Chapter V.

The Sword Of The Lord And Of Gideon.

Boston, at the beginning of the war, was not a place to go to sleep in. Massachusetts politics, so long eminent in the senate, had at last taken the field; and that city, which is the brain of the State, effervesced with enthusiasm. Men the least heroic, apparently, showed themselves capable of heroism; and dreamers over the great deeds of others looked up to find that they might themselves be "the hymn the Brahmin sings."

Eager crowds surrounded the bulletin, put out by newspaper offices, or ran to gaze at mustering or departing regiments. Windows filled at the sound of a fife and drum; and it seemed that the air was fit to be breathed only when it was full of the flutter of flags.

Ceremony was set aside. Strangers and foes spoke to each other; and the most disdainful lady would smile upon the roughest uniform. From the Protestant pulpit came no more the exhortation to brotherly love, but the trumpet-call to arms; and under the wing of the Old South meeting-house rose a recruiting office, and a rostrum, with the motto, "The sword of the Lord and of Gideon."

The Lord of that time was he at the touch of whose rod the flesh and the loaves were consumed with fire; who sent for a sign a drench of dew on the fleece; at the command of whose servant all Ephraim shouted and took the waters before the flying Midianites, with the heads of Oreb and of Zeb on their spears.

Of course there was a good deal of froth; but underneath glowed the pure wine. It is true that many went because the savage instinct hidden in human nature rose from its unseen lair, and fiercely shook itself awake at the scent of blood. But others came from an honest sense of duty, and offered their lives knowing what they did; and women who loved them said amen. It was a stirring time.

It is not to be supposed that our friends were indifferent to these events. It was a doubtful point with them, indeed, whether they could be content to leave the city that summer. Mr. Southard was decidedly for remaining in town; and Mr. Granger, though less excited, was inclined to second him. But Mr. Lewis had, early in the spring, engaged a cottage at the seaside, with the understanding that the whole family were to accompany him there, and he utterly refused to release them from their promise. As if to help his arguments, the weather became intensely hot in June. Finally they consented to go.

"We owe you thanks for your persistence," Mr. Granger said, as they sat together the last evening of their stay in town. "I couldn't stand two months of this."

Mr. Lewis was past answering. Dressed in a complete suit of linen, seated in a wide Fayal chair, with a palm-leaf fan in one hand and a handkerchief in the other, he presented what his wife called an ill-tempered dissolving view. At that moment, the only desire of his heart was that one of Sydney Smith's, that he could take off his flesh and sit in his bones.

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Aurelia and Margaret sat near by, flushed, smiling, and languid, trying to look cool in their crisp, white dresses.

Miss Hamilton would scarcely be recognized by one who had seen her only three months before. Happiness had done its work, and she was beautiful. Her face had recovered its smooth curves and bloomy whiteness, and her lips were constantly brightening with the smile that was ever ready to come.

Mr. Granger contemplated the two young ladies with a patriarchal admiration. He liked to have beautiful objects in his sight; and surely, he thought, no other man in the city could boast of having in his family two such girls as those who now sat opposite him. Besides, what was best, they were friends of his, and regarded him with confidence and affection.

Mrs. Lewis glanced from them to him, and back to them, and pouted her lip a little. "He is enough to try the patience of a saint!" she was thinking. "Why doesn't he marry one of those girls like a sensible man? To be sure, it is their fault. They are too friendly and frank with him, the simpletons! There they sit and beam on him with affectionate tranquillity, as if he were their grandfather. I'd like to give 'em a shaking."

Mr. Southard was walking slowly to and fro from the back-parlor to the front, and he, too, glanced frequently at the sofa where sat the two unconscious beauties. But no smile softened his pale face. It seemed, indeed, sterner than usual. The war was stirring the minister to the depths.

Mr. Lewis opened a blind near him. A beam of dusty gold came in from the west; he snapped the blind in its face.

"Seems to me it takes the sun a long time to get down," he said crossly. "I hope that none of your mighty Joshuas has commanded it to stand still."

No one answered. They sat in the sultry gloaming, and listened dreamily to the mingled city noises that came from near and far; the softened roll of a private carriage, like the touch of a gloved hand, after the knuckled grasp of drays and carts; the irritating wheeze of an inexorable hand-organ; and, through all, the shrill cry of the news-boy, the cicada of the city.

The good-breeding of the company was shown by the perfect composure of their silence, and the perfect quiescence of their minds, by the fact that their thoughts all drifted in the same direction, each one after its own mode.

Mrs. Lewis was thinking: "Those poor horses! I wish they knew enough to organize a strike, and all run away into the green, shady country."

The husband was saying relentingly to himself, "I declare I do pity the poor fellows who have to work during this infernal weather."

The others were still more in harmony with Mr. Granger when he spoke lowly, half to himself:

"If that beautiful idyl of Ruskin's could be realized; that country and government where the king should be the father of his people; where all alike should go to him for help and comfort; where he should find his glory, not in enlarging his dominion, but in making it more happy and peaceful! Will such a kingdom ever be, I wonder? Will such a golden age ever come?"

Margaret glanced with a swift smile toward Mr. Southard, and saw the twin of her thought in his face. He came and stood with his hand on the arm of her sofa.

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"Both you and Mr. Ruskin are unconsciously thinking of the same thing," he said, with some new sweetness in his voice, and brightness in his face. "What you mean can only be the kingdom of God; and it will come! it will come!"

Looking up smilingly at him, Margaret caught a smile in return; and then, for the first time, she thought that Mr. Southard was beautiful. The cold purity of his face was lighted momentarily by that glow which it needed in order to be attractive.

Aurelia rose, and crossing the room, flung the blinds open. The sun had set, and a slight coolness was creeping up.

"This butchery going on at the South looks as if the kingdom of God were coming with a vengeance," said Mr. Lewis, fanning himself.

"It is coming with a vengeance!" exclaimed Mr. Southard. "God does not work in sunshine alone. Job saw him in the whirlwind. Massachusetts soldiers have gone out with the Bible as well as the bayonet."

Mr. Lewis contemplated the speaker with an expression of wondering admiration that was a little overdone.

"What _did_ God do before Massachusetts was discovered?" he exclaimed.

