Chapter I: A Few Pages From Clide De Winton’s Note‐Book (2)

I was so spell‐bound by the extraordinary beauty that borrowed a new charm from her emotions and from the despairing tenderness of her voice and manner that I entirely lost sight of every other point in the picture. In fact, I lost my head. I was after all no more than a man, and the wisest of us is but a fool in the hands of a woman. What could I do but what I did do? Fall upon my knees and swear that she should have Arcadia back again, adjure her to build up a new vision, and, if she loved me, never to talk about baseless fabrics and such like again; and as to her sinking down into a humdrum wife, it was preposterous nonsense. She could never be anything but an archangel to me, and that.... But why do I bear witness in this wanton way to my own folly? We made up our quarrel, as all such quarrels are intended to be made up. Isabel went to her room, and I went round to the stables. I had no fancy for meeting my step‐mother just now, and I had a vague sense of something having gone wrong with me which a gallop over the downs would set right.

It was a cold February morning—bitterly cold, but bright and bracing, just the sort of day to enjoy a ride across country; so as soon as I was out of the park I set spurs to my horse and galloped away, taking flying leaps over everything, hurdle, and ditch, and brook, as if the hounds were ahead, and my life staked on being in at the death. After five miles of this going‐in‐for‐the‐Derby pace I drew rein at the foot of a hill, and walked my horse to the top. The hard riding had made him so hot that his flanks smoked like a steam‐engine, and sent up clouds of vapor that enveloped me in a tepid bath; but I did not feel that the violent exercise had produced any effect on myself. I was not clear as to the nature of the effect I had expected, and still less could I analyze the cause that demanded it. Something was wrong somewhere. I looked about me vacantly, persistently, as men do when they feel they ought to look within themselves for the object of their search, and dare not.

I cast my eyes to the sky. It was as blue as liquid sapphire, and as cloudless. But it said nothing to me. The river winding round the foot of the wooded hill was ice‐bound and silent as death. The trees stood up naked and grim against the blue, like skeleton giants, and whispered nothing. There was no rustle of leafy tongues. They were dead and gone down into the dumb sod. There was no ripple of tiny cascades; no buzzing of insects holding council in the grass that grew high and free on the hill‐side; no song amongst the birds. Nothing spoke to me. Everything was dumb. Everything was cold. Everything was a disappointment. I began to whistle. The sound of my own voice echoed merrily through the wood, but it woke no responsive note from linnet or blackbird or robin. Silence everywhere.

“What can it mean?” I said aloud, the apostrophe not being addressed to the birds that could sing, and would not sing, but to my own perplexity concerning the scene at the breakfast‐table. There was something out of all reason in the passionate energy Isabel had displayed. Excuse it as my heart and my vanity would on the ground of a jealous love that shrank from any intrusion on our solitude capable of distracting my thoughts from her, which she chiefly urged as her motive of dislike to my two friends’ visit, I could not see it in a satisfactory light. Again, it was simply preposterous that a girl of one‐and‐twenty, who had seen even as little of the world as Isabel had, could be so morbidly shy as to cry herself into hysterics at the mere idea of being introduced to two old gentlemen in her own house. There was some motive in the background which it behooved me for my own peace of mind to discover.

Removed from the magnetic influence of her beauty, and her distress, and her pretty, endearing ways, I was able to look back dispassionately at the morning’s entertainment; and the more I looked at it, the less I liked it. The undisciplined outburst of temper which revealed to me the painful fact that Socrates was henceforth to be my model, and patience under an inevitable evil the sustained effort of my life, was in itself no small matter for regret. But this, though the most tangible of my cares, was not the one that chiefly possessed me. No; I could have signed away every penny of my wife’s fortune on the spot to feel sure that it had been a genuine outbreak of mere temper; but it was borne in on me, not by circumstantial, but by strong internal evidence that she was actuated by _fear_. Fear of whom? Of what? What could her young life have done, or suffered, or known, that she should be afraid? Her uncle had been very tyrannical, and was now very much incensed with her on account of her marriage. But she had nothing to fear from him now. He might storm and fume, but she was out of his reach; he could not hurt her. Besides, she had not hinted at any fear of malice or vengeance on his part as a reason for shunning the society or acquaintance of other men. Who or what was she afraid of? “She hated fuss, and I promised her this and that and the other.”

Nonsense! Two old friends of my father’s sleeping a night or two in the house did not constitute a fuss. “She hated trustees; they were always....” Stop! No; I’m a fool and a brute to wrong the child by such a thought. Besides, I never hinted, even indirectly, at anything like inquiries and settlements. I avoided the subject scrupulously. No; there could be nothing in that.

The fact is, the dear child is in love with me, and wants to play at Romeo and Juliet for the rest of her life; and here am I, like a born idiot, making a mountain out of a mole‐hill, instead of blessing my stars for my luck. This, by a natural train of thought, led me to picture her standing on the balcony by moonlight, and myself in the garden below looking up and worshipping.

