Religion And State In Our Republic
The great questions which concern the relation of the state to the church have already been partially treated of in this magazine. The vast importance of the subject, however, demands that we should return to it once more, and will serve as a sufficient excuse if we even repeat many things which have already been said in previous articles. The relation which the state ought to have to the church according to sound principles of philosophy, the relation which it is intended to have according to the principles of the Constitution of this republic, the relation which it ought to have according to the principles of the canon law and theology of the Catholic Church, and the bearing of these various questions severally toward each other, both in their theoretical and practical import, make up together a complex topic which is under a perpetual and ardent discussion, and which is felt by all parties to involve momentous issues. We have no unwillingness to express fully and unreservedly all our convictions and opinions upon any of the several parts of this question. It is undoubtedly much desired by many who are hostile to the Catholic religion or suspicious of it, on account of its bearing upon the science of politics, that competent persons should make such full explanations of the real and genuine principles by which all sound and thoroughly‐instructed Catholics of the present time in our own country, as well as elsewhere, are and will be guided. We see no reason why their desire should not be gratified, but, on the contrary, every motive and reason worthy of having any weight with a sincere and courageous advocate of the Catholic cause, why the discussion should be brought as speedily and directly as possible upon the merits of the case fully exposed.
The leaders of the Catholic body, and, in due measure, the great body itself, are credited by many persons with certain views and intentions concerning the institutions, laws, and political destinies of this republic which necessarily cause them to regard the increase of our numbers and the extension of our influence in the nation with alarm. Such persons would like to know what we would really undertake to do with this republic, if we had the power to do what we pleased. We are willing to let them know precisely what our opinion about the matter is, and to use our best endeavors to explain what those principles of the Catholic Church are which must form the conviction of every one of her devoted and instructed members upon the right and just method of applying the divine law to the various conditions in which a state may exist; from that in which the church is at her lowest point of depression, to that in which she is at the summit of her influence. In our own case, as citizens of the United States, the manner in which Catholic principles require us to act, as voters, judges, legislators, with that degree of influence we now have, and in which the same principles would require us to act if we were equal or superior in number and influence to non‐Catholics, if we were in the majority, or if we were practically the whole people, is a topic upon which we think it desirable that all should be enlightened, as well those who are members of the church as those who are aliens from her fold. Stated in an abstract form, the question is, What is the ideal Christian state when actualized in its perfection, and what is the difference between that state and the one which is the best practically in our real circumstances?
In discussing this theme we must beg the indulgence of our readers if we begin at a considerable apparent distance from the practical point we intend to come at eventually. We have to lay down some general principles about government, and to make some explanations about the American Constitution, before we can grapple with the main difficulty. In our opinion, many maxims usually taken for granted by speakers, writers, and by their blind followers, in treating of political constitutions, and specially of our own, are sheer assumptions which will not bear examination. Such are, that in general, the spiritual and temporal orders are in their nature and ought to be kept separate from each other, and are really separated in our own political constitution. Those sophistical maxims have been combated by Dr. Brownson so frequently and victoriously that we can scarcely hope to produce any new arguments or more lucid expositions to convince those whom he has not been able to satisfy. Sometimes, however, a sound from an unexpected quarter startles the attention which has remained sluggishly insensible to a louder and more continuous booming to which it has been accustomed for a long time. We trust, therefore, that the authority of a great foreign writer, who is a Protestant withal, and one of the most celebrated historians of the age, will claim some little deference from those who may refuse it to any one of ourselves. And we accordingly resort to Prof. Leo, of Halle, rather than to any Catholic author, for an exposition of the general relation of the state to the church, and of the particular form of that relationship in the United States.
In the introduction to his great work, Lehrbuch der Universalgeschichte, Leo develops with masterly force of reasoning the fundamental principle upon which his entire work is constructed, and which is, in truth, the architectonic law of the history of the human race. The history of mankind is the evolution in successive and progressive stages of the grand plan of God to conduct the human race to its prefixed supernatural end of beatitude in God through the incarnation of the Word. The organization of the various portions of the human race in distinct nations, with their laws, political institutions, and governments, is subordinated to this end, and therefore subordinated to that higher and more universal organization in which all are included, and which dominates over all—the church. The nations which have been broken off from the church which God established from the foundation of the world for all mankind, have been broken off through sin, revolt against God, defection from the movement of the human race on the line marked out by the Creator towards its end and destiny. Yet, even in this defection, they derive all their constitutive and organic principles and forces from their previous union with the divine society or church, and are formed by religious ideas which are merely perverted, corrupted, travestied imitations of the revealed dogmas which their forefathers had received. All true reform, restoration, renovation, and improvement must be effected by a return to unity, a reincorporation into the church, and a reflux of organic life from the centre into the chilled and deadened members.
“No religion can unfold itself among men, extend itself, or maintain its existence, without social relations existing between men themselves. Every religion presupposes a state originating together with itself or already previously formed; but it is equally true that no state is conceivable without a religion, for every state includes a system of moral conceptions, and is itself a system and manifestation of moral conceptions; and a system of moral conceptions without a religious force underlying it is something unthinkable.”
Here we have the statement of the universal principle that the religious and political orders, the spiritual and the temporal, or, otherwise, church and state, are, like soul and body, though distinct, inseparable in living, organized humanity. The author then goes on to prove the truth of his assertion by the example of our own republic, apparently the most notable exception to his rule, and an instance sufficient to disprove to most men of modern habits of thought the universality of the rule as an organic principle of society.
“In appearance, some particular religion may leave the state free to shift for itself or make itself free from it, and some particular state act in the same way toward religion; but this is only in appearance, for when, for example, the North American state proclaims that the religious confession is a matter of indifference in respect to its existence, it proceeds on the assumption that there could not be any religious confession, except such an one as should include in itself that which constitutes its own proper religious force. Just suppose that a religion like that of the Assassins or Robber sects of the East should make its appearance in North America, and you would speedily see how the entire body politic would be violently agitated by efforts to cast out this foreign religious force, and to annihilate it within its own precinct. You would see then at once that the North American state, in spite of all its contrary assurances, has its own religion, and a state religion at that, as the collision of some of the North American states with the Mormons has already amply proved. This North American religion of state only avoids assuming the name and aspect of a religion or an ecclesiastical organization, and manifests itself rather altogether in the ethical institutions of the state as they are for the time being, and consequently permits a most extraordinary variety of religious doctrines and churches to exist alongside of the state, yet only under the tacit condition that they all acknowledge that which is the religious force of the state as their own. If, therefore, the North American state proclaims that religion is an indifferent matter, it proceeds from an absurd imagination that there cannot be any religion which does not include in itself that particular religious force which its own moral subsistence has need of. In point of fact, religion and the state form one ethical whole, precisely as in individual men the soul remains an inseparable whole, although we separately consider particular faces of its exterior surface as special faculties—understanding, will, etc. Religion and state are one single ethical whole, which, although divided into distinct members, and apparently separated in these, must always be united in one germinating point and a common vital root.”(151)
A singular corroboration of the doctrine of Leo in its application to the United States is furnished by the following extract from the New York Herald. If it seem to any one singular that we cite the Herald on such a question, it will cease to appear so when we explain our reason for doing it. This well‐known paper is remarkable for a certain tact and sagacity in divining and expressing the instinctive dictates of American common‐sense upon questions which concern practical, temporal interests. We cite it, therefore, in this instance, as a proof of the fact that the public sensibility is stirred by any practical collision of a foreign and hostile religious force with the latent religious force underlying our own legislation, just as Leo says it must be. Theories and phrases are disregarded; and the mouth‐piece of popular opinion strikes at once, promptly and surely, upon the very head of the nail, and drives it home. It is very singular to see, in the extract we are about to cite, how the instinct of self‐interest and self‐preservation evolves by a short process the same conclusion which the philosopher establishes as the result of long study and thought. Here is the extract in full, with some passages marked in italics by our own hand, to which we wish to call special attention, as containing the nucleus of the whole matter, and agreeing almost verbally with the language we have quoted from Dr. Leo:
“Brigham Young And Polygamy—Will The Prophet Take Sensible Advice?
“Judge Trumbull, United States senator from Illinois, has just had a conversation with Brigham Young in Salt Lake City, which, as reported, is of more than ordinary significance and importance. It seems that as the judge was taking leave of Young, the latter remarked that on returning to Congress he (the judge) might hear of some persons—obnoxious federal officials—being put out of the Territory, and, if done, he might be sure it would be for just and good reasons. Judge Trumbull replied by requesting Young, before he took any step of that kind, to make known his grievances to President Grant, remarking that the President was a just man, intending to do justice to all, but that he would not permit a violation of law to go unpunished, and adding that it would ‘not be safe to molest public officers in the discharge of their duties.’ The judge then asked Young if he promised obedience to the Constitution and the laws of the Union. The latter replied that he would adhere to the Union, but that there was ‘one enactment of Congress which the Mormons would not obey,’ namely, the one forbidding polygamy.
“Here, then, is the whole Mormon question in a nutshell—the positive declaration on the part of the Mormon leader that federal officers, sent to Utah, unless acceptable to himself, should be banished the Territory, and that there was at least one law of Congress he positively refuses to acknowledge or obey. Now, what is the plain duty of the national government in the face of these revolutionary averments? It is to see that the enactments of Congress are enforced without respect to persons or religions, and that the representatives of the federal government legally appointed for that purpose shall be upheld and protected, if it be necessary to employ the whole power of the nation. This Mormon matter demands decisive action on the part of the administration. President Grant has already declared his purpose of enforcing the laws impartially, even the most obnoxious, and there is no good reason why the Mormons should be exempted from the operations of this policy. The fact is, Brigham Young and his satellites have been treated with too much leniency and good‐nature by the United States government ever since they settled upon the national domain, and whatever they have done for the improvement of the wilderness in which they settled they have done for their own benefit, and have reaped the rewards of their industry and frugality. Among the many other settlements that have sprung up in the great West and grown into populous cities and States since the Mormon hegira from Nauvoo, where can one be shown to have defied the United States government, and to have treated its laws and its public officials with the contempt and insolence the Mormons have? On the contrary, among the most loyal States in the Union, and among those which sent into the field the greatest armies during the struggle for our national existence, are States in which the earlier pioneers had to undergo as many perils, hardships, and privations in organizing their communities, in subduing the forests and the savage, and in implanting the seeds of civil and religious liberty and constitutional law, as ever the Mormons did in erecting their Salt Lake empire, and in establishing in the heart of the nation’s public domain a religious organization the corner‐stone of which is a dogma abhorrent to modern civilisation and in violation of all the received rules of decent social and domestic life and society. Therefore the claims of these impertinent and rebellious Mormon squatters for immunity from the operations of the general laws of the country, on account of the service they have rendered in improving a barren waste, but more properly in making fortunes for themselves out of the Gentiles and the government, are idle and ridiculous. Greater hardships and more personal sacrifices, we repeat, have been undergone by settlers in other tracts of territory, now become great and prosperous States, respecting the laws and fighting for the national flag, than ever these Mormon adventurers encountered from the time when old Joe Smith went into the tablet business, after the manner of Moses, and founded the Mormon sect, up to the moment of the conversation Brigham Young held with Senator Trumbull, as related above. They have no claims for political sympathy, for immunity from legal responsibilities, nor for hardly the consideration paid to other religious communities; for the odor of their sanctity is foul, and their moral practices are unlike those of all modern Christians. We say, therefore, to Brigham Young and his deluded followers, that they had better accept the sensible advice of Judge Trumbull, consult with President Grant before they proceed to extremities, accept the laws of Congress in regard to polygamy, as well as in regard to everything else they are required to, and either haul in their rebellious horns or prepare to pack up their baggage for a tramp to some distant country outside the boundaries of the United States. You must obey the law, Prophet Brigham, or you must march. Uncle Sam has stood your nonsense long enough. He will tolerate it no longer.”
What is it which is thus asserted by a paper always considered as advocating the most extreme modern notions respecting religious liberty? It is that there is something in our civilization, our received rules of morality, our lawful principles and acts of administration, intolerant of certain religious dogmas and tending to exclude them. This latent something is what Leo calls our state religion, the religious basis of our institutions and laws, of our whole political and social fabric.
The first point we wish to come at, in our evolution of the whole question under discussion, is, what is this religious basis or fundamental religious law, essentially and precisely? According to Leo and excellent authors of our own, it is the moral law, so far as that law governs political and social relations. Whatever is contra bonos mores is prohibited and excluded by it, and nothing more. But this is too general. We are obliged to ask what moral law, what standard or criterion of good or bad morals, is tacitly understood? To this we reply that, in our opinion, it is the Christian law, as embodied in the common and statute laws under which we have been living since the origin of our nation. If we ask, further, what fixes and determines this Christian law—that is, what criterion determines that which is really prescribed or forbidden by this law—we can assign nothing more definite and precise than the common and general conscience of the sovereign people, as this exercises its controlling power through legislative and judicial enactments and decisions. It is therefore not an unchangeable quantity, but variable and varying in the different laws of the distinct States, and in the different laws of separate epochs which are the result of the change for better or worse which takes place in the moral sense of the community. We cannot enumerate a definite number of moral canons forming our state religion in every part of the country during every period of its history. But we can, at any one time, designate a certain number of things required, permitted, or forbidden by our state code of morals, without respect to the doctrines of any particular religious body. Whatever religious doctrine professed by any set of men contradicts any part of this code, although it may be maintained and advocated theoretically with impunity so long as this can be allowed without immediate danger of inciting to an open violation of the laws, cannot be reduced to practice without bringing the offending parties within the coercive jurisdiction of the courts of justice. A Mahometan or a Mormon will be allowed to advocate in speech or writing the claims of Mahomet or Joe Smith as the great prophet of God, and to defend polygamy as a divine institution; but if he attempts to keep a harem, the law will condemn the act, and will punish it, at least to a certain extent, by inflicting legal disabilities on every one of his wives and children who is not regarded as legitimate by the statutes of the State where he lives. Any enthusiast may give himself out as an inspired prophet; but if he is directed by his fancied revelations to kill some one, to set up a kingdom for himself, or to undertake anything else against the laws, the laws will avenge themselves without regard to his liberty of conscience or his interior conviction that he is executing the commands of God. A very piquant and characteristic expression of this principle was once given by General Jackson. After the capture of the Indian chief Black Hawk and his adviser, the Prophet, an interview took place between the warlike president and these dusky potentates of the forest. The president demanded of the chief an account of the reasons and motives which had led him to make war on the United States. The crestfallen warrior laid all the blame on the Prophet, who was in turn subjected to the stern glance and imperious demand of the formidable old general. Quailing and abject beneath the superior moral force of the great white chief, the trembling Prophet excused himself by saying that he had been deceived by what he thought was the voice of the Great Spirit, but which was only the whispering of his own mind. Upon this the old general, gathering up all the dignity and force of his character into his brow and attitude, and raising his voice to a tone of thunder, turned upon the poor Prophet, and anathematized him with this terrible dogmatic decree: “If you ever again mistake the hallucinations of your disordered imagination for the inspirations of the Divine Spirit, by the Eternal! I will send you where it will be for ever impossible for you to repeat the mistake!” Our chief magistrate spoke according to the written and unwritten law of our constitutions and our traditions. There is a certain point beyond which the practical carrying out of opinions or beliefs, whatever claim they may make to be derived from a superhuman source, will be resisted by the entire coercive and penal force of the law. There are and must be certain inherent principles in our laws, whether these are vague or definite, variable or fixed, which determine this point of physical resistance to liberty of conscience or liberty of religion. These constitute our state religion, which claims for itself a legal infallibility, as exacting and unyielding as that of the Holy See, so far as outward submission and obedience are concerned.
We come now at our immediate question, namely, the attitude of the Catholic religion towards this state religion; and if we are able to designate and define this accurately, we are able by logical consequence to conclude precisely what degree of agreement or opposition is contained in the essence of Catholic and of American principles respectively to each other. We intend to meet this question fairly and squarely, without trying to twist either the one or the other set of principles, or to invent a medium of compromise between them. We take the Catholic principles as they are authoritatively promulgated by the supreme authority in the church, the Roman Pontiff, particularly as contained in the encyclical Quanta Cura, with its appended Syllabus, and as they are taught and explained by the most approved authors in canon law. These definitions and expositions alone have authority in the church, and these alone have any weight or significance in the minds of thinking men who are not members of the church, but are more or less positively hostile to her extension in our country. Private versions or modifications of Catholicity count for nothing, for they are merely the theories of individuals, and will have no influence over the real development of the church, in so far as they disagree by excess or defect with her authoritative teaching. For ourselves, we are purely and simply Catholic, and profess an unreserved allegiance to the church which takes precedence of, and gives the rule to, our allegiance to the state. If allegiance to the church demanded of us opposition to political principles adopted by our civil government, or disobedience to any laws which were impious and immoral, we should not hesitate to obey the church and God. We should either keep silence and avoid all discussion of the subject, or else speak out frankly in condemnation of our laws and institutions, if we believed them to be anti‐ Christian or, which is the same thing, anti‐Catholic in their principles.
We do not try and judge Catholic principles and laws by the criterion of the American idea, as it is called, nor do we justify and vindicate these principles on the ground that they are in harmony with, or reconcilable to, the maxims and ideas upon which our political fabric is based. We aim at making an exposition of the case as it really is; and if we take a view of it favorable to our American political order, it is for the sake of justifying that order, and proving both to our own adherents and to our opponents that our duty to God does not require us to make war on it, so that all the arguments and motives for creating a conflict on the political arena may fall to the ground, and the battle‐field be restricted to the fair, open ground of theological polemics.
What is it, then, which furnishes to a certain set of violent enemies of the Catholic Church in this country a pretext for making the issue between Catholic and Protestant principles a political one, and inclines a great number of the mass of the people to believe or suspect that this pretext is valid? The newspapers, publications, and speeches which have been giving utterance to the sentiments of those who dread and oppose the spread of our religion, ever since it began to show signs of vitality and growth in this country, furnish the answer. The pretext is that all Catholics who thoroughly understand and are loyal to the principles of their religion wish to change or overthrow the republic, and substitute for it a political order fundamentally different; and that, if they ever become strong enough, they will do what they can to carry out their design. Is there any truth in this pretext? We will express our own convictions on the matter as fully and clearly as possible, and leave them to exert what influence they may upon those really sincere and intelligent persons who may honor us with their attention.
In the first place, as to the republican form and constitution of our government. There is no doubt a difference of opinion among our clergy and intelligent laymen in regard to the abstract question what form of government is the most excellent and perfect. In regard to this subject, it is a part of our American liberty that we should be free to form and express our own opinions, and there is undoubtedly a diversity of opinions regarding it among non‐Catholics, as well as among ourselves. It is certain that many of our bishops, clergy, and educated laymen have a very decided preference for the republican form of government, where it can be established under conditions favorable to order, stability, and success. And as to the mass of our people, they have suffered so much from tyranny and oppression that they are inclined to go to the extreme left rather than the extreme right in all questions of political authority and liberty. If we look at the question closely, we shall see that the difference of opinion which may exist in regard to the form of government among those who hold to the divine institution of the state, and the divine sanction to political authority and law, is really not concerning essentials. S. Thomas teaches that the best form of government is one which combines the monarchical, aristocratic, and democratic elements in just proportions. Bellarmine maintains that absolute monarchy is ideally the most perfect form of government, but that, considering the actual state of men, the mixed form is the best in practice. It is our opinion that very few men among the leading classes in the Catholic Church could be found, either in this country or in Europe, who would not agree with the second member of Cardinal Bellarmine’s proposition. This is quite enough for the justification of the governmental order established by our constitutions and laws in our United States. We have the monarchical principle in our president, and governors, and the mayors of cities. We have the aristocratic in the legislators, judges, and magistrates. The existence of the democratic element need not be proved. The difference between our monarchy and aristocracy and those which are hereditary is only that ours is elective, and the difference between them and certain others which are elective is that our election is only for a certain term and by a popular vote. The Pope is an elective monarch. The governing aristocracy of Belgium is elective. The essential principle of the mixed government is simply a stable and legitimate order, under which the monarchy, aristocracy and democracy are created and sustained in the regular exercise of certain functions of government. Catholics are therefore bound by their own principles to recognize the political order in the country as lawful, and to give it their allegiance. Moreover, without any question, apart from singular and individual opinions which Catholics as well as Protestants may entertain, the Catholics of this country are agreed in the conviction that the republican institutions of the United States are the best and the only possible ones for our own country. They have no desire to subvert them, and there has never been any conspiracy against them, except in the malicious or deluded brains of fanatical anti‐Catholic writers and speakers and of the crowd which they have duped. Genuine Catholics will never conspire against our government and laws, but will always be true and loyal American citizens. If the majority of the people or the whole people were to become Catholics, they would not use their power to subvert our American institutions, or substitute for them those of any European nation. On the contrary, nothing could happen which would secure the perpetuity of the republic and promote its political prosperity and glory with anything like the influence which the Catholic religion would exercise in producing such desirable results. The dangers we have to apprehend come from the sectarian divisions which waste and neutralize the religious sentiment and force of the country, from infidelity and radicalism, from vice and immorality, from secret societies, from public and private corruption and profligacy, from swindling and maladministration in high quarters, from principles akin to those of the conspirators of Europe, from detestable books like Lothair, atheistical magazines and unprincipled newspapers—evils for which the Catholic Church alone can furnish a remedy.