"I was surprised to hear, Mr. Granger, that your cousin Sinclair had joined a New York regiment," Mrs. Lewis said hastily. "Only the day before the steamer sailed in which he had engaged passage, some quixotic whim seized him, and he volunteered. I cannot conceive what induced him."

"I think the uniform was becoming," Mr. Granger said dryly.

"I pity his wife," pursued the lady, sighing. "Poor Caroline!"

"She has acted like a fool!" Mr. Lewis broke in angrily. "It was her fault that Sinclair went off. She thorned him perpetually with her exactions. She forgot that lovers are only common folks in a state of evaporation, and that it is in the nature of things that they should get condensed after a time. She wanted him to be for ever picking up her pocket-handkerchief, and writing acrostics on her name. A man can't stand that kind of folderol when he's got to be fifty years old. We begin to develop a taste for common sense when we reach that age."

"He showed no confidence in her," Mrs. Lewis said, with downcast eyes, "He often deceived her, and therefore she always suspected him."

"I think that a man should have no concealments from his wife," said Mr. Southard emphatically.

"That's just what Samson's wife thought when her husband proposed his little conundrum to the Philistines," commented Mr. Lewis.

Margaret got up and followed Aurelia to the window.

"I am very sorry for Cousin Caroline," said Mr. Granger, in his stateliest manner, rising, also, and putting an end to the discussion.

"He is always sorry for any one who can contrive to appear abused," Mr. Lewis said to Margaret. "If you want to interest him, you must be as unfortunate as you can."

Margaret looked at her friend with eyes to which the quick tears started, and blessed him in her heart.

He was passing at the moment, and, catching the remark, feared lest she might be hurt or embarrassed.

"Don't you want to come out on to the veranda?" he asked, glancing back as he stepped from the long window.

The words were nothing; but they were so steeped in the kindness of the look and tone accompanying them that they seemed to be words of tenderness.

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She followed him out into the twilight; the others came too, and they sat looking into the street, saying little, but enjoying the refreshing coolness. Other people were at their windows, or on their steps; and occasionally an acquaintance passing stopped for a word. After a while G----, the liberator, came along, and leaned on the fence a moment--a man with a ridge over the top of his bald head, that looked as if his backbone didn't mean to stop till it had reached his forehead, as probably it didn't; a soft-voiced, gently-speaking lion; but Margaret had heard him roar.

"Mr. G----," said Mr. Granger, "here is a lady with two dactyls for a name, Miss Margaret Hamilton. She will add another, and be Miriam, when your people come out through the Red Sea we are making."

"Have your cymbals ready, young prophetess," said the liberator. "The waters are lifting on the right hand and on the left."

The next day they went to the seaside, the ladies going in the morning to set things in order; the gentlemen not permitted to make their appearance till evening.

After a pleasant ride of an hour in the cars, they stepped out at a little way-station, where a carriage was awaiting them. About half a mile from this station, on a point of land hidden from it by a strip of thick woods, was their cottage.

The place was quite solitary; not a house in sight landward, though summer cottages nestled all about among the hills, hidden in wild green nooks. But across the water, towns were visible in all directions.

They drove with soundless wheels over a moist, brown road that wound and coiled through the woods. There had been a shower in the night that left everything washed, and the sky cloudless. It was yet scarcely ten o'clock; and the air, though warm, was fresh and still. The morning sunshine lay across the road, motionless between the motionless dense tree-shadows; both light and shade so still, so intense, they looked like a pavement of solid gold and amber. If, at intervals, a slight motion woke the woods, less like a breeze than a deep and gentle respiration of nature, and that leaf-and-flower-wrought pavement stirred through each glowing abaciscus, it was as though the solid earth were stirred.

A faint sultry odor began to rise from the pine-tops, and from clumps of sweet-fern that stood in sunny spots; but the rank, long-stemmed flowers and trailing vines that grew under the trees were yet glistening with the undried shower; the shaded grass at the roadside was beaded, every blade, with minute sparkles of water; and here and there a pine-bough was thickly hung with drops that trembled with fulness at the points of its clustered emerald needles, and at a touch came clashing down in a shower that was distinctly heard through the silence.

The birds were taking their forenoon rest; but, as the carriage rolled lightly past, a fanatical bobolink, who did not seem to have much common sense, but to be brimming over with the most glorious nonsense, swung himself down from some hidden perch, alighted in an utterly impossible manner on a spire of grass, and poured forth such a long-drawn, liquid, impetuous song, that it was a wonder there was anything of him left when it was over.

Three pairs of hands were stretched to arrest the driver's arm; three smiling, breathless faces listened till the last note, and watched the ecstatic little warbler swim away with an undulating motion, as if he floated on the bubbling waves of his own song.

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In a few minutes a turn of the road brought them in sight of the blue, salt water spread out boundlessly, sparkling, and sail-flecked; and presently they drove up at the cottage door.

This was a long, low building, all wings, like a moth; colored, like fungi, of mottled browns and yellows; overtrailed by woodbines and honeysuckles, through which you sometimes only guessed at the windows by the white curtains blowing out.

"Why, it is something that has grown out of the earth!" exclaimed Margaret. "See! the ground is all uneven about the walls as it is about the boles of trees."

This rural domicil faced the east and the sea; and an unfenced lawn sloped down to the beach where the tide was now creeping up with bright ripples chasing each other.

The house was pleasant enough, large and airy; and, after a few hours' work, they had everything in order. Then, tired, happy, and hungry, they sat down to luncheon.

"Isn't it delightful to get rid of men a little while, when you know that they are soon to come again?" drawled Aurelia, sitting with both elbows on the table, and her rich hair a little tumbled.

Margaret glanced at her with a smile of approval. "That sweet creature!" she thought. And said aloud, "You know perfectly well, Aura, that all the time they are gone we are thinking of them and doing something for them. Whom have we been working for to-day but the gentlemen, pray?"

To her surprise, Aurelia's brown eyes dropped, and her beautiful face turned a sudden pink.

"I never could carve a fowl," said Mrs. Lewis plaintively. "But there must be a beginning in learning anything. I wish I knew where the beginning of this duck is. Aura, will you go look in that Audubon, and see how this creature is put together? We are likely to be worse off than Mr. Secretary Pepys, when the venison pasty turned out to be 'palpable mutton.' We shall have nothing."

