Chapter III (1)

And now I am sure you are satisfied that Dick was on the right road, acting religion as fast as he learned it; trying to be all he knew--to live a truthful, generous, self-respecting life. He had little help, you know, and, if he followed that crowd that I told you of oftener than before, and heard much that enabled him to take whole books into his "inner consciousness" which would otherwise have been a dead letter to him, he was not one to make a flourish of trumpets about it, or to dream of complaining that the world would not stand still until he got up to it. He had but one intimate friend, it is true; but he was a friend you and I might be glad to win; a friend who never argued or lectured, but only quietly built his life on the only true foundation--the true faith--and then left it to show for itself. So, simply trusting in whatever was good, yet so fierce against whatever was evil, scornful of everything wrong and weak, practising as well as believing, you may be sure Carl Staffs would never have held out his honest hand to Dick, if Dick were not worthy of it. And this makes me think great things of my hero, of whom scarcely anybody thought at all. He had his place in Ames & Harden's store, and he had his talks, too, now with one person, now with another, and perhaps thought of things he heard. He was only a boy yet, and had his follies, without doubt, fancying at times that there was something in him, if circumstances would only draw it out, which would prove him a great deal worthier of high places than those now occupying them. I am not sure but that, if he had had a country-home, he might sometimes have lain down under the trees, and, while watching in a dreamy way the clouds sailing down to the west, and the vigilant stars coming out to guard the earth in the sun's absence, and listening to the wind among the trees, the twittering of some wakeful bird, or the rustling of some grand old river, he might have had yearnings no one could explain, and not have felt the sky too far to climb or the river too deep to fathom; for Dick's was only a boy's heart, that had still to learn that we cannot go from the Broadway pavement to Trinity spire in one step. {530} Even in his city home, if home it could be called, it may be that, just after he had been to church with Carl, he had glowed with the thought that he--even he--might some day be a Loyola or a Francis Xavier, for "the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

But as yet his life consciously held but one romance--one dream of earth. There were few to care for him; but there was a little girl once who had made Christmas memorable to him, and Dick had not forgotten her. She had grown a beautiful young lady now, in Dick's eyes, though to all others she was merely a thin, dark school-girl. They still lived in the handsome house on Fourteenth street, and Carl Stoffs and his band played for many a dance there, although I am sorry to say that, even after a New Year's party, Dick had to be sent more than once to Mr. Brandon's office with a little bill, due to Ames & Harden, mostly for school-books, novels, and gilt annuals. But then that was no fault of Mary's, you know.

Mr. Brandon was not a pleasant man to go to with a bill, or for much of anything in the money line. "The deuce take it, my dear!" he often said to his wife. "Are you bent on ruining me?"

"Don't be silly, Charley, love," the dauntless little woman would say, not in the least disturbed by the angry voice and black brow that were so terrible to Dick. "For people of our position, we live very shabbily."

"Hang our position! I tell you, madam, we are going the road to beggary; we are, indeed."

"O Charles! do be quiet," was her ready answer. "I am so sick of that sort of stuff."

"Then _be_ sick of it," this dreadful man would exclaim; "for I'll tell it to you every day and every hour, until it gets through your silly head. Money! money! money! I never hear anything else in this house. I've sold myself for it, body and soul, and much good it has done me! I'll not give you a penny, madam; not a penny."

But that was all talk; for, of course, he had to give his wife, who was a nice little body, very sweet and good-tempered, but rather fond of the good things of this world, whatever she had set her heart upon having.

"If papa should be right--" Mary would sometimes urge.

"Nonsense! they all say the same thing; why shouldn't they? If I didn't spend your father's money in making things pleasant at home, he'd be spending it on clubs, or whatever it is which uses up their money when they have the spending of it all to themselves. You'll have a husband, likely enough, one of these days, who'll scold for every pocket-handkerchief you buy; but you won't mind it. They must scold about something, you know, dear."

"O mamma! I'd never live a day--if--" At which sentence, never completed, Mrs. Brandon would laugh, and the subject would be dropped for the present; but, of course, after such scenes, Mr. Brandon wouldn't be very amiable to a boy like Dick with a bill in his hand. But Dick to him was a mere machine, belonging to a store over the way, and as such he treated him, with as little malice in his hard words as if he were swearing at a table or chair. To Dick, Mr. Brandon was Mary's father, and that meant a great deal; Dick could never talk openly to him, nor stand in his presence quite as he did in the presence of other men.

{531}

For, though Dick had never been outside the city limits, and had never seen a hill, nor a field of corn, he was a trifle romantic, I am afraid, after all.

Yes, it is true that he grew to be almost a man without having ever climbed a hill or seen a field of grain. But there was a good time coming.

"Dick," said Carl Stoffs, that true and faithful friend--"Dick, would you like to go to the country?"

"Would I like to go to the country?" he repeated, finding no words of his own to say, so great was his bewilderment at such a question--"Would I like to go to the country?"

"Any time you're ready," said the German, seating himself. "Take your time to answer, my lad."

"What would I do in the country? I was never there in my life!"

"And you don't look more pleased than though I'd asked you to go to--to--the end of the world."

