Chapter VII (5)

It is a strange fact, and one that we must regret, that England should owe the final conquest of Canada to one who should have honored this martyr of his family, but who was really intensely English, and rivalled Ireton by his bloody march up the St. Lawrence, butchering priests at their own church doors with as little compunction as Ireton felt for Father James Wolf. {850} That martyr had a brother George, an officer in the Irish army. Although doomed, he managed to escape, and reaching England, finally settled in Yorkshire. His grandson Edward fought under Marlborough, and rose to the rank of general. His son, a namesake of the Limerick martyr, was General James Wolfe, who died in the arms of victory at Quebec, having struck the blow that seemed to crush for ever Catholicity in Canada.

Another bishop, Arthur Magennis, a Cistercian, Bishop of Down and Connor, was, in spite of his infirmities and years, dragged on shipboard, to be carried to some other land. Death was, however, the object of his tormentors, not exile: and, as he lingered too long to please their impatience, they dragged one of the ship's cannon beside his berth, and, firing it, caused such a shock to the invalid that he expired.

The clergy who suffered met death in every form. Some perished of starvation in the mountain, like the Rev. John Carolan; some were starved to death in prison, like the Dominican father, John O'Laighlin; some, tracked to their hiding-places, were shot in their caves, like the Franciscan father, Francis Sullivan; some were stoned to death, and flung into rivers, like the Dominican father, John Flaverty; many cut down by the roadside, or shot and hacked to pieces, like Stephen Pettit, the Dominican fathers, Peter Costello, Dominic Neagan, Lawrence O'Ferral; others more deliberately hanged on sea or land, like the Franciscan fathers, Fergal Ward, Denis Nelan, Rev. Peter Higgins, the Dominican Bonaventure de Burgo, and many more; or drowned at sea, like the Trinitarian fathers O'Conor and Daly; or tied to stakes and shot, like the Jesuit, Father Bathe, and his brother at Drogheda.

"Of the many thousands of Irish men, women, and children who
were sold into slavery in the West Indies, the names of very
few have been preserved. Among these was Father David Roche,
Dominican. Full details of this infamous traffic are given by
Prendergast, _Cromwellian Settlement_. Thus, a government
order, published on March 4th, 1655, states that, in the four
preceding years, 6400 Irish, men and women, boys and maidens,
had been disposed of to the English slave-dealers. On the 14th
September, 1653, two English merchants, named Selleck and
Leader, signed a contract with the government commissioners, by
which a supply was granted to them of 250 women and 300 men of
the Irish nation, to be found within twenty miles of Cork,
Youghal, Kinsale, Waterford, and Wexford. Roger Boyle, Lord
Broghill, (afterward Earl of Orrery,) deemed it unnecessary to
take such trouble in visiting different parts of the kingdom,
and undertook to supply the whole number from the county of
Cork alone; hence he received an order empowering him to search
for and seize upon that number, 'and no person, being once
apprehended, was to be released but by special order in writing
under the hand of Lord Broghill. In the month of November,
1655, all the Irish of the townland of Lackagh, county of
Kildare, were seized on by the agents of the government. They
were only forty-one in number, and of these four were hanged by
sentence of court-martial; the remaining thirty-seven,
including two priests, were handed over to Mr. Norton, a
Bristol merchant, to be sold as bond-slaves to the
sugar-planters at the Barbadoes.' Again, on the 8th December,
1655, we find a letter from the commissioners to the Governor
of Barbadoes, 'advising him of the approach of a ship with a
cargo of proprietors, deprived of their lands, and seized for
not transplanting.' They add that among them were three
priests, and the commissioners particularly desire that these
may be so employed that they may not return again where that
sort of people are able to do so much mischief, having so great
an influence over the popish Irish."

{851}

Of their sufferings at sea our author gives no record; but Anderson, in his _History of the Colonial Church_, (ii. p. 52-3,) describes, from a petition to Parliament, the sufferings of English prisoners "crowded into close holds amid horses," "sold, on arriving, to the most inhuman persons," and treated worse than beasts; "sleeping in styes, worse than hogs in England, and many other ways made most miserable beyond expression of Christian imagination." And nothing in the annals of history will justify the supposition that the Irish fared better.