Margaret started up. "Infirm of purpose, give me the carver!" she cried; and seizing the knife, in a moment of inspiration, triumphantly carved the mysterious duck, and betrayed its hidden articulations.

Mrs. Lewis contemplated her with great respect. "My dear," she said, "I have done you injustice. I have believed that though you could succeed admirably in the ornamental and the extraordinary, you had no faculty for common things. I acknowledge my error.'Nemesis favors genius,' as Disraeli says of Burke."

After luncheon and a siesta, they dressed and went out onto the lawn to watch for the gentlemen, who presently appeared.

Mr. Granger presented Margaret with a spike of beautiful pink arethusa set in a ring of feathery ferns. "It came from a swamp miles away," he said. "I wanted to bring you something bright the first day."

"You always bring me something bright," she said.

To Be Continued.

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_Problems Of The Age_, And Its Critics.

The article from _The Independent_ of August 20th, which we quote in full below, has been sent to us by the writer of it, with an accompanying note, requesting us to take notice of its observations. Our remarks will, therefore, be chiefly confined to this particular criticism on the _Problems of the Age_, although we shall embrace the opportunity to notice also some other criticisms which have been made in various periodicals.

"The pastor of the Broadway Tabernacle, many years ago, taking a hint from Archbishop Whately,'traced the errors of Romanism to their origin,' _not_ 'in human nature,' but in Old School theology. The ultra-Calvinist doctrine of original sin, he argued, necessitated the dogma of baptismal regeneration; and the doctrine of physical inability brought in the notion of sacramental grace. Mr. Hewit is a living example, and his book is documentary proof, of the justice of this theory. His early training was under the severest of schoolmasters, in the oldest of schools. The problems on which his mind has been exercised from his birth are such as this: How men can be 'born depraved, with an irresistible propensity to sin, and under the doom of eternal misery.' With admirable infelicity, a treatise on questions like this--the freshest of which are as old as Christian theology, and the others as old, if not older, than the fall of man--has been entitled _Problems of the Age_, on the ground (as we are informed in the preface) that they are 'subjects of much interest and inquiry in our own time.' From his hereditary embarrassments on these subjects, the writer makes his way out to a new theodicy, which on the subject of the existence of sin is Taylorism, word for word; on the subject of natural depravity is something like Pelagianism; and on the subject of original sin is a curious notion, which he strives mightily to represent as the sentiment of Augustine. The whole series of ideas is labelled 'Catholic Theology,' and represented as the antagonist of Protestant opinion.

"The volume deserves no small praise as a specimen of lucid, consecutive argument on difficult questions, conducted in pure English. The only serious blemish upon the author's style is his habit, when he has said a thing once in good English, of saying it over again immediately in bad Latin. But this, we suppose, is less the fault of his taste than of his position. The logic of the book, also, has not more faults than are commonly incident to such discussions; it is strong for pulling down, feeble in building up. It reduces to absurdity the statements of some of his antagonists, with wonderfully complacent unconsciousness that a smart antagonist could get exactly the same hitch about the neck of _its_ statement, and drag it to the same destruction.

"The plan of the work is curious. It begins with the primary cognitions of the mind, and goes forward with an _à priori _ argument for the existence of God: that if God exists, he must necessarily exist in Trinity; must create just such a universe; must be incarnate in the Second Person; must redeem a fallen race; must institute the Roman Catholic Church, its sacraments and ritual. The second part is devoted to finding in Augustine the ideas of the former part--ideas some of which, unless that lucid author has been hitherto read with a veil upon the heart,

'Would make _Augustine_ stare and gasp.'

"Besides the limits of space, which are imperative, two reasons suffice to excuse us from examining in detail the course of this ingenious and protracted argument:

"_First_. It is a matter of comparatively little interest to scrutinize severely the _processes_ of a reasoner to whom one half of his _conclusions_ are prescribed beforehand, under peril of excommunication and eternal damnation, while he holds the other half under a vow to repudiate them at a moment's notice from the proper authority.

"_Second_. It is profoundly unsatisfactory to argue against any such book, whatever its origin or pretensions, as representative of the Roman Catholic theology. From page to page the author challenges our respect and deference for his views as being the teachings of the church.'This is Catholic truth; this is Catholic theology.' {176} But, once let us give chase to one of his propositions, and hunt it down into the corner of an absurdity, and we are sure to hear some of the author's confederates trying to call off the dogs with the assurance,'Oh! that is only a notion of Hewit's;' or, 'only a private opinion of theologians;' or, 'only the declaration of an individual pope;' or, 'only a decree of council which never was generally received: the church is not responsible for such things as these.' So slippery a thing is 'Catholic doctrine'! So unrestful is the 'repose' offered to inquiring minds by that church, which divides all subjects of religious thought into two classes: one, on which it is forbidden to make impartial inquiry; the other, on which it is forbidden to come to settled conclusions."

We confess that it appears to us a very puzzling "problem" to find out how to answer the foregoing criticism, or the others from non-catholic periodicals which it has been our hap to fall in with. Not one of them has seriously controverted the main thesis of the book they profess to criticise, or to make any well-motived adjudication of the several portions of the argument by which the thesis is sustained. Some, like the one before us, attempt to set aside the whole question; others content themselves with a round assertion that the arguments are inconclusive; and the residue confine themselves to generalities; or, at most, to the criticism of some minor details. We should not think it worth while to trouble ourselves or our readers with a formal replication to such superficial critics, were it not for the opportunity which is afforded us of bringing into clearer light the total lack of all deep philosophy or theology in the non-catholic world, and the value of the Catholic philosophy which we are striving to bring before the minds of intelligent and sincere inquirers after truth.

