Chapter X: Alarming Symptoms (6)

How strangely this colloquy between a Methodist and Congregationalist fell upon the Catholic ear of their mutual friend! Comment, however, was discreetly forborne. That friend had learned in the very infancy of a Catholic life, beginning at the mature age of thirty-five by the register, the futility of controversy, and that the pearls of truth are too precious to be carelessly thrown away. Strangely enough these expressions affected one whose habits of thought and conduct had been silently forming in accordance with that life for twenty-five years!

“Old grooves” indeed! Lucifer found them utterly irreconcilable with his “advanced ideas” in heaven. Confessedly, the success of his progressive enterprise was not encouraging; but the battle and its results established his unquestionable claim as captain and leader of the sons and daughters of progress for all time.

“Modern thought!” So far as we can discover, the best it has done for its disciples is to prove to them beyond a doubt that their dear grandpapa of eld was an ape, and that they, when they shake off this mortal coil, will be gathered to their ancestors in common with their brethren, the modern monkeys!

We, who believe the authentic history of the past, can see in this boasted new railroad, upon which the freight of modern science and advanced civilization is borne, a pathway as old as the time when our dear, credulous old grandmamma received a morning call in Eden from the oldest brother of these scientific gentlemen, who convinced her in the course of their pleasant chat that poor deluded Adam and herself were fastened in the most irrational rut--a perfect outrage upon common sense--and that a very slight repast upon “advanced ideas” would lift them out of it, emancipate thought, and make them as “gods knowing good and evil.”

We all know how well they succeeded in their first step on the highway of progress. They lost a beautiful garden, it is true, of limited dimensions, but they gained a world of boundless space, and a freedom of thought and action which was first successfully and completely illustrated by their first-born son when he murmured, “Why?” and killed his brother, who was evidently attached to grooves.

They left the heritage thus gained to a large proportion of their descendants. A minority of them, it is true, prefer to “seek out the old paths” of obedience to the commands of God, “and walk therein”--to shun the “broad road” along which modern civilization is rolling its countless throngs, and to “enter in at the strait gate” which leadeth to life eternal, to the great disgust of the disciples of modern thought, who spare no effort to prove their exceeding liberality by persecuting such with derision, calumny, chains, imprisonment, and death!

Thank God this is all they can do! Rage they never so furiously, He that sitteth in the heavens laughs them to scorn. He will defend and preserve his anointed against all the combined hosts of Bismarcks, kaisers, and robber princes, who illustrate the liberal ideas that govern the march of modern civilization.

TRACES OF AN INDIAN LEGEND.

It has been said of our energetic republic that it had no infancy; that it sprang into a vigorous and complete existence at a bound. However true this may be with respect to its material structure in the hands of the remarkable men who first planted colonies on American soil, there is another view of the picture which presents widely different features.

To the eye of the Christian philosopher the religious and moral aspects of our country to this day afford subjects for anything but satisfactory reflection.

The pioneers of civilization along the northeastern borders of our territory were--whatever their professions to the contrary may have been--worshippers of material prosperity. The worship of God and the claims of religion were indeed important and proper in their place for a portion of the seventh part of each week, but the moment they came in conflict with Mammon there was little question which should yield. It was not to be expected that the saints whom the Lord had specially chosen, and unto whom “He had given the earth,” should be diverted from their pursuit of the great “main chance” by precepts which were applicable only to ordinary and less favored mortals.

Whatever progress the church has yet achieved in this region is the result of appalling labors and sacrifices. The foundation was laid in sufferings, fatigues, and perils, from the contemplation of which the self-indulgent Christians of our day would shrink aghast; laid long before the so-called Pilgrim fathers landed at Plymouth, while the savage still roamed through the unbroken forests of New England, and disputed dominion with wild beasts hardly more dangerous than himself to the messengers of the Gospel of peace. Amid the wonderful beauty and variety of the panorama which her mountains, lakes, and valleys unfold to the tourists and pleasure-seekers of to-day, there is scarcely a scene that has not been traversed in weariness, in hunger, and cold by those dauntless servants of God who first proclaimed the tidings of salvation to the wild children of the forest.

Futile, and even foolish, as the toils of these early fathers may appear to the materialist and utilitarian of this day, because of their tardy and apparently inadequate fruits, the designs of Heaven have not been frustrated, and its light reveals a very different history. We read therein how He who causes “the weak and foolish things of this world to confound the wise” and to proclaim his praise, sent his ministering angels to hover over the pathway moistened with the tears and blood of his servants, to note each footprint through the dreary wilderness, to gather the incense of each prayer, and to mark each pain and peril of their sacrificial march for record in the archives of eternity, as an earnest for future good to those regions, and as enduring testimony before the high court of heaven to their fitness for the crown--far surpassing in glory all earthly crowns--which they won by their burning zeal and unwavering patience.

Nor were their efforts in the field of their earthly labors so vain as some of our modern historians would have us suppose. Prayer and exertion in the service of God are never fruitless. If it is true--as the great Champlain was wont to say--“that one soul gained for heaven was of more value than the conquest of an empire for France,” they gained from the roving tribes of the desert many sincere and steadfast adherents to the faith--whose names are recorded in the book of life--and scattered benedictions along their painful pathway which have shed their beneficent influences over the scenes they traversed down to the present day. We hope to illustrate and sustain this assertion in the following sketch, drawn from our memory, of traditions--preserved among the Indians of St. Regis--to which we listened many years ago.