“What a distracting Juliet she would have made!” I exclaimed aloud, carried away by my imagination. Then—I can’t for the life of me tell why—but I remembered how she had looked a while ago with her hands clasped and her head thrown back, and how she had suddenly checked her passionate complaint to assume the rapt attitude, the _pose_ of picturesque despair, and how very melodramatic the effect had been. If it had not been the purest nature, it would have been the most finished piece of acting that ever drew down the house to a Siddons or a Kemble. But it _was_ pure nature. Then why do I start, and why does my heart begin to thump against my coat in this inexplicable way? Pshaw! Because I am a fool. I set spurs to my horse, and galloped home, whistling defiantly all the way.

My wife was watching for me, Juliet fashion, from the window of her turret chamber, and, as soon as she caught sight of my horse entering the park, flew down to meet me in the hall.

“Why did you stay away so long, Clide? Mrs. de Winton ‘sent me her compliments to know if I wouldn’t like to go and see the dairy’; but I didn’t like. I was afraid it was just an excuse to get me all to herself and scold me. I knew I was naughty this morning, and you may scold me as much as you like; but I won’t be scolded by anybody else.” And nestling up to me in her childlike way, Isabel laid her cheek on my shoulder, and looked up at me with two eyes that would have melted a judge and won from any twelve men in England an unhesitating verdict of—innocent as a babe unborn. Linking her arm in mine, and whispering all the way as if we were a pair of lovers stealing a clandestine interview, she carried me off to her boudoir. Then, when we were safe in the room, she turned the key in the door, and began to skip and dance about like an emancipated kitten, giving me chase round the room, clapping hands and laughing and singing in frantic merriment. We kept up this impromptu game of puss‐in‐the‐corner till she was fairly tired out and allowed herself to be taken prisoner and held in durance vile on my knee, while she panted for breath, and shook back her hair, that had slipped from its imprisoning pins, and fell in long, black ripples down her shoulders. Thinking the moment opportune, “Now, my darling,” I said, “let us have a quiet little talk together. How are we to make it straight with the dowager? It won’t do to have her suspect my dear little dove of not being as good and as sweet‐tempered as I know her to be, and I’m afraid that silly pout at breakfast has put you in a false light with her.”

Isabel said nothing for a moment, but went on shaking her curls.

“Do you wish me to go and beg her pardon?” she said at last. “I will, if you like, Clide.”

“My angel! no. I doubt the wisdom of that,” I replied, laughing at the _naïveté_ of the proposal. “It would be better if we took some more practical means of pacifying her. Suppose we give in about asking down these two old friends of mine?”

“Very well. I will do anything you like, Clide,” she answered indifferently, rolling a curl on her two fingers, and not looking up at me.

“The admiral is the jolliest old tar in the world,” I continued, “and will never talk a word of politics or business, or anything you don’t care about; and as to Sir Simon, my only fear is that you will fall in love with him, and some fine morning elope after him, or with him if he stays long enough. He’s the most unmerciful lady‐killer in the three kingdoms.”

“Is he?”

This was said in a sort of absent way, as if she had been only listening with one ear to what I was saying; all her thoughts were intent on the curling operation, that was again recommenced and completed for the tenth time.

“Then shall I tell Mrs. de Winton that we will ask them both for Wednesday—till Saturday, say? If you like them, it s very easy to renew the invitation.”

“Of course,” assented Isabel, and began a fresh curl.

“How proud I shall be introducing my wife!” I said, pushing back the heavy veil of hair that partly hid her face from me.

She shook it down again, not roughly, but there was a touch of impatience in the movement that surprised me. I thought it best, however, not to seem to notice it. Suddenly she started from my knee, flew to the piano—I had ordered a Cottage Pleyel for her private use—and broke out into a gush of song that made the air literally thrill with melody. Passionate, tender, angry, and entreating by turns, her voice poured out the florid Italian music with the full‐throated carol of a thrush. Singing was as natural to her as speaking. In fact, she appeared to find it an easier medium of emotion, whether of pain or pleasure, than speech; and when she was excited, her first impulse was to break out in thrills and cadences just as a bird might do. Once started, she could go on for ever. I sat a full hour this morning listening to her running through a _repertoire_ of varied power and beauty. Schubert, Rossini, Beethoven, Verdi—she was at home in every school, and her rich soprano voice adapted itself to each as if that one had been her sole and special study. But while I sat there drinking in the intense delight, my mind divided between it and the beauty of her face, some sudden expression of the latter every now and then startled me. The wonderful mobility of her features reflected every changing emotion of the music with a responsive fidelity which it is impossible to describe. I suppose it was the absence of the artistic instinct in me, combined with a total ignorance of the emotional law of music, that made this appear to me unnatural, and filled me with a sudden and painful misgiving as to the genuine truthfulness of Isabel’s nature. Was it possible to feign so perfectly, and to be at the same time thoroughly truthful?

