Chapter XIII: The Search Nearly Over (5)

Such unions have nowhere been more numerous or more thoroughly organized than in Germany, though their formation is of recent date. It was during the revolution of 1848, of which we have already spoken, that the German Catholics were roused to a more comprehensive knowledge of the situation, and resolved to combine for the defence of their rights and the protection of their religion. Popular unions under the name and patronage of Pius IX. (Pius-Vereine) were formed throughout the fatherland, with the primary object of bringing together once a week large numbers of Catholic men of every condition in life. At these weekly meetings the questions of the day, in so far as they touched upon Catholic interests, were freely discussed, and thus an intelligent and enlightened Catholic public opinion was created throughout the length and breadth of the land. In refuting calumnies against the church the speakers never failed to demand the fullest liberty for all Catholic institutions.

On the occasion of beginning the restoration and completion of the Cathedral of Cologne, the most religious of churches, the proposition that an annual General Assembly of all the unions should be held was made and received with boundless enthusiasm. The first General Assembly took place at Mayence in October, 1848; and thither came delegates from Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, and all the other states of Germany, whose confidence and earnestness were increased by the presence of the Catholic members of the Parliament of Frankfort. For the first time since Luther’s apostasy the Catholics of Germany breathed the air of liberty. The bishops assembled at Würzburg, gave their solemn approbation to the great work, and Pius IX. sent his apostolic benediction. Since that time General Assemblies have been held at Breslau, May, 1849; Ratisbon, October, 1849; Linz, 1850; Mayence, 1851; Münster, 1852; Vienna, 1853; Linz, 1856; Salzburg, 1857; Cologne, 1858; Freyburg, 1859; Prague, 1860; Munich, 1861; Aix-la-Chapelle, 1862; Frankfort, 1863, and in other cities, down to the recent persecutions.

These assemblies represented a complete system of organization, in which no Catholic interest was forgotten. Every village and hamlet in the land was there, if not immediately, through some central union. We have had the honor of being present at more than one of these assemblies, and the impressions which we then received are abiding. Side by side with cardinals, bishops, princes, noblemen, and the most learned of professors sat mechanics, carpenters, shoemakers, and blacksmiths--not as in the act of worship, in which the presence of the Most High God dwarfs our universal human littlenesses to the dead-level of an equal insignificance, but in active thought and co-operation for the furtherance of definite religious and social ends. The brotherhood of the race was there, an accomplished fact, and one felt the breathing as of a divine Spirit compared with whose irresistible force great statesmen and mighty armies are weak as the puppets of a child’s show.

We have not the space to describe more minutely the ends, aims, and workings of the numberless Catholic associations of Germany; but we must express our deep conviction that no study could be more replete with lessons of practical wisdom for the Catholics of the United States. Organization is precisely what we most lack. Our priests are laborious, our people are devoted, but we have not even an organized Catholic public opinion--nay, no organ to serve as its channel, and make itself heard of the whole country. Many seem to think that the very question of the necessity of Catholic education is still an open one for us; and this is not surprising, since we have no system of Catholic education. Catholic schools, indeed, in considerable number, there are, but there is no organization. The great need of the church in this country is the organization of priests and people for the promotion of Catholic interests. Through this we will learn to know one another; our views will be enlarged, our sympathies deepened, and the truth will dawn upon us that, if we wish to be true to the great mission which God has given us, the time has come when American Catholics must take up works which do not specially concern any one diocese more than another, but whose significance will be as wide as the nation’s life.

A STORY WITH TWO VERSIONS.

Yes, sir, this is Brentwood. And you are of the race, you say, though not of the name. Clarkson, sir? Surely, surely. I remember well. Miss Jane Brent--the first Miss Brent I can recall--married a Clarkson. So you are her grandson, sir? Then you are right welcome to me and mine. Come in, come in. Or, if you will do me the honor, sit here in the porch, sir, and my Kate will bring you of her best, and right glad will we be to wait again on one with the Brent blood in him.

None of the name left? Ah! Mr. Clarkson, have you never heard, then? But you must have heard of James Brent. Surely, surely. He lives still, God pity him! What’s that? You want to hear the story out? Well, sir, no man living can tell you better than I, unless it be Mr. James’ self. Settle yourself comfortably, Mr. Clarkson, and I’ll tell you all.

Yes, this is Brentwood. ’Twas your great-great-grandsire founded it, two hundred years back, he and his brother--James and William. They began the work which was to grow and grow into foundries and factories, and the bank that was to ruin all. But I’m telling the end afore the beginning. The next two brothers built the church you see there, sir, down the road; and the next two after them added the tower and founded the almshouses; and then came the fourth James and William Brent, and one of them was an idiot, and the other was and is the last of the name.

I was twenty years older than Mr. James, and, before ever he came into business, had served with his father. I watched him grow up, and I loved him well. But from the first I knew he was different from the rest of his race. He was his mother all over again--a true Mortimer, come of nobles, not of townsfolk; all fire and sweetness and great plans for people’s good and happiness, but with little of the far-sighted Brent prudence. He was just as tender of Mr. William as if he had had all the wits of himself, and used to spend part of every day with him, and amuse him part of many a night when the poor gentleman could not sleep.