Scattered along the southern shores of the St. Lawrence, from the foot of Lake Ontario to the village of St. Regis--while St. Lawrence County, N.Y., was yet for the most part covered with primitive forests--were many encampments of these Indians. That whole region abounded in game and furnished favorite hunting-grounds, to which they claimed a right in connection with their special reservation in the more immediate neighborhood of St. Regis. At each of these encampments an aged Indian was sure to be found, who, without the title of chief, was a kind of patriarch among his younger brethren, exercised great influence in their affairs, and was treated with profound respect by them. He was their umpire in all disputes, their adviser in doubtful matters, and the “leader of prayer” in his lodge--always the largest and most commodious of the wigwams, and the one in which they assembled for their devotions.

One of the oldest of these sages--called “Captain Simon”--must have been much more than a hundred years of age, judging from the dates of events of which he retained a distinct remembrance as an eye-witness, and which occurred in the course of the French and Indian wars, over a century previous to the time when we listened to his recital. His head was an inexhaustible store-house of traditions and legends, many of them relating to the discovery and settlement of Canada and the labors of the first missionaries. He was very fond of young people, and, gathering the children of the white settlers around him, he would hold them spell-bound for hours while he related stories of those early days in his peculiarly impressive and figurative language. He claimed that his grandfather was one of the party who accompanied Champlain on his first voyage through the lake which bears his name, and that he afterwards acted as guide and interpreter to the first priest who visited the valley of Lake Champlain. When he heard that we were from Vermont, he asked for a piece of chalk, and, marking on the floor an outline of the lake and the course of the Richelieu River, he proceeded to narrate the voyage of Champlain and his party in the summer of 1609.

Embosomed within the placid waters of Lake Champlain, near its northern extremity, is a lovely island, of which Vermonters boast as the “Gem of the Lake,” so remarkable is it for beauty and fertility. Here the party landed, and Champlain, erecting a cross, claimed the lake--to which he gave his own name--its islands and shores, for France and for Christianity. Half a century later one La Motte built a fort upon this island, which he named St. Anne, giving the island his own name; and it is called the Isle La Motte to this day.

Champlain explored the lake as far as Crown Point, where they encountered and defeated a band of Iroquois Indians; but not deeming it wise to adventure further at that time so near such powerful foes, they returned down the lake without delay. This encounter was the first act of that savage drama which so long desolated New France, and threatened it with entire destruction.

Six years later, in the summer of 1615, another party landed on the Isle La Motte. It was made up of a missionary of the Recollect Order and his escort of Indians in two bark canoes. The grandfather of our narrator was one of these. They remained a day or two on the island, and the missionary offered the Christian sacrifice for the first time within the territory now embraced by the State of Vermont.[97]

The object of his journey was to visit scattered bands of hunters who were encamped along the eastern shore of the lake and its vicinity, at different points in the valley of Lake Champlain.

Leaving the Isle La Motte, they steered for the mouth of the Missisque River, which they navigated up to the first falls, where the village of Swanton now stands. Here they found a flourishing encampment, and remained some days for the purpose of instructing the Indians in the truths of Christianity. The missionary found that some dim reports of the Christian teachers had preceded him, and prepared the way for his work, the success of which encouraged and consoled him.

From that place they proceeded on foot for some miles to the base of a line of hills, sketched by the narrator, and corresponding to those east of St. Alban’s. Here they also remained several days, the reverend father toiling early and late in the duties of his vocation. He was now surrounded by a crowd of eager listeners; for not only did his former audience accompany him, but a goodly number from the surrounding hills and from Bellamaqueau and Maquam Bays--distant three and five miles respectively--flocked to hear his instructions and to be taught “The Prayer” revealed to them by the Great Spirit through his servant.

Here they brought to him also the beautiful Indian maiden, of whom her race cherish the legend that her declining health led her people to bring her to these hills, hoping the change from the low lands and damp atmosphere of her home to the bracing mountain air might prove beneficial. Instead of finding relief, she only declined the more rapidly, so that she was soon unable to be carried back. She, too, had heard whispers of holy men who had come to teach her race the path of heaven, and wistfully she had sighed daily, as she repeated the yearning aspiration: “Oh! if the Great Spirit would but let me see and listen to his messenger, I could die in peace!”

The Indians, to this day, tell with what joy she listened to his words; how eagerly she prayed that she might receive the regenerating waters; how, when they were poured upon her head, her countenance became bright with the light of heaven; and how her departure soon after was full of joy and peace. Her burial-place was made on one of those eastern hills. It was the first Christian burial for one of her race in Vermont, and her people thought her intercessions would not fail to bring down blessings upon all that region.

Pursuing their journey by the trail of those who had preceded them through the dense wilderness--for our aborigines were skilled in tracing lines of communication between their different camps with extreme directness by aid of their close observations of nature--the party arrived at another camp on the bank of a river discovered by Champlain, and named by him the Lamoille.

At this place an Indian youth came to the missionary in great distress. His young squaw was lying at the point of death, and the medicine men and women could do nothing more for her. Would not “The Prayer” restore her? Oh! if it would give her back to him, he, with all his family, would gratefully embrace it! The reverend father went to her, and, when he found she desired it, baptized her and her new-born infant in preparation for the death which seemed inevitable. Contrary to all expectation, she recovered. Her husband and his family, together with her father’s family, afterwards became joyful believers.