During long examinations of early records and manuscript matter relating to the colonies which formed the American Union, no allusion has met our eye relating to any of these priests sold as slaves in America by the Puritans. It is doubtful, therefore, whether any ever reached our shores. But it seems to us that researches will yet lead to some clue or trace in the West India Islands, that favorite mart for the Puritan slave-dealers, who sold alike there the Irish Catholic, or the Christian or Pagan Indian of New England. It is, however, a curious fact that the first victim of the witchcraft excitement in New England was one of the Irish slaves, a poor woman, who though able to repeat the Lord's Prayer in Latin and Irish, failed to pray in the to her unknown English tongue, was adjudged a witch, and put to death.

Of the Irish transported to St. Christopher's we find some account in the Jesuit Father Peter Pelleprat's _Relation des Missions des Pères de la Compagnie de Jésus dans les Isles et dans la Terre Ferine de l'Amérique Méridionale_, (Paris, 1655.) Part of the island belonged to the French, and Father John Destriche (Stritch?) an Irish member of the Society, was sent in 1650, to the boundary. His long-forsaken countrymen flocked around, braving all dangers from their cruel task-masters; and he spent three months hearing confessions, baptizing, instructing, consoling and fortifying with the sacraments these poor exiles. He then, in the disguise of a merchant, visited Montserrat, which was, for a time, an independent Irish isle, and so laid down on maps, and where even the negroes spoke Irish. But, at this time of Puritan rule, the English had reduced them to slavery. Here he raised a little chapel in the depth of a forest, and the Irish every day, under pretext of cutting wood, made their way to the spot, and, after giving the day to religion, cut some wood to carry back.

Returning to St. Christopher's, he found the English renewing the persecution. One hundred and twenty-five of the most fervent Catholics were carried off and set ashore on the barren island of Crabs or Boriquen. Here some undoubtedly perished of starvation; a few reached St. Domingo, but, on the refusal of the Spaniards to receive them, managed to find transport to Tortugas, then in the hands of the French.

Father Destriche then collected all the Irish he could, and conveyed them to Gaudeloupe, making excursions from time to time to bring in others to swell this settlement; and visiting in disguise the various English islands.

No allusion is made to any priest among these exiles; but this father was not probably alone. Research in this field may yet enlarge the touching memorials which Mr. O'Reilly deserves so great credit for presenting to us.

The persecution may be said to close with the Puritan rule; Archbishop Plunkett, whose life is well and concisely given, having been a victim to the infamous fiction of plots in the reign of Charles II., and brought to the scaffold by the false testimony of men of his own country and faith.

{852}

The last of the martyred clergy was the Dominican Father Gerald Gibbon, sub-prior of Kilmallock, killed by some of William III.'s roving cavalry at Listuahill, in the County of Kerry, in 1691.

Mr. O'Reilly has done an excellent work. The records of the lives and deaths of these illustrious men should be familiar to all their countrymen, not to excite feelings of hostility and vengeance against the descendants of the wrong-doers; for, as in the case of Wolfe, the later generations fall away at times, and the priest we revere may trace his descent from a persecutor. But the lives of these martyrs remind us in these days of insidious prosperity, that we should struggle as manfully against the persecution of religious indifference as they did against the persecution of rack, and sword, and halter, and show that we deem the religion they died for worthy of a life of love and sacrifice.

----------

De Profundis.

O weary, weary heart, O fainting soul!
Thy struggle is in vain;
The fiery waves of woe that o'er thee roll
O'erwhelm with fiercest pain.
There is for thee no rest, for thee no peace
Till thought and mem'ry, life itself shall cease.

"Rest for the weary"--words that flatteringly
Promise thy heart relief;
The words of peace are meaningless to thee,
They mock thy endless grief.
Think not thy soul from further woe to save,
Seek not for rest, or seek it in the grave!

----

Sweet rest, sweet peace. O Jesu! thou canst give
E'en in my mortal woe;
Thou bidst my struggling, dying soul to live,
And lead'st me gently through
The waves that dash against my tired feet,
To fields of living green and verdure sweet.