Their father died just when they came of age. They were twins, the last Brent Brothers, sir; and ’twas a great fortune and responsibility to fall full and with no restraint into such young hands. Mr. James seemed like one heart-broken for nigh a year after, and carried on everything just as his father had done, till we all wondered at it; then he saw Miss Rose Maurice, and loved her--as well indeed he might--and after that things changed. She was as simple in all her ways as she was beautiful, and would have thought my cottage good enough, so long as he was in it with her. But he!--well, sir, I know he has kissed the very ground she trod on, and he didn’t think a queen’s palace too fine for her. As soon as ever he saw her he loved her and set his soul to win her; and the very next day he began a new home in Brentwood. Where is it? Alack! alack! sir. Wait till ye _must_ hear. Let’s think, for a bit, of only the glad days now.

You could not call it extravagance exactly. It set the whole town alive. So far as he could, he would have none but Brentwood folk to work upon the place where his bride was to dwell. And he said it was time that so old a family should have a home that would last as long as they. Ah! me, as long as they!

Of course there was a city architect and a grand landscape gardener; but, oh! the thoughtfulness of him whom we were proud to call our master. There, in the very flush of his youth and love and hope, he took care of the widows and the little children; contrived to make work for them; was here and there and everywhere; and there was not a beggar nor an idler in Brentwood--not one. The house rose stately and tall; he had chosen a fair spot for it, where great trees grew and brooks were running, all ready to his hand; and that city man--why, sir, ’twas marvellous how he seemed to understand just how to make use of it all, and to prune a little here and add a little there, with vines and arbors and glades and a wilderness, till you didn’t know what God had done and what he had given his creatures wit to do. And in the sunniest corner of the house--Brent Hall, as they called it--Mr. James chose rooms for Mr. William, who was pleased as a child with it all, and used to sit day by day and watch the work go on.

All the time, too, the Brent iron-foundries were being added to and renovated, till there was none like them round about; and the town streets were made like city streets, and the town itself set into such order as never before; and when all was ready--’twas the work of but three years, sir--when the house was hung with pictures and decked with the best; in the spring, when the grass and the trees were green, and the flowers were blooming fair, then he brought her home. And when I saw her--well, sir, first I thought of the angels; but next (if I may say it; and I wot it is not wrong)--next I thought of our Blessed Lady. There was a great painting in the Hall oratory--by some Spanish painter, they said. Murillo? Yes, sir, that is the name. It looked like Mrs. James Brent, sir. Not an angel, but a woman that could suffer and weep and struggle sore; and, pure and stainless, would still remember she was of us poor humans, and so pity and pray for us.

We had been used to have Mr. Brent come into our houses, and to see him in the poorest cottages and the almshouses, with smiles and cheery words and money; but Mrs. James gave more than that, for she gave herself. I’ve seen those soft hands bind wounds I shrank from; and that delicate creature--I’ve seen her kneeling by beds of dying sinners, while her face grew white at what she saw and heard, and yet she praying over ’em, and, what’s more, _loving_ ’em, till she made the way for the priest to come. And she laid out dead whom few of us would have touched for hire, and she listened to the stories of the sad and tiresome, and her smile was sunshine, and the very sight of her passing by lifted up our minds to God. Her husband thwarted her in nothing. What was there to thwart her in? He loved her, and she should do what she would in this work which was her heart’s joy.

Then we had been used to see Mr. James in church regular, weekday Mass and Sunday Mass; but Mrs. James was there any time, early mornings and noons and nights. I fancy she loved it better than the stately Hall. After she came, her husband added the great south transept window from Germany, and the organ that people came miles to hear; and he said it was her gift, not his. The window picture is a great Crucifixion and Our Lady standing by. You’ll understand better, Mr. Clarkson, ere I finish, what it says to Brentwood folk now.

The first year there was a daughter only; but the next there came a son. After that, for six long years there were no more children, but then another son saw the light. What rejoicings, what bonfires, what clanging of bells, there was! But ere night the clanging changed to tolling and the shouts to tears; for the child died. And when Mrs. James came among us again, very white and changed and feeble, we all knew that with Mr. James and Mr. William, we were seeing the last Brent Brothers, whatever our grandchildren might see.

However, _she_ was spared, and Mr. James took heart of such grace as that, and said it would be Brent and Son, which sounded quite as well when one was used to it. And to make himself used to it--or to stifle the disappointment, as I really think--he began the Brent Bank. There had been a Brent Bank here for years past, and to it all Brentwood and half the country round trusted their earnings. Only a few really rich people had much to do with it, but men in moderate circumstances, young doctors and lawyers with growing families, widows, orphans, seamstresses, the factory people, laborers, thought there was no bank like that. Mr. James’ kind spirit showed itself there as elsewhere, and nobody felt himself too insignificant to come there, if only with a penny.