After some days the Indians of that place accompanied the party in canoes to the lake and along its shores to the mouth of the Winooski River, which they ascended as far as the first falls. Here they remained many days, during which time the missionary visited the present site of Burlington, and held two missions there--one at a camp on the summit of a hill overlooking the valley of the Winooski as it approaches the lake, and one near the lake shore.

If Vermonters who are familiar with the magnificent scenery which surrounds the “queen city” of their State never visit the place without being filled with new admiration at the infinite variety and beauty of the pictures it unfolds from every changing point of view, we may imagine how strangers must be impressed who gaze upon them for the first time. Not less picturesque, and if possible even more striking, were its features when, crowned by luxuriant native forests and fanned by gentle breezes from the lake, it reposed within the embrace of that glorious amphitheatre of hills, in the undisturbed tranquillity of nature. It was not strange that the natives were drawn by its unparalleled attractions to congregate there in such numbers as to require from their reverend visitor a longer time than he gave to any other place in this series of missions.

In the course of three months the party had traversed the eastern border of the lake to the last encampment near its southern extremity. This was merely a summer camp, as the vicinity of the Iroquois made it unsafe to remain there longer than through that portion of the season when the Mohawks and their confederates were too busy with their own pursuits among the hills of the Adirondacks to give much heed to their neighbors. At the close of the mission this camp was broken up for that season, and its occupants joined the reverend father and his party in canoes as far as the mouth of the Winooski River, whence men were sent to convey them to the starting-point at Swanton, where their own canoes were left.

On their way thither they lingered for some days on Grand Isle, then, as now, a vision of loveliness to all admirers of the beautiful, and a favorite annual resort of the natives for the period during which they were safe from the attacks of their merciless foes.

At every mission thus opened the missionary promised to return himself, or send one of his associates, to renew his instructions and minister to the spiritual wants of his converts. This promise was fulfilled as far as the limited number of laborers in this vineyard permitted. The brave and untiring sons of Loyola afterwards entered the field, and proved worthy successors of the zealous Recollects who first announced the Gospel message in those wilds.

Our Indian narrator, when he had finished his recital of missionary labors in this and other regions, would always add with marked emphasis: “And it is firmly believed by our people, among all their tribes, that upon every spot where the Christian sacrifice was first offered a Catholic church will one day be placed.”

There seemed to his Protestant listeners but slight probability of this prediction ever being fulfilled in Vermont--settled for the most part by the straitest sect of the Puritans--as there was not then, or until twenty years from that time, a Catholic priest or church in the State. Yet at this writing--and the fact has presented itself before us with startling effect while tracing these imperfect reminiscences--there is at every point indicated in his narrative a fine church, and in many places flourishing Catholic schools.

The labors of an eminent servant of God--to whom Vermont cannot be too grateful--have been particularly blessed on the Isle La Motte, where the banner of the cross was first unfurled within her territory. A beautiful church has been erected there with a thriving congregation and school.

Much as remains to be accomplished in this field, when we reflect upon all that has been done since the first quarter of this XIXth century, we can see great cause for encouragement and gratitude to Almighty God, who has not withheld his blessing from the work of his servants of the earliest and the latest times. “Going on their way, they went and wept, scattering the seed,” the fruits of which we are now gathering into sheaves with great joy.

FINDING A LOST CHURCH.

The present age is pre-eminently one of discovery. In spite of the wise man’s saying, “Nothing under the sun is new,” mankind, wiser in its own conceit than the wise man, insists upon the newness of its every production. In Rome a different spirit prevails. While the new is not entirely neglected, the great delight of many Romans is to find something old--the older the better. They live so much in the past that they follow with an eager interest the various steps taken to enlighten them on the lives and deeds of the men of old, their ancestors on the soil and in the faith which they profess.

Foremost in the pursuit and discovery of Christian antiquities stands the Commendatore de Rossi. It has been said that poets are born, not made: De Rossi’s ability as a Christian archæologist seems to be more the gift of nature than the result of study. With unwearied industry, with profound knowledge, with an almost unerring judgment, he finds out and illustrates the remains of Christian antiquity scattered around Rome--not on the surface, but in the deeps of the earth. The latest and one of the most important discoveries he has made forms the subject of the present paper.

Tor Marancia is a name not much known out of Rome, yet it designates a place which was of some importance in its day. The traveller who contemplates the works of ancient art collected in the Vatican Museum cannot fail to be interested in two very beautiful black and white mosaics which form the floor of the gallery known as the Braccio Nuovo. Mythological fables and Homeric legends are represented in these pavements, and they come from Tor Marancia. In the Gallery of the Candelabra, and in the library of the same museum, a collection of frescos, busts, statues, and mosaics of excellent workmanship and of great interest, likewise discovered at Tor Marancia, are exhibited. All these objects were found at that place in the course of excavations made there in the reign of Pope Pius VI. In ancient times a villa stood at Tor Marancia, of which these formed the decorations.