Jesu! sweet Jesu! in my darkest hour
On thee alone I call;
Though waves may dash and dark'ning skies may lower,
And raging storms appall,
I heed them not--I look beyond, above,
And find my refuge in thy Heart of Love!

K. A.

----------
{853}

From La Semaine Liturgique De Poitiers.

The Legend Of St. Michael And The Hermit.

"Consummatus in brevi, explevit tempera multa."
--_Book of Wisdom_.

A poor but venerable hermit, wearing the habit, sandals, and cord of St. Francis of Assisi, travelled, from dawn till the going down of the sun, over the flowery highways of verdant Normandy, passing through boroughs and villages, castles and towers. Was he a palmer from the Holy Land, come to rekindle the ardor of noble and valiant men of arms with tales of the woes of the Christians in Palestine? No, the times of Philip Augustus and Louis IX. had passed away. Yet our hermit kept steadily on, allowing himself not a day of rest but the Lord's day, seeking some one or something.

"What art thou seeking, pious traveller? Thy ardor is greater than that of a knight-errant longing to break a lance in honor of the fair lady whose color he wears."

"I am seeking a soul," replies the hermit, "because St. Michael the Archangel has made known to me that a throne in the eternal mansions awaits some soul from earth, a throne of dazzling beauty, resplendent with sapphires and diamonds, and the golden palms of the heavenly Jerusalem. But the soul thus summoned to a throne on high must not be _too young_."

"Keep on thy way. Old men are to be found in every country on the earth."

And the hermit kept on his way from the earliest dawn till eventide. At last he finds an aged abbot beneath the Gothic arches of an old Benedictine abbey. His reputation for sanctity and his great age, which was fourscore years, made our pilgrim hope that he had found the object of his search. So, on Sunday, after the hour of lauds, the hermit joyfully offered St. Michael, on bended knee, the name of the venerable abbot, with an account of his exemplary life; but, in the evening, after the hour of compline, the archangel said unto him, "Continue thy search. The abbot Fulgentius, worthy as he is, merits not this high reward. That servant of the Lord is still _too young_."

"He is fourscore years of age, of which sixty-four have been spent in the monastic state and in the same monastery."

"He has not yet lived twenty years as years are reckoned by the guardian angels. Pursue thy way, good hermit, and continue thy search."

After three months the pilgrim worn by fatigue and prolonged vigils joyfully brought four names to St. Michael. It will be understood that these names were chosen from among thousands by the zealous pilgrim. The first bright name on the list was that of a Lord of Falaise, illustrious through his ancestors, and still more so for his own charity. His castle with its square towers, surrounded by crags, deep moats, and high walls, was always hospitably open to all pilgrims and strangers as well as to the unfortunate. There he himself waited upon them at table, after having washed their feet with his own hands, count and baron as he was, and he never suffered them to depart till he had given them alms and chanted the divine office with them in the nave of his chapel of St. Prix. {854} A numerous progeny reverenced him, and all his vassals proclaimed his fatherly kindness. What more could be asked that he might exchange his feudal power for a throne in heaven?

The second on the list was the mother of fifteen children, seven of whom served their king as brave soldiers, seven others served the altar as priests or monks, and the remaining one, a daughter, had many children, who were reared under the careful and vigilant eye of their grandmother of pious renown. What more could be asked that she might pass from family honors to a throne in heaven?

The third was a noble warrior of the Knights of Malta, covered with wounds and scars gained in the service of God. Having been made, at the age of thirteen years, knight of his order and page of the grand master, he was appointed, at the age of twenty-two, to the command of three war-vessels which he armed at his own expense. He made himself formidable to all the Turks on the seas of the Levant. Being appointed captain of one of the galleys of Malta, our knight took twenty-two vessels from the paynim and delivered many thousand Christian slaves. The Emir Fraycardin, who held sway over the Druses of Mount Lebanon, and boasted of his descent from Baldwin, King of Jerusalem, conceived so high an esteem for him that he came forth from the town of Sayeda to visit him on board of one of his vessels, and on that occasion gave him a scimitar from Damascus, with a scabbard of wrought silver, inlaid with diamonds and rare pearls, which our hero presented to the king of France, in presence of the same emir of illustrious memory.