Another part of the subject is worthy of much more serious consideration, and requires far more elucidation in order to be presented in its true light. This relates, not to the outward form of the government, but to its inward spirit; to the scope and quality of the legislation, and not to the manner of designating the legislators or judges. All forms of government are lawful before the church, whether absolute monarchies or republics. It is evident that a republic may be governed in perfect accordance with Catholic principles, and that an empire may be governed in complete discordance with the same. A sensible man would not, therefore, be likely to consider the form of our government as the object which demands his particular solicitude in view of the progress of the Catholic religion. He would consider, rather, that the gist of the matter lay in the relation of Catholic principles to that which we have called, after Leo, the state religion. If we are correct in our preliminary statements, the Catholic religion always tends to infuse itself into the state in which it exists, and succeeds as soon as it has become the governing moral force which constitutes the soul of the body politic. Now, what is the relation of the Catholic religion to the actual state religion in our country, and, when they come strongly in contact, what degree of struggle will ensue between them, and what amount of change would be produced by the predominance of the Catholic force?
In the first place, let us consider the case in reference to those things which the Catholic conscience positively enjoins or positively prohibits. In every case of this kind a Catholic must obey his conscience; and if he is subject to a civil law which requires him to violate it, he must die rather than submit. Formerly we have had to make this passive resistance to laws existing in the American colonies; and in some cases—as, for instance, in regard to certain oppressive laws passed in the State of Missouri, it has been necessary to resist some state laws. On the whole, however, we may say that our laws do not put the Catholic citizen into the alternative of incurring a penalty from either the human or the divine law. This part of the case can be therefore dismissed as not practical.
In the second place, we have to consider those things which are the rights and privileges of the Catholic conscience, but which do not concern its indispensable obligations. In regard to these things, a Catholic must obey the law, and he must refrain from all violent and seditious conduct. He must submit to the abridgment of his rights and liberties so long as he cannot obtain their free possession and use by lawful means. But, under our free institutions, it is the right of the Catholic citizen, by argument, influence, and voting, to secure as much as possible of his just religious liberty without prejudice to the natural or civil rights of others. Therefore, as a matter of course, whenever Catholics obtain sufficient power to command a majority of votes, they will, if they act on Catholic principles, demand and obtain all their rights and full equality before the law with other citizens. For instance, in regard to schools, prisons, hospitals, ships of war, fortresses, etc., they will secure the complete right of Catholics in these places to practise their religion and to be free from the interference of non‐Catholic religious teachers appointed by the state.
But what would be the action of Catholics, if they should ever become the majority, in regard to requiring or prohibiting by law those things in which the Catholic conscience differs from the Protestant and non‐Catholic standard of right and wrong? It is always necessary in such a case for all parties to exercise the greatest forbearance, moderation, and fairness toward one another, in order that these questions should have a peaceable solution. Therefore those violent and fanatical or selfish demagogues, both clerical and lay, who seek to exasperate the non‐Catholic citizens of this country against their Catholic fellow‐citizens, are the most dangerous enemies of the public peace. We appeal to all candid, impartial, intelligent American citizens to say who are they who seek to fan the embers of strife into a flame; are they Catholic leaders, or are they the chiefs and orators of a violent, sectarian, anti‐Catholic party? Our Catholic citizens, if fairly treated, will always respect the rights of their fellow‐citizens. They will never take part in despoiling churches, societies, colleges, or other institutions of their property or chartered privileges, as radicals and infidels most assuredly will, so far as they have any power. Catholics will not do anything of this sort, even in case they should in certain States become an overwhelming majority. They will never seek to tyrannize over their fellow‐citizens, to establish their religion by force, or to compel any one to do those things which are required only by the Catholic conscience. The difficulty lies chiefly in respect to those laws which forbid certain things as contrary to the divine law. The civil code consists chiefly of laws prohibiting crimes against the moral law, and annexing penalties to the commission of them. The law must therefore have some ethical standard of right and wrong, and must be based on some interpretation of the divine law, or, in a Christian state, of the Christian law. Now, if the interpretation of the Christian law of morals held by one large portion of the community differs from that of another large portion, what is to be done? This is the precise question which we are seeking to answer in reference to the Catholic and non‐ Catholic portions of the community in any State where the former should be in the preponderance. The case of divorce and marriage is one precisely in point, and the most important and practical of all others which could be mentioned. Let us suppose, then, that the reformation of the marriage code were to come up before a legislature in which the majority were Catholics, under the leadership of sound jurists who were also strictly conscientious in fulfilling their duty of obedience to the church. Would they make the canon law also civil law in globo, without regard to the opinions or wishes of the minority? We think not. In our view of the case, the right and the wise thing to do would be to bring the law back to the condition in which it was during the earlier and better period of our existence as a people, in so far as the assent of the whole people could be secured with a moral unanimity. As for the rest, it would be altogether in accordance with Catholic precedents and Catholic principles not to legislate at all, but to leave the church and the other religious bodies to exert their moral influence over their own members.(152)
If we suppose the entire people of the United States to become a Catholic people, we must suppose, as a matter of course, that the entire law of the Catholic Church, in so far as it is an ethical code, becomes per se the sovereign law of the collective people. This follows by a rigorous deduction from the principles we have laid down respecting the religion of the state. The religion of the state, as we have seen, is its body of ethical principles. This body of principles came by tradition from the Christian teaching which created European civilization. It is, in a vague and general sense, the Christian law. It is good so far as it goes, and in harmony with Catholic principles. But it is imperfect and liable to change, for the want of a competent tribunal to pronounce upon its true, genuine sense in disputed cases. This is seen in the instance of marriage, there being in courts and legislatures no right or power to decide from the New Testament or any other source what the divine or Christian law really prescribes. Let the collective conscience of the country become Catholic, and it at once, without changing the fundamental principle of our organic law, obtains an infallible and supreme interpretation of that law which raises it to the standard of ideal perfection. It becomes a perfect Christian republic, passing under the control of a higher law in all that is comprised within the sphere of ethical obligation, but retaining political, civil, and individual liberty in all other respects, guarded by more powerful sanctions than it ever before possessed.
Do our fellow‐citizens who are not Catholics think it possible that this will ever take place? We suppose not. Nor have Catholics any certain grounds for expecting it, whatever they may hope from the power and grace of Almighty God. There is no reason, therefore, for making a controversy about what the Catholic Church would do in the United States if the whole people were her docile children. The question of real importance relates to the action which Catholics ought to take, and probably will take, as one factor of greater or less power in the political community. Our aim in discussing topics of this kind is, first, to animate Catholics to a manly and honorable determination to secure their own equal rights, and to obey strictly their conscience in all their political and civil relations. It is, in the next place, to persuade our fellow‐citizens that conscience and obedience to the teaching of the Catholic Church do not require or permit Catholics to make an aggressive party, to disturb the peace of the commonwealth, to subvert our laws or liberties, or to invade the rights of our fellow‐citizens, and seek the opportunity of establishing the supremacy of the Catholic religion by violent and forcible means. We have no expectation of convincing, conciliating, or silencing the greater portion of our active opponents. We have not the slightest hope of seeing them desist from their utterly unfair and fallacious method of conducting the controversy between us. Their only chance of success lies in sophistry, artifice, appeals to prejudice, ignorance, and passion, and the evasion of all serious argument. We have, however, great hopes of gaining more and more the hearing, the attention, and the confidence of that vast body of thinking and reading Americans who, if not convinced of the divine origin of the Catholic religion, are certainly devoid of all respect for every form of fanatical sectarianism. They know well that these violent parties, however loud in the assertion of liberal sentiments, are invariably tyrannical when they have power; and we hope to convince them that the Catholic Church, while condemning a false liberalism, is ever the guardian angel of true right and liberty.
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All the foregoing portion of this article was written four years ago, and has been waiting until the present moment for a suitable occasion of publication. The controversy aroused by Mr. Gladstone’s pamphlet in November of the last year has furnished a better occasion than we could have hoped for, and we have therefore offered this contribution to the discussion now going on. The statements we have made in regard to the essential relation between religion and the state with reference to our own republic are equally applicable to the European nations. They cover the whole ground of allegiance due from Catholics to an infallible authority, in respect to the domain of political ethics. This infallible authority is the proximate rule of faith in regard to what must be done or omitted in order to obey the law of God. It is the higher law, the objective rule, directing the subjective conscience, or practical judgment respecting right or wrong, in the individual. It is of course, supreme; for it is an unerring promulgation of the divine law. The definition of the infallibility of the Pope has not made the slightest practical change in respect to his authority of defining and proclaiming this infallible Catholic rule of conscience. All Catholics, bishops included, even when assembled in general council, were always required to assent to and obey his judgments in matters of faith and morals, as final and without right of appeal. The assent of the church could never be wanting, since it was obligatory on every bishop, priest, and layman to give it at once, under pain of excommunication. If some were illogical enough to maintain that the infallibility of his judgments depended on this assent, the erroneous opinion which they held did not subject them to excommunication as formal heretics before the solemn definition of the Vatican Council had condemned and anathematized their error as a heresy. Yet the Roman Pontiff always exercised his infallible prerogative without hesitation, and was always obeyed, except by heretics and rebels. In respect to the promulgation of the divine law to the consciences of all men, the Pope has always been, by divine right, just what he now is—the supreme teacher and judge of the whole earth, as the Vicar of Christ. His power is spiritual, and its executive is the conscience of each individual. Infallibility is obeyed only by interior assent, which is a free act of volition not subject to any coercive force. It is utterly silly, therefore, to say that this submission is a surrender of freedom, or that obedience to a rule of conscience subsisting in an infallible tribunal interferes with allegiance to civil authority one whit more than obedience to any kind of rule whatever. In fact, what Prince Bismarck denounces and wishes to crush is the resistance of subjective conscience to the absolute mandates of the state, for which we have his own plain and express words. His doctrine is the very quintessence of the basest and most degrading slavishness—the slavishness of intelligence and conscience crouching abjectly before pure physical force—la force prime le droit.
Legislative and governing authority in the church is something quite distinct from infallibility. It proceeds from the power delegated by Jesus Christ to his Vicar to exercise spiritual jurisdiction over all bishops and all the members of their flocks, and in general over all the faithful. No direct temporal jurisdiction is joined with it by divine right. The direct temporal jurisdiction of the Pope in his kingdom is from human right, and his ancient jurisdiction as suzerain over sovereign princes was also a mere human right. The indirect jurisdiction which springs from the divine right is only an application of spiritual jurisdiction, varying in its exercise as the civil laws are more or less conformed to the divine law, and depending on the concurrence of the civil power. Suppose, for instance, that a bishop revolts against the Holy See. The Pope judges and deposes him. This act deprives him of spiritual rights and privileges. If he is to be violently expelled from his cathedral, his palace, and the possession of his revenues, the civil magistrate must do this in virtue of a civil law. If he were one of the prince‐bishops of a former age, and were deprived of his principality, the civil law would deprive him. If he married, and incurred temporal penalties thereby, it would be through the civil law. The judgment which pronounces him guilty, deposed, excommunicated, invalidly married, and therefore liable to all the temporal penalties incurred under the civil code, is an act of spiritual jurisdiction. The temporal effect of this judgment is indirect, varies with the variation in civil jurisprudence, and depends on an executive clothed with a direct temporal and civil authority.
Nothing is more certain than that the church has always recognized the immediate derivation of the civil power in the state from God, its distinction from the spiritual power, and its sovereign independence in its own sphere of any direct temporal jurisdiction of the Pope. The statements made above show how the immutable rights of the Pope as Christ’s Vicar in respect to indirect jurisdiction in temporal matters have a variable application in practice, according to the variation of times, laws, and circumstances. It is futile, therefore, to attribute to the Holy See or to Catholics in general, on account of the doctrine of Papal infallibility and supremacy, the intention of striving after a restoration of all that actual exercise of ecclesiastical power in political affairs which was formerly wielded by popes and bishops. Much more futile is it to suppose that a claim to revive ancient political rights derived purely from human laws and voluntary concessions is always kept in abeyance, and to be ever dreaded and guarded against by states.
Catholics ought to beware, nevertheless, of regarding the ancient constitution of Western Christendom under the headship of the Pope as something needing an apology, or as a state less perfect than the one which has supplanted it. We do not share in or sympathize with this view or with the political doctrines of those who hold it, however estimable they may be, in the slightest degree. Although convinced that the mediæval system has passed away for ever, and that the present and coming age needs a régime suited to its real condition, and not to one which is ideal only, we glory in the past which partly realized that Christian ideal.
France was par excellence the Christian nation, as even Duruy, advocate though he be of the principles of ’89, proclaims with a Frenchman’s just pride in the Gesta Dei per Francos. Her golden age was the period between Louis le Gros and Philippe le Bel. Her decadence and disasters began with the contest of the latter sovereign and the infamous Nogaret, precursor of the Cavours and Bismarcks, against Boniface VIII. Crecy, Poitiers, and Agincourt, the dismemberment of France, the conquests of Edward III. and Henry V., the apparition of Etienne Marcel, the father of Parisian revolutionists and communists, were in logical sequence from Philippe’s rebellion, and the logical antecedents of the modern French Revolution and the disasters of 1870. In that olden time France was rescued only by the miraculous mission of Joan of Arc, a kind of living personification of the Catholic Church, in her three characters as virgin, warrior, and victim. So, at a later period, S. Pius V., that pontiff whom Lord Acton has so vilely calumniated, saved Europe from the Turkish invasion to which the recreant sovereigns had exposed it by basely abandoning the Crusades to despoil each other. It needs but small knowledge of history to see through the sophisms of second‐class writers like Buckle and Draper, who seek to despoil the Catholic Church of her glory as the sole author and preserver of civilization in Western Christendom. The history of Europe from the fall of the Roman Empire to this moment is only the record of an effort of the popes to lead the nations in the path of true glory and happiness, and of the ever‐recurring struggle of the civil power, of sophists, and of revolutionists to drag them aside into the path of degradation and misery, for their own base and selfish purposes. Faithless priests, unworthy heirs of noble names, men who have perverted the highest gifts of nature and grace, have, during this long, eventful course of time, been mixed up with the arrogant tyrants, cunning politicians, bold blasphemers, shameless sensualists, and their common herd of followers, in the war against the vicegerent of God and the spouse of Christ. What is now, has been in the time past, and will be until the curtain drops after the finished drama. There are similar actors on both sides now, and a similar struggle, to those recorded in the history of the past. We may expect a similar result. La Pucelle was falsely accused, unjustly condemned, suffered death by fire, and triumphed. The Catholic religion is La Pucelle. Abandoned, falsely accused, doomed to the flames, by an ungrateful world, recreant or cowardly adherents, and open enemies, it will be hailed in the age to come by all mankind as the saviour of the world.
Release
I sometimes wish that hour were come When, lying patient on my bed, My soul should view her future home With eager, trembling wings outspread And earnest faith; that age and pain Should pass at death’s divine behest, As the freed captive leaves his chain When he has ceased to be the guest Of prisons—on the dungeon floor A burden dropped for evermore.
Eternal joy, eternal youth, Await beyond that portal gray— Which all must pass that hope for truth— The lonely spirit freed from clay; But suffering only bids us yearn For that mysterious, strange release Which through the grave, the funeral urn, Brings such infinitude of peace. Oh! in that dread, ecstatic hour Uphold me, Saviour, with thy power.
The Veil Withdrawn.
Translated, By Permission, From The French Of Mme. Craven, Author Of “A Sister’s Story,” “Fleurange,” Etc.
XXXIV.
I pretended to be very much surprised the next morning when Lando informed me Gilbert was obliged to take his departure the following day in order to join an English friend of his who was to accompany him to Egypt and had sent a despatch he should be at Malta by the end of the week.
I recollect nothing more concerning that morning except my depression, which only increased as the day advanced. Towards night this sadness assumed a new character, and became still deeper in consequence of a letter from Lorenzo, announcing his return the following day.
He had left Milan, and was now at Bologna. He was really there this time, and not pretending to be, as when he went to Sorrento to see Donna Faustina! Oh! what bitter thoughts, what feelings of indignation, were awakened by the perusal of this letter, at once devoid of affection and sincerity! He doubtless supposed a scandal published in so many newspapers, though only the initials of the persons concerned were given, had come to my knowledge, but he was in that sort of humor in which the wrongs one has to endure produce an irritation against those who have the most to suffer in consequence. It was evident he felt some regret for the past, but there was not a symptom of repentance; and though he did not say so directly, his letter seemed intended to warn me, as he had once done, with regard to questions, advice, and promises, that he was not disposed to endure the slightest reproach. Not a word that appealed to my generosity, not one that could touch my heart! I could see nothing to cheer and console me in that direction. All was dark and cold. Such was my conviction on reading this letter. But I did not appear the less cheerful when evening came to remind me that my interior struggle would be over in a few hours, and the next day I should feel at liberty to yield without restraint to thoughts I should no longer be afraid to betray.
The large drawing‐room on the ground floor which opened into the small garden after the fashion of Pompeii, with its pillared portico, had been arranged for the occasion by Lando, who had constructed a platform, ornamented with lights and flowers, where the concert he had improvised was to take place, varied by speeches.
Gilbert was to explain its object at the commencement, and at the end, Angiolina, for whom Lando had begged this exceptionally long evening, was to go around with a basket to collect the money intended for the poor people whose lives had been saved by her mother.
Lando excelled in such arrangements, and, to tell the truth, he had left nothing here to be desired. I must also add that all of our little coterie, except Gilbert, Stella, and myself, eagerly participated in the work.