Often and often I sit here and wonder, Mr. Clarkson, why it all was--why God ever let it be--the shame and the sorrow and the suffering that came. I know Mr. James was lavish, but, if he spent much on himself, he spent much on others too; and he made God’s house as beautiful as his own. For a time it looked as if God’s blessing was on him; for he prospered year by year, and, except for his child’s dying and his wife’s frail health, his cup of joy seemed running over.

By and by came a year--you may just remember it, sir--a year of very hard times for the whole country. Banks broke, and old houses went by the board, and men were thrown out of work, and there was a cry of distress through all the land. But Brentwood folk hadn’t a thought of fear. Still, in that year, from the very first of it, something troubled me. Master was moody now and then; went up to the city oftener; had letters which he did not show to me, who had seen all his business correspondence and his father’s for thirty years and more. Sometimes he missed Mass, and presently I noted with a pang that he did not receive the Blessed Sacrament regular as he used. And Mrs. James was pale, and her eyes, that once were as bright and clear as sunshine, grew heavy and dark, and she looked more and more like the picture in her oratory; but it made one very sad somehow to see the likeness.

The hard times began at midsummer. The Lent after there was a mission of Dominican friars here. I was special busy that week, and kept at work till after midnight. One evening, about eight, Mr. James came hurriedly into the office and asked for the letters. He turned them over, looked blank, then said the half-past eleven mail would surely bring the one he wanted, and he should wait till then and go for it himself. For five minutes or so he tried to cast up some accounts; then, too nervous-like to be quiet longer, he said: “I’ll go and hear the sermon, Serle. It will serve to fill up the time.” And off he went.

The clock struck the hour and the half-hour, and the hour and the half-hour, and I heard the half-past eleven mail come in, and, soon after, Mr. James’ step again, but slow now, like one in deep thought. In he came, and I caught a glimpse of his face, pale and stern, with the lips hard set. He shut himself into his private room, and I heard him pacing up and down; then there came a pause, and he strode out again. He seemed very odd to me, but he tried to laugh, as he put down two slips for telegrams on my desk. “Which would you send?” said he.

One was, “Go on. I consent to all your terms.” The other was, “Stop. I will have nothing more to do with it, no matter what happens.”

Something told me in my heart that, though he was trying to pass this off in his old way like a joke, my master--my dear master--was in a great strait. I looked up and answered what he had not said at all to get an answer, with words which rose to my lips in spite of myself. Says I: “Send what Mrs. James would want you to send, sir.” And then his ruddy, kind face bleached gray like ashes, and he gave a groan, and the next minute he was gone.

Though my work was done for that night, I would not leave the bank; for I thought he might come back. And back he did come, a full hour after, steady and grave and not like my master. For, Mr. Clarkson, the bright boy-look I had loved so, which, with the boy-nature too, had never seemed to leave him, was all gone out of his face, and I knew surely I never should see it there again. He wrote something quickly, then handed it to me, bidding me send telegrams to the bank trustees as there ordered. The slip which bore my direction bore also the words, with just a pencil-line erasure through them, “Go on. I consent to all your terms.” So, for good or for ill, whichever it might be, the other was the one he must have sent.

These telegrams notified the trustees of a most important meeting to which they were summoned, and at that meeting I had, as usual, to be present. Perhaps his colleagues saw no change in him; but I, who had served him long, saw much. O Mr. Clarkson, Mr. Clarkson! whatever you may be--and you are young still--_be honest_. For, sir, there’s one thing of many terrible to bear, and it’s got to be borne here or hereafter by them as err from uprightness; and that thing is shame. I’d seen him kneel at the altar that morning, and she beside him, bless her! That’s where he got strength to endure the penance he had brought upon himself; else I don’t know how he ever could have borne it or have done it.

They sat there about him where they had often sat before, those fifteen country gentlemen, some of whom had been his father’s and his uncle’s friends, and some his own schoolmates and companions. And he stood up, and first he looked them calm and fearless full in their faces, and then his voice faltered and stopped, and then they all felt that it was indeed something beyond ordinary that was coming.

Don’t ask me to tell my master’s shame as he told it, without a gloss or an excuse, plain and bald and to the point. I knew and they knew that there was excuse for his loving and lavish nature, but he made none for himself.

Well, there’s no hiding what all the world knows now. He had let himself be led away into speculation and--God pity and forgive him!--into fraud, till only ruin or added and greater sin stared him in the face; then, brought face to face with that alternative, he had chosen--just ruin, sir.

There was dead silence for a space, till Sir Jasper Meredith, the oldest man there, and the justest business man I ever met, said gravely: “Do you realize, Mr. Brent, that this implies ruin to others than to you?”

He was not thinking of himself, though this trouble would straiten him sorely; he was thinking, and so was my master, and so was I, of poor men, and lone women, and children and babies, made penniless at a blow; of the works stopped; of hunger and sickness and cold. Mr. James bowed his head; he could not speak.