The escutcheon of our knight bore a chevron gules, on a field or, charged at the bend with a flower-de-luce or, and surmounted by the silver cross of the Order of Malta. [sic]

He seemed truly endowed with valor and sanctity, which made up for want of age, for he was only twenty-nine. What more could be asked that he might pass from the midst of combats to the bosom of everlasting peace, and from the triumphs of victory to a glorious throne in heaven?

Finally, the fourth name was that of a widow, like the prophetess Anna, who departed not from the temple of Jerusalem, by fasting and prayers serving God day and night. Like her, she was devoted to good works, to the care of the sick, the help of the infirm, and the charge of orphans. She was called "the eye of the blind," and "the consolation of the afflicted," and throughout old Neustria with its green orchards the echoes of the manor-houses and the huts alike knew of the wondrous deeds of good Dame Lois.

Proud of all these names, the hermit at the early hour of lauds presented the list to St. Michael; when evening had brought the hour of compline, the holy chant being ended, St. Michael gave back to the hermit the precious paper, all perfumed with the incense of paradise, and said to him: "Faithful servant, continue thy search: all these names are dear and precious in the eyes of God; but they who bear them are still too young."

"But the sire of Falaise has seen almost a hundred years pass over his now bald head, and his beard is whiter than the snows of Mount Saint Bernard!"

"That noble lord of a hundred years is only reckoned fifteen by the calendar of the guardian angels," replied the archangel.

{855}

"But this mother of fifteen children and twelve grandchildren who are her crown and her glory? ... And the pious widow?"....

"The mother will only be eight years old come the festival of the Assumption of Our Lady, her holy Patroness; and the pious and chaste widow is hardly older than the sire of Falaise."

"And the Knight of Malta? Illustrious and brave above his fellow-knights, he is only twenty-nine years old according to the record of his baptism; but these few years have been well employed in defending Christendom against the infidel Turks who tremble before his Damascus blade."

"The knight has made progress, it is true, in the way of real life. He is almost old enough to reign; but his guardian angel demands yet a space of time before imprinting on his soul the seal of the eternal and heavenly life. Go thy way, and continue thy search."

The hermit, in the silence of his cell, was terrified to see how hard it was to attain length of years according to the reckoning of the angels; but he redoubled his zeal to discover the rare treasure demanded by St. Michael. Seven Sundays having passed away weeping and praying in the undercroft of the church of St. Gerbold, shepherd of Bayeux, of learned memory, he saw the archangel with his sword of gold coming toward him resplendent with light. Troubled in the depths of his heart, the hermit said to him humbly: "I have only one name to present thee, and this name offers but little that is worthy of relating; yet I lay it before thee." And he held forth the paper wet with his tears to St. Michael, who took it, smiling meanwhile on the trembling hermit.

The paper had hardly been placed in the angel's hands when the sombre crypt was filled with a soft light; an unknown perfume embalmed the air, and the hermit, almost ravished with ecstasy, at once understood that the chosen one so long sought after was at length found. ...

The elect soul rose like a blue vapor above the tower of the church, above the lofty mountains, beyond the stars: it rose luminous and full of majesty, till it came to the courts of the New Jerusalem to take its place upon the dazzling throne awaiting it among the angels.

"How old, then, is this soul according to the calendar of eternal life?" were the first words addressed St. Michael by the hermit, still on his knees.

And St. Michael graciously replied: "This saint was only twenty-one years old according to the reckoning on earth, but he was a hundred by that of the guardian angels who watch over souls. Not one hour of his short life was lost for eternity. It was not only not lost, but--which is necessary to attain length of years that are meritorious and venerable in our eyes--not one hour failed to be reckoned twice or thrice, and sometimes a hundredfold, by the merit of his deeds of faith, hope, charity, and mortification. Nothing is lost which is pleasing in the eyes of the Lord. A glass of water given with love in his name becomes a majestic river flowing on for ever and ever; while a treasure given without love or from human motives is counted as nothing in the great Book of Life! To really live, thou must love God while exiled here below, as we love him in the home of the blessed. Thou must also love thy neighbor, whose soul reflects the image of its Maker."