"I have often wished to see the country," returned Dick, in the tone in which we might wish to see China if we had nothing else to do; "but I don't see my way to doing so at present."

"I do believe, Dick, that you have lined the walls with gold pieces, you are so miserly of your time, and so stuck to this old place. Come now, we shall take you to the country, my wife and I. Now, to think there should be one on earth who never saw the green fields and the woods! It is to me a very odd thing! You are the blind man who never saw the sun, and does not think the sun worth seeing."

"Oh! no, indeed; not so bad as that; but--"

"Then you shall go. My sister has a house, with room for many, and we have taken half, keeping one room for you. Come and take your week with us."

"But, Mr. Stoffs, I intended during that week to read so much to take long walks about the city--and Mrs. Stoffs--"

"My wife sent me; I would not of myself have such a blind man with me, to read, to study, to walk; how can you in the city now? You will be wild when you have been once with us. You will go to-day with me--I will be waiting for you at my place at five. Will you come?"

"Indeed--"

"You will come." And, in truth, Mr. Stoffs had previously said so much of that wonderful land in which he was now living that Dick could not resist his last appeal, and afraid and shy as he well might be, having never spent twenty-four hours in a home circle in his life, he gave his promise to be at the appointed place of meeting in good time for the train.

But when the magnetism of his friend's presence was taken from him, Dick's heart grew heavy in his breast. If it had been to go to another city, or on a matter of business, Dick's excitement would have been delightful; but "the country," of which he knew nothing, and of which he had such strange fancies, picked up he could not tell where, that was another thing. City boys always laughed at country people when they came to the city--they had such queer ways--and yet--and yet--he felt strange and shy about going among them. Perhaps he felt that the tables would be turned on him there, and that his ways would be as queer in their eyes as theirs had been in his; perhaps he felt the full force of the homely old saying that "a cock can crow best in his own farm-yard."

{532}

But, as the day wore on, Dick's spirits rose; he thought of all the stories he had read of fresh country life; a poem or two of cows and brooks came vaguely among his thoughts, and by the time he reached his little room, and began to pack his not abundant wardrobe, he was eager for the first glance at "the country."

"Then, may the Lord's blessing go with you," said his kind but very slovenly landlady. "I hope you'll come back as brown as a berry, sir. I was two year in the country once, and, though I won't say I'd like it for always, yet my heart do get to wishing these days for a sight o' the flowers and the fields. You'll mind the fruit, sir, and the dews o' night; there does be great dews fallin', and a deal of ague, I'm told. Good-by to you." And Dick said "good-by" to her with something like emotion; for it was his first "good-by" to any one, and the woman had been good to him, and if her hair was in a blouse, and her garments ill made and not clean, Dick was not startled, for he had never seen them otherwise.

Then he walked on to meet Mr. Stoffs, and found he was nearly an hour before the time. It seemed as if the moment of departure would never come; but it did, at last, and, as in a sort of dream, the dusty city youth was whirled by cottages nestling among proud, protecting trees, past the green hills, and through fields "all rich with ripening grain," until the panting train pulled up between a pile of stones and a little yellow station-house, with a narrow platform running beside it.

"Now, then, here we are!" said the German, and took up his bundles and basket; for who ever saw a Carl Stoffs in the cars that had not a bundle and basket, and a quantity of household furniture besides? This last Dick took in charge, and so laden the two made their way out of the cars. Around the little yellow station-house dodged two splendid bays with silver harness, that were being driven rapidly round a corner close to the narrow platform, and went out into the dusty road; for sidewalks there were none. Soon the sound of carriage-wheels made them turn aside, and Dick stumbled, as he walked for the first time on the soft green grass.

When you take a mountain lassie to Rome and show her St. Peter's, she is not enthusiastic; indeed, she is terribly disappointed. She expected something so much greater than her mountains, so much brighter than her green valleys. If Dick was disappointed when he put his foot on nature's velvet carpet and found it only caused him to stumble, I cannot say. I think he felt surprised that a brook beside the way and far blue hills before him wrought no emotion within him. Fortunately Carl asked no raptures.

"That was the Brandons' turnout," he said in a prosaic way, as Dick recovered his footing, and returned to the road.

"Is that so?" asked Dick. "Do they live here?"

"Yes," said Carl, "and a fine place it is too; but I think the man's going too fast."

Then Dick was thoughtful for a minute or two, pitying the daughter, if it were so; but it is hard to think that a man's family are near to want when his stylish carriage has just turned you out of the road, and the pity soon seemed misplaced.

{533}

The walk seemed long to Dick; he did, indeed, enjoy the cool breeze, fresher and purer than any he had ever felt before but he had his own baggage and Carl's curtain-rods besides, and he was used to pavements. They had already passed many fine houses, with lawns and carriage-ways, shaded by great trees in front of them, and now and again a little house, with flowers and clustering vines, and groups on the porches; but Carl's steps lingered at none. At last they turned out of the dusty road into a shaded lane, a veritable lane, as new to Dick as the Paris Boulevards would be to Mrs. Partington; two or three more cottages, smaller and not so much garden-room, and then Carl said:

"Eh! but I'm glad to get home! Come here, Will! Come, boys!"