My aunt, in particular, looked with a favorable eye on this mixture of charity and amusement, which at once satisfied her kind heart and gratified her dominant passion. It seemed to her a more delightful invention had never been brought from beyond the Alps. Besides, she had that very day made a discovery which put an end to her maternal indecision with regard to her daughter’s fate. This indecision, in consequence of Lando’s intentions, which became more and more evident, was caused neither by the frivolity for which he might have been reproached, nor by the extravagance with which he had squandered his modest patrimony, nor by any other motive dictated by prudence, but solely by a difficulty which vanished in the twinkling of an eye as soon as my aunt discovered a fact she was before ignorant of, to wit, that Lando Landini, like a great many younger sons of good family in Italy, had a right to assume, on marrying, a title he had not heretofore borne. Oh! from that instant nothing more was wanting. She had always found Don Landolfo nearly faultless, but now he could offer her daughter the charming title of the Countess del Fiore, he was perfection itself. After such a revelation, her consent was not deferred for an instant. Lando, in the midst of the preparations he was making, had taken time to come in haste to communicate the news. This explained the air of triumph, as well as joy, with which my aunt made her appearance in the evening, and the unusual brilliancy of Teresina’s black eyes, greatly set off by the white dress and coral ornaments she wore. Her sister had also something in her manner that evening that differed a little from the unmeaning placidity which usually characterized her. She was not as pretty as Teresina, but she had a more agreeable expression, and a better right to the epithet of simpatica which was sometimes given her. Their faces were both flushed with the excitement produced in advance by the pleasure of singing in company when it could be done without fear and without any doubt of success. And my cousins had voices of superior quality, such as are often met with in Italy, and harmonized wonderfully together. They were, moreover, very good musicians, and though their style was not perfect, every one listened to them with pleasure, more especially the young amateur of music who had been appointed to accompany them that evening. For some time, the Baron von Brunnenberg had regarded Mariuccia in a most sentimental manner; but hitherto the handsome young Englishman, Harry Leslie, seemed to please her more than the baron, and consequently she had always treated the latter with more or less coldness. It was evident, however, that Leslie, since the evening on Mt. Vesuvius, had not a thought or look, or scarcely a word, for any body but Stella. I often wondered if this had any effect on her, as I observed her occasionally pensive air so unlike her usual self. However the case might be, Mariuccia had drawn therefrom a practical conclusion for her own personal benefit: Leslie did not care for her; she must therefore resign herself and turn to some one else. This resignation led her to favor the baron with such smiles as he had never obtained before, so that he also was radiant, and the group around the piano presented an appearance of the utmost satisfaction. I felt a sensation of surprise as I looked at their smiling faces and heard their merry voices. I seemed to be separated from them by an impassable grate that permitted me to see and hear them, but absolutely prevented me from approaching to participate in their liveliness and joy. “Happiness ... gaiety ... hope ... all these are at an end for me!” said I to myself. Nevertheless, I fulfilled all it was incumbent on me to do, and succeeded in appearing nearly the same as usual.
At length, all the company arrived, and when they had taken their places and every eye was turned towards the platform, I took Angiolina, and, going to the embrasure of a window, I sat down where I was half concealed, and took the child on my knee. The company of this angelic little creature was not only always delightful and soothing, but she had a singularly precocious instinct of the beautiful which excited my wonder and made me keep my eyes on her while she was listening to music, and even to poetry whose rhythm delighted her ear even when the words were beyond her comprehension, especially when it was her mother who was repeating it. At such times nothing was more touching than to behold the animated expression of her sparkling blue eyes and the tremulous movement of her childish mouth!... I now clasped her in my arms, and it seemed as if the agitation of my heart subsided as I embraced her!
The baron first played, by way of overture, a piece of Mendelssohn’s which disposed the audience to be attentive: then, after a moment’s silence, Gilbert made his appearance. He was extremely pale, and seemed to be making a great effort to rise above some great moral or physical suffering. This was so evident that he might have claimed the indulgence of the audience and excused himself on the plea of a real or pretended indisposition. But presently his voice grew stronger, the orator was roused, and his manner, usually so unpretending, became what it always was when he spoke in public—imposing, brilliant, and impressive. What he said at first I cannot tell. Too many recollections crowded on my mind at once as he made his appearance, reminding me of the day when I first heard him at the Hôtel de Kergy. I remembered what I was then, what my feelings, what my hopes were. I thought of all the changes that had since taken place, and what a singular coincidence it was that he should appear before me on the day of our separation in the same way as when we met for the first time! My attention was soon drawn to the words of the speaker by the murmur of approbation, that soon increased to enthusiastic applause, with which they were received. To speak of Vesuvius at Naples, and to Neapolitans, in a way to excite their interest, requires a tour de force, and this feat he was able to accomplish. With the ready appreciation of ability which characterized his audience, the difficulty he had to surmount was felt, and lively spontaneous applause interrupted him at every instant, as he mingled poetry, art, and history with an originality and grace that did not permit the least appearance of pedantry to diminish the charm of his profound, unstudied erudition. But when he finally came to the account he was appointed to give of our recent excursion, and began by describing the spot where we had witnessed the eruption together, I could not repress a thrill of emotion. I fancied, his eyes had detected me in the corner where I was concealed, and when he added that he felt in the presence of that spectacle a profound emotion the remembrance of which could never be effaced, however long the duration of his life! I leaned my forehead against Angiolina’s fair head as if everybody could understand the double meaning of his words, and for some minutes I heard nothing but the rapid beating of my heart....
All at once the child looked eagerly up, and touching my cheek with her little hand to attract my attention, she said in a joyful tone:
“Listen, listen to what he is saying about mamma!”
Then everything else was forgotten for an instant but the pleasure of hearing Stella’s courageous deed related in the noble, incomparable language peculiar to Gilbert. There was a burst of applause on all sides, and I was about to add mine when my attention was suddenly attracted and concentrated in an unexpected direction, as if dazzled by one of those repeated flashes of lightning that set the heavens aflame, and which is distinguished from the others by a more terrible brilliancy.
It had occurred to Lando to ornament the platform with shrubs and flowers, in order to conceal from the spectators those who were to take part in the performance till it was their turn to appear. Stella was in this way concealed from everybody but me. From the place to which I had betaken myself I could see her distinctly, and follow every movement she made, without her being aware of it. I was soon surprised and struck with the effect of the address she was listening to. It was not merely attention; it was not interest; it was a breathless emotion which contracted her features, and to such a degree that I thought she was going to faint. I had already risen to go to her assistance, when I was struck with a sudden idea which nailed me to the spot—an idea that no sooner crossed my mind than it became a certainty, and caused me such terrible anguish that I was frightened. I looked at her steadily, trying to imagine and read her thoughts, and while penetrating to the depths of her heart, I felt mine sink within me. Alas! Why should the discovery I thought I had made thus cause me to tremble and shudder? Why did it seem as if I had been struck by an arrow that pierced me to the heart?
I endeavored to overcome the repugnance I was so weak as to feel in my soul. Yes, I tried to regard Stella in the new light that had just dawned on me, and to consider him in this same light—him!... I tried to say to myself without shrinking that before me was the very one of whom I had spoken the evening before; who was at once beautiful, good, noble‐hearted, and worthy of him—and one whom he could love without fear, without scruple, without remorse. I tried to do all this, and like every effort to rise above self, this did me good, perhaps, and rendered me stronger; but I did not gain the victory.
As soon as Gilbert finished speaking, I watched him, in spite of myself, while Stella’s name was mingled with his in the enthusiastic acclamations of the audience, and—shall I avow it?—I noticed with pleasure that he left the platform without the least thought of approaching her. He slipped away as quickly as he could through a little door that opened on the portico, and from the shadowy recess where I was sitting, I could see him in the moonlight leaning against a pillar in the attitude of one who is reposing after some great effort or long constraint.
I was for some time incapable of giving the least attention to what was going on around me. I vaguely listened to A te sacrai Regina, to which Mariuccia’s fine contralto voice gave wonderful expression; and after this duet from Semiramis, various other pieces were played by the baron. One of these gave me a thrill, and brought me back to a sense not only of the present but of the past. It was the air of Chopin’s which Diana de Kergy played at Paris on that other farewell occasion! Everything to‐night seemed combined to overwhelm me with recollections and emotion! I could hardly bear to listen to this music, it so overpowered me with its heartrending, passionate character. My eyes, in spite of my efforts, were already filled with tears when the young amateur abruptly stopped and struck up a waltz from Strauss, with so much spirit and brio that Angiolina jumped down, as if drawn by some irresistible impulse, and began to whirl around, holding her little dress up with both hands. All those in the assembly who were still in their teens seemed strongly tempted to follow her example; but the waltz soon ended, silence was restored, and Angiolina returned to my side as Stella, in her turn, made her appearance.
The object of the soirée sufficiently accounted for the acclamations with which she was received—a marked homage to the noble deed that had just been eulogized in such eloquent terms. When these subsided, the silence became profound.
Stella remained motionless while all these demonstrations were going on around her in her honor, and did not seem to be aware of them. I can see her still in her white dress, the flowing sleeves of which displayed her hands and arms. Her only ornament was a circlet of gold, which confined the waving masses of her thick, brown hair. She did not look paler than usual, for her complexion, of dazzling whiteness, rarely had any color; her eyelashes and eyebrows were as dark as her hair, and her eyes, when nothing animated her, were of a rather dull gray; but at the least emotion the pupils seemed to dilate, and deepen in hue, and then nothing could surpass their brilliancy! This change was especially remarkable when she exercised the natural talent for declamation which she possessed without having ever cultivated it. Her sense of the poetic was profound and accurate, and her voice, full and sonorous, was precisely adapted to express what she felt at the moment in her heart. To this were added simple, natural gestures, which the mere movement of her beautiful hands and arms always rendered noble and graceful. There was no affectation about her, and yet her face, usually animated by extreme gaiety, possessed a strange tragical power. Such was Stella’s talent—a sufficiently faithful reflection of the character of her soul.
During the noisy manifestations that greeted her appearance, she was apparently very calm, as I have just described her; but her hands were clasped nervously together, and an almost imperceptible movement of her lips indicated more agitation than she manifested outwardly. But this repressed emotion added to the very charm of her voice when she began with incomparable grace a sonnet from Zappi; and when, striking another chord, she repeated a scene from one of Manzoni’s finest tragedies, there was a genuine thrill of admiration in the audience. I noticed poor Harry Leslie, in particular, who was touched, excited, amazed. I looked around for Gilbert—and (pardon me, O my God!—forgive me, Stella!) I was glad to see he was not present. The very power which each of them possessed in a different way of moving an audience seemed to establish a relationship between them, the bare thought of which made me suffer, and this suffering was as harrowing as remorse!
Finally, Stella began the canto at the end of the Divina Commedia, which commences with this prayer—certainly the most beautiful ever inspired by genius and piety: “O Vergin Madre! figlia del tuo Figlio!”(153) At that moment Gilbert reappeared. He did not enter the room, but remained leaning against the door. Nevertheless, I saw a slight flush pass over Stella’s brow; I heard her voice tremble; and I knew she was aware of his presence and had lost some of her self‐control. As for him, I saw he was surprised and astonished. He added his applause to that of the whole assembly. But when they all rose at the end to crowd around Stella, his eyes turned in a different direction, and it was evident he thought of her no longer.
At that instant, little Angiolina, who was leaning against my shoulder, mutely contemplating her mother, and only saying from time to time in a low voice, “How beautiful! Isn’t it beautiful?” as if she were listening to some musical strain, was borne away by Harry Leslie, who, as was appropriate, had been appointed to accompany the little quêteuse. There was now a bustle and general confusion, as is often the case after prolonged silence and attention, and everybody seemed wild with gaiety. To this merriment was added the noise of a deafening march which the baron played, as he said, by way of accompaniment to the triumphant progress of the child borne around the room on Leslie’s shoulder to receive the contributions that were to end the soirée.
The contrast between the state of my mind and all this tumult, animation, and gaiety, only served to heighten the agitation of my soul to the utmost. All the doors and windows of the room were open, and I mechanically went out and leaned for a moment against the same pillar where I had seen Gilbert only a short time before. While standing there, I suddenly heard his voice beside me:
“Adieu! madame,” said he in a low, trembling tone.
“Adieu, Gilbert! May heaven protect you!” I replied, extending my hand. He took it, pressed it to his lips, gave it a slight pressure, and that was all.... He was gone! I followed him with my eyes, by the bright moonlight, till he disappeared under the trees of the avenue.
I remained motionless in the place where I was, looking alternately at the garden around me bathed in the light of the moon, and at the brilliantly illuminated salon within. And while my eyes wandered from one to the other, it seemed as if everything before me disappeared never to return, that these bright lights were about to be extinguished never to be relighted again, this numerous assembly dispersed never to be reunited, and it was the last time I was to mingle in the gay world surrounded by all the display that wealth could afford. The impression was singular; but what is certain, I felt at that very moment all my happiness was over, that which was dangerous as well as that which was legitimate, pleasure as well as repose, joy as well as peace, memory as well as hope! It was a moment of agony, but the sufferings of such agony, however terrible they may be, are they not, like a mother’s throes, the signs and prelude of life?
XXXV.
When I returned to the drawing‐room, I found scarcely any one left. Leslie came to tell me Stella had gone away without bidding me good night, because she was in a hurry to take Angiolina home as soon as the collection was ended. Presently nobody remained. Silence once more reigned, and I found myself alone, face to face with myself!
But I by no means experienced the happiness that so often results from the accomplishment of a duty, or the consummation of a sacrifice. On the contrary, I felt a desolation which was the prelude of a state of mind which was to render the following days gloomy beyond any I ever spent in my life—gloomy! yes, as the profound darkness of night just before the dawn!
While Gilbert remained, I did not allow myself to analyze my feelings for fear of shaking my resolution. I was able to maintain it to the end; but as soon as he was gone, I gave free course to every thought that could aggravate my sufferings. I now experienced that isolation which, from childhood, I had dreaded more than death! Lorenzo no longer cared for me, I should never behold Gilbert again, and the friendship of Stella, the only one who comprehended and pitied me, I was not sure of preserving!
I now began to recall, and study, so to speak, all that had taken place during the evening just at an end, but this only seemed to increase the conviction that had taken such strong possession of my mind. I felt determined, however, to ascertain the truth. I would satisfy my mind. I would question her till she told me exactly all that was passing in her heart.
But Stella, with all her gaiety, was not a person who could readily be induced to make a confidential disclosure of her most secret thoughts. Without the least dissimulation, she was impenetrable. She knew how to enter fully into the feelings of others—their joys and, above all, their sufferings. But if, on the other hand, any one sought to participate in hers, a smile, the opening of her large eyes, or a slight movement of her lips and shoulders, seemed to forbid looking beneath the serene expression of her smiling face. The truth was, she thought very little about herself. There was no duplicity in the habit she had acquired of never lifting the veil that concealed the inner workings of her heart, for she did not try to raise it herself, and was by no means curious to fathom all that was passing there.
When I saw her again, I found her, therefore, nearly the same as usual—a little graver, perhaps, and somewhat more quiet, but that was all. As to questioning her, I did not dare to, and the query soon rose in my mind: Have I read her heart aright? And to this immediately succeeded another: Has she read mine? I dwelt on these questions a long time without being able to answer them to my satisfaction.
What inclined me to decide in the affirmative was the care we both took to avoid mentioning Gilbert’s name, the tacit agreement we made not to prolong our interview, and the facility with which, under some trifling pretext, she excused herself from driving out with me, though she consented to let me take her little Angiolina.
I set off, therefore, with the child, and drove beyond Posilippo where the road descends to the water’s edge. There I left the carriage, and taking the child, I went down to the shore and seated myself so near the sea that the waves died softly away at my feet. I had a particular fancy for this spot. Seated there in full view of Nisita, with Ischia, Procida, Capo Miseno, and Baja in the distance, Pozzuoli at the right, and the heights of Posilippo and Camaldoli at the left and behind, I seemed to be a thousand leagues from the inhabited world, in a spot where it was easier than anywhere else to forget all the rest of the universe.
While I sat there silently gazing around me, Angiolina was running about gathering sea‐shells to fill the little basket she had brought for the purpose. Occasionally she stopped and clapped her hands with delight as she looked around. More than ever did I at that moment envy Stella the happiness that prevented her from feeling the isolation and intolerable void in which I was plunged! I envied her, and forgot to pity her! I forgot, moreover, to tremble for her! One would have thought the saying: “Aux légers plaisirs les souffrances légères; aux grands bonheurs les maux inouis,” or, at least, the evident truth they contain, had never struck my mind!
At that time I only dreamed of human happiness under every conceivable form—a happiness that seemed to be accorded and permitted to others, but of which I was for ever deprived. And while Angiolina continued to ramble about, not far off, I ceased admiring the spectacle before me, and suddenly burying my face in my hands, I burst into tears. At the same instant I felt Angiolina’s little arms around my neck.
“Zia Gina!” she exclaimed (she had heard her mother call me Gina, as well as sister, and composed therefrom the name she always gave me). “Zia Gina, what makes you cry?”
“I am sad, Lina,” said I, my tears falling on her beautiful fair curls.
“Why?”
“I cannot tell you.”
“Can you tell the good God?”
What a singular question!... She made me blush, and, after a moment’s reflection, I replied somewhat evasively:
“One can tell him everything, Lina, for he is our Father.”
“Yes, I know he is our Father; I call him so every day.”
Her attention was diverted an instant by a butterfly she saw floating by. She watched it till it flew away, and then resumed:
“Then, my dear Zia Gina, you must pray God to console you.”
“Pray for me, carina.”
After some reflection, she said: “I only know two prayers—the Our Father and Ave Maria: which shall I say for you?”
“Say both of them.”
“Yes, certainly: Our Father first; I like it so much.”
And there on the shore she folded her hands, raised her eyes, as blue as the heavens to which she raised them, and with her clear, silvery voice softly repeated the divine words. If ever there were lips on earth worthy of being the echo of that voice which once uttered this prayer that we might learn it, they were certainly the innocent lips now repeating it beside me! I too clasped my hands and joined in her prayer.
When it was ended, she stopped a moment with a thoughtful air, and then repeated: “Deliver us from all evil.”
“But, as I am praying for you, ought not I to say to Our Father: Deliver Zia Gina from all evil?”
“Yes, my darling,” exclaimed I, embracing her: “yes, pray always in this way for me, and may God hear and bless you!”
Her angelic face, her piety and innocence, completely diverted my mind from my sorrows. I only felt an infinite joy at not having rendered myself unworthy to hear the words she had just uttered. I had suffered; I still suffered, of course; but I had prayed, and still prayed, to be delivered from temptation and sin, and it seemed to me a ray from heaven had fallen on me in answer to this angel’s prayer!
But this impression, though lively and consoling, was only momentary, I had to return to the reality of life, and this reality was painful. It became much more so the following day when Lorenzo at last returned.
He did not, of course, appear like a man who returns to the fireside he loves and respects. Nor could he be expected to present himself in the attitude of a penitent. I was far from being prepared, however, for the stand he took and the complete change I found in him, but Lorenzo had been endowed by Divine Providence with such rare gifts that, in giving himself up to evil instead of good impulses, he had to suffer from the law which condemns those to stray further away and fall lower who would perhaps have become guides to others had they not erred from the right way. The serious errors into which he had fallen, less excusable than they would have been at any other epoch of his life, were this time accompanied by a shamelessness and indifference to scandal that at once wounded and disgusted me. The consciousness of faults he would not acknowledge caused him insupportable uneasiness, and this produced a complete change in the expression of his face, his language, and even in his manners, formerly so dignified and courteous, but now haughty and not unfrequently rude. But what was specially evident was, the fatal fascination he did not cease to feel. The fact was, he had not been driven from her by disgust: repentance and duty had not led him to return to me. She who had forsaken him still reigned in his heart, and the influence I had over him so short a time before, was now utterly destroyed!
All this was clearly perceptible from the first day of his return. I saw he was even rather irritated than pleased at having no reproach to make me. In fact, he did not propose peace, but imposed it, on the condition of absolute silence on my part. The slightest reproach from me, I felt, would have been the cause of a violent scene and perhaps of open rupture!
Such was the aspect my life assumed at Lorenzo’s return. Will any one be astonished at the revolt I felt in my heart in spite of my apparent submission, which was only a mixture of pride and disdain? Will any one wonder at the harrowing regrets, dangerous recollections, and profound discouragement which threw me into the deepest melancholy, and sometimes into utter despair? I began my life over again in imagination with Gilbert, and dwelt on what it might have been, that I might suffer the more for what it was!
This remembrance seemed to be my only resource: these vain desires and regrets my only solace. I gave myself up to them with my whole heart, and thus, while I considered myself irreproachable, I was as much separated from Lorenzo as he was from me, and I allowed myself to live interiorly in a world over which I had no scruple in allowing another to reign almost absolutely!