But I was cut short in my perplexing reflections by the luncheon‐bell, that sounded a vigorous carillon at the foot of the stairs leading up to my wife’s boudoir. She shut the piano quickly, and, passing her arm through mine, marshalled me down to the dining‐room, humming the “Valse de Venzano” all the way.

I observed casually during lunch that we had fixed on Wednesday to have Sir Simon and the admiral down to the Moat. Mrs. de Winton slowly elevated her eyebrows, but gave no articulate indication of surprise.

I did not look at Isabel while I made this announcement, but when, a moment after, I stole a glance at her, she was as pale as the table‐cloth. Instantaneously I grew a shade paler. I felt I did. My heart stood still. What in the name of wonder was behind this dislike of hers to see these two men? There was a mystery somewhere. She was afraid of somebody or something. At any and every cost I must find it out.

To Be Continued.

Religion And State In Our Republic.

The great questions which concern the relation of the state to the church have already been partially treated of in this magazine. The vast importance of the subject, however, demands that we should return to it once more, and will serve as a sufficient excuse if we even repeat many things which have already been said in previous articles. The relation which the state ought to have to the church according to sound principles of philosophy, the relation which it is intended to have according to the principles of the Constitution of this republic, the relation which it ought to have according to the principles of the canon law and theology of the Catholic Church, and the bearing of these various questions severally toward each other, both in their theoretical and practical import, make up together a complex topic which is under a perpetual and ardent discussion, and which is felt by all parties to involve momentous issues. We have no unwillingness to express fully and unreservedly all our convictions and opinions upon any of the several parts of this question. It is undoubtedly much desired by many who are hostile to the Catholic religion or suspicious of it, on account of its bearing upon the science of politics, that competent persons should make such full explanations of the real and genuine principles by which all sound and thoroughly‐instructed Catholics of the present time in our own country, as well as elsewhere, are and will be guided. We see no reason why their desire should not be gratified, but, on the contrary, every motive and reason worthy of having any weight with a sincere and courageous advocate of the Catholic cause, why the discussion should be brought as speedily and directly as possible upon the merits of the case fully exposed.

The leaders of the Catholic body, and, in due measure, the great body itself, are credited by many persons with certain views and intentions concerning the institutions, laws, and political destinies of this republic which necessarily cause them to regard the increase of our numbers and the extension of our influence in the nation with alarm. Such persons would like to know what we would really undertake to do with this republic, if we had the power to do what we pleased. We are willing to let them know precisely what our opinion about the matter is, and to use our best endeavors to explain what those principles of the Catholic Church are which must form the conviction of every one of her devoted and instructed members upon the right and just method of applying the divine law to the various conditions in which a state may exist; from that in which the church is at her lowest point of depression, to that in which she is at the summit of her influence. In our own case, as citizens of the United States, the manner in which Catholic principles require us to act, as voters, judges, legislators, with that degree of influence we now have, and in which the same principles would require us to act if we were equal or superior in number and influence to non‐Catholics, if we were in the majority, or if we were practically the whole people, is a topic upon which we think it desirable that all should be enlightened, as well those who are members of the church as those who are aliens from her fold. Stated in an abstract form, the question is, What is the ideal Christian state when actualized in its perfection, and what is the difference between that state and the one which is the best practically in our real circumstances?

In discussing this theme we must beg the indulgence of our readers if we begin at a considerable apparent distance from the practical point we intend to come at eventually. We have to lay down some general principles about government, and to make some explanations about the American Constitution, before we can grapple with the main difficulty. In our opinion, many maxims usually taken for granted by speakers, writers, and by their blind followers, in treating of political constitutions, and specially of our own, are sheer assumptions which will not bear examination. Such are, that in general, the spiritual and temporal orders are in their nature and ought to be kept separate from each other, and are really separated in our own political constitution. Those sophistical maxims have been combated by Dr. Brownson so frequently and victoriously that we can scarcely hope to produce any new arguments or more lucid expositions to convince those whom he has not been able to satisfy. Sometimes, however, a sound from an unexpected quarter startles the attention which has remained sluggishly insensible to a louder and more continuous booming to which it has been accustomed for a long time. We trust, therefore, that the authority of a great foreign writer, who is a Protestant withal, and one of the most celebrated historians of the age, will claim some little deference from those who may refuse it to any one of ourselves. And we accordingly resort to Prof. Leo, of Halle, rather than to any Catholic author, for an exposition of the general relation of the state to the church, and of the particular form of that relationship in the United States.