The last call seemed to fill the lane with children. They might have come down from the trees, or up from the earth, for all Dick could tell; but at the sound of Carl's voice the place was alive--big boys and little boys, great girls and small girls, all round and fat, brown-eyed and yellow-haired, with all manner of greetings, gathered around the travellers, eagerly drew their baggage from their hands, and with baskets, bags, bundles, and curtain-rods, made a grand triumphal procession before them, shouting, laughing, pushing against each other, the big ones stumbling over the little ones, and yet nobody hurt.

A few steps more and a rustic gate was opened and some one came and stood under the archway of evergreen branches, intertwined with some drooping vines. She was facing the West, looking down the lane, shading her eyes with her hand, although the sun was almost down. Just for a moment she stood in the bright sunset glow, under the green archway, shading her brown eyes from the light, looking down the shadowy lane; and, as she so stood, she seemed a very fair and graceful girl indeed. An instant more and the children, in the importance of their mission as baggage-carriers, pushed past her, and she retreated with them toward the house.

"Come, Rose! Here we are!" called Carl to her. And she turned and met them as they reached the gate.

"You are welcome," she said to Dick when he was introduced at the gate.

"You are welcome," said Mrs. Stoffs, coming toward them from the porch.

"You are welcome," repeated Mrs. Alaine, at the door. And Dick had not a word of answer to any one of them.

They were to him as grand as princesses and as gracious as queens, as they came forth to receive him and bid him welcome to their little cottage; and Dick was not used to courts or to queens and princesses, so he could only bow and shake the hands so cordially extended to him.

I am afraid my hero was not at all happy for the first few minutes that he sat on the stoop between Mrs. Stoffs and Mrs. Alaine, not knowing what answer to make to even their simplest remark, and that he was much relieved when they joined their voices to the hubbub the children were making around Carl. Such shyness as Dick's is very painful to the spectators, as well as to the embarrassed one; but, then, there's this to be said about it, when it is once entirely conquered it never can come back again, and I fancy there are some very nice people in the world, now very self-possessed and perfectly well-bred, who would give much to feel again the awkwardness and embarrassment which, once upon a time, caused them such keen annoyance. {534} The women pitied Dick, but liked him none the less for the color that would come into his face and the hesitation of his replies; but their feeling for the stranger was greater than any pleasure to themselves, and so it was not long before they went into the house with the declared intention of "getting tea." But going into the house was not going away altogether, for the room which served for parlor, library, sitting-room, dining-room, and all, had a low window opening on the stoop, and Carl and Dick could see them well, and speak, if they chose, without raising their voices, as they went-back and forth from the table to the closet, and from the closet to the table, not to mention innumerable visits to Carl's basket, which seemed a pantry in itself. The children ran in and out, and one jolly little one, called Trot, who was as round as a dumpling, and was too young to be shy for very long, informed Dick she was glad he had come, for they were to have sweet-cakes for tea. Occasionally Rose would come and stand at the window and say something to tease "Uncle Carl," who was not slow to "give her as good as he got." Thus gradually Dick became more at ease, and began to distinguish a difference in the tones of the children's voices, and to take note of the strange Sunday-like stillness which, except for the merry noises in the house, was complete, and, to him, wonderful.

I think a tea-table is one of the nicest sights in the world. If there is a grain of poetry in a woman, and I believe that there is no woman without a grain of poetry in her, it will surely, mark my words, however rough and prosaic she may be, come out about tea-time. That was a very pretty tea-table at which Dick took his place that evening; there was no silver nor China, and there was, perhaps, too great an abundance of good things; but it startled Dick, and I contend that it was nice and pretty, if only for the reason that it had a clean table-cloth, a bunch of flowers, and every dish in its proper place. Mrs. Alaine, who was only a feminine edition of her brother Carl, sat at the head of the table, in a clean calico dress, with a white collar and a blue ribbon. She had a child on each side of her, whose glee, at the prospect of sweet-cakes and peaches (out of Carl's basket) after they had eaten their bread and butter, she tried to moderate with a smiling, "Hush, children! What will Mr. Heremore think of you?" Mrs. Stoffs, who had also a round flat face, and was dressed in a clean calico, with white collar and a knot of pink ribbons, Dick had seen many times before, and dearly loved the good humor that bubbled all over her face whenever she spoke. She also had a child on each side of her, whose audible whispers about the good things coming she answered and mysteriously increased by promises of the same again another day. But opposite Dick was a face that was not round nor especially good-humored; for the two children under charge of Rose were the least repressible of the whole flock, and they tried her slender stock of patience sorely; especially, as she said afterward to her mother, with many blushes and half crying at the recollection, "as they would say _such_ things right before the strange gentleman!" Rose had a pretty blue muslin, with a tiny bit of lace around the neck, for her raiment, and there was a something red, green, brown, blue, pink, or yellow, that fluttered here and there before Dick's eyes whenever she moved to help the children, or turned her young face, with its flitting colors, toward him. {535} But whether it were a ribbon, or a blush, or the hue of her hair, or an aureole around her head, and whether it were no color at all, or all colors together, or a rainbow out of the clouds, I do not think Dick had, for one moment, a definite idea--at least, while it was flitting before his eyes.