The following Saturday I was at the grate of the convent parlor a long time before my usual hour. The anguish of my soul was at its height, and for the first time, without regard to the place where I was, and perhaps I ought to say, to her who listened to me, I made known all my troubles to Livia, not only Lorenzo’s new offences, but also my other trials, my inclinations, my regrets, and what at the same time I called my “courageous sacrifice.”
She turned pale as she listened to me, and an expression of grief, such as I had never seen her wear, came over her face, which remained anxious, even when I told her that she unawares had given me the strength to accomplish it.
“So much the better,” said she; adding, with a grave smile, “If that is the case, I certainly did not this time play the part of a jettatrice!... But, Ginevra, you escaped a less fearful peril the day I saw you borne by that furious horse towards the abyss. You were saved when I saw you again, whereas to‐day....”
“To‐day?... Are you not satisfied? Have I not obeyed what I felt were your wishes?”
“Yes, my poor Gina, you have made an effort, a courageous effort; and yet you deceive yourself like a child. Lorenzo certainly ought to conduct himself very differently; but even if he did, you would still be deprived of the happiness you dream of. As to that other mirage,” continued she with a shudder. “O merciful heavens! do you not see whence comes the light that has caused it? Ginevra, I can only say one thing to you—what I have said before: pray!”
“I pray every day.”
“With fervor?”
“Yes, Livia, with all my heart, I assure you, I pray as well as I know how. I tell you the truth.”
As I uttered these words, a celestial smile came over her face for the first time since the beginning of our conversation, and she exclaimed:
“O dearest sister!”...and then stopped.
Rather vexed than consoled by the manner in which she received my communications, I remained with my forehead leaning against the grille, feeling for the first time how truly it separated us, that my sister felt no pity for me, did not render me justice as she ought, and that she knew neither the world, nor its difficulties, nor its temptations, nor its pains. My tears fell like rain as I made these reflections, but it seemed as if Livia, usually so compassionate, beheld me weep with indifference.
All at once she asked:
“Ginevra, is it long since you went to confession?”
I abruptly, raised my head, my tears ceased to flow, and I wiped my eyes with a gesture of impatience. It was certain Livia could find nothing to say that did me any good. I made no reply.
“You will not tell me. Why not, carina?”
Was I really out of humor with her—with Livia? And on the point of showing it? . . . Oh! no; I at once felt it was impossible. Besides, the touch of severity that chilled me had disappeared. She now spoke in a tone I never had refused to listen to. I therefore replied without any further entreaty:
“Yes, Livia, longer than usual.”
No sooner had I uttered these words, than a lively color suffused my whole face. It at once occurred to me that the time corresponded exactly with the length of Gilbert’s visit at Naples. Livia did not observe my confusion, and calmly resumed:
“Listen, Gina. You believe, as well as I, that the Sacrament of Penance is a remedy, do you not? It has been called, I think, ‘the divine prescription for the maladies of the soul,’ and you are conscious, I trust, that your soul is really ill.”
“Oh! yes, my soul, my heart, my mind, my body, my whole being! O Livia! I suffer every way!”
“Well, if you were physically ill, you would certainly consult the best physician in the city, and, who knows? if there were a better one still at the other end of Europe, you would perhaps, like many others, undertake a long journey to consult him as to the remedy.”
“Perhaps so! What then?”
“Listen, dear Gina. I have just thought of a piece of advice to give you, and as it has occurred to me in a moment of pity for you, when my whole heart is filled with affection and sympathy, perhaps it is a good inspiration you would do well to follow.”
“O Livia!” I exclaimed, greatly affected, for I recognized the accent of affection I had been so doubtful about—an affection more than human, because it was an emanation of divine charity: “Yes, tell me, dear sister, what it is. Say anything you please. Command me, and I will obey you.”
She proceeded to inform me that a saintly monk had recently arrived at Naples who was universally known and respected on account of his extensive knowledge, and was remarkable for the unpretending simplicity of his manners. His words went to the heart, led sinners to return to God, and made those who were pious better than they were before.
“Go to him humbly, I beseech you, and open your heart to him before God—your whole heart. I feel a conviction he will be able to give you the remedy you need, and if you have the courage to apply this remedy, whatever it be, I feel the assurance, Ginevra, you will be healed.”
XXXVI.
Let those who do not wish to enter the region into which I am about to lead my readers, now lay aside this book. I assure them, however, there is nothing in the previous portion of this narrative more strictly true than what I am going to relate. I affirm, moreover, that it refers to a point that interests every Christian soul; I might say, every human soul, but I know beforehand that they alone will comprehend me who have faith in these words: “I believe in God the Father Almighty,” that is to say, they who with the Catholic Church firmly believe His Omnipotence is present, living and acting in our midst, and there is not a single instant in which the material and spiritual world, the world of nature and the inner world of the human soul, cannot feel its supernatural and miraculous effects. At the mere sight of this word, I suppose every sceptical, incredulous, or scornful reader has taken the alarm and made his escape, and I shall henceforth address only those who speak, or at least comprehend, the language I am about to employ.
I left the convent without deciding on the hour for following Livia’s advice, and was already on my way home when I took the sudden resolution to proceed without any delay to the church she had indicated. This church was one of the finest in Naples, the only one, perhaps, in which the eye is not offended by any of the incongruities so often found in Italy between the beautiful proportions, the marbles, the frescos that adorn the walls, and certain objects of devotion whose choice or execution indicates more piety than taste. Here everything harmonized, and this harmony was favorable to devotion. I took a chair and knelt against it on the marble pavement; then, according to the Neapolitan custom at confession, I took off my hat and threw over my head a scarf of black lace I wore over my silk dress, and patiently waited for others to enter the deserted church. It was nearly three o’clock.
I did not have to wait long. As soon as the clock struck, I saw quite a number of men and women of every rank and age, as well as young ladies and even children, come in and gather around the confessional, near which by chance I had stationed myself. I turned towards a lady who knelt beside me, and asked the name of the confessor she was awaiting. She looked up with an air of surprise.
“Father Egidio di San Mauro, of course,” said she. “Do you not know his confessional?”
Father Egidio was the name of the priest to whom my sister had directed me. Chance had led me to the spot I wished to find. I was obliged to wait a long time; but this delay, and the profound silence around, aided me in concentrating my mind on the act I was going to perform, and enabled me, I think, to make a good preparation. Besides, I had already gained a victory over myself by the very act of coming here, for I had been obliged to surmount a mixture of timidity and embarrassment one always feels about going to a strange confessor.
At length the priest we were waiting for made his appearance. He came slowly out of the sacristy and proceeded directly to the high altar, where he knelt for some time in prayer. He then rose, and, crossing the church, passed before me on his way to the confessional. He was of lofty stature, but bowed down by years and still more by that sanctity which does not spare the body. His white hair and bald forehead gave his mild, delicate features a grave, imposing aspect, which at once inspired respect, though it was impossible to feel any fear.
I ought to have been the first to approach, as I arrived before the others; but as soon as Father Egidio seated himself in the confessional, which, according to the Italian style, was only closed by a low door, he perceived the children awaiting him, and, leaving the door open, he made them a sign to approach. One by one they presented themselves before him. He bent down his head as he addressed them, and the innocent faces raised towards him were marked by a pious attention that was touching. He smiled occasionally as he listened to them, and the hand they kissed when they were done, he afterwards placed on their heads in benediction.
When the children had finished I was obliged to wait still longer, for a young man brushed hastily by me and fell on his knees in the place they left vacant, and this time the confession was long. Father Egidio, resting both hands on the shoulders of his new penitent, bent his head to listen without interrupting him, and when the young man ceased speaking, the advice he gave in return must have touched his penitent’s heart, for, as he listened, he bent his head lower and lower towards the old priest’s knees, and when he rose his eyes were inundated with tears.
At last my turn came, and I knelt in the place usually taken at confession. My voice trembled as I began, but grew stronger by degrees, and I continued with clearness and the wish to be sincere. My troubles, alas! were closely connected with my faults, and I not only opened my heart and soul, but laid before him my entire life, feeling, as I did so, the relief there is in the avowal of one’s weaknesses in confession that can be compared to no human confidence, however great the wisdom or sympathy that wins it. He murmured two or three times as he listened, “Poor child!” but did not otherwise interrupt me till I had finished.
The words he addressed me then were the mildest and yet most powerful that ever roused the human heart to a sense of duty. But when he finally told me that though I had banished him whose presence was so dangerous to my soul, I must likewise banish his memory with equal resolution; that the recollections in which I still indulged without scruple ought to be resisted, overcome, rooted out, and rejected, I felt an insurmountable repugnance, and replied:
“No, father, I cannot do it.”
He again repeated, “Poor child!” and then said in a tone of mingled compassion and kindness:
“You are not willing, then, to give God the place he has a right to in your heart?”
I did not understand his meaning, and replied:
“Father, I cannot help what I think and feel, or what I suffer.”
Without losing anything of his mildness, but with an authority that subdued my rebellious spirit, he said:
“I know, my child, what is in your power, and what does not depend on your will; but in the name of Him who now speaks to you through me, I ask you to repeat with a sincere heart these words, which comprise all I have just said:
“O my God! root out of my heart everything that separates it from Thee.”
These words, the accent with which they were uttered, and the prayer that I have no doubt rose from the depths of the holy soul from which they sprang, inspired me with the wish and strength to obey.
O my God! enable me now to make others understand what then took place in my soul.
I leaned my head against my clasped hands, and after a moment’s silence, during which I summoned all the strength of my will, I slowly repeated with the utmost sincerity the words he dictated:
“O my God! root out of my heart everything that separates it from Thee.”...
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O merciful, divine Goodness! how shall I speak of Thee? how tell of thy marvellous grace and love? While uttering these words, before they were even ended, I felt touched by some strange, mysterious, supernatural influence. My heart and soul seemed filled with light. My whole being was transformed. I was inundated with a joy that could not be expressed in human language, and the source of this joy, the sensible cause, which I still feel, and shall never cease to feel, was the conviction made audible in some miraculous manner that God loves me!
God loves me. Yes, I heard these words. I comprehended their entire signification. The Veil was forever withdrawn. The mysterious enigma of my heart was solved as clearly and obviously as my eyes beheld the light of day.
I loved, not as we try, but in vain, to love our fellow‐creatures; I loved with all the strength of my heart! and with so much strength that I could not have loved more without dying!...
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All human language is inadequate, I know, to speak of supernatural grace. I can only stammer as I attempt it, and will no longer dwell on the ineffable moment which wrought an entire transformation in my life. I no longer recollect what words I then uttered, or what was said to me: I only remember the holy absolution I received with bowed head, and these words, afterwards uttered in a tone of emotion: “Be calm, my child, and go in peace.”
I had knelt down overwhelmed with sadness. I rose up so happy that I suffered from the great intensity of a joy my heart was too weak to endure!
XXXVII.
Long years have passed by since that day, and perhaps long years still await me; but whatever be the duration of my life nothing will ever efface the remembrance—not of the moment I have just described, for that moment is always present, it can never become a memory of the past—but of the effect which the sight of the earth, the sky, and the sea had on me when I issued from the church where I had received so great a blessing. Everything seemed to have assumed a new aspect, a new meaning, a more glorious signification; for the torrent of happiness in my soul seemed diffused over all nature! I no longer wished for anything. I had found all. I was freed from all anxiety. Hope had become certitude—a certitude more complete than can be derived from the surest of earthly things; for great indeed is the certitude of that assurance which nothing can deprive us of, except through our own will!...
Nothing could quench the source from which sprang my joy, or deprive me of its benefits: nothing, for my will was henceforth absorbed, and, so to speak, lost in the most ardent love!
To love with strength, disinterestedness, and passion the worthiest object on earth, and learn all at once we could not be deprived of it without the consent of our own heart, would not this induce us to utter the word never with an absolute meaning that the things of this world do not admit of? It was thus God gave me the grace to love, to feel sure of loving always, sure of the impossibility of ever being deprived of the object of my love!
The beauty of the natural world around me now seemed a mere ray of this joy. Never had I found it so lovely. And yet (those whom I alone address now will understand this, however contradictory it may appear) I felt an almost equal disgust for all created things, an ardent desire to renounce everything, a profound contempt for all that had hitherto seemed worthy of so much esteem. Wealth, honor, dress, display, luxury, even the beauty, so uncertain, which I prized so much—they all lost their importance and became worthless in my eyes, not through satiety, or a feeling of melancholy, but through the disgust one naturally feels for the mediocre after seeing the beautiful, and for the beautiful after seeing the perfect!
On the other hand, in spite of this fountain of inexhaustible joy, I by no means imagined I was released from suffering; and what was also strange, perhaps, I did not desire to be. I already felt there was a lively, poignant, and sometimes terrible suffering inherent in the divine love I had just begun to experience. He who has described this love better than any other human being, doubtless because he felt it in a greater degree; he who more than six centuries ago wrote the following words: “Nothing is stronger than love, nothing more generous, nothing more pleasant, nothing fuller or better in heaven or earth.... When weary it is not tired, when straitened is not constrained, when frightened is not disturbed, but like a lively flame and a torch all on fire, it mounts upward and securely passes through all opposition;”(154) he who uttered these and so many other burning words, likewise said these: “There is no living in love without some pain or sorrow.” I knew it, and my heart was as ready to embrace the one as the other. As to the ordinary trials of life, it seemed to me I had sufficient courage to encounter them all, and that henceforth I should have nothing in the world to fear, nothing to complain of....
To the reader who comprehends me, and knows all this is perfectly true, I need not say that the state I have just described, though a blessed and rare one, has in all ages, as well as ours, been one to which a great number of souls have arrived by slow but natural progression. When, therefore, I speak of this as miraculous and supernatural, I merely apply the word to the sudden wonderful grace which shortened the way for me, making me pass in an instant from a totally different frame of mind to a plenitude of faith and happiness!
And now ... how did they who were much more closely interwoven with my life than the natural world around me, appear in this new light? How did I now regard them in my heart?—Lorenzo! Livia! Stella! Gilbert! What were the feelings of my heart and soul towards them now that I was so suddenly brought to see and feel what was clear and right?...
In order to express my sentiments with regard to them, I will employ an illustration that may seem obscure, and yet I know no better way of making myself understood. It seemed to me that all the pure, tender, legitimate, and noble feelings of my heart found in this luminous flame a new and powerful aliment, while all others were consumed by this flame as quickly as pernicious weeds cast into a fiery furnace!
Nothing, therefore, was changed in my feelings towards Livia and Stella, unless I loved them more tenderly than before, one seeming more than ever an angel, and the other the dearest of friends!
As to Lorenzo, the change was great, sudden, and profound!... My affection for him, which he had mortally wounded and extinguished, was now rekindled at the divine source of all true love, and became equal to that I had felt at the time of my brightest hopes. The wish I once so ardently felt seemed now to be the only one worthy of occupying my mind. What did a little more or less of human love matter to me now? As Livia had predicted, my heart was satiated; I was rich, even if I did not possess the affection of a single heart on earth. It was, therefore, no longer through a selfish thirst for happiness I now wished to set his soul at liberty, but from a desire a thousand times more ardent—so ardent that it seemed to become my only passion!
And now, Gilbert! ... how shall I speak of him? How, in the light of this divine flame, did the dangerous attachment, the enervating, subtle affection that had so absorbed my mind, appear to me now? And those vague, false hopes—those impossible dreams—those harrowing regrets? And my foolish and culpable longing for his return?
All this was consumed like the pernicious weeds I have just spoken of, and I distinctly saw the abyss on the edge of which I had been walking. I turned away from the danger I had escaped with terror. I felt with profound gratitude that I was saved! ... and like one who has escaped from the perils of the sea, I looked back with horror on the waves that had so recently threatened to engulf me.
This impression was so strong that it began to render the memory odious that I so recently thought the only joy of my life—the joy I could not make up my mind to deny myself. The miraculous effect of the divine mercy had been in answer to the very essence of my prayer; the obstacle that separated me from God had been completely rooted out of my heart. In this respect, more than any other, I felt changed and transformed. But this powerful impression was modified by degrees, and I was soon able to see Gilbert in so clear and true a light as to think of him henceforth without the least disturbance of mind. I now thought of his danger, and the thought filled me with regret. I perceived my secret participation, the primary, and often the only, cause of others’ faults, from which it is so rare to be wholly exempt in such cases, and I prayed God to pardon me and heal the wounds of his soul as perfectly as he had healed mine!
Perhaps I have dwelt too long on this event—the greatest, the only great event of my life—and the effect it had on me in so many ways. But it was necessary to describe the transfigured state of my soul in order to explain what I still have to relate—this day having, thank heaven! set its ineffaceable seal on every succeeding day of my life.
XXXVIII.
For several days I had some difficulty in concealing the irrepressible joy I betrayed in my face in spite of my efforts, and which there was apparently nothing to justify.
Lorenzo’s attitude, in fact, remained the same. He continued, as he had done since his return, to appear only at the hour of his repasts. A part of the morning he remained shut up in his studio, which he now rarely allowed me to enter, and he spent all his evenings abroad. Mario had returned to Sicily; Stella had not yet wholly resumed her usual ease with me, and Lando, absorbed in his own affairs, was less interested than usual in mine.
Our customary reunions continued, however, and the same visitors assembled every evening, as before. I frequently heard my aunt loudly lament the departure of quel Francese simpatico, and declare how much il Kergy was missed by everybody. In fact, Gilbert’s name was continually repeated, and I sometimes thought Stella was astonished at my calmness, which was incomprehensible to her, whereas, on the contrary, I was not in the least surprised at her silence, which I understood perfectly. But we continued our tacit agreement never to speak of him to each other. Several days passed in this way, during which Livia was the only person from whom I concealed nothing. How great her joy was when, on seeing me again, she read with a single look the recovered peace of my soul, it is useless to say here. From that time we seemed to be united by a stronger tie than that of blood, and to have become more than sisters. But when, in the transport of my new joy, I declared that the luxuries of my beautiful home now seemed a burden and a fetter, and that I preferred the austere simplicity which surrounded her, she at once checked me.
“Our tastes should correspond with our vocation, Gina. Yours is not to leave the world, or even to lay aside its superfluities. Endeavor to please Lorenzo, to win him back. That is your mission, which is as high as any other; and when you feel your former affection for him revive in your heart, believe me, carina, it will meet with no opposition from the love God has revealed to your soul! You have dreamed of great things for Lorenzo. Come, Gina, courage! now is the time to realize them!”
It was thus she led me back to a great but evident truth. I comprehended it in spite of the different feelings I had experienced, and trusted time would give me an opportunity of winning back my husband’s heart, which was even sorer than mine had ever been. My eyes were often filled with tears, in spite of myself, as I saw the alteration in his face, his anxious look, his brow furrowed before the time, and all the sad indications by which a soul that is tarnished betrays the reaction which has such an injurious effect on physical beauty itself. But the time was gone by when it seemed possible to form some project, and achieve it in a day. I had learned the value of the words patience and silence.
I rose now every morning as soon as it was light, and went with Ottavia to the church of a neighboring convent to seek strength for the day and, so to speak, draw fresh joy from the inexhaustible fountain. I afterwards carried myself the alms which, in my pride and indolence, I had hitherto been contented to distribute by her hands. This was the only outward change in my way of life, and it was one that nobody perceived. But it was not quite the same with the change that had unconsciously taken place in my language, manners, and even in the expression of my face, and though Lorenzo seldom had an opportunity of noticing me, I soon fancied he had recovered a certain ease of manner towards me. Until now, he had been, not only wounded in his pride and passion, but especially humiliated in my presence; and it must be acknowledged that the coldness and disdain that constituted the mute form of my reproach were not calculated to conciliate him. The freezing haughtiness of his air in return, which seemed to add outrage to perjury, increased my exasperation to the utmost, and irritated me more than his actual offences did at the time I gave myself up with desperation to the thought of Gilbert, as a kind of intoxication which made me at once forget my grief and my anger. Now I no longer sought to escape from the one, and the other was wholly extinguished. This new state of my soul produced an outward calmness and serenity I had never possessed before.