The criticisms begin with the title of the work. The critic of _The Independent_ objects to our calling old questions _problems of the age_. _The Southern Review_ coincides with him, and suggests that they should rather have been called "problems _of all ages;_" while another critic, in _The Evening Post_, gives his verdict that they are all to be classed as "problems of a bygone age." This last criticism is the only one founded upon a reason; and is, at the same time, a full justification of the appropriateness of the title before all those who still profess to believe in the revelation of God. The different classes of protesters against the teaching of the church have wearied themselves in vain in searching for a satisfactory solution of the problems of man's condition and destiny; either in some new rendering of divine revelation, or in some system of purely rational philosophy. The despair produced by their utter failure vents itself in the denial that these problems are real ones, capable of any solution at all, and in the attempt to relegate them finally into the region of the unknowable. This is a vain effort. They have forced themselves upon the attention of the human mind ever since the creation, and they will continue to do so, in spite of all efforts to exorcise them. The relations of man to his Creator, the reason of moral and physical evil, the bearing of the present life on the future, the significance of Christianity, and such like topics, can be regarded as obsolete questions only by a most unpardonable levity. The so-called Liberal Christian and the rationalist may in deed proffer the opinion that the solutions we have given are already antiquated. But, with all the hardihood which persons of this class possess in so remarkable a degree in claiming for themselves all the light, all the intelligence, all the spiritual vitality existing in the world, we must persist in thinking that their triumphant tone is some what prematurely assumed. {177} We insist that the problems of bygone ages are the problems of the present ages, and that the solutions of bygone ages are the only real ones, as true and as necessary at the present moment as they have ever been. The restless mind of the non-Catholic world, having broken away from its intellectual centre to wander aimlessly in the infinite void, has plunged itself anew into all the puzzle and bewilderment from which Christianity with its divine philosophy had once delivered it, and, wearied with its wanderings, longs and yet delays to return to its proper orbit. Hence the great problems of past ages have become emphatically the problems of the present, and must be answered anew, by the same principles and the same truths which past ages found sufficient, yet presented in part in modified language, in a new dress, and with special application to new phases of error. The title _Problems of the Age_ is therefore fully justified as the most felicitous and appropriate which could have been chosen for a treatise intended to meet the wants of those who are seeking for help in their doubts and difficulties respecting both natural and revealed religion. Any believer in the Christian revelation who cannot recognize this, and heartily sympathize in any well-meant effort to present the Christian mysteries in an aspect which may attract honest and candid doubters or unbelievers, shows that he has mistaken his side, and has more intellectual sympathy with unbelief than he would willingly acknowledge, even to himself.

Another anonymous critic sets aside with one sentence the entire argument of the book; because, forsooth, it begins with the assumption that the Catholic doctrine is the only true one, and demands a preliminary submission of the reader's mind to the authority of the Catholic Church. Nothing could be more superficial and incorrect than this statement of the thesis proposed by the author. The whole course of the argument supposes that an unbeliever or inquirer after the true religion begins with the first, self-evident principles of reason; proceeds, by way of demonstration, to the truths of natural theology, and by the way of evidence and the motives of credibility advances to the belief of Christianity and the divine authority of the Catholic Church. The thesis proposed or the special topic to be discussed by the author is, Supposing the authority of the Catholic Church sufficiently established by extrinsic evidence, is there any insurmountable obstacle, on the side of reason, to accept her dogmas as intrinsically credible? The implicit or even explicit affirmation that Catholic philosophy is the true and only philosophy, that it alone can satisfy the demands of reason, is no begging of the question; for it is not stated as the _datum_ or logical premiss from which the logical conclusions are drawn. It is stated as being, so far as the mind of the sceptical reader is concerned, only an hypothesis to be proved, an enunciation of the judgment which is made by the mind of a Catholic, the motives of which the non-catholic reader is invited to examine and consider by the light of the principles of reason, or of those revealed truths of which he is already convinced.

A most sapient critic in the London _Athenaeum_, venturing entirely out of his depth, makes an observation on the statement that absolute beauty is identical with the divine essence, which we notice merely for the amusement of our theological readers. The statement of the author is, that beauty is to be identified with the divine essence, by virtue of its definition as the splendor of truth, and because truth, being identical with the divine essence, its splendor must be also. {178} This consummate philosopher argues that beauty must be identified, not with the divine essence, but with its splendor, because it is the splendor of truth. The splendor of God is, then, something distinct from God; and he is not most pure act and most simple being! We cannot wish for a more apposite illustration of the total loss of the first and most fundamental conceptions of philosophy and natural theology out of the English mind--a natural result of that movement which began with Luther, when he publicly burned the _Summa_ of St. Thomas.

_The Mercersburg Review_ denies the demonstrative force of the evidences of natural religion and positive revelation; referring us to conscience, or the moral sense, as the ground of belief in God and in Jesus Christ. This is another proof of the truth of our judgment, that the radical intellectual disease which Protestantism has produced requires treatment by a thorough dosing with sound philosophy. The corruption of theology has brought on a corruption of philosophy, and heresy has produced scepticism, so that we can hardly find a sound spot to begin with as a _point d'appui_ for the reconstruction of rational and orthodox belief. We do not despise the argument from conscience and the moral sense, or deny its validity. We did not specially draw it out, because we were not writing a complete treatise on natural theology; but it is contained in the metaphysical argument establishing the first and final cause. Apart from that, it has no conclusive force. What is conscience? Nothing but a practical judgment respecting that which ought to be done or left undone. What is the moral sense, but an intimate apprehension of the relation of the voluntary acts of an intelligent and free agent to a final cause? It is only intellect which can take cognizance of a rule or principle directing a certain act to be done or omitted, or of the intrinsic necessity of directing all acts toward a final cause or ultimate end. The intellect cannot do this, or deduce an argument from conscience and the moral sense for the existence of God, unless it has certain infallible principles given it in its creation; and with these principles, the existence of God and all natural theology can be proved by a metaphysical demonstration, proceeding from which, as a basis, we prove Christianity and the Catholic Church by a moral demonstration which is reducible to principles of metaphysical certitude. Deny this, and conscience, or the moral sense, is a mere feeling, a sensible emotion, a habit induced by education, a subjective state, which is just as available in support of Buddhism or Mohammedanism as of Christianity. _The Mercersburg Review_ is trying to sustain itself midway down the declivity of a slippery hill, afraid to descend where the mangled remains of Feuerbach lie bleaching in the sun, and unwilling to catch the rope which the Catholic Church throws to it, and ascend to the height from whence Luther, in his pride and folly, slid. Kant's miserable expedient of practical reason may suit those who are content with such an insecure position; but it will never satisfy those who look for true science, and certain, infallible faith.