In the introduction to his great work, _Lehrbuch der Universalgeschichte_, Leo develops with masterly force of reasoning the fundamental principle upon which his entire work is constructed, and which is, in truth, the architectonic law of the history of the human race. The history of mankind is the evolution in successive and progressive stages of the grand plan of God to conduct the human race to its prefixed supernatural end of beatitude in God through the incarnation of the Word. The organization of the various portions of the human race in distinct nations, with their laws, political institutions, and governments, is subordinated to this end, and therefore subordinated to that higher and more universal organization in which all are included, and which dominates over all—the church. The nations which have been broken off from the church which God established from the foundation of the world for all mankind, have been broken off through sin, revolt against God, defection from the movement of the human race on the line marked out by the Creator towards its end and destiny. Yet, even in this defection, they derive all their constitutive and organic principles and forces from their previous union with the divine society or church, and are formed by religious ideas which are merely perverted, corrupted, travestied imitations of the revealed dogmas which their forefathers had received. All true reform, restoration, renovation, and improvement must be effected by a return to unity, a reincorporation into the church, and a reflux of organic life from the centre into the chilled and deadened members.

“No religion can unfold itself among men, extend itself, or
maintain its existence, without social relations existing between
men themselves. Every religion presupposes a state originating
together with itself or already previously formed; but it is
equally true that no state is conceivable without a religion, for
every state includes a system of moral conceptions, and is itself
a system and manifestation of moral conceptions; and a system of
moral conceptions without a religious force underlying it is
something unthinkable.”

Here we have the statement of the universal principle that the religious and political orders, the spiritual and the temporal, or, otherwise, church and state, are, like soul and body, though distinct, inseparable in living, organized humanity. The author then goes on to prove the truth of his assertion by the example of our own republic, apparently the most notable exception to his rule, and an instance sufficient to disprove to most men of modern habits of thought the universality of the rule as an organic principle of society.

“In appearance, some particular religion may leave the state free
to shift for itself or make itself free from it, and some
particular state act in the same way toward religion; but this is
only in appearance, for when, for example, the North American
state proclaims that the religious confession is a matter of
indifference in respect to its existence, it proceeds on the
assumption that there could not be any religious confession,
except such an one as should _include in itself that which
constitutes its own proper religious force_. Just suppose that a
religion like that of the Assassins or Robber sects of the East
should make its appearance in North America, and you would
speedily see how the entire body politic would be violently
agitated by efforts to cast out this foreign religious force, and
to annihilate it within its own precinct. You would see then at
once that the North American state, in spite of all its contrary
assurances, has its own religion, and a state religion at that, as
the collision of some of the North American states with the
Mormons has already amply proved. This North American religion of
state only avoids assuming the name and aspect of a religion or an
ecclesiastical organization, and manifests itself rather
altogether in the ethical institutions of the state as they are
for the time being, and consequently permits a most extraordinary
variety of religious doctrines and churches to exist alongside of
the state, yet only under the tacit condition that they all
acknowledge that which is the religious force of the state as
their own. If, therefore, the North American state proclaims that
religion is an indifferent matter, it proceeds from an absurd
imagination that there cannot be any religion which does not
include in itself that particular religious force which its own
moral subsistence has need of. In point of fact, religion and the
state form _one_ ethical whole, precisely as in individual men the
soul remains an inseparable whole, although we separately consider
particular faces of its exterior surface as special
faculties—understanding, will, etc. Religion and state are one
single ethical whole, which, although divided into distinct
members, and apparently separated in these, must always be united
in one germinating point and a common vital root.”(151)

A singular corroboration of the doctrine of Leo in its application to the United States is furnished by the following extract from the _New York Herald_. If it seem to any one singular that we cite the _Herald_ on such a question, it will cease to appear so when we explain our reason for doing it. This well‐known paper is remarkable for a certain tact and sagacity in divining and expressing the instinctive dictates of American common‐sense upon questions which concern practical, temporal interests. We cite it, therefore, in this instance, as a proof of the fact that the public sensibility is stirred by any practical collision of a foreign and hostile religious force with the latent religious force underlying our own legislation, just as Leo says it must be. Theories and phrases are disregarded; and the mouth‐piece of popular opinion strikes at once, promptly and surely, upon the very head of the nail, and drives it home. It is very singular to see, in the extract we are about to cite, how the instinct of self‐interest and self‐preservation evolves by a short process the same conclusion which the philosopher establishes as the result of long study and thought. Here is the extract in full, with some passages marked in italics by our own hand, to which we wish to call special attention, as containing the nucleus of the whole matter, and agreeing almost verbally with the language we have quoted from Dr. Leo:

“Brigham Young And Polygamy—Will The Prophet Take Sensible Advice?

“Judge Trumbull, United States senator from Illinois, has just had
a conversation with Brigham Young in Salt Lake City, which, as
reported, is of more than ordinary significance and importance. It
seems that as the judge was taking leave of Young, the latter
remarked that on returning to Congress he (the judge) might hear
of some persons—obnoxious federal officials—being put out of the
Territory, and, if done, he might be sure it would be for just and
good reasons. Judge Trumbull replied by requesting Young, before
he took any step of that kind, to make known his grievances to
President Grant, remarking that the President was a just man,
intending to do justice to all, but that he would not permit a
violation of law to go unpunished, and adding that it would ‘not
be safe to molest public officers in the discharge of their
duties.’ The judge then asked Young if he promised obedience to
the Constitution and the laws of the Union. The latter replied
that he would adhere to the Union, but that there was ‘one
enactment of Congress which the Mormons would not obey,’ namely,
the one forbidding polygamy.