Then I had to bring out the books, and we went carefully over them page by page. It was like the Day of Judgment itself to turn over those accounts, and to read letters that had to be read, and to find out, step by step, and in the very presence of the man we had honored and trusted, that he had really fallen from his high place. He quivered under it, body and soul, but answered steadily every question Sir Jasper put to him; spoke in such a way that I was sure he as well as I thought of the last great day, and was answering to One mightier than man. And presently, when they had reached the root of it--well, Mr. Clarkson, it was sin and it was shame, and I dare not call it less before God; yet it was sin which many another man does unblushingly, and had he persisted in it--had he only the night previous sent that message, “Go on”--it was possible and probable that he could have saved himself. Yet, if I could have had my choice then or now, I would rather have seen him stand there, disgraced and ruined by his own act and will, than have had him live for another day a hypocrite.

But Sir Jasper said never a word of praise or blame till the whole investigation was ended; listened silently while Mr. James told his plan to sell all he owned in Brentwood, pay what debts he could, and then begin life over again abroad, and work hard and steadily to retrieve his fortunes, that he might pay all and stand with a clear conscience before he died. Then Sir Jasper rose and came to him, put his two hands on Mr. James’ shoulders, and looked him straight in the eyes. “James Brent,” he said, “I knew your father before you, and your father’s father, but I never honored them more, and I never honored you more, than on this day when you confess to having disgraced your name and theirs, but have had the honesty and manliness to confess it. Disgrace is disgrace; but confession is the beginning of amendment.”

That was all. There was no offer of money help; all Sir Jasper could offer would have been but a drop in the ocean of such utter ruin. There was no advice to spare himself before he spared his neighbor; Sir Jasper was too just for that. But after those words I saw my master’s eyes grow moist and bright, and a gleam of hope come into his face. My poor master! my poor master! Thank God we cannot see the whole of suffering at the beginning!

The intention was not to let the news get abroad that night. Mr. James went home to tell his wife and children--how terrible that seemed to me!--and I sat busy in the office. It was the spring of the year. Fifteen years ago the coming month he had brought his bride home in the sunshine and the flowers. This afternoon darkened into clouds, and rain came and the east wind. I lighted the lamps early and went to my work again. Presently I heard a sound such as I never heard before--a low growl, or roar, or shout, that wasn’t thunder or wind or rain. It grew louder; it was like the tramp of many feet, hurrying fast, and in the direction of the bank. Then cries--a name, short, distinct, repeated again and again: “Brent! Brent! James Brent!”

I went to the window. There they were, half Brentwood and more, clamoring for the sight of the man they trusted above all men. I flung the window up and they saw me.

“Halloo, there, Joseph Serle!” cried the leader, a choleric Scot who had not been many years among us. “Where’s our master?”

“Not here,” says I, with a sinking at my heart.

“He knows,” piped a woman’s shrill voice; “make him tell us true.”

And then the Scot cries again: “Halloo, Joseph Serle, there! Speak us true, mon, or ye’ll hang for’t. Is our money safe?”

What could I say? Face after face I saw by the glare of torches--faces of neighbors and friends and kin--and not one but was a loser, and few that were not well-nigh ruined. And while I hesitated how to speak again that woman spoke: “Where’s James Brent? Has he run, the coward?”

That was too much. “He’s home,” cried I, “where you and all decent folk should be.”

“Home! home!” They caught the word and shouted it. “We’ll go home too. We’ll find James Brent.” And the tide turned towards the Hall.

I flew down the back-stairs to the stable, mounted the fleetest horse, and galloped him bareback to Brent Hall; but, fast as I rode, the east wind bore an angry shout behind me, and, if I turned my head, I saw torches flaring, and the ground seemed to tremble with the hurrying tramp of feet.

I don’t know how they bore it or how I told ’em. I know I found them together, him and her, and she was as if she had not shed a tear, and her eyes were glowing like stars, bright, and tender, and sad, and glad all at once. I had hardly time to tell the news, when the sound I had dreaded for ’em broke upon us like the rush and the roar of an awful storm. On they came, trampling over the garden-beds, waving their torchlights, calling one name hoarse and constant--“Brent! Brent! James Brent!”

“My love,” he said, bending down to her, “stay while I go to them.”

And then she looked at him with a look that was more heavenly than any smile, and said only: “James, my place is by your side, and I will keep it.”

He put his hand quick over his eyes like one in great awe, smiled with a smile more sad than tears, then opened the hall door and stood out before the crowd--there where many a man and woman of them had seen him bring his young bride home. And the sudden silence which fell upon them his own voice broke. “My friends,” he said, “what would you have of me?”

Straight and keen as a barbed arrow, not from one voice, but from many, the question rose, “Is our money safe?” And after that some one called: “We’ll trust your word, master, ’gainst all odds.”

I had thought that scene in the bank was like the Judgment Day; but what was this? He tried to speak, but his lips clave together. Then I saw her draw a little nearer--not to touch him or to speak to him; she did not even look at him, neither at the people, but out into the darkness, and up and far away; and her very body, it seemed to me, was praying.