Lorenzo’s quick, penetrating eye soon detected the change without being able to imagine the cause. One day, after looking attentively at me for a moment, a sad, thoughtful expression came over his face, and I thought there was something like affection and respect in his look.
This did not prevent him, however, from spending the evening away from home, and I anxiously followed him in spirit as usual, not daring to utter a word to detain him, and still less venture to question him. A whole week passed in this way, in the vague hope of finding some means of influencing him, but nothing of the kind happened. All at once, one morning, by some extraordinary accident we happened to be alone a moment together, and after causing me some anxiety by the gloomy expression on his face, he gave me a great but pleasant surprise by saying:
“What would you say, Ginevra, if I proposed your taking a journey to Sicily with me?”
I uttered an exclamation of joy.
“What a question, Lorenzo! You know well nothing could give me more pleasure than to see my father again, and Messina, the dear old palace, and....”
Here I stopped, too much affected to continue, and fearing to awaken remembrances that might seem like a reproach. He perceived it and was grateful.
“Well, my lawsuit is about to be tried. Don Fabrizio desires my presence, and I would not for anything in the world renounce the pleasure of hearing him plead. We will start next week, then, if you are willing.”
This proposition caused me the liveliest and most unexpected pleasure. To leave Naples! To go with him! and to a place where, more easily than anywhere else, it seemed to me I could overcome the fatal remembrance in his heart I had to struggle against! And from there—who could tell?—induce him perhaps to go to some distant land; persuade him to let me follow him, go with him to the ends of the earth, if necessary, in search of the pure air he needed to restore him to health! All this crossed my mind in the twinkling of an eye, and for the first time for a long while I saw a ray of hope before me.
When I announced the projected journey to Stella with a satisfaction I made no attempt to conceal, she looked at me with an air of surprise.
“You have entirely forgiven Lorenzo, then?” said she.
“Yes.”
“Then I conclude he has at last acknowledged his offences and begged your pardon.”
“No.”
“No?... In that case, Ginevra, you have greatly changed.”
“Yes, a blessed change has come over me.”
“I have noticed it for some days, and if I ask what has produced it, will you answer me sincerely?”
“Yes, without hesitation. I will tell you the plain truth.”
And without turning my eyes away from hers, which were fastened attentively on me, I calmly continued:
“Between my violent indignation against Lorenzo, and my strong fancy for Gilbert, I went very far astray from God, Stella. A single instant of extraordinary grace enabled me to see this. Everything is clear to me now. I no longer seek happiness: I possess it.”
The moment Stella heard me pronounce Gilbert’s name, which we had invariably avoided of late, the pupils of her eyes dilated, and, as I went on, took that intensity of color and expression which all emotion imparted to them. But she merely replied:
“I do not wholly understand you, Ginevra, I confess, but I see you are happy and courageous: that is sufficient.”
After a moment’s silence, I resumed:
“And will you allow me to ask you a question in my turn, Stella?”
She blushed without making any reply. I hastened to say that my question only concerned Harry Leslie. At his name, she resumed her usual expression, and a double smile beamed from her eyes and lips.
“Certainly, ask anything you please.”
“Well, he came yesterday with a gloomy air to announce his departure. Am I wrong in thinking you have something to do with it?”
“No,” replied she, smiling, “not if it is true he cannot remain in Naples without marrying me, for I have not otherwise ordered him to go away.”
Desirous of drawing her out on this point, I continued:
“But, after all, Mr. Leslie is kind, handsome, excellent, very wealthy they say, and of a good family. You are very difficult, Stella.”
“Yes, perhaps so,” replied she with agitation and a kind of impatience. Then she continued in a melancholy tone of anguish:
“Ginevra, never speak to me again, I beg, either of happiness or the future. I do not know as I shall ever be any happier than I am now, but I know I can be less so.... Oh! may what I now possess never be taken away from me. I ask nothing more.”
She shuddered and stopped speaking, as if she could not give utterance to her fears. It was not the first time I had seen her seized with a kind of terror when the words future and happiness were mentioned before her. One would have said she thought there was no happiness in reserve for her, unless at the price of that she already possessed, and this thought came over her like a vision of terror.
Poor Stella! Alas! how insecure the joys of earth! To be deprived of them, or tremble lest we may be—that is to say, to possess these joys with a poignant fear that empoisons every instant of their duration, and increases more and more in proportion to their prolongation!...
Is it, then, really necessary for a supernatural light to open our eyes to force us to acknowledge that this world is only a place of promise, of which the realization is in another?
To Be Continued.
The Brooklet
From The German Of Goethe.
O brooklet silver bright and gay! For ever rushing on thy way, I, lingering, ever ask thee whence Thou comest here, where goest thou hence?
“From the dark rock’s deep breast I come, O’er flow’rs and moss I toss and roam; While on my bosom smiles and lies The hovering vision of the skies.
“Ask not of me, a laughing child, Whither or whence my foot steps wild; Him do I trust to guide me on Who called me from the senseless stone.”
The Colonization Of New South Wales By Great Britain.(155)
Some few years ago it became known that the government of Great Britain were thinking of renewing the experiment of transporting convicts to Australia with the object of affording them a chance of reformation. This time, however, it was its western shore which was to be tried, and that, too, on a scale not inferior in magnitude to that on which the attempt had been so unsuccessfully made in New South Wales and Van Diemen’s Land. The bare suggestion of such a proposal sufficed to kindle a flame of indignation throughout the whole Australian continent—for such must an island be called which is as large as Europe. To judge from a letter which we shall have occasion to quote further on, the system as pursued in Eastern Australia, although upon so insignificant a scale, is fraught with evils similar to those which so signally characterized its more important precursor in the west. Yet were the eastern colonists, or an influential and active portion of them, ready to risk the reproduction of the baneful curse which for nearly half a century blighted the prosperity and checked the growth of their western rivals, and from the consequences of which the latter are suffering to this day. So bitter, however, was the remembrance of this system amongst the western colonists, so keen their sense of the dire mischiefs still resulting from its action, that they went the length of avowing their fixed determination to separate from the mother‐country, if the experiment were attempted, although some thousands of miles intervened between them and the spot where the experiment was proposed to be renewed.
What were the causes of a failure so disastrous? The objects proposed in the original undertaking were of the noblest. To colonize a newly‐ discovered country of great extent and promise, to develop its resources, and to bring it under the sway of a benign and noble civilization, was a worthy object of ambition. To unite with this a scheme for the reformation of criminals, in a land where they would be entirely removed from old associations, where they might enter upon a new career without being ever dogged by the spectre of the past, was a great and beneficent design. How was it that the proposed reformatory became a horrible curse alike to the convicts and the colony, and that no prospect of progress in any form could be reasonably entertained until the original scheme was utterly swept away, and the local administration taken altogether out of the hands of the home government, and placed upon its present independent footing?
The question of the reformation of criminals is not only of pressing importance, but one that appeals to our higher feelings; and it has of late become a subject of special investigation to the somewhat interested philanthropy and eminently shallow psychology of the day. It is impossible to say that any solution of the question was seriously attempted in the original transportation project to Botany Bay. It was the one object, nevertheless, which assumed a prominent place in the experiment; and to the history of its failure we propose to devote our chief attention. The colonization of the country was distinctly announced as forming part of the scheme; nor, indeed, is it easy to see how it could very well have been dissociated from it. On this subject, therefore, we will offer a few remarks by way of introduction.
The recolonization of Southern Europe by the Northern tribes in the Vth and VIth centuries of the present era offers a striking contrast to the colonization of Australia by a nation calling itself Christian. Anything but prepossessing is the description given us by the historians of those Northern invaders, whose deeds but too faithfully bear out the description. Over depopulated provinces, cities in ashes, and the ruins of the noblest monuments of religion and art, they swarmed into their new settlements. Vandals, Franks, Goths, and Huns, all alike were distinguished for an unpitying cruelty, although the Huns surpassed the rest in licentious profligacy and crime. Yet amidst the ruin they had made, and the prodigious havoc with which they had desolated the fairest countries of Europe, the winning accents of Christian civilization stole into their ears and subdued their untutored souls. In one respect they had the advantage of the first English settlers in Australia. They had not been flung out of their own country like garbage. They came under no ban of law. They bore not with them the consciences of convicted criminals. They marched to the spoil under the (to them) legitimate banners of ambition, or to satisfy their greed of gain. The untutored instincts of humanity, grand even in their lawlessness and ferocity, urged them on. Deformed, as might have been expected, with many of the gross vices of the savage, they were not wanting in some of the more attractive features of the nobility of nature. Their ears had never listened to the loving voice of the Virgin Daughter of Sion. Their hearts had never been disciplined nor their minds formed by the revelation from heaven committed to her keeping. Theirs was not the guilt, as it has been of some of the nations of this XIXth century, to have apostatized to the barbarous maxim that “might makes right.” They knew no better. No sooner, however, did the majestic vision of the Spouse of Christ—the Catholic Church—meet their gaze, than, far from treating her with insult and outrage, they threw themselves with loving veneration at her feet, bowed their necks with the truthful docility of children to her discipline, and arose to prove themselves her most faithful defenders.
But whilst the men‐eating aborigines of Australia had no civilization to communicate, the first invaders of its shores from Great Britain were, some of them, of the worst class of barbarians—the barbarians of civilization. They were of those whose untamable souls law, civilization, and religion had failed to subdue. They were the offscouring of the criminal class of the three kingdoms. The society they had outraged had cast them out from itself upon the coasts of Australia. They stepped on shore convicted as felons. They had forfeited the citizenship of their own country; and, although still undergoing their respective sentences, it was understood that they were to have the opportunity of making a fresh start in their new country, should their conduct correspond with the clemency of the executive. On a career that, more than any other, requires a spirit of enterprise, light‐heartedness, and courage, they had set out under the ban of expatriation, the burden of shame, and all the depressing influences of detected guilt. Of such were the first settlers of Australia.
On the evening of the 26th of January, 1788, the English dominion over what has been called the fifth division of the globe was inaugurated by the solemnity of pledging the king’s health round a flag‐pole. His majesty’s subjects in New Holland, at the period of this imposing function, numbered one thousand and thirty souls. Of these seven hundred and seventy‐eight were convicts. The remaining two hundred and fifty consisted of the soldiers who formed the garrison of the new settlement, and their officers, together with a few civil functionaries. In this rude germ of future commonwealths the elements neither of agriculture nor of commerce as yet existed. An encampment of huts was its first abiding‐ place. For food it depended on the stores brought with it from the mother‐ country; amongst which was neither seed nor other provision for future crops. At the moment at which we write, after a lapse of eighty‐six years, the flocks and herds of a wealthy agricultural population range over an area as large as that of Europe; five splendid provinces, each with its own court and parliament, can boast of cities equal in size to many European capitals, and constituting commercial marts second to none on the face of the globe.
Of the prodigious strides they have made in material prosperity, Mr. Therry, in his interesting Reminiscences, gives the following striking illustration:
“It has been ascertained that our South Pacific colonies take from us in imports for every man, woman, and child of their respective populations, on the average, from £8 to £10 per head per annum, while the United States were only customers to us in 1859 (before the war began), at the rate of 17s. per head. The amount of imports received by Canada, which comes nearest to Australia, is £5 per head; that of New South Wales alone is £21 3s. 4d. per head; of Victoria, £25” (p. 9).
The commerce of these colonies with all parts of the world is nearly three times larger in money value than was the whole export commerce of England less than a century ago; and they receive from the United Kingdom upwards of twenty times the value of exports which the North American colonies were receiving at the time of their separation from the mother‐country. To crown the social edifice, a contented people live and prosper under the shadow of the freest institutions, in many respects surpassing, in this particular, the much‐vaunted model on which they have been framed.
It is certain that the prevailing motive of the English government in despatching a penal colony to Botany Bay was to supply the place of her lost American colonies. No doubt the idea of colonizing the country was present to their minds. But it never went beyond words. Not a single provision was made for colonial development. On the contrary, the whole constitution of the exiled community was fatal to such an object. For nearly half a century the inherent vices of the system struggled against and forcibly restrained any efforts to profit by the advantages of a country of such wonderful promise; nor was it before the original government scheme had been quite abandoned that the colony rose from its inaction, like an unfettered giant, and, as it were, almost at a stride, arrived at a pitch of prosperity unexampled, in so short a period of time, in the annals of the world, with the single exception of the American colonies after they had disembarrassed themselves of the yoke of the mother country.
The defection of those colonies had stopped an important outlet for the criminal population of the three kingdoms. We are told by Bancroft, in his History of the United States, that
“The prisoners condemned [in England] to transportation were a salable commodity. Such was the demand for labor in America that convicts and laborers were regularly purchased and shipped to the colonies, where they were sold as indented servants.”
The Irish malcontents, moreover—of whom, owing to the long misgovernment of the kingdom, Ireland was full, and whose disaffection had been stimulated by the revolt of the North American colonies—threatened to increase the convict population by a large and particularly unmanageable element. It was only a year or two before that a country happened to be explored and taken possession of in the name of England so happily fitted for colonization, and of which such admirable use has since been made. The discovery was the result of sheer accident, so far as the British government was concerned. The expedition to which it owes it was sent out by the Royal Society for scientific purposes; the object being to make accurate observations of the transit of Venus from the island of Otaheite. The islands of New Zealand and the east coast of New Holland were explored on the way home. The astronomical expedition returned to England in the midsummer of 1771.
In 1786, the government decided on establishing permanent settlements on the coast lately explored by Captain Cook, accompanied by Messrs. Green and Banks and Dr. Solander. The colony consisted exclusively of the convicts and the military in charge; of prisoners and their jailers. Any class out of which a free civil community might be formed could only arise out of chance settlers, or of those among the convicts whose position was the result rather of untoward circumstances than of any irreclaimable criminality of disposition, and who were prepared to re‐commence in those distant lands a career from which their misfortune or their fault had shut them out at home.
The constitution of the expedition was as follows: A governor, lieutenant‐ governor, judge‐advocate, commissary, and chaplain; a surgeon and two assistant surgeons; an agent for the transports; two hundred and twelve soldiers and mariners, including officers; their wives, numbering forty, and their children; five hundred and forty‐eight male convicts, and two hundred and thirty female.
The neighborhood of Botany Bay having been judged unsuitable for the new settlement, the expedition landed at a spot situated at the head of one of the coves of Port Jackson Harbor, which had been judiciously selected by the governor as the site of the future capital. The 26th of January, 1788, was the day of disembarkation, and it was on the evening of that day that the inaugural rite, to which we have before alluded, was solemnized. After a lapse of eleven days, consumed in putting up the public and private structures needful for the new colony, the ceremony of inauguration was supplemented by one of a yet more imposing character. On the seventh of February was held a formal assembly of all the members of the new commonwealth. An occasion of greater interest could not be imagined. Upon no band of colonists was ever lavished a greater wealth of hope and fortune. No guilt of diplomatic fraud or commercial overreaching marred their title to the new territory. Through no bloodshed, no violence, but quite unopposed, they had entered on its peaceable possession. No foreign power, to whom the new state might be calculated to give umbrage, threatened its future welfare. A magnificent harbor sheltered its ships and transports; and it was only one of many such with which a coast of vast extent was indented. A whole continent of virgin soil stretched out before them, which, under the influence of the finest climate under heaven, waited only the bidding of man to quicken within itself an exhaustless luxuriance of vegetable life. A mighty Empire of the South offered itself to any hands that were willing and able to grasp it. It was only reasonable to expect that England, having just lost her supremacy in the New World, would have devoted her utmost resources of civilization and statesmanship to laying deep and wide the foundations of her new dominion. If none of the members of an aristocracy enjoying more advantages and more power than were ever possessed by the most privileged class of any the most privileged nation, were willing to leave the home of their ancestral traditions, the softness of hereditary ease, and an absolute independence of fortune’s caprice, in order to join in the struggling life of a young community, we should at least have expected that the mother‐country would despatch a contribution from each of the other classes of her citizens to assist in the formation of the new settlement. Her system of jurisprudence, admirable in spite of the inextricable jumble of statutes and precedents amidst which it has been reared, would be represented, one would have thought, by a sufficient number of lawyers of character; her merchant princes would be encouraged to carry their spirit of enterprise to so rich and promising a field; still more, that which forms the only true and solid basis of material prosperity—agriculture—would be abundantly cared for in the shape of a due supply of competent masters and sturdy laborers; last, though not least, some provision would be made, not only for the moral and religious training of the people, but for such mental cultivation as was compatible with the condition of an infant community. What no one in his senses could have anticipated was that the government of a great and ancient nation should have sent out as the founders of a new colonial empire a contingent of malefactors, guarded by a few marines. Upon the occasion of the formal inauguration ceremony the whole colony were assembled around the governor. Nearest to himself were the lieutenant‐governor, the judge‐advocate, provost‐marshal, commissary, adjutant, doctor, and chaplain. The two hundred and twelve marines, including no less than fifteen commissioned officers, were drawn up in battle array. Apart from the rest, as under the ban of crime, stood the bulk of the community—namely, the convicts. To this assemblage the judge‐ advocate read the royal commission and the act of Parliament which constituted the court of judicature. After the reading of which documents the one hundred and ninety‐seven marines shouldered old “Brown Bess,” made ready, presented, and fired three times.
The ceremony was not imposing, but it was on a par with the rest of the proceedings. The governor, Capt. Phillip, wound it up with a speech in which, in spite of grammatical errors which may be pardoned in a sailor, he displayed considerable ability and eloquence, but a marvellous absence of common sense. In the course of a somewhat inflated panegyric on England and her fortunes, his excellency went on to portray his native country as the peculiar favorite of heaven, and to ascribe her successful colonization of New Holland—a matter considered by anticipation as already accomplished, and that, too, in the teeth of the recent defection of her most splendid colonies on the plea of tyrannical misgovernment—to a prolonged special intervention of Divine Providence.
“Nor did our good genius desert us,” continued the governor, “when we reached our destination. On the contrary, it was then that her(?) crowning favor was bestowed. Witness the magnificent harbor which before us extends its hundred beautiful bays. Witness the beautiful landscape, the islands, capes, and headlands, covered with waving foliage, rich and varied beyond compare. Witness every surrounding object which, as regards a situation for our future homes, our necessities could demand or our tastes desire. Happy the nation whose enterprises are thus favored by the elements and by fortune! Happy the men engaged in an enterprise so favored! Happy the state to whose founding such propitious omens are granted!”
It is clear from the following passage, incredible as it may appear, that the government of the day did really contemplate founding a new state beyond the seas out of the criminal population, the moral refuse of society. Gov. Phillip even challenges for the scheme the praise of magnanimity.
“The American colonies,” he said in his inaugural address, “smarting under what they considered a sense of injustice, had recourse to the sword, and the ancient state and the young dependency met in deadly conflict. The victory belonged to the American people, and Britain, resigning the North America continent (?) to the dominion of her full‐grown offspring, magnanimously seeks in other parts of the earth a region where she may lay the foundations of another colonial empire, which one day will rival in strength, but we hope not in disobedience, that which she has so recently lost” (Flanagan, vol. i. p. 30).
It is, however, remarkable that Mr. Flanagan grounds his own attribution of magnanimity on the absence of those very features of the new territory on whose conspicuous presence the governor, standing on the spot, congratulates his fellow‐colonists, as one of the signs of a special interposition of Providence in their favor.
“To incur vast expense,” writes the author of the History of New South Wales, “encounter great dangers, and overcome great difficulties, in order to possess and colonize a country more remote than any hitherto brought under subjection by Europeans—a country presenting no pre‐eminent attractions in soil, destitute, so far as was then known, of the precious metals, and inhabited by a people in the greatest degree barbarous and devoid of all riches—while countries possessing all those attractions which New Holland wanted were within her reach, is the best evidence which can possibly be afforded of national magnanimity” (Flanagan, vol. i. p. 2).