At this spot also is found the entrance to a very extensive catacomb which contains three floors, and diverges in long, winding ways under the soil of the Campagna. The catacomb has been called by the name of S. Domitilla, on evidence found during the excavations made there. This lady was a member of the Flavian family, which gave three occupants to the imperial throne--Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian. It is a well-known fact that those early Christians who were blessed with wealth were in the habit of interring the bodies of their brethren, of saints, and of martyrs within the enclosure of their villas. Such villas were situated outside the limits of the city; and hence we find the entrance to every catacomb beyond the city walls, with the solitary exception of the catacomb or grottos of the Vatican, and the entrances to all of them are found in sites ascertained to have been the property of Christians. It might be easy to multiply instances of this, taking the facts from the _Acts of the Martyrs,_ wherein the places of sepulture are indicated, and the names of those who bestowed the last rites upon the dead recorded.

Domitilla, or Flavia Domitilla, as she is sometimes termed, was a niece of the consul Flavius Clemens, who was cousin of the Emperor Domitian. She was a Christian, having been baptized by S. Peter; and, after a life spent in charitable works, amongst which was the burial of the martyrs “in a catacomb near the Ardeatine Way,” the same of which we write, she also suffered martyrdom. Her two servants, Nereus and Achilleus, were put to death previously, and their bodies were placed in this catacomb by Domitilla.

In 1854, while De Rossi was pursuing his researches in the catacomb of S. Domitilla, he came upon the foundations of a building which pierced the second floor of the subterranean cemetery. This was a most unusual occurrence, and the eminent archæologist eagerly followed up his discovery. He found a marble slab which recorded the giving up of a space for burial “Ex indulgentia Flaviæ Domitillæ”--a confirmation of the proprietorship of the place.

De Rossi naturally concluded that the building thus incorporated in the Christian cemetery was of great importance. The _loculi_, or resting-places of the dead, were very large, which indicates great antiquity; the inscriptions likewise were of a very early date; and _sarcophagi_ adorned with lions’ heads, marble columns overturned, and other signs, led the discoverer to the conclusion that he had come upon the foundations of a church constructed within this cemetery. In the course of his excavations he had penetrated into the open air, and found himself in a hollow depression formed by the falling in of the surface. Amongst other objects discovered were four marble slabs containing epitaphs furnished with consular dates of the years 335, 380, 399, and 406; and also a form of contract by which the right of burial in the edifice was sold. The proprietor of the land above the cemetery opposed the continuance of the excavations, and the discoverer, obliged to withdraw, covered up the materials already found with earth, and turned his attention to other recently-discovered objects in another place.

Twenty years after, in 1874, Monsignor de Merode purchased the land overlying the catacomb and church, and the excavations were again undertaken under most favorable circumstances. In vain did the Commission of Sacred Archæology, under De Rossi’s guidance, seek for the four marble columns and the two beautiful _sarcophagi_ that had been seen there twenty years before. The proprietor is supposed to have carried them away. But they found instead the floor of the church or basilica, with its three naves, the bases of the four columns, the apse, the place where the altar stood, and the space occupied by the episcopal chair behind the altar. The basilica is as large as that of San Lorenzo beyond the walls. The left aisle is sixty feet long by thirteen broad; the central nave is twenty-four feet broad; and the right aisle, which is not yet entirely unearthed, is considered to be of the same breadth as the first mentioned; the greatest depth of the apse is fifteen feet. “The church,” says De Rossi, “is of gigantic proportions for an edifice constructed in the bowels of the earth and at the deep level of the second floor of a subterranean cemetery.”

Here, then, was a basilica or church discovered in the midst of a catacomb. That the latter belonged to Flavia Domitilla was well known; and yet another proof, which illustrates archæological difficulties and the method of overcoming them, was found here. It was a broken slab of marble containing a portion of an inscription:

......RVM
.....ORVM
(*)

and having the image of an anchor at the point(*). It was concluded that the anchor was placed at an equal distance from both ends of the inscription, and the discoverer, with the knowledge he already has of the place, supplied the letters which he considered wanting to the completion of the inscription, and thus produced the words,

SEPVLCRVM
FLAVIORVM
*

(sepulchre of the Flavii). This reading is very probably the right one, and its probability is greatly strengthened by the position of the anchor, since the full inscription, as here shown, leaves that sign still in the centre.

But to find the name borne by these ruins when the building of which they are the sole remnants was fresh and new presented a task to their discoverer. It was necessary to seek in ancient works--pontifical books and codices--for some account of a basilica on the Ardeatine Way. In the life of S. Gregory the Great it is related that this pontiff delivered one of his homilies “in the cemetery of S. Domitilla on the Ardeatine Way, at the Church of S. Petronilla.” The pontifical books and codices, although they differ in details--some saying in the cemetery of Domitilla, and others in that of Nereus and Archilleus, which is the same place under another name--agree in the principal fact. On the small remnant of plaster remaining on the wall of the apse an unskilled hand had traced a _graffito_, or drawing scratched on the plaster with a pointed instrument, somewhat resembling those found on the walls of Pompeii. This _graffito_ represents a bishop, vested in episcopal robes, seated in a chair, in the act of delivering a discourse. This rude sketch of a bishop so occupied, taken in conjunction with the fact that S. Gregory did here deliver one of his homilies, is a link in the chain of evidence which identifies the ruin with the ancient basilica of S. Petronilla.