“Is our money safe?” It was like a yell now, and James Brent made answer: “My friends, I am a ruined man.”

“Is our money safe?” Little children’s voices joined in the cry. My God, let Brentwood never hear the like again!

My master held out his hands like any beggar; then he fell down upon his knees. “I confess to you and to God,” he said, “there is not one penny left.”

Mr. Clarkson, I am Brentwood born and bred. I love my master, but I love my place and people too. We are a simple folk and a loving folk. It is an awful thing to shake the trust of such. They had deemed their honor and their property for ever safe with this one man, and in an hour and at a word their trust was broken, their scanty all was gone, their earthly hopes were shattered. Mr. Clarkson, sir, it drove them wild.

That day had set on Brent Hall fair and stately; the morrow dawned on blackened ruins. The grounds lay waste; the fountains were dry; pictures which nobles had envied had fed the flames; fabrics which would have graced a queen stopped the babbling of the brooks; and in front of Brent Bank hung effigies of the last Brent Brothers, with a halter about the neck of each.

He had planned--my master, my poor master!--to retrieve all. Why could it not be? God knows best, but it is a mystery which I cannot fathom. That night’s horror and exposure brought him to the very gates of death; and when he rose up at last, it was as a mere wreck of himself, never to work again. His wife’s dowry went to the people whom he had ruined and who had ruined him. They lived until her death, as he lives still, on charity.

And that is all? No, Mr. Clarkson, not quite all. He was brave enough, since he could not win back his honor otherwise, to stay among us and gain a place again in the hearts he had wounded sore. Sometimes I think he teaches us a better lesson, old, and alone, and poor, than if he had come to build his fallen home once more. I think, sir, we have learned to pity and forgive as we never should have done otherwise, since we have seen him suffering like any one of us; as low down as any one of us.

JAMES BRENT’S VERSION.

He has told you the story, then, my boy, has he? And you are the last of us, and you have my name--James Brent Clarkson. The last? Then I will tell you more than he could tell you. Do not shrink or fancy it will pain me. I would like to let you know all, my boy--not for my sake; but you say you are only half a Catholic, and I would have you learn something of the deep reality of the true faith.

The night I waited for the half-past eleven train I had been stopped on my way to the bank by a crowd at the church door, and I heard one man say to another: “They’re dark times, neighbor--as dark as our land’s seen these hundred years.” And his mate answered him: “Maybe so, Collins; maybe so. But Brentwood don’t feel ’em much. I believe, and so does most folks, that if all other houses fell, and e’en the Bank of England broke, Brent Brothers would stand. It’s been honest and true for four generations back, and so ’twull be to the end on’t.” Then the crowd parted, the men went into the church, and I passed down the street.

“Honest and true for four generations back, and so ’twull be to the end on’t.” The words haunted me. At last, in desperation, to rid myself of the thought, I went to church also. Going in by a side door, I found myself in a corner by a confessional, quite sheltered from view, but with the pulpit in plain sight. There, raised high above the heads of the people, the preacher stood, a man of middle age, who looked as if he had been at some time of his life in and of the world; his face that of one who has found it almost a death-struggle to subdue self to the obedience and the folly of the cross. He seemed meant for a ruler among his fellows. I wondered idly what he was doing there in the preacher’s frock, speaking to the crowd.

He was telling, simply and plainly, of our Lord’s agony in the garden. But simple and plain as were his words, there was something in the face and voice which drew one into sympathetic union with this man, who spoke as if he were literally beholding the load of our sin lying upon the Lord’s heart till his sweat of blood started. And when he had painted the scene to us, he paused as hearing the awful cry echo through the stillness that reigned in the crowded church, then bent forward as if his eyes would scan our very hearts, and spoke once more.

I cannot tell you what he said, but before he ended I knew this: my sin cost our Lord’s agony; added sin of mine would be added anguish of his. The choice lay before me. When I showed Serle those two despatches, the one “Stop,” the other “Go on,” I held there what would be my ruin for time or for eternity.

There is a world unseen, and mighty; its powers were round me that night like an army. Hitherto I had been deceiving myself with the plea of necessity of others’ interests to be considered, of my honor to be sustained. That night another motive rose before me, but it was of an honor put to dishonor--the Lord of glory bowed down to the earth by shame.

The letter must be answered before morning, so pressing was my need. I decided to go to the telegraph office, and by the time I reached it my mind must be made up. But, in the street, I came face to face with the preacher I had heard that night. The moon was near the full. We two looked straight at each other, passed, then turned as by one impulse, and faced again. They who fight a fight to its end, and conquer, but only with wounds whose scars they must bear to their graves, sometimes gain a great power of reading the souls of those who are fighting a like contest, and know not yet if it will end in victory or defeat. Some fight like mine I felt sure that priest had fought. “What would you have, my brother?” he asked.