_The Round Table_, in a notice which is, on the whole, very favorable and appreciative, complains that we have accused Calvinism of being a dualistic or Manichaean doctrine. We have not only affirmed, but proved that it is so. By Calvinism, however, we mean the strict, logical Calvinism of the rigid adherents of the system. {179} The moderated, modified system, which approaches more nearly to the doctrine of the most rigorous Catholic school, we do not wish to censure too severely. Neither do we charge formal dualism, or a formal denial of the pure, unmixed goodness of God even upon the strictest Calvinists. What we affirm is, that, together with their doctrine respecting God, which is orthodox, they hold another doctrine respecting the acts of God toward his creatures, which is logically incompatible with the former, and logically demands the affirmation of an evil and malignant principle equally self-existent, necessary, and eternal with the principle of good, and thus leads to the doctrine of dualism in being. Many orthodox Protestants have spoken against Calvinism much more severely than we have done; and, in fact, while we cannot too strongly reprobate its logical consequences, we always intend to distinguish between them and the true, interior belief which exists in the minds of many Calvinists, excellent persons, and really nearer to the church, in their doctrine, as practically apprehended, than they are aware of.

Our _Independent_ critic is displeased with the Latin quotations from scholastic theology which we have somewhat freely employed, and compliments us, as he apparently supposes, by suggesting that this violation of good taste is to be ascribed, not to any lack of judgment on our part, but to the fault of our position. It is somewhat amusing to notice the patronizing air which this well-meaning gentleman assumes, and the evident complacency with which, from the height of his little, recently constructed eminence, he looks down with a smile of pitying forbearance upon our unfortunate "position." We will consent to waive, once for all, all claims of a personal nature to any consideration which is not derived from our position as a Catholic and a humble disciple of the scholastic theology. That theology is the glory and the boast of Christendom and of the human intellect. We are firmly convinced that there is no true wisdom, science, illumination, or progress to be found, except in following the broad path which scholastic theology has explored and beaten. Although our nice critic--who seems to have more admiration for the effeminate classicism of Bembo and the age of Leo X. than the masculine _verve_ of St. Thomas--may call the scientific terminology of the schoolmen "bad Latin," we shall venture to retain a totally different opinion. It is unequalled and unapproachable for precision, clearness, and vigor. We have employed it because our own judgment and taste have dictated to us the propriety of doing so. We have not been led by servile adhesion to custom, or the affectation of making a display, but by the desire of making our meaning more clear and evident to theological readers, especially those whose native language is not English, and of introducing into our English theological literature those definite and precise modes of reasoning which belong to these great schoolmen. We can easily understand the aversion of our opponents to the schoolmen, in which they are only following after their predecessor, Martin Bucer, who said, albeit in Latin, _Tolle Thomam et delebo Ecclesiam Romanam_, "Take away Thomas, and I will destroy the Roman Church." To the personal remarks of the critic in regard to the author and the history of his religious opinions we give a simple _transeat_, and pass to what semblance of argument there is in rejoinder to the thesis defended in the _Problems of the Age_.

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The critic says that the same process of logic which the author employs against his opponents would destroy his own statements. This is a mere assertion, without a shadow of proof, and we meet it with a simple denial. It is, moreover, a piece of triviality with which we have no patience. It is the language of the most wretched and shallow scepticism, conceived in the very spirit of the question of Pontius Pilate to our Lord, "What is truth?" We have been engaged for thirty years in the study of philosophy and theology, and have carefully examined and weighed the matters we have undertaken to discuss. The substance of the doctrine we have presented is that in which the greatest minds of all ages have been agreed; and it has been proved and defended against every assault in a manner so triumphant that its antagonists have nothing to say, but to deny the first principles of logic, the possibility of science, the certainty of faith. There are, undoubtedly, certain minor points which are open to question and difference of opinion. But, as to our main thesis, that the Catholic dogmas are not contradictory to anything which is known or demonstrable by human science, we defy all opponents to refute it.