After tea, Carl took out his pipe, and settled into his big chair on the porch; and the children, having got somewhat over their awe of the stranger, volunteered to take him down the lane, and show him where there had been a robin's nest last spring, an expedition, however, that was vetoed by Carl on the ground that you couldn't see even a robin's nest in the dark. Then Rose came out to tease Uncle Carl again; but, forgetting her purpose, stood where the light from within seemed to set her in glory, like the angels in pictures; and by and by, it came about, no one knew how, that her shrine was vacant, and she, a very nice little girl with her hands in the pockets--very impracticable pockets they were--of her muslin apron, was telling Dick, with the children as prompters and commentators, the full particulars of the finding of the robin's nest, and what work she had had to keep the children from bringing sorrow and dismay to the hearts of the parent robins by stealing away their little ones. Then, as the moon rose, there was no reason why the children should not take Dick down the lane to show to him the tree where the nest had been; and then it was needful that he should know just how far it was from sister Rose's window, and yet how quickly, on hearing the shouts of rejoicing, she had come to Mrs. Robin's assistance. Then it was so funny to see a man who had never climbed a tree, that it was needful two or three should go up one to show how it is done. Then, too, there were lightning-bugs by the million around them, and as Dick had never seen anything like them, unless it was fire-crackers on Fourth of July night, they had to catch several for his investigation. When Rose told how those little things are really the people of the forest, who are so timid they do not dare to come out in the daytime, but do all their praying by night, and have always been good friends to children, showing them their way home when lost, and driving away the ghosts that would frighten the wanderers, then the children opened their brown hands and let them fly away, promising never to make prisoners of them again.

And so, though Dick still felt strange and shy, it was not in such an unpleasant way as when he sat on the porch trying to answer Mrs. Alaine and Mrs. Stoffs when they spoke to him. When, at last, he closed his eyes that night, he was half ready to admit that "the country" might almost be the enchanted land some people had made it out to be.

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{536}

Letter Apostolic Of Our Holy Father The Pope Pius IX.

To All Protestants And Other Non-catholics.

To All Protestants And Other Non-Catholics, Pius IX., Pope:

You already know that We, having been elevated, notwithstanding
our unworthiness, to this Chair of Peter, and therefore
invested with the supreme government and guardianship of the
whole Catholic Church by Christ our Lord, have judged it
reasonable to summon to Us Our Venerable Brethren the Bishops
of the whole earth, and to unite them together, to celebrate,
next year, an OEcumenical Council; so that in concert with
these our Venerable brethren who are called to share in our
cares, we may take those steps which seem most opportune and
necessary, to disperse the darkness of the numerous
pestilential errors which everywhere rage to the increasing
overthrow and the intoxication of many souls; and also to
confirm and increase daily more and more among the Christian
people entrusted to our watchfulness the dominion of true
Faith, Justice, and the Peace of God. Confidently relying on
the close ties and most loving union which in so marked a way
unite to Ourselves and to this Holy See these our Venerable
Brethren, who, through all the time of our Supreme Pontificate,
have never failed to give to Ourselves and this Holy See the
clearest tokens of their love and veneration; We have the firm
hope that this OEcumenical Council, summoned by Us at this
time, will produce, by the inspirations of Divine Grace, as
other General Councils in past ages have done, abundant fruits
of benediction, to the greater glory of God, and the eternal
salvation of men.

Sustained by this hope, and roused and urged by the love of our
Lord Jesus Christ, who gave his life for the whole human race,
We cannot restrain Ourselves, on the occasion of the future
Council, from addressing our Apostolic and paternal words to
all those who, whilst they acknowledge the same Jesus Christ as
the Redeemer, and glory in the name of Christian, yet do not
profess the true faith of Christ or hold to and follow the
Communion of the Catholic Church. And we do this to warn, and
conjure, and beseech them with all the warmth of our zeal and
in all charity, that they may consider and seriously examine
whether they follow the path marked out for them by Jesus
Christ our Lord, and which leads to Eternal Salvation. No one
can deny or doubt that Jesus Christ himself, in order to apply
the fruits of his redemption to all generations of men, built
his only church in this world on Peter; that is to say, the
Church, One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic; and that he gave
him all the power necessary to preserve the deposit of Faith
whole and inviolable, and to teach the same Faith to all
kindreds, and peoples, and nations; so that all men who through
baptism become members of his mystical body, and of that new
life of grace, without which no one can ever attain to life
eternal, may always be preserved and perfected in them; and
this church, which is his mystical Body, may always in its own
nature remain firm and immovable to the consummation of ages,
that it may flourish, and supply to all its children all the
means of Salvation.