“Answers to two questions, father,” I replied. “If a man has done wrong to others, and can only repair it by added wrong, shall he disgrace his own good name for ever by avowal, or shall he sin? And if his fall involves the suffering of his innocent wife and children, may he not save himself from shame for their sake? It is a matter which may not wait now for confession even. Answer as best you may, for the love of God.”

I fancied that the stern face before me softened and grew pale, and in the momentary stillness I understood that the Dominican was praying. Then he answered, few words and firm, as one who _knew_:

“To choose disgrace is to choose the path our divine Lord chose. To involve our dearest in suffering is to know his anguish whose blessed Mother stood beneath his cross.”

Then, after one more slight, intense silence, “My brother,” he said earnestly, “I do not know your life, but I know my own. To drink the Lord’s cup of shame to its dregs--_with him_--is a blessed thing to do, if he gives a sinner grace to do it.”

Tell me a thousand times that you have no faith yourself; that to love God passionately is a dream, a delusion, unworthy of our manly nature; that to choose shame is folly, to choose suffering is a mad mistake--what shame could atone for my sins or give back to the poor the means of which my folly had robbed them? What can your words count with those who have once tasted the bitter sweetness of the Lord’s own chalice? Suddenly, standing there, I knew what it means to love God more than houses or lands, wife or children; to have him more real to the soul than they to the heart; to be willing and glad to forsake all for him; to know I had one more chance left to do his will, not Satan’s; and to make my choice. Having brought his agony on him, there was nothing more I _could_ do but bear it with him.

My boy, though you came on my invitation, you chose the twilight in which to come to me, that I might hide my shame at meeting you. Such shame _died dead_ in two awful nights and days: First, confession before the priest of God; then to colleagues and friends; then to my wife and to my son--oh! that stings yet; then to an angry throng, whose trust I had betrayed, whose hopes I had blasted, whose love and reverence I had turned to hate and scorn. I have seen my home in ruins, my effigy hung up and hooted at in the public square, my name become a byword, my race blotted out. I am an old man now, and still they tell my story in Brentwood; each child learns it; strangers hear of it. Yet, if the power were mine to alter these twenty years of humiliation, I would not lose one hour of suffering or shame.

You ask me why? Thirty-five years ago I stood here, the centre and the favorite of this town, and I set myself to work my own will, to gain glory for me and mine. My wife, my name, my home, were my idols. It seemed an innocent ambition, but it was not for God, and it led me into evil work. You told me that since you came of age you have been but once to confession. It is by the light of that sacrament that what seems to you the mystery of my life is read. For a Catholic--whether striving after perfection, or struggling up from sin to lasting penitence--has for pattern the life of Jesus, the doing all in union with him, after his example. What is the sacrament of penance but the bearing of shame, though in the presence of a compassionate priest, with him who, when he could have rescued us at the price of one drop of his most precious blood, chose to die in ignominy, bearing before the world the entire world’s disgrace? My boy, if in any way, by the love of our common name, I can influence you, _go back to confession_. It is the very sacrament for men who would be upright, and loyal, and strong, and true; or who, having fallen, would humbly and bravely bear for Christ’s sake the disclosure and the penalty.

My penance--given by God, mark you--was heavy, men think. Was it heavier than my sin? They do not know everything. All my life I had been helped, guarded, upheld; and for such to fall is a deadlier sin than for others. The infinite love of God bore with me and saved me. And as, day by day, like the unremitted lashes of a scourge, suffering fell to my portion, I tell you that a strange, an awful sweetness mingled with the anguish. I knew it was the hand of God that smote me, and that he smote here to spare hereafter.

Oh! do not look at me. Stop! Turn your face away! I thought all such shame was dead, but there are moments when it overwhelms me with its sting. Did I say or dare to think that _God loves me_? Wait, wait, till I can remember what it means!

Yes, I know now. Through all that night, while the torches glared, and wrathful faces looked curses at me, and lips shouted them, ever through all I saw, as it were, One sinless but reputed with the wicked; stripped of his garments as I of my pride; made a spectacle to angels and to men; mocked, reviled, scourged, crucified; and through the wild tumult I heard a voice say, as of old to the repentant thief on the cross: “This day thou shalt be with me.” And through all my heart was answering to his most Sacred Heart, “I, indeed, justly; for I receive the due reward of my deeds: but this man hath done no evil.” How could I wish to be spared a single pang or lose one hour of shame with him? What part could any Christian take but to suffer with him, having made him suffer? And when one has said “with him,” one has explained all. But, somehow, people do not always seem to understand.

* * * * *

Understand? Ah! no. It is a story, not of two versions, but of many. Some called James Brent a fool, and some a madman, and some said he should have saved his honor and his name at all hazards; and some, that he had no right to entail such suffering on his household. But there is one light by which such stories should be read, that is truer than these. When time is gone, and wealth is dust, and earthly honor vanishes like smoke, then, by the standard of the cross of Christ, wealth, and pomp, and pleasure, and business shall be duly tried. Shun humiliation here as we will, there shall be after this the judgment, when the Prince of Glory, who pronounces final sentence, will be he who, while on earth, chose for his portion a life of suffering and a death of shame.