But a still more convincing testimony was forthcoming. A large fragment of marble, containing a portion of what appeared to have been a long inscription, was found in the apse. There were but few complete words in this fragment, and these were chiefly the termination of lines in what seemed to have been a metrical composition. Odd words, selected at random from a poem, standing alone, devoid of preceding or succeeding words, might not seem to furnish very rich materials even to an archæologist. These wandering words were, however, recognized to be the terminal words of a poem or eulogium written by Pope Damasus in honor of the martyrs Nereus and Achilleus. Now the connection between this metrical eulogium and the basilica was to be sought for. In the Einsiedeln Codex the place where this poem was to be seen is stated to have been the sepulchre of SS. Nereus and Achilleus, on the Appian Way, at S. Petronilla. The poem, or rather this fragment of it, being found at this sepulchre, it was natural to conclude that the church was that of S. Petronilla. The Appian Way is the great high-road from which the Ardeatine Way branches off near this spot.

Again, the basilica of S. Petronilla was frequented by pilgrims from many nations in the VIIth century. Among these were Gauls, Germans, and Britons. In their itineraries of the martyrs’ sepulchres in Rome, and in the collection of the metrical epigraphs written at these places, it is proved that the original name of this church was that of S. Petronilla. “Near the Ardeatine Way is the Church of S. Petronilla,” say these old documents, and they likewise inform us that S. Nereus and S. Achilleus and S. Petronilla herself are buried there: “Juxta viam Ardeatinam ecclesia est S. Petronillæ; ibi quoque S. Nereus et S. Achilleus sunt et ipsa Petronilla sepulti.”

A second fragment of the slab containing the metrical composition of Pope Damasus has since been found, and this goes to confirm the testimony furnished by the former fragment. In the following copy of the inscription the capital letters on the right-hand side are those on the fragment first discovered; those on the left belong to the recently-discovered portion:

“NEREUS ET ACHILLEUS MARTYRES.

“Militiæ nomen dederant sævumQ gerebant
Officium pariter spectantes jussA TYRanni
Præceptis pulsante metu serviRE PARati
Mira fides rerum subito posueRE FVRORem
COnversi fugiunt ducis impia castrA RELINQVVNT
PROiiciunt clypeos faleras telAQ. CRVENTA
CONFEssi gaudent Christi portaRE TRIVMFOS
CREDITe per Damasum possit quid GLORIA
CHRISTI.”

The date of the church was likewise ascertained. It is known that Pope Damasus, the great preserver of the martyrs’ graves, would never allow the Christian cemeteries to be disturbed for the purpose of building a church therein; and although he himself strongly desired that his remains should repose in one of these sacred places by the side of his predecessors, he abandoned this desire rather than remove the sacred ashes of the dead. It may naturally be concluded, then, that this church was built after his day--he died in 384--as were the churches of S. Agnes, S. Lawrence, and S. Alexander, all of which are beyond the city walls and built in catacombs. The catacombs under the Church of S. Petronilla showed an inscription bearing the date of 390, and in the church itself a monumental slab with the date of 395 has been found. It is thus almost certain that between the highest date found _under_, and the lowest date found _in_, the church--that is, between the years 390 and 395--the basilica of S. Petronilla was constructed.

For about three centuries and a half this church was well frequented. We have records of gifts sent to it, precious vestments, etc., by Pope Gregory III., who reigned from 715 to 741. But in 755 the Longobards came down upon Rome; they desecrated the churches and cemeteries around the city, and then began the siege of Rome. After peace was made, the pontiff of the period, Paul I., transferred the relics and remains of the saints to safer custody, and the Church of S. Petronilla became deserted. From unmistakable signs it seems that this desertion was conducted in a most regular manner, and that it was closed and despoiled of its precious objects. The door which entered the left aisle was found walled up; the altar, the seats of the choir, the episcopal chair, and the ambons or marble pulpits ware all removed and transported elsewhere. The floor of the church, so far below the level of the surrounding soil, formed a resting-place for the water which drained through the neighboring lands after rains had fallen, and this undoubtedly formed the strongest reason for the abandonment of S. Petronilla. Nothing was left in it but _sarcophagi_ and sepulchres, the pavements with their marble epitaphs--so valuable to-day in revealing history--some columns with their beautifully-carved capitals, which time or an earthquake has overturned and hidden within the dark bosom of the earth for more than a thousand years.

The hundred pilgrims who came from America, with a hundred new-found friends, assembled on the 14th of June, 1874, to pray in that disentombed old church. They had come from a world unknown and undreamt of by the pilgrims who had formerly knelt within these walls; and as they looked around on the wide and desolate Campagna, and on the monument of Cecilia Metella shining in the distance white and perfect, in spite of the nineteen centuries that have passed away since it received its inmate, and at the blue, changeless sky overhead, and then turned their eyes upon the church, decorated that morning with festoons of green branches and gay flowers, the same as it may have been on other festive occasions a thousand years ago, they may have felt that time has effected almost as little change in the works of man as in those of nature, and that all things in Rome partake of Rome’s eternity.

NEW PUBLICATIONS.

LE CULTE CATHOLIQUE OU EXPOSITION DE LA FOI DE L’EGLISE
ROMAINE SUR LE CULTE DU AUX SAINTS ET A LEURS RELIQUES, A
LA BIENHEUREUSE VIERGE MARIE, AUX IMAGES, etc., en réponse
aux objections du Protestantisme, suivie d’une dissertation
historique et critique sur le celibat du clergé. Par l’Abbé
Louis-Nazaire Bégin, Docteur en Théologie, Professor à la
Faculté de Théologie de l’Université Laval. Quebec: Typographie
d’Augustin Cote et Cie. 1875.