Now, whoever will carefully examine and reflect upon the
condition of the various religious societies divided among
themselves, and separated from the Catholic Church, which from
the days of our Lord Jesus Christ and his Apostles has ever
exercised, by its lawful pastors, and still does exercise, the
divine power committed to it by this same Lord; will easily
satisfy himself that none of these societies, singly nor all
together, are in any way or form that one Catholic Church which
our Lord founded and built, and which he chose should be; and
that he cannot, by any means, say that these societies are
members or parts of that Church, since they are visibly
separated from catholic unity.

{537}

For such like societies, being destitute of that living
authority established by God, which especially teaches men what
is of Faith, what the rule of morals, and guides them in
everything that relates to eternal life, are always varying in
their doctrines, and this changing and instability is
increasing. Every one therefore must perfectly understand, and
clearly and evidently see, that such societies are distinctly
opposite to the church instituted by our Lord Jesus Christ; for
in that church truth must always continue firm and inaccessible
to change, so as to preserve absolutely inviolate the deposit
confided to her, for the guardianship of which the presence and
aid of the Holy Ghost has been, promised to her for ever. Every
one also knows that from these divergent doctrines and
opinions, social schisms have had their birth, which have again
generated within themselves sects and communions without
number, which spread themselves continually to the great injury
of Christian and civil society.

Indeed, whoever observes that religion is the foundation of
human society, must perceive and confess the great influence
which this division of principles, this opposition, this strife
of religious societies among themselves, must have on civil
society, and with what force this denial of the authority
established by God, to determine the belief of the human mind,
and direct the actions of men as well in private as in social
life, has fostered, spread, and supported those deplorable
changes of times and circumstances, those troubles which at
this day overwhelm and afflict almost all peoples.

Let all those, then, who do not profess the unity and truth of
the Catholic Church, avail themselves of the opportunity of
this Council, in which the Catholic Church, to which their
forefathers belonged, affords a new proof of her close unity
and her invincible vitality, and let them satisfy the longings
of their hearts, and liberate themselves from that state in
which they cannot be assured of their own salvation. Let them
unceasingly offer fervent prayers to the God of Mercy, that he
will throw down the wall of separation, that he will scatter
the darkness of error, and that he will lead them back to the
Holy Mother Church, in whose bosom their fathers found the
salutary pastures of life, in whom alone the whole doctrine of
Jesus Christ is preserved and handed down, and the mysteries of
heavenly grace dispensed.

For Ourself, to whom the same Christ our Lord has entrusted the
charge of the supreme Apostolic ministry, and who must,
therefore, fulfil with the greatest zeal all the functions of a
good Pastor, and love with a paternal love, and embrace in our
charity all men, wherever dispersed over the earth, We address
this letter to all Christians separated from Us, and We again
exhort and conjure them quickly to return to the one fold of
Christ.

For We ardently desire their salvation in Jesus Christ, and We
fear to have one day to render account to him who is our Judge,
if We do not show them, and if we do not give them, as far as
is in our power, the sure means to know the way which leads to
eternal salvation. In all our prayers, beseeching and giving
thanks, we cease not, day or night, to ask earnestly and humbly
for them, of the Eternal Pastor of souls, the abundance of
light and heavenly grace. And since, notwithstanding our
unworthiness, We are his Vicar upon Earth, with outstretched
hands We wait, in the most ardent desire, the return of our
erring sons to the Catholic Church, so that We may receive them
with love into the mansion of our Heavenly Father, and enrich
them with his unspeakable treasures. On this longed-for return
to the truth and unity of the Catholic Church depends not only
the salvation of individuals, but still more Christian society;
the whole world cannot enjoy true peace unless it becomes one
Fold under one Shepherd.

Given at St. Peter's, in Rome, the 13th day of September, 1868,
and the twenty-third year of our Pontificate.

The remarks which follow are extracted from _The London Saturday Review_:

The Pope And The General Council.

We read the Pope's Address to all Protestants and non-Catholics
at some disadvantage. It reaches us only through a French
version, furnished to the _Moniteur_, and published in
that journal of Monday. And we may, in the first place,
complain to His Holiness of the slovenly and parsimonious way
in which he discharges the function so dear to him. He
expatiates on his zeal for all Christian souls, and he is
assured that he shall have to give account for us all at the
Great Day. He, the Good Shepherd--such is his title, and we
ought perhaps to write it, "His," entrusted to him by Christ
Himself our Lord--is bound by the charge of his Supreme
Apostolic Ministry to embrace in his paternal charity all men
in the whole world, and therefore he addresses this letter to
all Christians separated from him. So lofty a purpose might
have justified some care in carrying it out. But what has His
Holiness done that his epistle should reach his erring people?
Does he expect that the whole human race is bound to read the
Government journal of Rome? Is his conscience satisfied that
his tremendous responsibility is fulfilled by the cheap and
easy method of publishing his behests in an obscure newspaper,
and leaving to those most concerned to find out, as they can,
what so nearly concerns their eternal salvation, through the
medium of unauthorized versions and newspaper reports?
{538}
This is the difficulty of a Vicar of Christ who has heavenly
functions to discharge, and only human means to work with. As
it is quite certain, as things stand, that the awful words
which concern the immortal destinies of every human being who
names the name of Christ will not reach one in a hundred
thousand of them, it seems to follow that if the Pope has these
duties toward all mankind, he ought to have been entrusted with
an archangelic trumpet to address himself to so very large an
audience. It is a sad come-down from the appeal _urbi et
orbi_ to have to hoist it up in a penny Dublin paper. Who
knows how many the Pope would not influence if he would be at
the trouble of addressing us by some such mundane
instrumentality as the penny post? The Archbishop of
Canterbury, for example; has he, as courtesy would seem to
require, received in any authoritative way this communication
from Rome, or heaven, or wherever it was indited?