“How grand is the prospect which lies before the youthful nation!” exclaimed the enthusiastic governor to the new colony in his inaugurative speech. “Enough of honor for any state would it be to occupy the first position, both in regard to time and influence, in a country so vast, so beautiful, so fertile, so blessed in climate, so rich in all those bounties which nature can confer; ... its fertile plains tempting only the slightest labor of the husbandman to produce in abundance the fairest and the richest fruits; its interminable pastures, the future home of flocks and herds innumerable; its mineral wealth, already known to be so great as to promise that it may yet rival those treasures which fiction loves to describe—enough for any nation, I say, would it be to enjoy those honors and those advantages; but others not less advantageous, but perhaps more honorable, await the people of the state of which we are the founders.”
“To these,” continued the governor, addressing that engaging instalment of British civilization which the imperial government had sent forth from the shores of their country to take possession, in its name, of this new land, and develop its abundant resources, “will belong the surpassing honor of having introduced permanently the Christian religion and European civilization into the southern hemisphere. At no distant date it will be theirs to plant the standard of the cross and the ensign of their country in the centre of numerous populous nations to whom both these have hitherto been but little known. Such are the objects which will arouse the enterprise and stimulate the energies of the people of this young country—enterprise and energy, directed not toward conquest or rapine, chiefly because Australia, rich beyond measure in her own possessions, cannot desire those of others, but towards the extension of commerce, the spread of the English language, the promotion of the arts and sciences, and the extension of the true faith. Such are the circumstances and conditions which lead to the conviction that this state, of which to‐day we lay the foundation, will, ere many generations have passed away, become the centre of the southern hemisphere—the brightest gem of the Southern Ocean” (Flanagan, vol. i. pp. 32, 33).
Were these, then, whom Capt. Phillip addressed the men to introduce the Christian religion and European civilization in a newly‐discovered continent? Were a detachment of jail‐birds and their keepers to “develop commerce, spread the English language, promote the arts and sciences, and extend the true faith?” Were such as these the missionaries to plant the standard of the cross, or even that of their own country, amidst populations alien to both alike? Did the English government seriously propose to make a missionary college out of a reformatory, if such it could be called? Were the Barabbases of England to be the pioneers of civilization, the Artful Dodgers of the metropolis the heralds of the Christian faith?
The truth is that the only object directly provided for by the government to which England was indebted for this “magnanimous” deed of colonization was the establishment of a secure and distant depot for the worst criminals of the country.
The noble object to which the exhaustless resources of the continent they had just taken possession of were to be devoted was left to the chapter of accidents. A picture of the future greatness of the equivocal colony was, it is true, dashed off, in glowing colors, by Commodore Phillip, but no provision of any kind was made for its realization.
There was nothing whatever to hinder the attainment of both these objects, or at least an attempt to attain them. On the contrary, never was a fairer opportunity for an experiment of the kind offered to a people. Before them lay the wide, almost limitless landscape in all its exuberant beauty and unexhausted fertility. There it lay, as a kind of treasure‐trove, at their feet, with no one to dispute its possession. Their first object ought assuredly to have been to bring a large portion of the soil under cultivation; agriculture being that on which more than on anything else the prosperity of a country, and especially of a young country, depends. Not one shilling did these original and eccentric colonists invest in the soil of that vast island continent, every acre of which was theirs, with all its latent wealth, whether that wealth consisted in its as yet untried productive powers, or in the hoard of precious metals which might be locked up in its secret depths.
The home government thus had it in their power to offer to a superior class of yeomen inducements of the most persuasive kind to try their fortunes in the new colony. Sufficient area being left for the development of a splendid capital, they should have been planted in middling‐sized farms as closely around the reserved area as seemed desirable, and stretching out into the continent in gradually‐encroaching circles. A small contingent of married men, of good reputation amongst their neighbors, and of superior capacity and attainments, should have been encouraged to throw their fortunes into the colony. To these a greater extent of land should have been granted. These settlers would have formed the nucleus of a class from which could have been selected men fitted for holding the most responsible positions. The young colony could very well dispense with hereditary titles of honor. But it could not so well dispense with a class such as we refer to, if it was to become a country to which men of character and position would not hesitate to resort. A class was wanted other than the emancipists—the very worst that could have been chosen—to supply persons of standing, acquirements, and, above all, of reputable experience for the magistracy, and for other national, so to speak, as well as local, offices of trust and administration. Such a class of yeomen having been thus provided, the staff of government officials, the military and naval forces, and the continually increasing influx of convict laborers, added to the population of those classes themselves, would have supplied a considerable population, ready to hand, of customers and consumers. The mercantile and professional classes would soon have sent their contributions from the overstocked mother‐country, not in arrear, at all events, of the ordinary course of supply and demand. A manufacturing class would have developed of itself quite as soon as the interests of the colony required it. And, lastly and most imperatively of all, had the mother‐country been Catholic, the interests of religion would have been the very first consideration. Priests and a nucleus of one or more religious orders would have been despatched with the expedition. Churches would have been the first structures raised. Land would have been set apart for their support, and for the appropriate splendor of Christian worship. And hospitals, attended by religious of both sexes, would have been erected, and endowed with sufficient land for their perpetual support.
Nothing of the sort was so much as attempted. Thirty years after the memorable inauguration day, a period of time embracing nearly one‐half of the entire age of the colony, the then governor, Macquarie, we are told by Mr. Therry, “considered the colony was selected as a depot for convicts; that the land properly belonged to them, as they emerged from their condition of servitude; and that emigrants were intruders on the soil.” Ten years afterwards, little more than seventy years ago, the state of “the brightest gem of the Southern Ocean,” in spite of the encouragement given to emigration by Macquarie’s successor, Sir Thomas Brisbane, during the three years of his administration, is thus described by the very competent authority just quoted: “The majority of the community he (Sir Thomas Brisbane) ruled over were of the convict class, who were not respectable nor right‐minded. It consisted of very inflammable materials, composing two‐thirds of the whole community, which it required the exercise of a stern authority to repress.”
Natural advantages have triumphed over the obstacles offered by human folly. The present condition of the Australian colonies more than realizes the glowing expectations of the head‐jailer of the first convict gang that landed on their shores. Indeed, if those utterances of Commander Phillip were to be judged by the results, we might be tempted to ascribe them to the inspiration of even prophetical sagacity. One merit, at all events, may be accorded to the enthusiastic sailor. He did not overestimate the boundless resources and advantageous position of the noble country of which he and his prisoners were assuming the proprietorship “on behalf of the British people,” utterly incapable as they were of taking advantage of them.
To Be Concluded Next Month.
A Summer In Rome
By The Author Of “The House Of Yorke.”
Of course all our friends exclaimed, when we intimated the possibility of our remaining in Rome for the summer:
We would suffocate with heat.
We would be poisoned with malaria.
We would have chills, and consequently fevers.
The fruit would make us sick, the wine would turn sour while we were pouring it out, and we would be kept awake all night by people in the street.
We would have no one to speak to, for everybody would be gone out of town.
Besides, and above all, it was not the proper thing to do.
I do not believe that either of us was serious in first making the proposal, unless Bianca cherished such a wish under her pensive silence; but so much opposition led us to look at the project, and we did not find it so bad as might have been expected. Besides, no one with a particle of spirit likes to be scouted and talked down; and all of us had spirit enough to feel a little vexed at the storm of opposition we had brought about our ears—all except Mr. Varney. He was too indolent to resent anything.
“I do not believe that there is the least necessity for having a fever in Rome,” said Isabel. (It was nearly always Isabel who spoke.) “One has but to select a cool apartment and use a little prudence. If we were to do as I have seen people do here—go from the oven to the refrigerator—we should know what to expect. To walk in a sunny street till you are in a perspiration, then sit on a shady stone to cool off, is not only inviting a fever, but sending a gendarme to fetch it. As for heat, New York is ten times hotter; and I once passed a whole summer in New York, and was quite comfortable; wasn’t I, papa? Then, how any one can say that we shall have no one to speak to I cannot imagine. Here are four of us; and I take perfect delight in talking to myself. The most interesting conversations I ever had in my life were with Miss Isabel Varney.”
“Besides,” said a clear voice from the window, “what we came to Rome to see doesn’t go away in the summer.”
We all looked at Bianca, who had turned her head toward us to speak, and was gazing out the window again, the lace curtain wrapped about her like a bridal veil, and the persienne half closed to shield her from the many eyes in the piazza.
“May I ask what you came to see?” inquired a visitor, who always tried to make this silent one talk.
She only half turned to answer.
“The Holy Father; the shrines and homes of the saints; all the holy, and all the beautiful, and all the famous places here; and the skies that are above them. And, again, the Holy Father. He is the Christian Prometheus, bound to the Vatican as to a rock, and we are a little chorus of American Oceanides who are come to bewail him, and who have no mind to go away for pleasure.”
“Brava!” said papa.
“And as for the ‘proper thing,’ ” said another member of the family, “we have bored ourselves to death all winter trying to do that.”
“Besides,” struck in Isabel, with a bright thought, “we want to learn the language; and that we never could do going about from place to place. Here we can sit down quietly, and study the four or five hundred irregular verbs at our leisure, and settle the genders of things, and learn to pronounce properly all their undulating and circuitous strings of vowels and the little curly tails to their ridiculous words.”
“Don’t include me in your class, if you please,” Mr. Varney said. “I would as soon shave off my hair and wear a wig as drop my own language and speak another. I shall speak English when I say anything; and if people do not understand me, it will not be my fault. We can always find interpreters; and I do not approve of—of—er—of deserting your own tongue for another,” he concluded rather weakly, not having measured his strength before commencing this speech.
The truth was that he never did approve of anything which cost him the least effort; but we listened as gravely as if we believed him to be actuated by the most heroic patriotism.
“You are quite right, papa,” Isabel said emphatically. “Still, since interpreters may not always be honest, you know, it is better that some of us should understand and be able to protect the family.”
“You will not find the verbs so difficult as you may imagine,” remarked an Italian. “The irregularities are chiefly in the preterite. Preterites are always ragged. They are never a part of the original language, I think, but were interpolated when it was discovered that a nicer expression of thought was needed; and then the grammarians had to accommodate themselves to circumstances, and use what was left. You will take pleasure in learning so musical a language, Miss Isabel.”
“Oh! I think English quite as musical as Italian,” replied the young woman with composure.
“When you speak it, signorina,” said the Italian, after a momentary pause of astonishment.
“I find the phrases and words I learned in music very useful,” she continued. “The other day I said ‘allegro, ma non troppo,’ to the coachman, and he drove perfectly. That is on millions of pieces of music, you know, papa. It quite pleased me to talk to a coachman as if he were a fugue. And when I said ‘andante,’ he actually put down the brake.”
“But you know we were going down‐hill then, Bella,” remarked her sister.
“I can make the servants understand perfectly well,” continued Isabel. “But in churches and galleries, and catacombs, and such places, the people are very stupid.”
This is the way in which Miss Isabel Varney made the servants understand perfectly:
“Angelina,” she would say to the donna, in English, “I want you to black my thick walking‐boots. The dust has made them look dingy. But first bring me another pitcher of water. It is strange that in a city that would be a lake if all its aqueducts were to burst at once one cannot get more than a quart of water at a time. Make haste, now, for I wish to go out immediately.”
Angelina stood immovable, a picture of distressful doubt. The time had gone past when she would have ventured to remind her mistress that English had not been included in her education.
“Oh! to be sure,” says Isabel. “What a bother it is when one is in a hurry! What is the Italian for water, Bianca? Acqua? Well, Angelina, bring me some acqua.”
The donna began to lift her apron toward her eyes.
“Apportez moi some acqua!” said her mistress distinctly and authoritatively.
The donna shrank back. “Signorina mia,” she began pitifully.
“Don’t talk!” cried the young lady. “What is the use of your talking to me when I cannot understand a word you say? It is too absurd. Besides, it is the servant’s place to obey without speaking. Bianca, do look in the dictionary for the Italian for wish or will, the strongest word you can get; then in the grammar for the first person, singular, indicative of it—or, no, the imperative. And be quick, or I never shall get out. Voglio? Angelina, I voglio a pitcher of acqua—what is the word for quickly? Vitement? No. That isn’t Italian. It must be vita. That is an Italian word, I know, and it sounds as if it meant quickly. Angelina, I voglio acqua vita.”
“Si, si, signorina!” exclaimed the poor little donna, and ran off, glad to get out of the room.
“And, after all, she hasn’t taken the pitcher,” said Isabel. “But may be she will bring a pailful. She knew quite well that I was finding fault because we have so little. They understand what we say, I’m sure they do. Their ignorance is all a pretence.”
Five minutes passed, and ten minutes; and when the young lady had exhausted herself in impatient exclamations, Angelina entered the chamber, all out of breath, but smiling in confident triumph, and placed in her hand a bottle on which was an apothecary’s label with acquavite neatly inscribed on it.
There was a bersagliere passing the house at that moment; and I have always thought I would like to know if he ever suspected that the hand of a papalina flung that bottle which alighted safely on the great tuft of flying feathers in his hat. I am sure that if the bottle had contained anything but acquavite, the military would have been called out.
This feat accomplished, Miss Isabel seized the empty water‐pitcher, and thrust it into the hands of the frightened girl with one word, “Acqua!” uttered in a tone which proved her to have tragical abilities.
Angelina returned in a trice with the water, and found her mistress standing in the middle of the room, with a stern countenance, and a dictionary in her hand.
“Now, nero my guadagno.”
The girl lifted her eyes to the ceiling.
“Profitto, I mean,” was the hasty correction.
Tears rolled down Angelina’s cheeks.
“It couldn’t be that boot is stivale!” said the young woman in a low tone to a third person in the room. “That sounds as if it meant something three‐cornered.”
“You might try,” was the suggestion.
“Stivale?” demanded the young woman of the donna.
“Si, signorina,” said the girl eagerly, glancing at the articles in question.
“Well, nero my stivale,” ordered the mistress haughtily.
“O Dio mio!” sobbed Angelina.
Isabel lost all patience and dignity. She flew at the boots and caught them in one hand, flew at the toilet‐table and snatched her tooth‐brush in the other, then, rushing at the terrified donna, performed before her face a furious pantomime of polishing her boots with the tooth‐brush.
“Capisco!” cried Angelina joyfully.
“It is worse than Robinson Crusoe with his man Friday,” sighed Isabel, sinking, exhausted, into a chair. “These scenes are positively ruining my disposition. You know, Bianca, I used to have a very good temper, and the servants at home were always fond of me. But here I am becoming a scold and a fury. We must get settled in another apartment, and have a teacher right away.”
A cool summer apartment was found near the Esquiline, a teacher engaged, and our parting friends went their several ways, taking doleful leave of us.
And here it may not be amiss to make the reader better acquainted with the family who desire the pleasure of his acquaintance and company for a time.
Mr. Varney, the son of a Boston merchant, had, when he was young and venturesome, made a voyage to Spain in one of his father’s ships. The ship came back without him; but, after six months’ absence, he returned, bringing with him a young Spanish wife, whom he had wooed and won during that brief visit. She lived only ten years, pining ever for the sunny land of her birth, and dropped away finally before they had begun to fear that she was dying, leaving two daughters, Bianca and Isabel.
Her death quite uprooted her husband from his accustomed life, and gave him a shock from which he never recovered. He had always promised, and had meant, to take her back to Spain; but, between the calls of business and a habit of procrastination, had put off the visit from year to year till it was too late. Then the New England which had killed her became distasteful to him, and, after lingering a few years to settle up his business, he went abroad for an indefinite time, taking his daughters with him. He seemed to fancy that by this tardy journey he was proving to his wife his regret and the sincerity of his promises.
They avoided Spain, however, unwilling to hasten at once to that land which she had longed in vain to see. There was even an idea of self‐exile and punishment in going so near without touching its beautiful shores. They visited England and France, then came directly to Rome.
“I do not believe that we shall ever go away from Italy for any length of time,” Bianca said. “It is the true land of the lotos, and we have eaten of the charmed plant.”
“Would you like to live here always?” her father asked, looking earnestly at her.
There was a certain pensive melancholy in her face and attitude which constantly drew his anxious regards.
“Yes!” she answered slowly.
“I think Bianca is changed from what she used to be,” he said afterward to one of the family. “It seems to me that I remember her gay and bright, like Isabel; but she has grown quiet and gentle, little by little, and so gradually that I do not know when the change began.”
The person whom he addressed tried to give him the comfort and reassurance which his anxiety evidently pleaded for. She pointed out that one had but to look at the two girls to see at once the difference in their temperaments; that Isabel’s shorter and more compact form proved a stronger and more aggressive vitality than her sister’s willowy slenderness was capable of; that the very shape of their faces—a delicate oval in the one and a full oval in the other—was another proof of difference; and that, moreover, Bianca, being the elder, had been of an age to be impressed by her mother’s death, while Isabel was still too young.
“And I find yet another reason,” the comforter continued, turning mentor. “Your frequently‐expressed regret for your wife, and the habit you have of referring to her love for Spain and her home‐sickness, cannot fail to sadden so sensitive a heart as Bianca’s, while Isabel thinks that it is merely a ‘way you have got into,’ as she would express it.”
It was, perhaps, rather a severe speech; but when a person contracts a habit of making a mournful luxury of his troubles, and of perpetually setting up his mourning standard beside the red, white, and blue of those who at least try to be cheerful, it does no harm to let him know that the effect is not enlivening.
Well, we were settled in our summer quarters, and had just finished our first dinner there, when the historian of the party made a prudent suggestion.
“Since we are beginning a new life with new people, I think that we should have a clear understanding about everything, so as to save trouble at the end,” she said.
Her ears were still ringing with the din of battle which had accompanied their exit from their former home—the loud voice of the padrona demanding payment for broken chairs and tables that had dropped in pieces the first time they were touched; the vociferous porter, who insisted on having money because he had snatched Isabel’s reticule from her hand, in spite of her, and carried it a dozen steps; the small but very shrill boy, whom they had no recollection of ever having seen before, and who wanted to be paid for they knew not what; the hysterical donna, who expected that her heart, lacerated because her services had not been re‐engaged, would be soothed by the gift of a few extra lire; and a half‐dozen beggars crying for “qualche cosa.”
And so “it might be as well to have everything arranged at the beginning,” remarked this prudent person.
“I settled about the furniture before you came in to dinner,” Isabel said. “I had the whole family up, and before their eyes, with papa as witness, I shook and leaned on every table and cabinet, and sat down in every chair as hard as I could. Two chairs dropped, and are taken out for repair, which will cost us nothing. And I have ordered out all the paper bouquets with tall glass cases over them, and all the ornamental cups and saucers. But I think we may as well tell them that if they send begging people up to us, we will deduct what we give from the rent. Papa says he has made a careful reckoning, and finds that if we give a soldo to each ragged beggar in the street, and half a lira to each well‐dressed beggar who comes up, we shall be ourselves reduced to beggary in six months.”
Bianca turned round on the piano‐stool, her face full of expostulation. “Oh! but those dear Capuchins!” she exclaimed.
“It isn’t likely that I meant to refuse a Capuchin,” answered Isabel indignantly. “They are an exception; and so are all religious. No one can say that religion costs them much in Italy. I am ashamed to give so little and receive so much.”
“Having an understanding at the beginning will make no sort of difference at the end,” Mr. Varney said. “Every stranger here expects to have a fight with the family he is leaving. It is a part of the play which cannot be left out by particular request, like the Prince of Denmark out of Hamlet. Let us put off explanations till they are forced on us. I would like, though, to say a word or two to Giuseppe about the table.”
Giuseppe was a new servant, whom we considered ourselves very fortunate in engaging, as he not only spoke English, but had lived in England several months, and might therefore be supposed to know something of Anglo‐Saxon ways. He came in immediately.