ANTI-CATHOLIC MOVEMENTS IN THE UNITED STATES.

Like commercial panics, periodical outbursts of irreligious fanaticism seem to have become regular incidents in the history of the United States--occurrences to be looked for with as much certainty as if they were the natural outgrowth of our civilization and the peculiarly-constituted condition of American society. Though springing from widely different causes, these intermittent spasms have a marked resemblance in their deleterious effects on our individual welfare and national reputation. Both are demoralizing and degrading in their tendencies, and each, in its degree, finally results in the temporary gain of a few to the lasting injury and debasement of the multitude. In other respects they differ materially. Great mercantile reverses and isolated acts of peculation, unfortunately, are not limited to one community or to the growth of any particular system of polity, but are as common and as frequent in despotic Asia and monarchical Europe as in republican America. Popular ebullitions of bigotry, on the contrary, are, or, more correctly, ought to be, confined to those countries where ignorance and intolerance usurp the place of enlightened philanthropy and wise government. They are foreign to the spirit of American institutions, hostile to the best interests of society, and a curse to those who tolerate or encourage them. The brightest glory of the fathers of the republic springs, not so much from the fact that they separated the colonies from the mother country and founded a new nation--for that is nothing strange or unheard-of in the world’s history--but that they made its three millions of inhabitants free as well as independent: free not only from unjust taxation and arbitrary laws, but for ever free to worship their Creator according to the dictates of their conscience, unawed by petty authority and unaffected by the shifting counsels of subsequent legislators.

From this point of view the Revolution appears as one of the grandest moral events in the records of human progress; and when we reflect on the numerous pains, penalties, and restrictions prescribed by the charters and by-laws of the colonies from whence our Union has sprung, it challenges our most profound admiration and gratitude. This complete religious equality, guaranteed by our fundamental law, has ever been the boast of every true American citizen, at home and abroad. From the halls of Congress to the far Western stump-meeting we hear it again and again enunciated; it is repeated by a thousand eloquent tongues on each recurring anniversary of our independence, and is daily and weekly trumpeted throughout the length and breadth of the land by the myriad-winged Mercuries of the press. This freedom of worship, freedom of conscience, and legal equality, as declared and confirmed by our forefathers, has become, in fact, not only the written but also the common law of the land--the birthright of every native-born American, the acquired, but no less sacred, privilege of every citizen by adoption. Whoever now attempts to disturb or question it, by word or act, disgraces his country in the eyes of all mankind, and defiles the memory of our greatest and truest heroes and statesmen.

So powerful, indeed, were the example and teachings of those wise men who laid broad and deep the foundations of our happy country that, during the first half-century of our national existence, scarcely a voice was raised in opposition or protest against the principle of religious liberty as emphatically expressed in the first amendment to the Constitution. A whole generation had to pass away ere fanaticism dared to raise its crest, until the solemn guarantees of our federal compact were assailed by incendiary mobs and scouted by so-called courts of justice. The first flagrant instance of this fell spirit of bigotry happened in Massachusetts, and naturally was directed against an institution of Catholic learning.

In 1820 four Ursuline nuns arrived in Boston and established there a house of their order. Six years later they removed to the neighboring village of Charlestown, where they purchased a piece of ground, and, calling it Mt. St. Benedict, erected a suitable building and reduced the hitherto barren hill-side to a state of beautiful cultivation. In 1834 the community had increased to ten, all ladies of thorough education and refinement. From the very beginning their success as teachers was acknowledged and applauded, and their average attendance of pupils was computed at from fifty to sixty. Of these, at least four-fifths were Protestants, the daughters of the best American families, not only of New England, but of the Middle and Southern States. Though it was well known that the nuns had ever been most scrupulously careful not to meddle with the religious opinions of their scholars, and that not one conversion to the church could be ascribed to their influence, the fact that a school conducted by Catholic religious should have acquired so brilliant a reputation, and that its patrons were principally Protestants of high social and political standing, was considered sufficient in the eyes of the Puritan fanatics to condemn it.

Its destruction was therefore resolved on, and an incident, unimportant in itself, occurred in the summer of 1834 which was eagerly seized upon by the clerical adventurers who then, as now, disgraced so many sectarian pulpits. It appears that an inmate of the convent, a Miss Harrison, had, from excessive application to music, become partially demented, and during one of her moments of hallucination left the house and sought refuge with some friends. Her brother, a Protestant, having heard of her flight, accompanied by Bishop Fenwick, brought her back to the nunnery, to her own great satisfaction and the delight of the sisterhood. This trifling domestic affair was eagerly taken up by the leaders of the anti-Catholic faction and magnified into monstrous proportions. The nuns, it was said, had not only driven an American lady to madness, but had immured her in a dungeon, and, upon her attempting to escape, had, with the connivance of the bishop and priests, actually tortured her to death. Falsehoods even more diabolical were invented and circulated throughout Boston. The following Sunday the Methodist and Congregational churches rang again with denunciations against Popery and nunneries, while one self-styled divine, a Dr. Beecher, the father of a numerous progeny of male and female evangelists, some of whom have since become famous in more senses than one, preached no less than three sermons in as many different churches on the abominations of Rome. All the bigotry of Boston and the adjacent towns was aroused to the highest pitch of frenzy, and threats against the convent were heard on every side.