We say it with all respect, that the Pope's address was
calculated not so much to attract as to repel. He does not
condescend to argue; although he assures us that we are
enveloped in a cloud of error, he is at no pains to dissipate
it; with a bold _petitio princitii_ he sonorously assumes
the very point at issue--the point, be it added, at issue not
only between him and his bishops on the one hand, and the
imposing ranks of the vast oriental church, our own church, and
the vast Protestant communities of Europe and America, on the
other, but the point which has been most keenly debated by the
theologians and canonists of the western obedience. The Pope's
address rests upon one, and upon only one, huge assumption. It
is that the Pope, in his single capacity as monarch and
autocrat of the church, advanced to the supreme government of
the whole Catholic Church, has the inherent right of
prescribing the faith of the church; that he is the one and
supreme legislator as well as administrator. This is what even
the church of Rome has not yet formally decreed, even by the
easy method which a few years ago decreed the Immaculate
Conception. Ultra-montanism--or, in other words, and to express
it generally, the personal infallibility and supreme authority
of the pope--is not yet _de fide_. But this is what the
Pope assumes; and it is most likely as a step toward what it is
understood will be the next Roman development of doctrine, and
probably the end aimed at in summoning this so-called
oecumenical council that the Pope, in his letter, takes up the
position of autocrat. He addresses us, but it is only to assist
his next move as regards his own subjects, and to help to
settle the vexed question which his predecessors have found to
be so inconvenient when denied by Bossuet, De Marca, Van Espen,
and the Doctors of the Sorbonne, to say nothing of the Councils
of Constance and Basle.

In the mean time let us see what it is the Pope in his
exuberant charity offers us. It is, we regret to say, extremely
little. He bids us stay at home and pray to be united; at least
we hope that he goes as far as this. But as he cannot count
much upon the efficacy of the prayers of obstinate heretics, it
would be perhaps nearer to the truth if we said that all that
the Pope has to say is to invite us to return to his fold. The
Vatican Eirenicon is of the simplest--no conditions, no
explanations, no discussion of difficulties, no healing of
wounds, no solemn canvassing of controversies, no arguments.
Return first, and discuss afterward, when there is nothing to
discuss. Might we venture to hint to Archbishop Manning who is
polite enough to consider the present attitude of the Church of
England toward Pius IX. as exactly similar to the state of
things as between Gregory I. and the Pagans and Goths and
Arians of his time--that even Arius got a hearing, and was
allowed his say? Not so with us. There is a controversy between
Rome and those whom Rome calls non-Catholics, as to the, not
primacy, but exclusive autocracy of the See of Rome. There is
only one way of deciding it--_rixá est ubi tu pulsas, ego
vapulo tantum_. All that we have to do is to be kicked, and
submit. This is good schoolmaster's language; but, as far as we
remember, it is not the old way of dealing with even heresy and
schism. The huge series of councils might have been reduced to
a single and very portable volume, had this mode of settling
controversy been the church's old and compendious method.

One misunderstanding, or misrepresentation, it seems to be well
at once to remove. The Westminster _Gazette_--writing, we
hope, without having read the Pope's address speaks of it as an
invitation to those to whom it is addressed to repair to the
OEcumenical Council of 1869, adding that the church will ever
be ready to offer explanations, and to labor to remove
obstacles to reunion. This is just what the Pope does not do.
He does not invite non-Catholics, either in any corporate or
private capacity, to repair to Rome. He simply says that he
will pray for them, and bids them be reconciled.
{539}
Invitation there is none; offers of explanation there are none.
We are seriously to lay to heart our condition, and give it up.
We are invited to conform, and nothing else. To the council
neither our bishops nor pastors are asked. And this is the more
noticeable because the Orientals are invited. "We raise our
voice once more to you, and with all the power of our soul we
pray you, we conjure you to come to this Council, as your
ancestors came to the Council of Lyons and to the Council of
Florence." Such is His Holiness's language to the Oriental
bishops, as we find it in his Apostolic letter of September
8th, translated in the Westminster _Gazette_. This
Florentine precedent will hardily be reassuring to the
Orientals; and though, after all, the summons to them is
substantially only what the summons to us is, as the Pope in
either case takes up the same position--that of the exclusive
supremacy of the See of Peter, and denies that the Eastern
bishops are really bishops till they have submitted to him--yet
we must remind not only the Westminster _Gazette_ but the
_Univers_, that their statement that the Pope has issued
anything like an invitation to attend the council, or rather
his council, to "all those whose separation dates from the
sixteenth century," is simply untrue. Even if we had been
asked, and even were it announced that we should have ample
liberty to state our case, we say, as Laud said more than two
centuries ago, "To what end freedom of speech, since they are
resolved to alter nothing?"