_Le Culte Catholique_ is another valuable addition to controversial literature, by the author of _The Bible and the Rule of Faith_.

It is true that the days of controversy seem to be drawing to a close. The Greek schism still holds itself aloof in sullen isolation; but the controversy is exhausted, and all that is left of a church has become the mere unfruitful appanage of a northern despotism.

As to Protestantism, it never had any positive existence as a confession. Three hundred years have exhausted its theological pretensions. As a religion it has ceased to exist, and it lies buried beneath the weight of its own negations. The only formidable enemies of the church now are the disowners both of Christ and God, and they seek her destruction because they know that she alone offers an insuperable obstacle to the universal atheism which they hope to bring about.

Under such circumstances works like Dr. Bégin’s are chiefly useful for the information of Catholics, and for the support they render to their faith.

_Le Culte Catholique_ is, the writer tells us, “an exposition of the faith of the Roman Church in the matters of the worship of the saints and of their relics, of the blessed Virgin Mary, of images, etc., in reply to the objections of Protestantism, followed by a historical and critical dissertation on the celibacy of the clergy.” On these trite subjects little that is new can be said. But the work before us is a terse and lucid summary of Catholic teaching on the above points.

It is the object of the society of Freemasons to effect the universal deification, the rejection, that is, of the belief in any existence higher than the human being, and in any superiority of one man over another. For this they find it convenient to support the foolish Protestant objection to a splendid ritual and costly churches, on the ground that “God is a spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.” Dr. Bégin quotes the following telling passage from a contemporary writer in answer to this frivolous objection:

“I know the old tirades about the temple of nature. No doubt the starry vault of heaven is a sublime dome; but no worship exists which is celebrated in the open air. A special place of meeting is required for collective adoration, because our religious sociability urges us to gather together for prayer, as it were to make a common stock of our joys and griefs. Besides, should the time come when we shall have nothing but the cupola of heaven to shelter our religious assemblies, it would require a considerable amount of courage to betake ourselves thither, especially in winter. And the philosophers who find our cathedrals so damp would not be the most intrepid against the inclemency of the sanctuary of nature. Thus do great errors touch on the ridiculous. Reasoning begins their refutation; a smile ends it.”

The second chapter is an admirable exposition of the special worship (_hyperdulia_) paid to the Blessed Virgin Mary, in the course of which he shows triumphantly that the definition of her Immaculate Conception was no new doctrine, but a mere definite and dogmatic statement of a doctrine which had been all along held implicitly in the church. The following simile, illustrative of this argument, appears to us to be worth quoting: “Modern science, which is daily making such extraordinary progress, discovers, ever and anon, fresh stars, which seem to float in the most distant depths of space, which become more bright as they are more attentively observed, and which end by becoming stars of continually-increasing splendor. These stars are not of recent date; they are not new; they are only perceived. Something analogous takes place in the heavens of the church on the subject of certain truths of our faith. Their light reveals itself and develops by degrees. Sometimes the shock of controversy illuminates them. Then comes a definition to invest them with fresh splendor. But in receiving this supplement of light, destined to make them better understood by the faithful, they lose nothing of their proper nature; their essence is not in the slightest degree changed; only our minds appropriate them with more facility.”

FLOWERS FROM THE GARDEN OF THE VISITATION; or, Lives of Several
Religious of that Order. Translated from the French. Baltimore:
Kelly, Piet & Co. 1875.

To those who have attempted to form an adequate conception of the charitable and ascetic spirit, the simple record of these saintly lives must have a wonderful fascination. To those, even, who are wholly absorbed in a life of pleasure it will at least possess the merit of a new sensation, if they can forget the silent reproof which such examples convey.

It affords matter of encouragement in these days of combined luxury and destitution to look over the history of those--many of whom were delicately reared--who left all for God, content to do whatsoever he appointed them to do, and to submit to extraordinary mortifications for his sake. The work embraces six brief biographies of Visitation Nuns eminent for their self-sacrificing labors for the moral and intellectual education of their charges, and in other good and charitable offices. Their names, even, may be quite new to English-speaking readers, but that fact is all the more in keeping with their hidden lives. We have said enough to indicate the general character of the volume.

JOHN DORRIEN: A novel. By Julia Kavanagh. New York: D. Appleton
& Co. 1875.

The writer succeeds, in the very opening chapter, in so portraying the character of a child as to make it a living breathing reality to the reader. The story of his humble life in childhood and his struggles and trials in later years is told without any attempt at fine writing--indeed, all the characters are simply and well drawn, and retain their individuality to the end. The heroine, neglected in childhood, and without any guide in matters of faith, is easily persuaded by a suitor that religion is contrary to reason; and thus, left to her own unaided judgment, and notwithstanding her innate love of truth, soon finds herself entangled in a web of deceit and hypocrisy. She only escapes the unhappiness which such a course entails by forsaking it.