With these words the angel disappeared, leaving behind him a long train of light in the dim vaults of the crypt of St. Gerbold.

{856}

"O Lord!" cried the hermit "grant me a true knowledge of the Christian life--the only life really worth the name--that at my last hour I may not hear resounding above my head the terrible words, _Too young!_ Teach me, O my God! the value of time, which is only given us that we may lay up treasures for heaven. Time is the money of eternity! time is the price of the Saviour's blood! time, so fleeting, which we seek to kill, and which will surely kill us; time, the inflexible tyrant who spares no one! Oh! that I might in turn triumph over time by making it serve to the sanctification of my soul and the winning of an eternal crown."

----------

New Publications.

Dissertations, Chiefly On Irish Church History.
By the late Rev. Matthew Kelly, D.D.
Dublin: James Duffy. 1869.

Rev. Matthew Kelly, a canon of his native diocese of Ossory, Ireland, and a Professor in Maynooth College, was one of the most accomplished of the contemporaries of Dr. John O'Donovan, Professor Eugene O' Curry, George Petrie, Rev. Dr. Todd, Very Rev. Dr. Renehan, and the few other truly great Irish scholars of the past and passing generations. He was a native of Kilkenny City, and was barely in the forty-fourth year of his age when called to his reward, Saturday, October 30th, 1858. He was a very able writer on and investigator of Irish history, in all its branches, particularly in the ecclesiastical and ethnological lines, of which his editorial labors for the Celtic and Archaeological Societies of Dublin, his editions of White's and O'Sullivan's writings relative to Ireland, as well as of the Martyrology of Tallacht, and his contributions to the Dublin _Review_, Duffy's _Catholic Magazine_, the London _Rambler_, etc., etc., have given abundant proof. He is more widely known by general readers through his remarkable translation of Gosselin's great work, _On the Power of the Pope during the Middle Ages_. His friend and fellow-laborer, Rev. Dr. McCarthy, has collected from the periodicals named, chiefly from the _Dublin Review_, into this volume--for a copy of which we are indebted to the Catholic Publication Society-- several dissertations by the lamented Dr. Kelly, chiefly on Irish church history--an examination of which makes us deeply regret that he was not spared to complete the labors in which he was engaged, and which he had in contemplation at the time of his death--which included nothing less desirable than a new and thorough edition of the _Acta Sanctorum_ of Colgan; a new edition and a continuation of Rev. Dr. John Lanigan's _Ecclesiastical History of Ireland_; and the completion of the publication, under such care as he was capable of bestowing, of the Very Rev. Dr. Renehan's _Collections on Irish Church History_. The volume before us should find a place in every private as well as public collection that aims to have represented in it the genuine scholarship of Ireland.

----

A Few Friends, And How They Amused Themselves.
A Tale in nine chapters; containing descriptions
of twenty Pastimes and Games and a fancy-dress party.
By M. E. Dodge, author of Hans Brinker and
the Irvington Stories.
Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co.

{857}

The author in this little book makes a happy effort to revive amongst us again those pleasant, home-like games that give such a charm to the fireside. Many of these pastimes are new, and all of them interesting and amusing, requiring enough thought and wit to keep one's faculties in pleasant activity. Society, it is true, will scarcely condescend to be amused in so simple and cheerful a way; but as it is a question whether it is ever heartily amused, we can very well afford to set aside its ruling, and enjoy ourselves with the pleasant pastimes of our "Few Friends." A picture-gallery, such as is described in its pages, although it might not provoke such artistic and wonderful criticisms as the Academy of Design, would not yet fail to be very amusing. The great charm of these games, as the author remarks in her preface, is the bringing together the old and young, in the common pursuit of pleasure.

----

A Short Grammar Of Plain Chant,
for the use of schools, seminaries, and
religious communities.
Troy, New York: P. J. Dooley. 1868.