The following report of the action of the New School Presbyterian Synod of New York and New Jersey we clip from the columns of one of the daily papers:

The Presbyterians And The Pope.

The following memorial and resolutions were presented by Rev. Dr. Adams:

_Whereas_, The Pope of Rome, called Pius the Ninth, did,
on the 13th day of September, in the year of our Lord 1868,
issue a certain letter, a proclamation addressed to all
Protestants and non-Catholics throughout the world, the import
of which is to unite and urge all persons and organizations
thus designated to hasten to return to the only fold, meaning
the Church of Rome.

_Whereas_, The said Pope in the said letter, called
paternal and apostolic, has in an unwonted manner, as if
pleading at the bar of public opinion, assigned several and
various reasons for its preparation and publication.

_Whereas_, Among the reasons so mentioned are the
assertion of his own supremacy over the human conscience as the
vicar of Jesus, and "the authority to govern the persuasions of
the human intellect and to direct the actions of men in private
and social life," as also this, that the rejection of this
authority and protest against it by so many has promoted and
nourished those perturbations in human affairs, in this our
day, which the said Pope pronounces miserable and grievous, but
which must be regarded by every friend of his species as
eminently hopeful and auspicious.

_Whereas_, All such claims and assertions on the part of
the Pope of Rome are to the last degree unfounded in fact,
contrary to the truth, reason, Scripture, and the whole genius
of Christianity, and, if allowed, would prove subversive to all
human rights and liberties.

_Whereas_, Recent movements, especially in Austria and
Spain, nations long in subjection to the monstrous pretensions
of the Papacy, command the prompt recognition, sympathy, and
support of all friends of humanity, freedom, and religion
throughout the land; therefore, be it

_Resolved_, That the facts here recorded furnish and
present a proper and fitting occasion for all Protestant
churches throughout Christendom, each in the mode which its own
wisdom shall suggest, to prepare and set forth for general
distribution, through the same channels which the Pope himself
has chosen, a suitable response to his letter, which response
shall contain a statement of the reasons why his claims can in
no wise be recognized, as inconsistent with a catholicity more
catholic than Rome the authority of infallible Scripture and
the glorious supremacy of Jesus Christ.

_Resolved_, That a committee be appointed by the Synod,
whose duty it shall be to consider the expediency of
corresponding with other Protestant bodies in this country and
in Europe as to the propriety of such timely action for the
furtherance of free Biblical Protestant Christianity.

_Resolved_, That it be referred to the same committee, if
they deem it wise, to prepare and publish a reply to the said
letter of the Pope, which shall be regarded as an expression of
the sentiments of this Synod concerning the matters therein
contained as of vital importance to all civil and religious
liberty throughout the world, and to the salvation of the human
race.

{540}

It was suggested that a committee consisting of three ministers
and three elders, be appointed to carry out the objects of the
resolutions. Dr. Cox wanted to see the committee larger. It was
an important subject, and we want names on the document which
will encourage our brothers in England and in all parts of
Europe. The following committee was appointed to take the whole
subject into consideration: Rev. William Adams, D.D., Rev.
Henry B. Smith, D.D., Rev. Roswell D. Hitchcock, D.D., Rev.
Jonathan F. Stearns, D.D., Rev. Edwin F. Hatfield, D.D., Rev.
Samuel T. Spear, D.D., Rev. George L. Prentiss, D.D., Hon.
William E. Dodge, Professor Theodore W. Dwight, LL.D., Hon.
Daniel Haines, Hon. Edward A. Lambert, J. B. Pinneo, Esq., S.
F. B. Morse, Esq., Cyrus W. Field, Esq.

We subjoin another report of the action of the central authority of the Evangelical Church of Prussia, from _The New York Herald_:

The Berlin Evangelical Consistory On The Pontifical Letter.

The pastoral letter in connection with his oecumenical circular
addressed by Pope Pius IX. to non-Catholic Christians has
roused Prussian evangelic church authority. The following
circular has been addressed to its consistories: "An open
letter of the 13th ult., by the chief of the Roman Catholic
Church, is directed to all Protestants, thus including the
members of our Evangelical State Church. As this document
contains, besides unjust accusations, many expressions of
respect and kindness toward Protestants, we are ready and
willing to consider it as a pledge of friendly and peaceable
relations for the future between both confessions for the sake
of the state and its citizens, and for the efficiency and
triumph of Christian truth. Every sincere evangelic Christian
acknowledges the duty of loving other confessions and deplores
the separation in the church, especially among members of a
common country. But as the chief of another church undertakes
in the said letter to demand, with assumed authority, from the
members of ours a renunciation of their cherished creed,
founded upon the inviolable word of God, and a retractation of
evangelical truth won by the blessed Reformation, without
offering on his part the least prospect of a reconciliation on
the basis of evangelical truth, we must decidedly reject his
action as an unjustifiable trespass upon our church, and in so
doing we are sure of the agreement of all Evangelicals. An
appeal to the members of our church not to heed this voice may
be deemed unnecessary; but it is proper to keep still more in
mind, opposed to such pretensions, the numerous members of our
persuasions who in the midst of Roman Catholicism are exposed
to the temptations of infidelity toward the Evangelical creed;
therefore, to procure the means for preaching to them, giving
them the sacraments, the Evangelical school and pastoral care,
collections are directed soon to be made in all our churches.
The royal consistories will communicate this to the ministers
of the dioceses, who on the days of collection on the following
Sundays are to make proper mention of it to their
congregations.