“Here, then, is the whole Mormon question in a nutshell—the
positive declaration on the part of the Mormon leader that federal
officers, sent to Utah, unless acceptable to himself, should be
banished the Territory, and that there was at least one law of
Congress he positively refuses to acknowledge or obey. Now, what
is the plain duty of the national government in the face of these
revolutionary averments? It is to see that the enactments of
Congress are enforced _without respect to persons or religions_,
and that the representatives of the federal government legally
appointed for that purpose shall be upheld and protected, if it be
necessary to employ the whole power of the nation. This Mormon
matter demands decisive action on the part of the administration.
President Grant has already declared his purpose of enforcing the
laws impartially, even the most obnoxious, and there is no good
reason why the Mormons should be exempted from the operations of
this policy. The fact is, Brigham Young and his satellites have
been treated with too much leniency and good‐nature by the United
States government ever since they settled upon the national
domain, and whatever they have done for the improvement of the
wilderness in which they settled they have done for their own
benefit, and have reaped the rewards of their industry and
frugality. Among the many other settlements that have sprung up in
the great West and grown into populous cities and States since the
Mormon hegira from Nauvoo, where can one be shown to have defied
the United States government, and to have treated its laws and its
public officials with the contempt and insolence the Mormons have?
On the contrary, among the most loyal States in the Union, and
among those which sent into the field the greatest armies during
the struggle for our national existence, are States in which the
earlier pioneers had to undergo as many perils, hardships, and
privations in organizing their communities, in subduing the
forests and the savage, and in implanting the seeds of civil and
religious liberty and constitutional law, as ever the Mormons did
in erecting their Salt Lake empire, and in establishing in the
heart of the nation’s public domain _a religious organization the
corner‐stone of which is a dogma abhorrent to modern civilisation
and in violation of all the received rules of decent social and
domestic life and society_. Therefore the claims of these
impertinent and rebellious Mormon squatters for immunity from the
operations of the general laws of the country, on account of the
service they have rendered in improving a barren waste, but more
properly in making fortunes for themselves out of the Gentiles and
the government, are idle and ridiculous. Greater hardships and
more personal sacrifices, we repeat, have been undergone by
settlers in other tracts of territory, now become great and
prosperous States, respecting the laws and fighting for the
national flag, than ever these Mormon adventurers encountered from
the time when old Joe Smith went into the tablet business, after
the manner of Moses, and founded the Mormon sect, up to the moment
of the conversation Brigham Young held with Senator Trumbull, as
related above. They have no claims for political sympathy, for
immunity from legal responsibilities, nor for hardly the
consideration paid to other religious communities; for the odor of
their sanctity is foul, and _their moral practices are unlike
those of all modern Christians_. We say, therefore, to Brigham
Young and his deluded followers, that they had better accept the
sensible advice of Judge Trumbull, consult with President Grant
before they proceed to extremities, _accept the laws of Congress
in regard to polygamy, as well as in regard to everything else
they are required to, and either haul in their rebellious horns or
prepare to pack up their baggage for a tramp to some distant
country outside the boundaries of the United States_. _You must
obey the law, Prophet Brigham, or you must march. Uncle Sam has
stood your nonsense long enough. He will tolerate it no longer._”

What is it which is thus asserted by a paper always considered as advocating the most extreme modern notions respecting religious liberty? It is that there is something in our civilization, our received rules of morality, our lawful principles and acts of administration, intolerant of certain religious dogmas and tending to exclude them. This latent something is what Leo calls our state religion, the religious basis of our institutions and laws, of our whole political and social fabric.