“There are two or three directions which I wish to give once for all, Giuseppe,” Mr. Varney said in his slow, languid way. “I hope you will remember them, for I do not like to repeat orders.”
“Yes, sir!” said Giuseppe, with a stiffness of bow and attitude oddly in contrast with his sparkling Italian face.
“In the first place,” resumed his master, “when I say that I want breakfast, or dinner, or the carriage at a certain hour, I mean that time precisely, and not an hour or a half‐hour later, nor even five minutes later.”
A second bow and “Yes, sir!” worthy of May Fair.
Mr. Varney went on argumentatively, bringing his fingers into play: “Secondly, I want my wine brought in with the seals unbroken. If I find a single bottle of the wine I have put up opened, I will”—he paused for a suitable threat.
“Break the bottle over your head,” struck in Isabel. “Remember, papa, all the watered wine we have paid for, and don’t be too mild. Remember the horrible stuff for which we paid three times the market price all last winter. Don’t be too mild. You may depend upon it, Giuseppe, we shall not permit of any tampering with wine, or fruit, or candles, or anything. We have had too much of that.”
“Yes, miss!” says Giuseppe.
“I hate to be called ‘miss,’ ” remarked the young lady. “Call me signorina. Of all titles I think miss the most disagreeable. And Mrs. and Mr. are not much better. The Italian language has that one advantage, I will own.”
“Be careful about the fruit you give us,” Mr. Varney went on. “We want ripe fruit. The figs to‐day were not quite perfect. Figs,” said Mr. Varney with solemn deliberation—“figs should be just right, or they are good for nothing. When they are just right, there is nothing better, and you can give them to us three times a day. They must be ripe, but not too ripe; fine‐grained, but not salvy; cool, crisp, intensely sweet, and on the point of bursting open, but not quite broken.”
Giuseppe forgot his English training long enough to inquire, “Hadn’t you better speak to the trees about it, sir?”
“That will do,” Mr. Varney concluded with dignity. “I have no more to say now. You can go.”
The setting sun, shining on the new walls opposite, was reflected into our drawing‐room, lighting it beautifully, touching Mr. Varney’s gray hair and pleasant face, as he sat in a huge, yellow arm‐chair by the window and diving into Isabel’s bright eyes, as she leaned on his shoulder, and looked over with him the Diario Romano, trying to make out the holy‐ days.
“Here is the anniversary of the coronation of Pius IX.,” she said. “I wonder if we shall be arrested if we wear yellow roses in our hats, Bianca?”
Mr. Varney pored awhile over the book in his hand, and presently asked, with a general inquiring glance about the room, “Does anybody know what time of day or night twenty‐three o’clock is? Here is a function announced to begin at twenty‐three o’clock. Do people go to church at that hour? I should think it would be very late at night.”
“It might be some time the next day,” suggested a member of the family.
The gentleman arranged his glasses, and looked puzzled. “Then, when a function is announced for twenty‐three o’clock on Wednesday, it takes place at some hour on Thursday,” he said.
No one ventured either to acquiesce or to dissent, and it was concluded to put this difficulty on the list of questions we were making out for our Italian teacher to answer the next morning.
“He will be such a convenience to us!” Isabel said. “People assure me that he knows everything, and is never at loss for an answer.”
Mr. Varney took a pinch of snuff. He had always shown an inclination toward that indulgence, but had not dared to yield to it in America. Now, however, with such eminent examples constantly before his eyes, he could carry his snuff‐box, not only with impunity, but with a kind of pride.
“Have you reflected, my daughter,” he asked, “that your Italian teacher knows not a word of English, and that, since you cannot very well fly at him, as you could at Angelina, and extract his meaning at the sword’s point, his explanations, however excellent they may be, are not likely to profit you much for some time to come?”
“Oh! we will make out some way,” she replied carelessly. “One can always understand a clever person. Besides, if worse comes to worse, I don’t know why I shouldn’t fly at him, if necessary. He will be paid for his time; and one can always scold a person whom one pays.”
The last sun‐ray faded away, and the golden globe of the new moon shone out over Santa Maria Maggiore, shining so low and full in the transparent sky that one almost feared it might strike the tower or domes of that dearest of churches in passing, and break itself like a bubble.
We were silent a little while, then Mr. Varney said, “Sing us that song you are humming, my darling.”
When he said “my darling,” he always meant Bianca.
She made a motion to put away the music‐sheet before her, and take another, but replaced it; and presently we heard her low voice, which half sang, half spoke, the words:
“Friend, the way is steep and lonely, Thickly grows the rue; All around are shadows only: May I walk with you?
“Not too near; for, oh! your going Is upon the heights, Where the airs of heaven are blowing Through the morning lights.
“Dare I brush the dews that glisten All about your feet? Can I listen where you listen? Meet the sights you meet?
“Not too far—I faint at missing You from out my way. Vain is then the glory kissing All the peaks of day;
“Vain are all the laughing showers Leading in the spring; All the summer green and flowers, All the birds that sing.
“At your side my way is clearest: Tell me I may stay! Not too near—and yet, my dearest, Not too far away!”
“What does it mean?” asked Mr. Varney. “It seems to me very obscure.”
“Oh! a song isn’t expected to mean anything but melody,” somebody answered rather hastily. “All that is required of the lines is that they should be of the proper length. Sing the other, Bianca—the one I looked over to‐ day.”
The speaker knew that nothing suited Mr. Varney so well as a genuine love‐ song.
Bianca sang
“O roses dewy, roses red and sweet! Tinting with your hues the summer air, Give my cheeks your blushes, give my mouth your breathing, Add such rounded beauty as is meet, Wrap me in the graces all your tendrils wreathing; For he loves me, and I would be fair.
“O sunshine, playing with the swinging vine, Sift your gold through all my dusky hair, Gild each braid and ringlet with a softened glimmer, Hint the crown his love has rendered mine. Than the brightest eyes, oh! let not mine be dimmer; For he loves me, and I would be fair.
“O lilies! in a drift of scented snow, Willing all your sweetness to immure In a leafy cloister, waves alone caressing, Give my soul your whiteness ere ye go, That its stainless beauty be to him a blessing; For he loves me, and I would be pure.
“O faithful stars! I pray ye, touch me so With the virtue given unto you That I fail him never, living, nor yet dying, Howsoe’er the days may come and go, With a steadfast tenderness his life supplying; For he loves me, and I would be true.”
The first stroke of the Ave Maria broke off the last chord of the song, and there was silence in the room till the bells had sung their evening chorus.
Matter. VI
Constitution of bodies.—We have hitherto explained and vindicated those facts and principles which experience and reason point out to us as the true foundations of a sound philosophical theory of matter. We are now prepared to examine the much‐vexed question of the constitution of bodies; nor are we deterred from our undertaking by the very common belief that the essence of matter is, and will ever be, an impenetrable mystery; for although the different schools of philosophy have long disputed about the subject without being able to agree in their conclusions, we are confident that these very conclusions, every one of which contains a portion of truth, will afford us the means of reaching the true and complete solution of the question.
The opinions at present entertained by philosophers about the constitution of matter may be reduced to the three following:
Some affirm that the first constituents of natural bodies are the first matter and the substantial form, as explained by Aristotle and by his followers. This view, which reigned supreme for centuries, we shall call the scholastic solution of the question.
Others affirm, on the contrary, that the first constituents of bodies are simple elements, or points of matter, acting on each other from a certain distance, and thus forming dynamical systems of different natures according to their number, powers, and geometrical arrangement. This second view, which, after Boscovich, found a great number of advocates, we shall call the dynamic solution of the question.
Finally, others affirm that the first constituents of bodies are molecules, or chemical atoms. This view, based entirely on chemical considerations, originated with Dalton, of Manchester, early in the present century, and it was very favorably received by all men of science as the true interpretation of chemical facts. This third view we shall call the atomic solution of the question.
The investigation of the grounds on which these three solutions are supported will soon convince us that none of them can be entirely rejected, as each of them has some foundation in truth. To begin with the scholastic solution, all true philosophers know that God alone is a pure act; whence it follows that all creatures essentially consist of act and potency. This act and this potency, when there is question of material things, are called the substantial form and the matter. It is therefore an evident truth that material substance is essentially constituted of matter and substantial form. Against this doctrine nothing can be objected by the advocates of the dynamic or of the atomic solution.
On the other hand, the doctrine which teaches that bodies are made up of chemical atoms, or molecules, which have a definite nature and combine in definite numbers, is very satisfactorily established by experimental science; and nothing can be objected against it by speculative philosophers. But, to prevent misconceptions, we must observe that this theory does not consider the chemical atoms as absolutely indivisible, or as absolutely primitive, or as so many pieces of continuous matter. The word “atom” in chemistry signifies the least possible quantity of any natural substance known to us. Atoms are chemical equivalents. Their chemical indivisibility, on account of which they are called “atoms,” is a fact of experience; but they are absolutely divisible, owing to their physical composition; for we know by the balance that atoms of different substances contain different quantities of matter; and their vibrations, change of size, and variations of chemical activity with the variation of circumstances, unmistakably show that their mass is a sum of units substantially independent of one another, though naturally connected together by mutual actions in one dynamical system. Their matter is therefore discrete, not continuous.
As to the doctrine of simple and unextended elements, we have no need of saying anything in particular in this place, as such a doctrine is a simple corollary of the thesis concerning the impossibility of continuous matter, which we have fully developed in our last article.
From these remarks it will be seen that to the question, What are the primitive constituents of bodies? three answers may be given, and each of them true, if properly interpreted, as we shall presently explain. Thus it is true, in a strictly metaphysical sense, that the primitive constituents of bodies are the matter and the substantial form; it is true again, in a certain other sense, that the primitive constituents of bodies are chemical atoms; and it is true also, in a still different sense, that the primitive constituents of bodies are simple and unextended elements. Hence the scholastic solution does not necessarily clash with the atomic, nor does this latter exclude the dynamic, but all three may stand together in perfect harmony, or rather they are required by the very nature of the question, in the same manner as three solutions are required by the nature of a problem whose conditions give rise to an equation of the third degree. The duty, therefore, of a philosopher, when he has to handle this subject, is not to resort to one of the three solutions in order to attack the others, as it is the fashion to do, but to investigate how the three can be reconciled, and how truth in its fulness can be attained to by their conjunction.
This may appear difficult to those whose philosophical bias in favor of a long‐cherished opinion prevents them from looking at things in more than one manner; but those whose mind is free from prejudice and exclusiveness will readily acknowledge that whilst the atomists determine the constituents of bodies by chemical analysis, the dynamists, on the contrary, determine those constituents by mechanical analysis, and the scholastics by metaphysical analysis. Now, these analyses do not exclude one another; they rather prepare the way to one another. Hence their results cannot exclude one another, but rather lead to one another, and give by their union a fuller expression of truth.
If we ask of an atomist, “What are the primitive constituents of a mass of gold?” he will answer that they are the atoms, or the molecules, of gold, as chemistry teaches him. This answer is very good, as it points out the first specific principles of the compound body; for we cannot go further and resolve the molecule without destroying the specific nature of gold. For this reason the atomist, when he has reached the atoms of gold, stops there, and declares that the analysis cannot go further. He evidently refers to the chemical analysis.
If now we ask a dynamist, “What are the primitive constituents of a mass of gold?” he will answer that they are the simple elements of which the molecules of gold are made up. This answer, too, is very good, as it points out the first physical principles of the compound body; for we cannot go further and resolve the simple element without destroying the physical being. For this reason the dynamist, when he has reached the simple elements, stops there, and declares that the analysis can go no further. Of course he means the physical analysis.
Let us now ask of a schoolman, “What are the primitive constituents of a mass of gold.” He will answer that they are the substantial form and the matter, as the last terms obtained by the metaphysical analysis of substance. This last answer also is very good, as it points out the first metaphysical principles of substance. It should, however, be borne in mind that this answer does not apply to the mass of the body as such, nor to its molecules, but only to each primitive element contained in the mass and in the molecules of the body, as we shall fully explain in another place. When he has reached the substantial form and the matter, the schoolman stops there, and declares that the analysis can go no further. He means the metaphysical analysis, which resolves the physical being into metaphysical realities incapable of further resolution.
It is manifest that these three answers, however different, do not clash with one another. Accordingly, the atomist, the dynamist, and the schoolman may all agree in teaching truth, while they give different answers. The fact is, they do not look at the question from the same point of view, and, rigorously speaking, they solve different questions.
The first answers the question, What are the first specific principles of gold or the first golden particles; and he affirms that they are the molecules or atoms of gold.
The second answers the question, What are the first physical principles of such golden particles? and he affirms that they are unextended elements or primitive substances.
The third answers the question, What are the first metaphysical principles of those primitive substances? and he affirms that they are the matter and the substantial form.
This being the case, it may be asked how it came to pass that the atomic, the dynamic, and the scholastic solutions have hitherto been considered as irreconcilable. We reply that the three solutions would never have been held irreconcilable, if their advocates had kept within reasonable limits in the expression of their views. But as philosophers, like other people, are often exclusive, narrow‐minded, and ready to oppose whatever comes from a school which is not their own, it frequently happens that they are too easily satisfied with a partial possession of truth, and disdain the views of others who regard truth under a different aspect. By such a course, instead of promoting, they hinder, the advance of philosophical knowledge; and while fighting under the banner of a special school, which they mistake for the banner of truth, they allow themselves to be carried away by a spirit of contention, the unyielding character of which is the greatest impediment in the way of philosophical progress. The constitution of bodies is one of the subjects which, unfortunately, have been and are still handled by different schools with remarkable unfairness to one another. The atomist fights against the dynamist, and both despise the follower of the schoolman; whilst the schoolman from the stronghold of his metaphysical castle looks superciliously on both, confident that he will eventually drive them out of the field of philosophy. This attitude of one school towards another is not worthy of men who profess to love truth. If the atomistic philosopher cannot go beyond the chemical analysis, we will allow him to stop there, on condition, however, that he shall not claim a right to prevent others, who may know better, from proceeding to further investigations beyond the boundaries of chemistry. In like manner, if the dynamist cannot rise to the consideration of the metaphysical principles of substance, let him be satisfied with the consideration of the primitive elements of matter, and dispense with further inquiries; but let him not interfere with the work of the metaphysician, whose method and principles he does not understand. As to the metaphysician himself, we would warn him that, however deeply conversant he may be with the general truths concerning the essential constituents of things, he is nevertheless in danger of erring in their application to particular cases, unless he tests his conclusions by the principles of chemical, mechanical, and physical science; for it is from these sciences that we learn the true nature of the facts and laws of the material world; and all metaphysical investigation about the constitution of bodies must prove a failure, if it lacks the foundation of real facts and their correct interpretation.
It is obvious, after all, that truth cannot fight against truth; and since we have shown that each of the three solutions above given contains a portion of truth, we cannot reject any of them absolutely, but we must discard that only which troubles their harmony, and retain that through which they complete and confirm one another.
We therefore admit the substantial points of the three systems on the constitution of bodies, and recognize the general principles on which they are established. The analysis of bodies carried on through all its degrees leads to the following results:
First, by analyzing the body chemically, we find the atoms, or molecules, endowed with a determinate mass and with specific powers, corresponding to the specific nature of the body. Such atoms are not absolutely indivisible, though chemistry, as yet, cannot decompose them: hence atoms are further analyzable.
Secondly, by analyzing the atom, or the molecule, we discover its components, or primitive parts, called primitive elements, and primitive substances, which are physically simple and unextended, and concur in definite numbers to the constitution of definite molecular masses.
Finally, by analyzing the simple element or the primitive substance, which can no longer be resolved into physical parts, we find that such an element consists of act and potency, or, as we more frequently express ourselves, of form and matter, neither of which can exist separately, as the first physical being which exists in nature is the substance arising from their conspiration. Accordingly the form and the matter of which the simple element consists are not physical, but only metaphysical, principles, and they constitute a metaphysical, not a physical, compound.
These three conclusions are scientifically and philosophically certain; and while they afford a sound basis to our reasonings on material objects, they reconcile modern physics with the principles of old metaphysics. We say with the principles, not with the conclusions; for we must own that the old metaphysicians, owing to their insufficient knowledge of the laws of nature, not unfrequently failed in the application of their principles to the interpretation of natural facts. Thus the chemical, the dynamical, and the scholastic views of the constitution of bodies cease to be antagonistic, and each of the three schools is awarded all it can claim consistently with the rights of truth.
As we intend to speak hereafter more in detail of the constitution of bodies, we shall content ourselves at present with these general remarks on the subject. It is manifest from what precedes that bodies and molecules arise from simple elements, and are substances, not on account of their bodily or molecular composition, but merely because their primitive physical components, the elements, are substances. Hence the question concerning the constitution of material substance, as such, does not necessarily require any further research after the constitution of bodies, but may be directly settled by the consideration of the elements themselves.
We have already seen that the primitive elements of matter are rigorously unextended; that each of them is endowed with activity, passivity, and inertia, and is thus fitted to produce, receive, and conserve local movement; and that the elementary activity, whether attractive or repulsive, is exercised in a sphere according to a permanent law. And since the essential constitution of things must be gathered from their essential properties, it is of the utmost importance for us to ascertain whether the principles of the material element may be fully determined by its known properties, or whether the element may possess occult properties which, if known, would modify our notion of its principles; for it is only after an adequate knowledge of its principle of activity, of its principle of passivity, and of the relation of the one to the other, that we can safely pronounce a judgment about the essence of a primitive being.
We may ask, therefore, in the first place: Does a simple element possess any occult power besides its known power of attracting or repelling?
This question must be answered in the negative. Occult powers and occult qualities have been admitted by the ancient philosophers, and are admitted even now, in compound substances, not because any unknown power resides in the first elements of which they are made up, but because the manner of their composition, and consequently the manner of determining the resultant of their elementary actions, transcends our conception and baffles our calculations. Thus the phenomena of chemical affinity, cohesion, capillarity, electricity, and magnetism depend on actions which science cannot trace to their primitive causes—viz., to the simple elements—but only to their proximate causes, which are complex, and, as such, follow different laws of causation corresponding to the different modes of their constitution. Before we are able to trace such phenomena to their simple and primitive causes, it would be necessary to find out the intrinsic constitution of every molecule; the number, quality, and arrangement of its constituent elements; the arrangement and distance of the molecules in the body; and the mathematical formulas by which every movement of each particle could be determined for every instant of time. As this has not been done, and will never be done, the determination of the causality of molecular phenomena remains, and will ever remain, an insoluble problem, and the complex power from which any such phenomenon proceeds remains, and will ever remain, unknown so far as it is the result of an unknown composition, though we know, at least in general, the nature of the primitive powers from which it results. In other terms, there are no occult powers in matter, but only unknown resultants of known primitive powers.
To prove this, we observe that an occult power is to be admitted, then, only when a phenomenon occurs which cannot proceed from powers already known. This is evident; for, when phenomena can be accounted for by known powers, there is no ground for any inquiry about occult causes. In other words, to look for occult causes without data or indications on which to ground the induction, is to propose to one’s self a problem without conditions; which no man in his senses would do. Now, no phenomenon has been observed anywhere in material things which cannot proceed from the known powers of attraction and repulsion; nay, it is positively certain that all phenomena proceed from the same powers. For each material point, when acted on, receives a determination to local movement, and nothing else; and therefore the effect of the action of matter upon matter is nothing but local movement, one element approaching to or retiring from the other. Now, this is precisely what attractive and repulsive powers are competent to do. Hence it is that in all the works of science and natural philosophy the causality of phenomena of every kind is uniformly traced to mere attractions and repulsions.