The moral of the tale (if that is not an obsolete term) is what the reader would naturally infer--the necessity of early religious instruction, and the advantage, even in this life, of a belief in revealed truth. We are glad to note the absence of the faults which disfigure much of the imaginative literature of the day, not excepting, we are sorry to say, that which emanates from the writer’s own sex. We see no attempt to give false views of life, or to undermine the moral and religious principles of the reader; on the contrary, there is reason to infer much that is positively good, though not so definitely stated as we should have liked.

THE BIBLE AND THE RULE OF FAITH. By the Abbé Louis-Nazaire
Bégin, Doctor of Theology, Theological Professor in the
University of Laval. Translated from the French by G. M. Ward
[Mrs. Pennée].

Protestantism is well-nigh defunct. It is in its last throes. It has not sufficient vitality left to care for its own doctrines, such as they are. As a religion it has almost ceased to exist. Disobedience to the faith has been succeeded by indifference; indifference by the hatred of Christ. Its rickety old doctrines, whose folly has been exposed over and over again thousands of times, have quietly tumbled out of existence. Protestants themselves have almost forgotten them, and certainly do not care enough about them to defend them. Paganism has returned--paganism in its last stage of sceptical development. We have to contend now for the divinity of Christ and the existence of a God. The Bible and the rule of faith are up amongst the lumber.

Yet it may be--as the writer of this work asserts; we much doubt it, however--that there are still “many poor souls in the bosom of Protestantism a prey to the anguish of doubt.” To such the Abbé Bégin’s treatise on the rule of faith may be of the utmost service. The argument is extremely terse and lucid. In short, were the minds of Protestant fanatics open to reason, it could not fail to convince them of the unreasoning folly of their notions about the Bible being the one only rule of faith.

The first part of this work treats of the rule of faith in general, and proves, amongst other things, that such a rule must be sure, efficient, and perpetual to put an end to controversies.

The second part exhibits the logical impossibility of the Protestant rule of faith, remote and proximate. That is to say, that it is impossible for the unexplained text of the Bible to be a sure, efficient, and perpetual rule of faith, and for an immediate inspiration of its meaning to individuals by the Holy Ghost to be its means of explanation.

The third part proves very exhaustively that the Catholic rule of faith is the only possible sure, efficient, and perpetual one; namely, Holy Scripture, the remote rule, and the teaching church, the proximate one.

To any souls “in the bosom of Protestism” who are “a prey to the anguish of doubt,” if indeed there be such, we cordially recommend this treatise. Its tone is kind and gentle, its reasoning irresistible, and, with the blessing of God, is able to put an end to all their doubts on the fundamental question as to the true rule of faith.

PERSONAL REMINISCENCES. By Cornelia Knight and Thomas Raikes.
New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1875.

This is another of the pleasant “Bric-à-Brac series,” edited by Richard Henry Stoddard. Miss Knight was that nondescript kind of being known as a “lady companion” to the Princess Charlotte of Wales. Her position gave her peculiar facilities for enjoying the privilege, so dear to certain hearts, of a peep behind the scenes of a royal household. Never having been married, she had plenty of time for jotting down her notes and observations on men, women, and things. Many of the men and women she met were famous in their way and in their time. As might be expected, there is much nonsense in her observations, mingled with pleasant glimpses of a kind of life that has now passed away. Mr. Raikes’ journal is similar in character to that of Miss Knight, with the advantage or disadvantage, as may be considered, of having been written by a man.

THE CATHOLIC WORLD.

VOL. XXII., No. 129.--DECEMBER, 1875.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1875, by Rev. I. T. HECKER, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.

MR. GLADSTONE AND MARYLAND TOLERATION.

It was supposed that Mr. Gladstone had been so triumphantly refuted, as a polemic, that he would take a prudent refuge in silence. At a moment when neighboring nations were rent with religious dissensions, and when England needed repose from, rather than fuel added to, her internal agitations, a statesman and ex-premier of the British Empire assumes the _rôle_ of a religious agitator and accuser, and startles, as well as offends, the public sense of appropriateness by his useless and baseless indictment against the Catholic Church, to which England owes all that is glorious in her constitution and in her history; against English Catholics in particular, his fellow-subjects, who of all others, by their loyalty and Christian faith and virtues, can preserve the liberties and the institutions of their country, now threatened alike by infidel corruption, Protestant indifference, and communistic malice; and against that saintly and illustrious pontiff whose hand is only raised to bless, whose lips breathe unfaltering prayer, and whose voice and pen have never ceased to announce and defend the eternal truths of religion, to uphold morality, and to refute the crying errors and evils of our times. The unanswerable refutations which Mr. Gladstone’s attacks elicited from Cardinal Manning, Bishops Ullathorne and Vaughan, Drs. Newman and Capel, and Canon Neville, not to speak of the Italian work of Mgr. Nardi and the rebukes administered by the periodical press, had, it was believed, even by impartial Protestants, effectually driven this new champion of the old No-popery party in England from the field of polemics. But, like all new recruits, the ex-premier seems incapable of realizing defeat, or perhaps is anxious, at least, to retire with the honors of war.

Not content with the serial publication of his three tracts, he has just now republished them in one volume, with a _Preface_, under the title of _Rome and the Newest Fashions in Religion_--a title as unbecoming the gravity of his subjects as it is unsupported by the contents of the work. The preface to the republication not only reiterates his accusations on all points, but the author, not satisfied with his new part as theologian, essays the _rôle_ of historical critic, and thus gives prominence to a historical question of deep interest and of especial importance to the Catholics of this country.