It is with the sincerest pleasure we meet with any evidences of a desire to return to the use of the Gregorian chant in the offices of the church. Perfectly rendered, we know of no modern compositions in figured music which can equal it in fitness or grandeur. The best that can be said of timed music is, that it is pleasing; that its varied harmonies delight the ear; and that in the most worthy of such compositions there are pathetic, joyous, and at times sublime expressions. But of the Gregorian chant only can it be said that it edifies, compels to prayer and praise, and never hints at the world, the flesh, or the devil. Like the sacred vestments of the priest and the solemn ceremonies of Catholic worship, it is a part of the outward expression of the church's homage to God. It is the befitting song of the sanctuary, and we are thankful the church has never sanctioned any other.

To sing Gregorian chant as it should be sung is a science of its own; a fact not a few of our musicians appear to be ignorant of; and although the present little handbook does not pretend to be a treatise on the subject, yet it may perhaps be found, in the present state of our knowledge, a work better adapted to our wants than a more extended and philosophical treatise would be.

It is a first book on chant for beginners, and gives in a concise form all the preliminary notions upon which a further study may be based. The author has divided it into three parts: the first treating of the notation of plain chant; the second, of the structure and peculiarities of the modes or tones; and the third, or psalmody.

A convenient appendix has been added containing the different intonations for High Mass and the Divine Office. The whole will be found in strict conformity with the Roman Missal and Office Books, a matter which we deem of no slight consequence. The author, we observe, has followed the ordinary method (a faulty one, we think) in the matter of the division of the Psalm tones and the corresponding adaptation of the words. According to the system commonly adopted in our choir-books and in works on plain chant hitherto published in this country, the different mediations and cadences would require at least four different divisions or pointings of the Psalms. In fact, the rules laid down by all masters in Gregorian chant for accentuation and the adaptation of dactylic and monosyllabic words require only one pointing of the Psalms for all the tones and their various conclusions. We think this important point can be demonstrated, although it would be out of place here.

As a book of first principles of the chant, we most heartily commend this little volume to those for whose use it has been prepared, and have no doubt that it will find its way into all our seminaries and religious communities, and, we venture to hope as well, into our schools. To our Catholic youth the song of the church ought not to be an unintelligible jargon of sound. Let us add, that the effort of the publisher in putting out a work of this kind is deserving of the highest praise, and we trust will be fully appreciated. The work bears the imprimatur of the Rt. Rev. Bishop of Albany.

----

{858}

The Law Of Love And Love As A Law;
or, Moral Science, Theoretical and Practical.
By Mark Hopkins, D.D., LL.D., President of Williams College.
New York: Charles Scribner & Co. 1869.

This volume, albeit of moderate size and pretensions, would require an elaborate review to do it justice. The brief notice we bestow on it must not therefore be taken as a criterion of our estimate of its ability, or as a full and matured judgment upon its doctrines and arguments in detail or in reference to special points. Its general scope and tenor of thought and reasoning, we can say without hesitation, are in accordance with Catholic doctrine in respect to those matters which are clearly defined, and in accordance with that system of moral philosophy which we regard as the soundest and most rational on matters which are open to discussion. The tone and spirit of the work are elevated, its thought is strong, its style limpid and tranquil, its sentiments generally moderate and conservative. The author demolishes the wretched system of utilitarianism and several other sophisms, by a few blows as quietly yet as effectually given as those of a polar bear. He establishes also the freedom of the will as the necessary condition of obligation, and thus cuts up Calvinism root and branch. We should be glad to see a more distinct statement of the absolute right of God over his creatures as the author and preserver and sovereign Lord of the creation, as the basis of the obligation to obey his laws and those of his delegates even in things indifferent in themselves. This would in no wise conflict with the doctrine of the author that the reason of the eternal law is situated not merely in the free determination of the divine will, but chiefly and radically in the divine intelligence. The argument proving that all morality is determined by the final cause, or the relation of human acts to the ultimate end of man and creation, is admirable. So also is the resolution of all the ends and motives of creation into the _amor entis_, which is really the dominant idea in the author's philosophy and forms the character of his book. It is chiefly on account of this noble and elevated view that we take occasion to commend it, and expect a very great good to be done by it within the circle of the distinguished author's influence.