There was also an announcement in the papers that some sort of a letter to the Pope was proposed by members of the late General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church, although we do not know what came of the affair eventually.

We must give justice to one portion of the comments of the _Saturday Review_, namely, that which refers to the publication of the pontifical letter. It is a matter of great inconvenience to Catholics throughout the world, that the publication of important official documents at Rome is so tardy and insufficient. This is a defect which ought to be, and we hope will be, remedied. We have not yet seen the Latin text of the letter addressed by the Sovereign Pontiff to Protestants, and have been obliged to take a translation of it which is not remarkably well-executed, and in which we have corrected forty-seven typographical errors, from an English Catholic newspaper. The English translations of the grand and dignified pontifical documents which are sent forth by the Holy See, are generally wretched, and make them appear to readers who are unacquainted with the originals in a very unfavorable light.

{541}

It seems to us that it would have added very much to the effect of the Holy Father's paternal address to his erring and strayed children, if authentic copies had been at once sent to all the bishops, with a command to publish both the original Latin text, and also a translation authorized by themselves, with their own official counter-signature appended, for the benefit of all Christians within their several dioceses. As it is, however, the letter of the Holy Father has become very generally known through the indirect channel of the newspapers, and has not failed to produce a great sensation. It is just such an admonition as the head of the Church, who is conscious that his authority to teach the world is indubitable, might be expected to issue. It is in the style and manner which become the Vicar of Jesus Christ speaking to all the baptized, who, by virtue of their baptism, are lawfully subject to his pastoral jurisdiction. The Pope speaks as one having authority, and must necessarily do so, just as our Lord and the Apostles did, because he knows that he has authority, and that the evidence of his authority is so plain and clear, that at least all the educated pastors and teachers of the different Christian sects are capable of perceiving it and bound to acknowledge it. The _Saturday Review_ complains that the Pope does not argue on the subject, or adduce reasons to convince those who reject his authority. This is a most unreasonable objection. How would it be possible, within the limits of a brief letter, to address arguments, at length, to all the hundred and one different sorts of Protestants? The letter is not destitute of that kind and amount of argument which are alone suitable in a document of the kind. It appeals to the manifest fact that Protestants are divided among a multitude of differing sects and doctrines, without any principle of unity or certain criterion of truth; whereas the Catholic Church, in communion with the See of Peter, possesses that unity and universality which are the sure and evident marks of the presence of the Holy Spirit within her body, leading her perpetually into all truth, according to the promise of Christ. Our Lord, when he demanded the obedience of faith under the peril of eternal damnation from all his hearers, did not enter into long arguments. He presented brief and simple reasons in an authoritative manner to his auditors, and appealed to the evidences by which his divine mission was attested from heaven. In like manner the Holy Father, who is Christ's vicegerent upon the earth, affirms his own authority, commands submission to his teaching, and presents a simple, obvious argument addressed to the reason and conscience of all men, which they have the means of easily verifying if they will. The affirmation of his authority, and the command or exhortation to submit to it, are not made gratuitously, and do not rest upon a mere personal declaration of the Pontiff, to which men are to yield an assent which is blind, unreasoning, or destitute of solid motives. The motives are not expressed explicitly and at length in the letter; but they are appealed to as existing within the reach of those who are addressed, and the claim of submission is based upon them. The Holy Father speaks as the head of a communion embracing almost two thirds of all Christendom, which has existed in an unbroken continuity of doctrine and organization from remote antiquity, with the entire united moral force of all the bishops, doctors, and saints of the church in the present and the past ages, to back and support him. He speaks to those whose ancestors acknowledged his authority, and who have been severed from his communion by a violent revolution, whose justification three centuries have not been able to establish; but whose condemnation has been unmistakably pronounced by the disastrous results it has produced. {542} He has, therefore, a _prima-facie_ claim of prescription, possession, and general acknowledgment in his favor, which gives an immense moral weight to his utterance. Moreover, he speaks after having for three hundred years argued the whole case between himself and Protestants in the most thorough and complete manner, by the means of the theologians and writers of the Catholic Church, whose works are accessible in all languages. His bishops and priests are everywhere to be found, ready to argue and explain the doctrines of the church for the benefit of all those who desire it. At the council itself, instructions and conferences in various languages will be given upon all the points of controversy by the ablest and most learned preachers of all nations, and theologians will be ready to give private conferences to those who desire them. It cannot be said, therefore, that the Holy Father shuts out inquiry, argument, or discussion; for he does everything to invite and favor them, and by his act in summoning a council, and challenging the attention of the whole world, throws open all the doors and windows of the church to the light of all the intelligence of Christendom.