The first point we wish to come at, in our evolution of the whole question under discussion, is, what is this religious basis or fundamental religious law, essentially and precisely? According to Leo and excellent authors of our own, it is the moral law, so far as that law governs political and social relations. Whatever is _contra bonos mores_ is prohibited and excluded by it, and nothing more. But this is too general. We are obliged to ask what moral law, what standard or criterion of good or bad morals, is tacitly understood? To this we reply that, in our opinion, it is the Christian law, as embodied in the common and statute laws under which we have been living since the origin of our nation. If we ask, further, what fixes and determines this Christian law—that is, what criterion determines that which is really prescribed or forbidden by this law—we can assign nothing more definite and precise than the common and general conscience of the sovereign people, as this exercises its controlling power through legislative and judicial enactments and decisions. It is therefore not an unchangeable quantity, but variable and varying in the different laws of the distinct States, and in the different laws of separate epochs which are the result of the change for better or worse which takes place in the moral sense of the community. We cannot enumerate a definite number of moral canons forming our state religion in every part of the country during every period of its history. But we can, at any one time, designate a certain number of things required, permitted, or forbidden by our state code of morals, without respect to the doctrines of any particular religious body. Whatever religious doctrine professed by any set of men contradicts any part of this code, although it may be maintained and advocated theoretically with impunity so long as this can be allowed without immediate danger of inciting to an open violation of the laws, cannot be reduced to practice without bringing the offending parties within the coercive jurisdiction of the courts of justice. A Mahometan or a Mormon will be allowed to advocate in speech or writing the claims of Mahomet or Joe Smith as the great prophet of God, and to defend polygamy as a divine institution; but if he attempts to keep a harem, the law will condemn the act, and will punish it, at least to a certain extent, by inflicting legal disabilities on every one of his wives and children who is not regarded as legitimate by the statutes of the State where he lives. Any enthusiast may give himself out as an inspired prophet; but if he is directed by his fancied revelations to kill some one, to set up a kingdom for himself, or to undertake anything else against the laws, the laws will avenge themselves without regard to his liberty of conscience or his interior conviction that he is executing the commands of God. A very piquant and characteristic expression of this principle was once given by General Jackson. After the capture of the Indian chief Black Hawk and his adviser, the Prophet, an interview took place between the warlike president and these dusky potentates of the forest. The president demanded of the chief an account of the reasons and motives which had led him to make war on the United States. The crestfallen warrior laid all the blame on the Prophet, who was in turn subjected to the stern glance and imperious demand of the formidable old general. Quailing and abject beneath the superior moral force of the great white chief, the trembling Prophet excused himself by saying that he had been deceived by what he thought was the voice of the Great Spirit, but which was only the whispering of his own mind. Upon this the old general, gathering up all the dignity and force of his character into his brow and attitude, and raising his voice to a tone of thunder, turned upon the poor Prophet, and anathematized him with this terrible dogmatic decree: “If you ever again mistake the hallucinations of your disordered imagination for the inspirations of the Divine Spirit, by the Eternal! I will send you where it will be for ever impossible for you to repeat the mistake!” Our chief magistrate spoke according to the written and unwritten law of our constitutions and our traditions. There is a certain point beyond which the practical carrying out of opinions or beliefs, whatever claim they may make to be derived from a superhuman source, will be resisted by the entire coercive and penal force of the law. There are and must be certain inherent principles in our laws, whether these are vague or definite, variable or fixed, which determine this point of physical resistance to liberty of conscience or liberty of religion. These constitute our state religion, which claims for itself a legal infallibility, as exacting and unyielding as that of the Holy See, so far as outward submission and obedience are concerned.

We come now at our immediate question, namely, the attitude of the Catholic religion towards this state religion; and if we are able to designate and define this accurately, we are able by logical consequence to conclude precisely what degree of agreement or opposition is contained in the essence of Catholic and of American principles respectively to each other. We intend to meet this question fairly and squarely, without trying to twist either the one or the other set of principles, or to invent a medium of compromise between them. We take the Catholic principles as they are authoritatively promulgated by the supreme authority in the church, the Roman Pontiff, particularly as contained in the encyclical _Quanta Cura_, with its appended Syllabus, and as they are taught and explained by the most approved authors in canon law. These definitions and expositions alone have authority in the church, and these alone have any weight or significance in the minds of thinking men who are not members of the church, but are more or less positively hostile to her extension in our country. Private versions or modifications of Catholicity count for nothing, for they are merely the theories of individuals, and will have no influence over the real development of the church, in so far as they disagree by excess or defect with her authoritative teaching. For ourselves, we are purely and simply Catholic, and profess an unreserved allegiance to the church which takes precedence of, and gives the rule to, our allegiance to the state. If allegiance to the church demanded of us opposition to political principles adopted by our civil government, or disobedience to any laws which were impious and immoral, we should not hesitate to obey the church and God. We should either keep silence and avoid all discussion of the subject, or else speak out frankly in condemnation of our laws and institutions, if we believed them to be anti‐ Christian or, which is the same thing, anti‐Catholic in their principles.

We do not try and judge Catholic principles and laws by the criterion of the American idea, as it is called, nor do we justify and vindicate these principles on the ground that they are in harmony with, or reconcilable to, the maxims and ideas upon which our political fabric is based. We aim at making an exposition of the case as it really is; and if we take a view of it favorable to our American political order, it is for the sake of justifying that order, and proving both to our own adherents and to our opponents that our duty to God does not require us to make war on it, so that all the arguments and motives for creating a conflict on the political arena may fall to the ground, and the battle‐field be restricted to the fair, open ground of theological polemics.

