. He succeeded in his endeavors, and so different churches were left to follow their own custom, until the matter was finally decided, and the Roman practice made obligatory on all, at the general Council of Nicaea, A.D. 325.

"Such then is the testimony of St. Irenaeus concerning the general belief of all Christians of his day as to the rights and authority of the bishops of Rome, or holy and apostolic see, as it was generally termed in very early times. He taught that it was the duty of all churches and of each one of the faithful, that is to say, of all who believe in Christ, to adhere to the faith and the communion of the holy see, which by Christ's institution had been constituted in the person of Peter and his successors the necessary centre of unity of all other churches--which held on this account the supremacy of more powerful headship or primacy of authority in the universal church, under Christ our Lord.