Again, if any occult power, besides that of attracting or repelling, be assumed to reside in a primitive element of matter, such a power will remain idle for ever, inasmuch as it will never be applicable to the production of natural phenomena. On the other hand, it is obvious that a power destined to remain idle for ever is an absurdity. It is therefore absurd to assume that there is in the elements of matter any occult power besides that of attracting or repelling. In this argument the minor proposition is evident, because all active power is naturally destined to act; whilst the major proposition is evidently inferred from the fact that matter has no passivity, except with regard to local motion, as is acknowledged by all philosophers, and as we shall presently show from intrinsic reasons. Whence it follows that, if there were in matter any hidden power not destined, as the attractive and the repulsive are, to produce local movement, such a power would be absolutely useless, as absolutely inapplicable to any other matter, and would remain in this absurd condition for ever. We need not, therefore, trouble ourselves with the absurd hypothesis of occult powers; and we conclude, accordingly, that the principle of activity of a primitive element is merely attractive or repulsive, as explained in one of our past articles.
It may be asked, in the second place: Is the centre of a simple element to be identified with the principle of passivity of the element?
This question must be answered in the affirmative. For the principle of passivity is that to which the action is terminated; but the action of any one element of matter is terminated to the centre of any other element; therefore the centre of any element is its principle of passivity. The minor proposition of this syllogism might be proved by metaphysical considerations(156); but we may prove it more clearly in the following manner: Locomotive action implies direction, and no direction can be really taken in space except from a real point to another real point. Now, that by which any two elements, A and B, mark out two distinct points in space, is the centre of their sphere of action. The direction of the action is therefore from the centre of A to the centre of B, and vice versa—that is, the action of the one is terminated to the centre of the other. And thus it is evident that each single element receives the action of every other element in its central point, which is, accordingly, the passive principle of the element. This conclusion may be expressed in this other manner: In a material element the matter (passive principle) is a point from which the action of the element is directed towards other points in space, and to which the actions of other material points in space are directed.
We may remark, also, that material elements, whilst they are always ready to receive movement from extrinsic agents, cannot apply their own power to themselves, because they are inert. This being the case, it obviously follows that the action of an extrinsic agent on an element is terminated there where the action of the element itself cannot be terminated. Now, a little reflection will show that the centre of the element is just the point where the action of the element itself cannot be terminated. For as locomotive action implies direction, and as no direction can be had from the centre of activity to itself, but only from a point to a distinct point, the action of the element upon its own centre is a metaphysical impossibility. Whence we conclude that the principle of passivity, or that in which the primitive element is liable to receive a determination to local movement, is nothing else than the intrinsic term of its essence, the centre from which it directs its action in a sphere, or, in other terms, the matter itself as contradistinguished from the substantial form.
In the third place, it may be asked: Can it be proved that a material element is susceptible of nothing but local movement?
We answer: Yes. For we have shown that the passivity of the material element resides in a mere mathematical point, which, having no bulk, cannot be liable to intrinsic changes, and therefore is susceptible of such determinations only as will bring about a change of extrinsic relations. It is hardly necessary to explain that such a change of extrinsic relations is always brought about by local movement; for such relations either are distances or depend on distances; and distances cannot be modified except by local movement. It is thus manifest that material elements are susceptible of nothing but local movement. Hence the passivity of matter is confined to the reception of local movement alone.
From this well‐known truth we may again confirm our preceding solution of the question concerning occult powers. For the activity and the passivity of a simple element essentially respond to one another in the same manner and with as strict a necessity as giving and receiving, and since they spring from the principles of one and the same primitive essence, they must belong to one and the same kind. If, then, there were in the material elements any occult power besides that which produces local movement, there would be also a correspondent passivity not destined to receive local movement; for without this new passivity the occult power could not be exercised. And since the passivity of matter is limited to the sole reception of local movement, none but locomotive power can be admitted to reside in matter.
Essence of material substance.—We are now ready to answer with all desirable precision and clearness the question, “What is the essence of material substance?”—a question not at all formidable, when the active and the passive principle of matter have been properly defined and elucidated. Our answer is as follows:
The essence, or quiddity, of a thing is really nothing else than its nature; hence if we know the principles which constitute the nature of the material element, we know in fact the essence of material substance. Now, the principles which constitute any given created nature are an act of a certain kind—that is, a certain principle of activity; and a corresponding potency—that is, a corresponding principle of passivity. Whence we conclude that the principles of a material nature are the act by which such a nature is determined to act in a sphere and to cause local movement, and the potency on account of which the same nature is liable to receive local movement. And since the said act is called “the substantial form,” and the said potency “the matter,” we conclude that the essence of material substance consists of matter and substantial form.
This conclusion is by no means new; it expresses, on the contrary, the universal doctrine of the ancient philosophers on the essence of material substance. But it must be observed that we limit this doctrine to the essence of primitive elements, which alone can be rigorously styled “first substances,” whilst the ancients, owing to their imperfect notions of natural things, applied the same doctrine to compound substances, which they believed to arise by substantial generation instead of material composition. Thus our conclusion is more guarded and less comprehensive than that of the old metaphysicians. Moreover, the ancient philosophers, who did not know the primitive elements, but assumed the continuity of matter, could not picture to themselves the intellectual notions of matter and substantial form in a sensible manner, and certainly were unable to find any true sensible image of them; and for this reason their speculations about the essence of material substance remained imperfect and their explanations obscure and unsatisfactory. We, on the contrary, thanks to the investigations and discoveries made in the last centuries, have the advantage of knowing that all matter is subject to gravitation, and acts in a sphere according to a constant and very simple law, which presides over the molecular and chemical no less than the astronomical phenomena; and we are thus enabled to form a true and genuine conception of the matter and form of the primitive element, founded on ascertained facts, and free from false or incongruous imaginations. Hence the words “matter” and “form,” as employed by us, have such a clear and precise sense that no room is left for their misinterpretation.
We therefore know, and clearly too, the essence of primitive material substance, whatever may be said to the contrary by some admirers of the old philosophy, who spurn the discoveries of modern physics, or by some modern thinkers, who revile all metaphysical analysis as mere rubbish.
The essential definition of material substance, as such, is therefore the following: Material substance is a being fit to cause and receive merely local motion. This definition is fuller than the one adopted by the ancients, who defined matter to be “a movable being”—Ens mobile. Of course, when they spoke of a “movable” being, the ancients referred to “local” movement; but, as there are movements of some other kinds, none of which can be produced or received by matter, we prefer to keep the epithet “local” as prominent as possible in our definition, and we add the adverb “merely” as a further limitation required by the nature of the subject. The old definition mentions nothing but the mobility of matter. This is owing to the fact that the ancients had no notion of universal attraction, and considered the activity of material substance as dependent on movement, according to their axiom: Nihil movet nisi motum. But as we know, on the one hand, that the specific differences of things must be derived from their formal rather than from their material constitution, and, on the other, as the constituent form of the material element is an efficient principle of local motion, we include in the definition of matter its aptitude both to produce and to receive local motion “as the complete specific difference” which distinguishes material substance from any other being whatever.
It seems to us that our definition of matter wants neither clearness nor precision. Indeed, we would be unable to make it clearer or more accurate; and as for its soundness, let our readers, who have hitherto followed our reasonings, judge for themselves.
In the opinion of most modern philosophers, the essence of matter consists of extension and resistance. From what has preceded it is evident that this opinion is utterly false. Extension is not a property of matter as such, but only of physical compounds containing a multitude of distinct material points; and, even in this case, it is not the matter, but the volume, or the place circumscribed by the extreme terms of the body, that can be styled “extended,” as we have shown in our last article. As to resistance, it suffices to remark that no accidental act belongs to the essence of substance; hence resistance, which is an accidental act, cannot enter into the definition of matter. Some will say that, if not resistance, at least the power of resisting, belongs to the essence of matter. But not even this is true. The material element has the power of attracting or of repelling; but such a power cannot be considered as formally resisting. Resistance is a particular case of repulsion, when the agent by its repulsive exertion gradually lessens and exhausts the velocity of an approaching mass of matter; but resistance may also be a particular case of attraction, inasmuch as the agent by its attractive exertion gradually lessens and exhausts the velocity of a mass of matter receding from it. Hence all material substance has a motive power, either attractive or repulsive; but neither of them can be described as a resisting power; for attractivity does not resist the movement of an approaching body, nor does repulsivity resist the movement of a receding body. It is scarcely necessary to add that the notion of a resisting power essential to matter is a remnant of the old prejudice consisting in the belief that, when two bodies come in contact, the matter of the one precludes, by its materiality, bulk, and inertia, the further advance of the other. Nothing is more common, with the followers of the ancient theories, than the assumption that the matter of bodies by its quantity and by its occupation of space resists the passage of any other matter. We have shown elsewhere that resistance is action, and therefore is not owing to the inert matter standing in the way of the approaching body, but to the active power of which the inert matter is the centre.
To complete our elucidation of the essential definition of matter, something remains to be said about the inertia of material substance. We shall see that inertia is not a constituent, but only a result of the constitution, of matter; whence it follows that no mention of inertia is needed in the essential definition of material substance. In fact, the notion of this substance includes nothing but the essential act and the essential term, that is, the principle of activity and the principle of passivity, both concerned with local motion only. To have a principle of activity and a principle of passivity is in the nature of all created substances, and constitutes their generic entity; hence the mention of these two principles in our definition serves to point out the genus of material substance; whilst the intrinsic ordination of the same principles to local motion serves to point out the essential difference which separates matter from any other substance.
Inertia.—Many confound the inertia of matter with its passivity, and consider inertia as one of the essential constituents of matter. It is not difficult, however, to show that inertia and passivity are two distinct properties. Those who reduce the principles of real being to an act and a term, without taking notice of its essential complement,(157) reduce in fact the intrinsic properties of real being to activity and passivity, the one proceeding from the act, and the other from the potential term; and thus the inertia of matter, for which they cannot account by any distinct principle, is considered by them as an attribute of matter identical with, or at least involved in, its real passivity. The truth is that, as the act and the potency, which constitute the essence of a material being, are the formal source of its actuality, so also the activity connatural to that act, and the passivity connatural to that potency, are the formal source of the inertia by which the same being is characterized. This will be easily understood by a glance at the nature of inertia.
That inertia is not passivity is clear enough; for passivity is the potentiality of receiving an impression from without, whereas inertia is the incapability of receiving an impression from within; passivity is that on account of which matter receives the determination to move, whereas inertia is that on account of which matter cannot change that determination, but is obliged to obey it, by moving with the received velocity in the given direction. The determination to move is received only while the agent acts, that is, as long as the passivity is being actuated, and no longer; whereas the movement itself, which follows such a determination, continues, owing to inertia, without need of continuing the action, so that, if all further action were to cease, the moving matter, owing to its inertia, would persevere in its movement for ever.
Moreover, whence does the passivity and whence does the inertia of matter proceed? Matter is passive, because its substantial term, whose reality entirely depends on actuation, is still actuable or potential with regard to accidental acts. Passivity is therefore nothing but the further actuability of the substantial term; whilst, on the contrary, matter is inert, because its substantial act and its substantial term are so related to one another that the motive power possessed by the former can never terminate its action to the latter; for this is the only reason why a material element cannot modify the determinations which it receives from without. Hence inertia is nothing but the result of the special relation intervening between the principle of activity and the principle of passivity in the constitution of material substance; or, in other terms, inertia is a corollary of the essential correlation of form and matter, and, therefore, is to be traced, not, as passivity, to the essential term of the substance, but to its essential complement. This shows that, in the phrase matter is inert, the word “matter” stands for the material substance itself, and not for the matter, or potential term, which is under the substantial form, and whose character is passivity.
The question we have here discussed may seem of very little importance; yet we had to give its solution, not only because the confusion of distinct notions is a source of difficulties and sophisms, but also because the given solution confirms the necessity of admitting the essential complement as the third principle of real being, and because in spiritual substances there is passivity, though not inertia; which shows how indispensable is our duty of distinguishing between the two.
From the preceding remarks we infer also that inertia belongs to the essence of material substance, not, however, as a constituent principle, but only as something implied in the nature of its constituent principles. As it is impossible to alter the nature of such principles without destroying the essence of matter, so also it is impossible for matter to cease to be inert so long as its essence remains unchanged. In a word, non‐inert matter is a metaphysical impossibility.
Lastly, we may add that inertia does not admit of degrees; and therefore all material elements are equally inert. In fact, when we say that matter is inert, we mean, as has been explained, that material substance is entirely and absolutely incapable of imparting motion to itself. Now, absolute incapacity is perfect incapacity, and does not admit of degrees. Hence we may find in different bodies more or less of inert matter, but not more or less of inertia. This is true also of the passivity of matter; that is, we may find in different bodies more or less of passive matter, but not more or less of passivity; for passivity, as consisting in an absolute liability to accidental actuation, cannot admit of degrees.
A few conclusions.—It may be useful, and may prove satisfactory to our readers, to cast a glance over the ground we have trodden and the results so far reached. The sum and substance of the doctrine which we have endeavored to establish is contained in the following propositions:
I. Matter is not continuous, nor divisible in infinitum, nor has it any intrinsic quantity connected in any manner with its essential constitution.
II. All bodies are ultimately made up of primitive elements, physically simple and unextended, which being reached, the physical division of bodies cannot go further.
III. The primordial molecules, or so‐called “atoms,” of all substances are so many systems of simple elements dynamically bound with one another by mutual action.
IV. The continuous extension, or geometric quantity, usually predicated of bodies, is the extension of the place comprised within the extreme limits of each body. It is, in other terms, the extension of the volume, not of the matter. Nevertheless, such an extension may be called “material,” not only because the terms of its dimensions are material, but also because in most bodies the elements and the molecules are so close that their action on our senses produces the appearance of material continuity.
V. The extension of bodies is real, though their material continuity is merely apparent; hence only the volumes of bodies, and not their masses, can be properly styled extended.
VI. The true absolute mass of a body is the number of primitive elements it contains.
VII. The primitive elements are of two kinds, some of them always and everywhere attractive, others always and everywhere repulsive. The matter, however, is the same in both kinds, and bears the same relation to its form, whether this be of an attractive or of a repulsive nature.
VIII. There are no other powers in the primitive elements than that of attracting and that of repelling.
IX. All primitive elements have a sphere of activity, throughout which they constantly act according to the Newtonian law—that is, in the inverse ratio of the squared distances, even when the distance is molecular; and no distance, however great, can be designated where the action of an element will not have a finite intensity.
X. The active power of primitive elements cannot be exerted in the immediate contact of matter with matter, distance being an essential condition of all locomotive actions.
XI. The elementary power acts immediately on all distant matter throughout its sphere, independently of any material medium of transmission or communication. Movement, however, cannot be propagated without a material medium.
XII. The term from which the action of any given element is directed, and the term in which the same element receives the motion caused by other elements, is one and the same, viz., the real centre of its sphere of activity; and it is called the matter. The act from which such a centre receives its first existence is called the substantial form; and it has a spherical character, inasmuch as it constitutes a virtual indefinite sphere.
XIII. The essence of a primitive element of matter is by no means a mystery. The essential definition of such an element is “a substance fit to cause and to receive mere local motion.”
XIV. Inertia is an essential property of material substance, no less than activity and passivity. Inertia admits of no degrees.
XV. The so‐called “force of inertia” is neither the inertia itself nor any special motive power; but it merely expresses a certain exercise of the elementary powers dependent on the inertia of the matter acted on; for bodies, on account of their inertia, cannot leave their place before they have received in all their parts a suitable velocity. Hence while such a velocity is being communicated to a body, the body which is acted on cannot yield its place to the impinging body; and consequently, during the struggle of two bodies, the one which impinges loses a quantity of movement equal to that which it imparts to the mass impinged upon. The loss of movement in the impinging body is therefore caused, not by the inertia of the body impinged upon, but by its elementary powers as exercised by it during the reception of the momentum.
The foregoing conclusions, as every attentive reader must have noticed, have been drawn from nothing but known facts and received principles; we may therefore consider them as fully established. The more so as we have taken care to examine both sides of each question, and have given not only such direct proofs of each conclusion as would suffice to convince all unprejudiced minds, but also every objection that we have been able to find against our own views, and have thus found the opportunity of confirming, by our answers to the same, the truth of the doctrine propounded. There may be other objections which did not occur to our mind; yet it is likely that their solution will need no new considerations besides those already developed in the preceding pages. Should any other difficulty occur to the reader which cannot be answered by those considerations, we would earnestly entreat him to propound it to us, that we may try its strength. We are always glad to hear a new objection against what we hold to be true. For objections either can or cannot be solved. If they can, their solution will throw a new light on the doctrine we defend; and if they cannot, their insolubility will show us some weak point, or at least some impropriety of our language, and will thus cause us to correct our expressions or modify our opinions. Whatever helps us to regard things under some new point of view is calculated to enlarge our conceptions, to make our language clearer and more precise, and to strengthen our philosophical convictions. Those alone need to be afraid of objections who draw their conclusions from arbitrary hypotheses, instead of established truths.
We conclude the present article with a short answer to a question, which has often been raised by timorous people, concerning what may be styled the cardinal point of our doctrine on matter‐viz., the simplicity of material elements. The question is the following: If we admit that the elements of matter are physically simple, is there not a serious danger of setting at naught the essential difference between the spiritual and the material substance, and are we not drifting thus into materialism?
We reply that no such danger needs to be apprehended. For it is not true that physical simplicity constitutes the essential difference between spirit and matter. Every primitive being is physically simple; and yet it does not follow that all primitive beings belong to the same species. On the other hand, spirit and matter, notwithstanding their physical simplicity, evidently belong to different species. The element of matter is inert—that is, though acting all around itself, it cannot exercise its activity within itself; whereas the spiritual substance exercises its activity within as well as without itself, and continually modifies its own interior state by its vital operations. Again, the element of matter is ubicated in space, and marks a local point, from which it directs its action in a sphere; whereas the spiritual substance neither marks a local point in space nor acts in a sphere, but determines both the direction and the intensity of its action as it pleases. Moreover, the element of matter has nothing but locomotive power; whereas the spiritual substance possesses not only the locomotive, but also, and principally, the thinking and the willing powers, by which it vastly transcends all material being. This suffices to show that spirit and matter, though physically simple, have an entirely different metaphysical constitution—that is, a different substantial act, a different substantial term, and a different substantial complement. Hence the simplicity of the material element does not set at naught the essential difference between matter and spirit.
Those whose metaphysical notions about material substance still hang upon the physics of the ancients will be loath to admit that our unextended element can be physically simple; for they have been taught to believe that wherever there is matter and form, there is physical composition. But such a notion is evidently wrong; for where in the element are the physical components, without which physical composition is impossible? Can we say that the matter and the substantial form are physical components? Certainly not; for the form without the matter cannot exist, nor can the matter exist without the form. Both are absolutely required for the constitution of the primitive physical being. How, then, can they be conceived as physical beings, if no physical being can be conceived before their meeting in one essence and in a common existence? A physical compound is a compound whose components have a distinct and independent existence in nature; for physical beings alone can be physical components, and nothing which has not a distinct and independent existence in nature can be called a physical being, except by an abuse of terms. The physical being is a complete being—that is, an act materially completed by its intrinsic term, and formally completed by its individual actuality. All beings that are incomplete, and whose existence depends on other cognate beings, are no more than metaphysical realities. Hence the substantial form of the element, which has no separate existence, is not a physical, but only a metaphysical, being; and in the same manner, the matter to which that form gives the first existence is not a physical, but only a metaphysical, reality. Whence it follows that the composition of matter and substantial form is not a physical, but only a metaphysical, composition; and, further, that the primitive element is indeed a metaphysical, but not a physical, compound.
On this subject we shall have more to say when explaining the peripatetic theory of substantial generations, which assumes that the substantial form can be changed without changing the matter. It is on this assumption that the physical distinction between matter and form has been maintained. We shall prove in the most irrefragable manner that the assumption is based on an equivocation about the meaning of the epithet “substantial” as applied to natural forms, and that no form which is truly and strictly substantial—that is, which gives the first being to its matter—can leave its matter and be subrogated by another substantial form.
To Be Continued.