What is it, then, which furnishes to a certain set of violent enemies of the Catholic Church in this country a pretext for making the issue between Catholic and Protestant principles a political one, and inclines a great number of the mass of the people to believe or suspect that this pretext is valid? The newspapers, publications, and speeches which have been giving utterance to the sentiments of those who dread and oppose the spread of our religion, ever since it began to show signs of vitality and growth in this country, furnish the answer. The pretext is that all Catholics who thoroughly understand and are loyal to the principles of their religion wish to change or overthrow the republic, and substitute for it a political order fundamentally different; and that, if they ever become strong enough, they will do what they can to carry out their design. Is there any truth in this pretext? We will express our own convictions on the matter as fully and clearly as possible, and leave them to exert what influence they may upon those really sincere and intelligent persons who may honor us with their attention.

In the first place, as to the republican form and constitution of our government. There is no doubt a difference of opinion among our clergy and intelligent laymen in regard to the abstract question what form of government is the most excellent and perfect. In regard to this subject, it is a part of our American liberty that we should be free to form and express our own opinions, and there is undoubtedly a diversity of opinions regarding it among non‐Catholics, as well as among ourselves. It is certain that many of our bishops, clergy, and educated laymen have a very decided preference for the republican form of government, where it can be established under conditions favorable to order, stability, and success. And as to the mass of our people, they have suffered so much from tyranny and oppression that they are inclined to go to the extreme left rather than the extreme right in all questions of political authority and liberty. If we look at the question closely, we shall see that the difference of opinion which may exist in regard to the form of government among those who hold to the divine institution of the state, and the divine sanction to political authority and law, is really not concerning essentials. S. Thomas teaches that the best form of government is one which combines the monarchical, aristocratic, and democratic elements in just proportions. Bellarmine maintains that absolute monarchy is ideally the most perfect form of government, but that, considering the actual state of men, the mixed form is the best in practice. It is our opinion that very few men among the leading classes in the Catholic Church could be found, either in this country or in Europe, who would not agree with the second member of Cardinal Bellarmine’s proposition. This is quite enough for the justification of the governmental order established by our constitutions and laws in our United States. We have the monarchical principle in our president, and governors, and the mayors of cities. We have the aristocratic in the legislators, judges, and magistrates. The existence of the democratic element need not be proved. The difference between our monarchy and aristocracy and those which are hereditary is only that ours is elective, and the difference between them and certain others which are elective is that our election is only for a certain term and by a popular vote. The Pope is an elective monarch. The governing aristocracy of Belgium is elective. The essential principle of the mixed government is simply a stable and legitimate order, under which the monarchy, aristocracy and democracy are created and sustained in the regular exercise of certain functions of government. Catholics are therefore bound by their own principles to recognize the political order in the country as lawful, and to give it their allegiance. Moreover, without any question, apart from singular and individual opinions which Catholics as well as Protestants may entertain, the Catholics of this country are agreed in the conviction that the republican institutions of the United States are the best and the only possible ones for our own country. They have no desire to subvert them, and there has never been any conspiracy against them, except in the malicious or deluded brains of fanatical anti‐Catholic writers and speakers and of the crowd which they have duped. Genuine Catholics will never conspire against our government and laws, but will always be true and loyal American citizens. If the majority of the people or the whole people were to become Catholics, they would not use their power to subvert our American institutions, or substitute for them those of any European nation. On the contrary, nothing could happen which would secure the perpetuity of the republic and promote its political prosperity and glory with anything like the influence which the Catholic religion would exercise in producing such desirable results. The dangers we have to apprehend come from the sectarian divisions which waste and neutralize the religious sentiment and force of the country, from infidelity and radicalism, from vice and immorality, from secret societies, from public and private corruption and profligacy, from swindling and maladministration in high quarters, from principles akin to those of the conspirators of Europe, from detestable books like _Lothair_, atheistical magazines and unprincipled newspapers—evils for which the Catholic Church alone can furnish a remedy.

Another part of the subject is worthy of much more serious consideration, and requires far more elucidation in order to be presented in its true light. This relates, not to the outward form of the government, but to its inward spirit; to the scope and quality of the legislation, and not to the manner of designating the legislators or judges. All forms of government are lawful before the church, whether absolute monarchies or republics. It is evident that a republic may be governed in perfect accordance with Catholic principles, and that an empire may be governed in complete discordance with the same. A sensible man would not, therefore, be likely to consider the form of our government as the object which demands his particular solicitude in view of the progress of the Catholic religion. He would consider, rather, that the gist of the matter lay in the relation of Catholic principles to that which we have called, after Leo, the state religion. If we are correct in our preliminary statements, the Catholic religion always tends to infuse itself into the state in which it exists, and succeeds as soon as it has become the governing moral force which constitutes the soul of the body politic. Now, what is the relation of the Catholic religion to the actual state religion in our country, and, when they come strongly in contact, what degree of struggle will ensue between them, and what amount of change would be produced by the predominance of the Catholic force?