----

Mental Science.
A Compendium of Psychology and the History of Philosophy.
Designed as a text-book for high-schools and colleges.
By Alexander Bain, M.A., Professor in the
University of Aberdeen, etc.
New York: Appletons. 1868.

We are willing to believe that this book may contain much valuable information in regard to the history of philosophy, physiology, and psychological phenomena. But as a text-book of "Mental Science," it is an utter absurdity, since its fundamental principle destroys all metaphysical certainty. It is the quintessence of the worst and most absurd opinions of the empirical school of Herbert Spencer and Mill, and therefore simply a dose of intellectual strychnine. For the refutation of this miscalled "Mental Science," we refer to all the philosophical articles of this magazine.

----

Light On The Last Things.
By William B. Hayden.
Publishing House of the New Jerusalem.
20 Cooper Union. 1869.

We are rather surprised not to see on the title-page of this book, "published by order of the archangel Gabriel." It gravely informs us that the "Last Judgment foretold by Daniel, and in the book of Revelation, took place as described in that book, in the World of Spirits, in the year 1757, upon those who had accumulated there since the Lord's first appearing thus finishing the dispensation in _hades_. The last judgment once inaugurated, continues to 'sit,' as expressed in Daniel; it constantly proceeds hereafter, as explained in chapter vii.; the vast accumulation of the evil communities there will no more be allowed; it takes effect upon the multitudes who arise, at longest, in a very few years." (P. 188.) {859} We are glad to have authentic intelligence of such a gratifying nature. But this is not the best of it. "This removed evil influences, for the most part, from the intermediate world, replacing them with good influences. The heavens by the increase of numbers, and by an increased endowment of love and wisdom from the Lord, became more powerful, and began immediately, as a consequence, to shed down their influences more powerfully upon mankind, the church and the world. And they were moved nearer to men by the Lord that they might effect this purpose." We shrewdly suspect that our author has taken a moonlight ride on Mohammed's _Alborac_. Whoever has the curiosity to seek for a brief and easily readable summary of that fantastic system called Swedenborgianism will find it in this little volume. In point of credibility and reasonableness the doctrine of the New Jerusalem Church is about on a level with that of the Koran and the Book of Mormon, though more elevated and pure in its morality. There was never anything more ridiculous than the pretension of its adepts to be the true gnostics or spiritual men, and to look down on Catholics as the psychical or half carnal. Their doctrine of the incorporation of the Godhead is a crude and gross notion incompatible alike with the principles of reason and revelation, and rendering the formation of either a sound theology or a sound philosophy impossible. The rest of their system is a tissue of dreams and fancies resting on nothing more solid than the imagination of Swedenborg, and without the slightest claim on the attention of any reasonable man.

----

Life Of The Blessed Charles Spinola, S.J.,
with a sketch of the other Japanese Martyrs beatified on the
9th of July, 1867.
By Joseph Brockaert, S.J.
New York. John G. Shea. 1869.

The subject of this memoir was a Jesuit missionary in Japan in the seventeenth century, illustrious by birth but still more so by his virtue. Interwoven with the sketch of his life and martyrdom are many incidents of the history of Christianity and its glorious confessors in Japan, and an interesting account of the recent discovery of many thousands of Christians who have preserved the faith handed down by their ancestors from the days of persecution until the present time. The history of Japanese Christianity will compare with that of the first ages of the church, and is by itself a sufficient and overwhelming proof of the divine truth of the Catholic religion. Such books as this might be read with profit by every Catholic and by all who profess the name of Christ.

----

The Conscript: A Story of the French War of 1813.
By MM. Erckmann-Chatrian.
Translated from the twentieth Paris edition. With eight
full-page illustrations.
New York: Charles Scribner & Co. 1869.