The same _animus_ which inspired Mr. Gladstone’s attacks against the church, against his Catholic fellow-countrymen, and against the most august and venerable personage in Christendom, has also induced him to deny to the Catholic founders of Maryland the honorable renown, accorded to them heretofore by historians with singular unanimity, of having, when in power, practised religious toleration towards all Christian sects, and secured freedom of conscience, not only by their unwavering action and practice, but also by giving it the stability and sanctions of statute law. This is certainly the only phase in this celebrated controversy upon which it remains for Mr. Gladstone to be answered.

His Eminence Cardinal Manning, in _The Vatican Decrees in their bearing on Civil Allegiance_, at page 88 (New York edition), writes:

“For the same reasons I deplore the haste, I must say the
passion, which carried away so large a mind to affirm or to
imply that the church of this day would, if she could, use
torture, and force, and coercion in matters of religious
belief.… In the year 1830 the Catholics of Belgium were in
a vast majority, but they did not use their political power
to constrain the faith or conscience of any man. The ‘Four
Liberties’ of Belgium were the work of Catholics. This is the
most recent example of what Catholics would do if they were in
possession of power. But there is one more ancient and more
homely for us Englishmen. It is found at a date when the old
traditions of the Catholic Church were still vigorous in the
minds of men.… If the modern spirit had any share in producing
the constitution of Belgium, it certainly had no share in
producing the constitution of Maryland. Lord Baltimore, who
had been Secretary of State under James I., in 1633 emigrated
to the American plantations, where, through Lord Stafford’s
influence, he had obtained a grant of land.… They named their
new country Maryland, and there they settled. The oath of the
governor was in these terms: ‘I will not, by myself or any
other, directly or indirectly, molest any person professing to
believe in Jesus Christ, for or in respect of religion.’ Lord
Baltimore invited the Puritans of Massachusetts--who, like
himself, had renounced their country for conscience’ sake--to
come into Maryland. In 1649, when active persecution had sprung
up again in England, the Council of Maryland, on the 21st
of April, passed this statute; ‘And whereas the forcing of
the conscience in matters of religion hath frequently fallen
out to be of dangerous consequence in the commonwealth where
it has been practised, and for the more quiet and peaceable
government of the province, and the better to preserve mutual
love and amity among the inhabitants, no person within the
province professing to believe in Jesus Christ shall be
anyways troubled, molested, or discountenanced for his or her
religion, or in the free exercise thereof.’ The Episcopalians
and Protestants fled from Virginia into Maryland. Such was the
commonwealth founded by a Catholic upon the broad moral law I
have here laid down--that faith is an act of the will, and that
to force men to profess what they do not believe is contrary to
the law of God, and that to generate faith by force is morally
impossible.”

Mr. Gladstone, in his _Vaticanism_, page 96, replies to the above as follows:

“It appears to me that Archbishop Manning has completely
misapprehended the history of the settlement of Maryland and
the establishment of toleration there for all believers in the
Holy Trinity. It was a wise measure, for which the two Lords
Baltimore, father and son, deserve the highest honor. But the
measure was really defensive; and its main and very legitimate
purpose plainly was to secure the free exercise of the Roman
Catholic religion. Immigration into the colony was by the
charter free; and only by this and other popular provisions
could the territory have been extricated from the grasp of its
neighbors in Virginia, who claimed it as their own. It was
apprehended that the Puritans would flood it, as they did; and
it seemed certain that but for this excellent provision the
handful of Roman Catholic founders would have been unable to
hold their ground. The facts are given in Bancroft’s _History
of the United States_, vol. i., chap. vii.”

Again, in his _Preface_ to _Rome and the Newest Fashions in Religion_, page viii., Mr. Gladstone writes:

“It has long been customary to quote the case of Maryland in
proof that, more than two centuries ago, the Roman Catholic
Church, where power was in its hands, could use it for the
purposes of toleration. Archbishop Manning has repeated the
boast, and with very large exaggeration.

“I have already shown from Bancroft’s _History_ that in the
case of Maryland there was no question of a merciful use of
power towards others, but simply of a wise and defensive
prudence with respect to themselves--that is to say, so far as
the tolerant legislation of the colony was the work of Roman
Catholics. But it does not appear to have been their work.
By the fourth article of the charter we find that no church
could be consecrated there except according to the laws of the
church at home. The tenth article guaranteed to the colonists
generally ‘all privileges, franchises, and liberties of this
our kingdom of England.’ It was in 1649 that the Maryland
Act of Toleration was passed, which, however, prescribed the
punishment of death for any one who denied the Trinity. Of the
small legislative body which passed it, two-thirds appear to
have been Protestant, the recorded numbers being sixteen and
eight respectively. The colony was open to the immigration of
Puritans and all Protestants, and any permanent and successful
oppression by a handful of Roman Catholics was altogether
impossible. But the colonial act seems to have been an echo
of the order of the House of Commons at home, on the 27th of
October, 1645, that the inhabitants of the Summer Islands, and
such others as shall join themselves to them, ‘shall without
any molestation or trouble have and enjoy the liberty of their
consciences in matters of God’s worship’; and of a British
ordinance of 1647.

“Upon the whole, then, the picture of Maryland legislation is
a gratifying one; but the historic theory which assigns the
credit of it to the Roman Church has little foundation in fact.”