By another subterfuge, equally miserable, our critic shakes off all responsibility of even noticing the serious, calm, and well-motived statements which we have made respecting Catholic doctrines. We hold, he says, one half of our doctrines as prescribed by authority, under pain of excommunication and damnation; and the other half, under an obligation to renounce them at a moment's warning, from the same authority; therefore, no attention is to be paid to our arguments. This is one of the most remarkable and most discreditable statements we remember ever to have come across in a writer professing himself an orthodox Christian. Does this inconsiderate writer see to what a dilemma he has reduced himself? Either he must admit that Jesus Christ, the apostles, the Bible, teach him with authority, and plainly and unequivocally, certain doctrines which he is bound to believe, under penalty of being cast out from the communion of true believers, and incurring eternal damnation; or he must deny it. In the first case, he must retract his words, or give the full benefit of them to the rationalist and the infidel, against himself. In the second case, he must lay aside his mask, and step forth with the discovered lineaments of an open unbeliever. We receive the dogmas of faith proposed by the church because they are revealed by Jesus Christ through his Holy Spirit, who is indwelling in the body of the church. We cannot revoke these dogmas into an examination or discussion of doubt, any more than we can doubt our own existence, or the first principle of reasoning. Nevertheless, as we can argue against a person who doubts these first principles, or give proofs and evidences to an ignorant man of facts or truths whose certainty is known to us; so we can give proofs of dogmas of faith which we are not permitted to doubt for an instant to one who does not believe these dogmas, or understand the motives upon which their credibility is established. It is unlawful to doubt the being and perfections of God, the immortality of the soul, the truth of revelation. Yet we may examine thoroughly all these topics to find new and confirmatory proof and answers to objections. One who is in doubt or ignorance may examine and weigh evidences in order to ascertain the truth, and does not sin by keeping his judgment in suspense until it obtains the data sufficient to make a decision reasonable and obligatory. {181} In arguing with such a person, it is necessary to descend to his level, and reason from the premises which his intellect admits. In like manner, when it is a question of the Trinity, the Incarnation, the divinity of Jesus Christ, the canonicity and inspiration of the Scriptures, and all other Catholic dogmas; although a Catholic may not doubt any one of these, and would act unreasonably if he did, since he has the same certainty of their truth that he has of his own existence or the being of God; yet he may examine the evidences which are confirmatory of his faith for his own satisfaction, and reason with an unbeliever in order to convince him of the truth. The subterfuge by which our critic and some other writers, especially one in _The Churchman_, attempt to evade the inevitable deductions of Catholic logic, which they cannot meet and refute--namely, that we cannot, with consistency, argue about doctrines defined by infallible authority--is the shallowest of all the artifices of sophistry. When the Son of God appeared on the earth in human nature, and in form and fashion as a man, claiming infallible authority, and demanding unreserved obedience, it was necessary for him to give evidence of his divine mission. A Jew, a Mohammedan, or a Buddhist cannot, in reason or conscience, believe in Jesus Christ until this evidence has been proposed to him. When it is sufficiently proposed, he is bound to believe; and, once becoming aware that Jesus is the Son of God, he is bound to believe all that he has revealed, simply upon his word. But, supposing he has been erroneously informed that the teaching of Jesus Christ contains certain doctrines or statements of fact which are in contradiction to what seems to him to be right reason or certain knowledge, it is unquestionably both prudent and charitable to correct his mistakes upon this point, and thus remove the obstacles to belief from his mind. Precisely so in regard to the Catholic Church. The demand which she makes of submission to her infallible authority, as the witness and teacher established by Jesus Christ, is accompanied by evidence. It is upon this evidence we lay the greatest stress; and in virtue of this it is that we present the Catholic doctrines as certain truths which every one is bound to believe. Undoubtedly, the infallibility of the church once established, it is the duty of every one to believe the doctrines she proposes, putting aside all difficulties and objections which may exist in his own imperfect, limited understanding. Yet, if these difficulties and objections do not lie in the very mysteriousness, vastness, and elevation of the object of faith itself, but in merely subjective misapprehensions, it is right to attempt to remove them, and to make the exercise of faith easier to the inquirer. Moreover, although it is sufficient to prove the infallibility of the church, and then, from this infallibility, to deduce, as a necessary consequence, the truth of all Catholic teaching; it does not follow that each separate portion of this teaching cannot be proved by other and independent lines of argument. The divine legation of Moses is sufficiently proved by the authority of Christ; but it can be proved apart from that authority. So, the Trinity, the real presence, baptismal regeneration, or purgatory, are sufficiently and infallibly proved from the judgment of the church; but they may be also proved from Scripture, from tradition, and, in a negative way, from reason. In the _Problems of the Age_ our principal intention has been to clear away difficulties and misapprehensions from the object of faith, in order that candid inquirers might not be obliged to assume any greater burden upon their minds than the weight of that yoke of faith which the Lord himself imposes. {182} In doing this, we have endeavored not only to clear the dogmas of faith from the perversions of heretical doctrines, but also to distinguish them from theological opinions, which rest only on human authority, and are open to discussion. We have also thought it best, not merely to mark off doctrines of faith, and leave them in their naked simplicity, free from that theological envelope which is sometimes confounded with their substance; but also to give them that dress which, in our opinion, is best fitted to set off their native grace and beauty. We have not simply expressed the definitions of the church, discriminating from them the opinion of this and that school, and thus barely indicating what must be, and what need not be believed, in order to be a Catholic. We know the wants of the class of minds we are dealing with. They feel the need of some general view which shall give them a _coup a'oeil_ of the theological landscape, and enable them to embrace the details and single objects contained in it in one harmonious whole. They have had so much sophistical reasoning and false philosophy, as well as bad and repulsive theology, dinned into their ears and minds that they cannot be satisfied without some better system as a substitute. We were obliged, therefore, not only to point out that certain opinions--generally repugnant to those who have been sickened by imbibing the Calvinistic and Lutheran poison--are not obligatory on the conscience of any Catholic, but also to present the opinions of another school more remote from Protestant orthodoxy, and less repugnant to those who are called liberal Christians. Our critic seems to imagine that, in doing this, we are merely playing an adroit game in which all kinds of theological or philosophical opinions are used as counters, without reference to truth, and merely with the view of winning as many converts as possible, by any show of plausible argument. At any moment, he says, we are ready to throw away the whole, if commanded to do so by authority. Once caught, those who have been drawn into the church by an artifice will have their minds tutored in a far different way, and be obliged to keep themselves ready to accept the very contrary of that which we assured them was sound, orthodox doctrine, at the arbitrary will of the ecclesiastical authority. Until that authority defines precisely what the sound Catholic doctrine is, we can have no settled, well-grounded opinion; but only conjecture and hypothesis. Let the absurdity of any of these hypotheses be shown by some Protestant controversialist, and the plea is ready that the church is not responsible for private opinions. Yet we have been artful and audacious enough to put forth a network of such hypotheses as Catholic doctrine when they are not Catholic doctrine, and are directly controverted by other Catholic writers. In an article which appeared lately in _Putnam's Monthly_, publicly ascribed to the same gentleman who is the avowed author of the criticism we are noticing, there is a general charge made upon "Americo-Roman preachers," of presenting a "plausible pseudo-Catholicity" quite different from the genuine Italian and Irish article. _The Churchman_, not long ago, made a similar statement which, if not mendacious, is supremely foolish and ignorant, respecting F. Hyacinthe, and certain other devoted Catholics in France.

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The whole is a tissue of cobwebs, which a stroke of the pen can sweep away. The Holy See is not accustomed to condemn suddenly and by the wholesale the probable opinions of grave and learned theologians, much less the doctrines of great and long-established schools. In the _Problems of the Age_, we have been careful to follow in the wake of theologians of established repute, and not to lay down propositions whose tenability is doubtful or suspected. It is possible that some definitions or decrees may be made hereafter which may require us to modify some of our opinions in theology or philosophy, and we shall undoubtedly submit at once to any such decisions. But there is no probability that we shall ever be called upon to change radically and essentially that system of theology which we have derived from the best and most esteemed Catholic authors. There is certainly no reason to think that the tenets distinguishing the Dominican from the Augustinian school will ever be condemned in a mass. Those which distinguish the Jesuit school from either or both of these have been through a severe ordeal of accusation and trial long ago, and have come out unscathed. The same is true of the doctrines of Cardinal Sfondrati. Suarez, St. Alphonsus, Perrone, and Archbishop Kenrick are certainly respectable authority, and a good guarantee of the orthodoxy of opinions sustained by their judgment. Perrone, whom we have followed more closely than any other author in treating of the most delicate and difficult questions, has taught and published his theology at Rome. It has passed through thirty seven editions, and is more popular as a text-book than any other. He is a consultor of the Sacred Congregations of the Council and the Index, Prefect of Studies in the Roman College, and, together with Fathers Schrader and Franzlin, eminent theologians of the same Jesuit school, a member of the Commission of Dogmatic Theology, which is preparing the points for decision in the coming Council of the Vatican. The doctrines advanced in the _Problems of the Age_ in opposition to Calvinism, in accordance with the theological exposition of Perrone, cannot, therefore, be qualified as peculiar or curious opinions of the author, as pseudo-Catholic or Americo-Roman theories, or as liable to any theological censure of unsoundness.