Those of our readers who have already perused this story in our pages, will doubtless be pleased to learn that it is at length issued in a permanent and separate form. The volume needs no commendation from us; and we believe that many American readers will find in its pages new ideas of war and its horrors, even although our own battle-fields are yet scarcely green.

----

Outlines Of Composition.
Designed to simplify and develop the principles
of the Art by means of Exercises
in the preparation of Essays, Debates,
Lectures, and Orations. For the use
of schools, colleges, and private students.
By H. J. Zandee, and T. E. Howard, A.M.
Boston: Published by Robert S. Davis & Co.
New York: D. & J. Sadlier, and Oakley & Mason.
Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co.
Baltimore: Kelly & Piet.
Chicago: S. C. Griggs & Co.
St. Louis: Hendricks and Chittenden. 1869.

We take pleasure in noticing this Manual as an effort in the right direction. In all the experience of school-children there is nothing more difficult or perplexing than the art of composition; and few, even of the most diligent, attain to any degree of ease in its exercise until maturer years have taught them the lesson which these outlines are intended to convey, namely, that knowledge precedes speech, and thought goes before expression. {860} The years which elapse while the young writer is learning "what to say, and how to say it," will, in our view, be materially diminished by the use of such works as this, and we are glad to see, by its imprint, that publishers appreciate its value.

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Gray's School And Field Book Of Botany.
Consisting of "First Lessons in Botany,"
and "Field, Forest, and Garden Botany,"
bound in one volume.
By Asa Gray, Fisher Professor of Natural History in Harvard
University.
New York: Ivison, Phinney, Blakeman & Co.
Chicago: S. C. Griggs & Co. 1869.

The works of Professor Gray have been too long before the public and enjoy already too wide a reputation to make necessary any extended notice of this new and collected edition. The volume now before us is a fine octavo of more than 600 pages, and contains both the principles of the science, and the classification and description of various plants, to the number of nearly three thousand species. The illustrations are very numerous and of superior character; and the care which is displayed in the revision of the work, and its adaptation to the latest advancements of science, as well as the mechanical execution of the book itself, recommend it to all lovers of "the Field, the Forest, and the Garden."

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Charlie Bell, The Waif Of Elm Island.
By Rev. Elijah Kellogg, author of
_Spartacus to the Gladiators_,
_Good Old Times_, etc.
Boston: Lee & Shepard. 1868. pp. 325.

This book will assuredly suit those for whose special pleasure it was written. It abounds in stirring incident and thrilling adventure on sea and shore, which, though sometimes some what exaggerated, will not render it less acceptable to its juvenile readers. A good moral lesson, although not made obtrusively prominent, is taught in the gratitude of the orphan Charlie to his kind protectors. How true, too, and how boylike his remark to his "mother," on her expressing doubt as to his ability to accomplish a certain project, "O mother! when a boy gets anything in his head, he is bound to do it, by hook or by crook."

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The "Catholic Publication Society" will soon publish a new volume for youth, entitled, _Glimpses of Pleasant Homes_, by the authoress of the _Life of Mother McAuley_, etc. It will be beautifully illustrated and got out in the best style of the art.

The same Society will also soon publish

_Why People do not Believe; or, the Cause of Infidelity_,
translated from the French of Mgr. Lapot, of Louvain
University;

_Not Yet: A Story of To-Day_, by Miss Oxenham;

_Impressions of Spain_, by Lady Herbert, illustrated;

_Tales for the Many; The Life of Father Ravignan_;

Aubrey de Vere's _Irish Odes_;

and the third series of
_Illustrated Sunday-School Library_,
will be ready in a few days.

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Books Received.

The Triumph Of Faith. A Lecture delivered in the hall of the Cooper Institute, by the Rev. Thomas S. Preston, on the First Anniversary of the Church of the Epiphany, Sunday evening, January 10, 1869. New York: Robert Coddington, Publisher, 366 Bowery. 1869.

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Report Of The Secretary Of The Treasury On The State Of The Finances For The Year 1868. Washington: Government Printing Office.

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Tales of a Grandfather. By Sir Walter Scott, Bart. Second Series. A.D. 1603 to 1707. W. W. Swayne, New York and Brooklyn.