In the first place, let us consider the case in reference to those things which the Catholic conscience positively enjoins or positively prohibits. In every case of this kind a Catholic must obey his conscience; and if he is subject to a civil law which requires him to violate it, he must die rather than submit. Formerly we have had to make this passive resistance to laws existing in the American colonies; and in some cases—as, for instance, in regard to certain oppressive laws passed in the State of Missouri, it has been necessary to resist some state laws. On the whole, however, we may say that our laws do not put the Catholic citizen into the alternative of incurring a penalty from either the human or the divine law. This part of the case can be therefore dismissed as not practical.

In the second place, we have to consider those things which are the rights and privileges of the Catholic conscience, but which do not concern its indispensable obligations. In regard to these things, a Catholic must obey the law, and he must refrain from all violent and seditious conduct. He must submit to the abridgment of his rights and liberties so long as he cannot obtain their free possession and use by lawful means. But, under our free institutions, it is the right of the Catholic citizen, by argument, influence, and voting, to secure as much as possible of his just religious liberty without prejudice to the natural or civil rights of others. Therefore, as a matter of course, whenever Catholics obtain sufficient power to command a majority of votes, they will, if they act on Catholic principles, demand and obtain all their rights and full equality before the law with other citizens. For instance, in regard to schools, prisons, hospitals, ships of war, fortresses, etc., they will secure the complete right of Catholics in these places to practise their religion and to be free from the interference of non‐Catholic religious teachers appointed by the state.

But what would be the action of Catholics, if they should ever become the majority, in regard to requiring or prohibiting by law those things in which the Catholic conscience differs from the Protestant and non‐Catholic standard of right and wrong? It is always necessary in such a case for all parties to exercise the greatest forbearance, moderation, and fairness toward one another, in order that these questions should have a peaceable solution. Therefore those violent and fanatical or selfish demagogues, both clerical and lay, who seek to exasperate the non‐Catholic citizens of this country against their Catholic fellow‐citizens, are the most dangerous enemies of the public peace. We appeal to all candid, impartial, intelligent American citizens to say who are they who seek to fan the embers of strife into a flame; are they Catholic leaders, or are they the chiefs and orators of a violent, sectarian, anti‐Catholic party? Our Catholic citizens, if fairly treated, will always respect the rights of their fellow‐citizens. They will never take part in despoiling churches, societies, colleges, or other institutions of their property or chartered privileges, as radicals and infidels most assuredly will, so far as they have any power. Catholics will not do anything of this sort, even in case they should in certain States become an overwhelming majority. They will never seek to tyrannize over their fellow‐citizens, to establish their religion by force, or to compel any one to do those things which are required only by the Catholic conscience. The difficulty lies chiefly in respect to those laws which forbid certain things as contrary to the divine law. The civil code consists chiefly of laws prohibiting crimes against the moral law, and annexing penalties to the commission of them. The law must therefore have some ethical standard of right and wrong, and must be based on some interpretation of the divine law, or, in a Christian state, of the Christian law. Now, if the interpretation of the Christian law of morals held by one large portion of the community differs from that of another large portion, what is to be done? This is the precise question which we are seeking to answer in reference to the Catholic and non‐ Catholic portions of the community in any State where the former should be in the preponderance. The case of divorce and marriage is one precisely in point, and the most important and practical of all others which could be mentioned. Let us suppose, then, that the reformation of the marriage code were to come up before a legislature in which the majority were Catholics, under the leadership of sound jurists who were also strictly conscientious in fulfilling their duty of obedience to the church. Would they make the canon law also civil law _in globo_, without regard to the opinions or wishes of the minority? We think not. In our view of the case, the right and the wise thing to do would be to bring the law back to the condition in which it was during the earlier and better period of our existence as a people, in so far as the assent of the whole people could be secured with a moral unanimity. As for the rest, it would be altogether in accordance with Catholic precedents and Catholic principles not to legislate at all, but to leave the church and the other religious bodies to exert their moral influence over their own members.(152)

If we suppose the entire people of the United States to become a Catholic people, we must suppose, as a matter of course, that the entire law of the Catholic Church, in so far as it is an ethical code, becomes _per se_ the sovereign law of the collective people. This follows by a rigorous deduction from the principles we have laid down respecting the religion of the state. The religion of the state, as we have seen, is its body of ethical principles. This body of principles came by tradition from the Christian teaching which created European civilization. It is, in a vague and general sense, the Christian law. It is good so far as it goes, and in harmony with Catholic principles. But it is imperfect and liable to change, for the want of a competent tribunal to pronounce upon its true, genuine sense in disputed cases. This is seen in the instance of marriage, there being in courts and legislatures no right or power to decide from the New Testament or any other source what the divine or Christian law really prescribes. Let the collective conscience of the country become Catholic, and it at once, without changing the fundamental principle of our organic law, obtains an infallible and supreme interpretation of that law which raises it to the standard of ideal perfection. It becomes a perfect Christian republic, passing under the control of a higher law in all that is comprised within the sphere of ethical obligation, but retaining political, civil, and individual liberty in all other respects, guarded by more powerful sanctions than it ever before possessed.