Nevertheless, we have not, as the critic asserts, set forth these or other opinions indiscriminately, and in so far as they vary from the opinions of other approved Catholic authors, as being exclusively the Catholic doctrine. We have used extreme care and conscientiousness in this respect, although our critic is incapable of appreciating it, from his lack of all thorough knowledge of the controversy he has unadvisedly meddled with. We do not qualify as Catholic doctrine, in a strict sense, anything which is not _de fide obligante_, or admitted by the generality of theologians, without opposition from any respectable authority, as morally certain. We censure no really probable opinion as contrary to Catholic doctrine, and are disposed to allow the utmost latitude of movement to every individual mind competent to reason on theological subjects, between the opposite extremes condemned by the church. It does not follow from this, however, that our doctrine is mere hypothesis, and that we are forbidden or unable to come to any positive conclusions beyond the formal definitions of the church. The substance and essential constituents of the doctrine are certainly Catholic, and common to all schools. {184} The Council of Trent condemned the heresies of Calvin and Luther, and the Holy See, the whole church concurring, has condemned the heresies of Jansenius and Baius. We know, also, what was the theology of the men who framed and enacted the decrees condemning those errors, or affirming the opposite truths, what was the spirit animating the church at that time, and continuing in it until the present; and we have in the episcopate, but especially in the Holy See, the living, authentic teacher and interpreter of the doctrine contained in the written decrees. There is, therefore, a solid and common basis upon which all Catholics stand, and upon which it is possible and allowable to construct theological theories or systems. Learning, logic, the intuitive power of genius, and the special gifts imparted by the Holy Spirit to certain favored men, have their full scope in carrying on this work. Through their activity, conclusions, deductions, expositions, elucidations, may be attained, which have a value varying all the way from plausible conjecture and hypothesis up through the different degrees of probability, to moral certainty. For ourselves, we have always studied to find in the most approved authors those opinions which approach as nearly as possible to moral certainty; or, in default of such, those which are admitted to be probable, and to our mind appear intrinsically more probable than their opposites. We write and speak, therefore, not with an economy, or as presenting opinions likely to captivate our readers, but with an interior conviction, in accordance with that which we believe to be really the revealed and rational truth; or else we indicate that we are speaking under a reserve of doubt and suspended judgment. As for the insinuation that we are concerned in any artful scheme for palming off a plausible pseudo-Catholicity in lieu of the Catholicity of the Pope, the Roman Church, and of the faithful people of Ireland, we repudiate it as false, groundless, and injurious. We hold unreservedly to the Pope and all his doctrinal decisions; to the genuine, thorough, uncompromising Catholicity of Rome and the universal church; to the faith for which the martyred people of Ireland have dared and suffered all. Nothing could be more opposed to that astuteness for which Catholic ecclesiastics generally obtain extensive credit, than to attempt such a foolish scheme in this country and age of the world as some persons attribute to us for the purpose of nullifying the effect of our influence and arguments upon the minds of candid inquirers after truth. For what purpose or end could we desire to propagate the Catholic religion in this country, unless we are convinced that it is the only true religion established by Jesus Christ, and necessary to the salvation of the human race? With this conviction, it would be the most supreme folly to preach any other doctrine but that genuine and sound Catholic doctrine which is sanctioned by the supreme authority in the church, and which we desire to propagate. Individuals may, no doubt, err, even with good intentions, in the attempt to discriminate between the permanent and the variable, the essential and the accidental, the universal and the local elements in Catholicity; and in the effort to adjust the relations between the doctrine and institutions of the church and new conditions of human science, or political and social order. But it is impossible for any individual or clique either to master or resist the general Catholic sentiment, and thus to cause the acceptance of any form of pseudo or neo-Catholicism as genuine Catholicity. {185} Moreover, there is the vigilant eye and strong arm of ecclesiastical authority ready every moment to detect and restrain the aberrations of private judgment, and to condemn all opinions or schemes which cannot be tolerated without endangering either doctrine or discipline. The voice of the Holy Father is heard throughout the world, and the voice of the whole Catholic Church will reverberate to the uttermost parts of the earth from the approaching Ecumenical Council. All intelligent persons, more especially all inquisitive, shrewd, and cool-headed Americans, have the means of knowing what genuine Catholic doctrine is. Whoever should attempt to set forth a dilution of Catholicity with Grecism, Anglicanism, rationalism, or any other kind of individualism, as a lure to non-catholics, would, therefore, simply gain nothing, unless a little unenviable notoriety should seem to his vanity a gain worth purchasing by the betrayal of his trust. The people of this country want the genuine Catholicity, or nothing. They will not be deluded a second time by a counterfeit, and become followers of a man, a party, or a sect. Nor do we wish to deceive them. We desire to set before them the doctrine and law of the Catholic Church in their purity and integrity, that they may have the opportunity of embracing them for their temporal and eternal salvation. We have had this end in view in writing and publishing the _Problems of the Age;_ and, knowing well the delicacy and difficulty of the task, we have spared no pains to study the decisions of councils and the Holy See, to compare and weigh the statements of the most approved theologians, and to make no explanations which we were not satisfied are tenable, according to the received criterion of orthodoxy. We do not desire, however, or exact that any of our statements should be taken upon trust by any one. We have written for thinking and educated persons, who have need of light upon certain dark points of Christian doctrine; who are in earnest, and willing to take the time and trouble necessary for learning the truth. Such persons, if they read only English, will find all that is requisite, in addition to the citations made in the _Problems of the Age_, in _Möhler's Symbolism_. Scholars and theologians may satisfy themselves more fully by the aid of the collection of dogmatic and doctrinal decrees contained in Denziger's _Enchiridion_, and of the theologies of Billuart, Perrone, and Kenrick, the first of whom is a strict Thomist, the second a Jesuit, and the third of no particular school. In the exposition of the more antique and technically Augustinian tenets, the works of Berti, Estius, Antoine, Cardinal Noris, and Cardinal Gotti can be consulted. There are many other books relating to the Jansenist controversy, in Latin, French, and English, from which the fullest information can be obtained in regard to the history of the desperate struggle which that pseudo-Augustinian heresy--so nearly allied to the more moderate Calvinism and to one form of Anglicanism--made to gain a foothold in the church, and its thorough and complete discomfiture by the learning and logic of the great Thomist and Jesuit theologians, and the authority of the Holy See.