To pacify the public mind the selectmen of Charlestown, on the following day, the memorable 11th of August, appointed a committee to examine into the truth of the charges. They waited on the nuns, and were received by Miss Harrison, who was alleged to have been foully murdered. Under her personal guidance they searched every part of the convent and its appurtenances, till, becoming thoroughly satisfied with the falsity of the reports, they retired to draw up a statement to that effect for publication in the newspapers. This was what the rabble dreaded, and, as soon as the intention of the committee became known, the leaders resolved to forestall public sentiment by acting at once.

Accordingly, about nine o’clock in the evening, a mob began to collect in the neighborhood of Mt. St. Benedict. Bonfires were lit and exciting harangues were made, but still there were many persons reluctant to believe that the rioters were in earnest. They would not admit that any great number of Americans could be found base and brutal enough to attack a house filled with defenceless and delicate women and children. They were mistaken, however; they had yet to learn to what lengths fanaticism can be carried when once the evil passions of corrupt human nature are aroused. Towards midnight a general alarm was rung, calling out the engine companies of Boston, not to quell any fire or disturbance, but, as was proved by their conduct, to reinforce the rioters, if necessary. The first demonstration was made by firing shot and stones against the windows and doors of the main building, to ascertain if there were any defenders inside; but, upon becoming satisfied that there were none, the cowardly mob burst open the gates and doors, and rushed wildly through the passages and rooms, swearing vengeance against the nuns.

Trusting to the protection of the authorities, the gentle sisters were taken by surprise. The shots of their assailants, however, awakened them to a sense of danger. Hastening from their beds, they rushed to the dormitories, aroused the sleeping children, and had barely time to avoid the fury of the mob by escaping through a back entrance in their night-clothes. Everything portable, including money and jewelry belonging to the pupils, was laid hold of by the intruders, the furniture and valuable musical instruments were hacked in pieces, and then the convent was given to the flames amid the frantic cheers of assembled thousands. “Not content with all this,” says the report of Mr. Loring’s committee, “they burst open the tomb of the establishment, rifled it of the sacred vessels there deposited, wrested the plates from the coffins, and exposed to view the mouldering remains of their tenants. Nor is it the least humiliating feature, in this scene of cowardly and audacious violation of all that man ought to hold sacred, that it was perpetrated in the presence of men vested with authority and of multitudes of our fellow-citizens, while not one arm was lifted in the defence of helpless women and children, or in vindication of the violated laws of God and man. The spirit of violence, sacrilege, and plunder reigned triumphant.”

The morning of the 12th of August saw what for years had been the quiet retreat of Christian learning and feminine holiness a mass of blackened ruins; but the character of Massachusetts had received even a darker stain, a foul blot not yet wiped from her escutcheon. It was felt by the most respectable portion of the citizens that some step should be taken to vindicate the reputation of the State, and to place the odium of the outrage on those who alone were guilty. Accordingly, a committee of thirty-eight leading Protestant gentlemen, with Charles G. Loring as chairman, was appointed to investigate and report on the origin and results of the disgraceful proceeding. It met in Faneuil Hall from day to day, examined a great number of witnesses, and made the most minute inquiries from all sources. Its final report was long, eloquent, and convincing. After the most thorough examination, it was found, those Protestant gentlemen said, that all the wild and malicious assertions put forth in the sectarian pulpits and repeated in the newspapers, regarding the Ursulines, were without a shadow of truth or probability; they eulogized in the most glowing language the conduct of the nuns, their qualifications as teachers, their Christian piety and meekness, and their careful regard for the morals as well as for the religious scruples of their pupils. They also attributed the wanton attack upon the nunnery to the fell spirit of bigotry evoked by the false reports of the New England press and the unmitigated slanders of the anti-Catholic preachers, and called upon the legislative authorities to indemnify, in the most ample manner, the victims of mob law and official connivance.

But the most significant fact brought to light by this committee was that the fanatics, in their attack on Mt. St. Benedict, were not a mere heterogeneous crowd of ignorant men acting upon momentary impulse, but a regular band of lawless miscreants directed and aided by persons of influence and standing in society. “There is no doubt,” says the report, “that a conspiracy had been formed, extending into many of the neighboring towns; but the committee are of opinion that it embraced very few of respectable character in society, though some such may, perhaps, be actually guilty of an offence no less heinous, morally considered, in having excited the feelings which led to the design, or countenanced and instigated those engaged in its execution.” Here we find laid down, on the most unquestionable authority, the origin and birth-place of all subsequent Native American movements against Catholicity.