There remains but one more point to be noticed, closely connected with the topic just now discussed, the charge of Pelagianism made by our critic against our own doctrines, and of semi-Pelagianism made by _The Mercersburg Review_, against the same, which the latter does not distinguish from the doctrine of the Roman Church. {186} The learned Professor Emerson, of Andover, long since called the attention of his co-religionists to the fact that the designation of Pelagian is used in this country very much at random, and by persons who have no accurate notion of the tenets of Pelagius. Calvinism, Jansenism, and Baianism are heresies on one side of the line; Pelagianism and semi-Pelagianism on the opposite. The Catholic doctrine is the truth which they all deny or pervert, exaggerate or diminish, by their false perspective. Therefore, each of them accuses the Catholic doctrine of the error opposite to its own error. This is no new thing, but was long ago complained of by St. Athanasius and St. Hilary. The Arians accused the Catholics of being Sabellians, and the Sabellians accused them of being Arians or Arianizers. We uphold both nature and grace, against Calvinists and Pelagians, therefore we are by turns accused of denying both. In the present instance, we are accused of denying or diminishing grace. The accusation is foolish, and shows a very slight knowledge of theology in those who make it. The Pelagian heresy asserts that human nature is capable of attaining the beatitude which the holy angels and saints possess with Jesus Christ in God, by its own intrinsic power, and is in the same state now as that in which Adam was originally constituted. The contrary doctrine is so clearly stated and so fully developed in the _Problems of the Age_, that it suffices to refer the reader to its pages. The semi-Pelagian heresy asserts that human nature is capable of the beginning of faith by its own efforts, and also of meriting grace by a merit of congruity. This heresy is unequivocally condemned by the church, and rejected by every school and every theologian. There is not a trace of it in a single line we have written.

This leads us to notice a misapprehension into which the editor of _The Religious Magazine_ of Boston has fallen. This Unitarian periodical is one which we esteem very much, on account of its excellent and truly devout spirit; and its contributors belong to a class of liberal Christians whose tendencies inspire us with much hope. It is with pleasure, therefore, that we recognize the candid and amicable tone of the notice which it has given of that which we have written especially for those whose intellectual direction is in the line which it follows. Our Unitarian critic has, however, made the great mistake of supposing that we use an orthodox phraseology, without any ideas behind it different from those of liberal Christians or rationalists. He says, "Setting aside what we cannot help calling theological technicalities, his account of man's moral being accords almost entirely with that which our liberal Christianity would give." "Perhaps the criticism upon our author must be, that he only retains in word and form much which he has abandoned in fact." The writer of this has been so accustomed to associate certain Catholic formulas and words with Calvinistic ideas, that they seem to him to mean nothing when dissociated from them. With him, the logical alternative of Calvinism is Unitarianism; and whoever agrees with him in rejecting the former, must substantially agree with him in holding the latter, however his language may vary from that which he himself uses. The reason of this is, that he fails to apprehend the Catholic idea of the supernatural order; that is, of the elevation of the rational creature to the immediate intuition of the divine essence in the beatific vision. We fear that in the last analysis it will be found that Unitarians have lost the distinct conception of the personality of God, and retain only a vague, confused notion of him as abstract being, and therefore not an object of direct vision. {187} Hence, they conceive of the highest contemplation and beatitude of man in the future life as a mere evolution and extension of our natural intelligence and spontaneity. Or, if they do conceive of heaven as a state in which the soul attains to a direct, personal fellowship and converse with God as a friend, a father, a supreme, intelligent, living, and loving Spirit, with whom the human spirit comes into immediate relations, like those of man with man on earth, they still believe that we are capable of attaining to this by the mere development of our natural powers, and by purely natural acts. There is, therefore, a great chasm between the Unitarian and the Catholic doctrine. The latter teaches, in the mystery of the Trinity, the only real and possible conception of personal subsistence in the divine essence, and sets forth the concrete, living, active, impersonated God, in whom is infinite, self-sufficing beatitude, without any necessity to create for the sake of completing the reason, and relations, and end of his being. This infinite beatitude consisting in the contemplation and love of his own essence which is actuated in the Trinity, presents the idea of a beatitude infinitely superior to and distinct from any felicity to which we have any natural aptitude or impulse. Its cause and object is the divine essence, directly and immediately beheld by an intellectual vision, of which our corporeal vision of material objects is but a faint shadow. The Catholic doctrine teaches that human nature must be elevated by a supernatural gratuitous grace in order to attain to this vision of God; that in Christ it is so elevated, even to a hypostatic union with the second person of the Trinity; that in Adam it was elevated to a lesser or adoptive filiation; that the angelic nature is also elevated to a similar state; and that men, under the present dispensation; are subjects of the same grace. The church teaches, moreover, that this grace is granted to men, since the fall, only through the merits of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ upon the cross; that without divine grace they cannot even begin a supernatural life; that no merely natural virtue deserves this grace; and that it is by faith, which is the gift of God; by the sacraments, and by good works done in the state of grace, in the communion of the Catholic Church, that we can alone obtain everlasting life with Christ. There is as much difference between this doctrine and any form of Unitarianism as there is between the sun and the earth; the star-studded sky and a neat, well-kept flower-garden. Catholics may differ from each other in regard to certain questions concerning the state of human nature when destitute of grace; but we are all agreed in regard to the need of grace for attaining the end we are bound to strive after, the conditions of obtaining this grace, and the obligation of complying with them, as well as in regard to the insufficiency of all media for bringing the human race even to its acme of temporal progress and felicity, except the institutions and teaching of the Catholic Church.

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Heremore-Brandon; Or, The Fortunes Of A Newsboy.