CHAPTER 40
Two days after my arrival at Kamouraska, I received a letter
from the surrounding priests, at the head of whom was the Grand Vicar Mailloux,
expressing the hope that I would not try to form any temperance society in my
new parish, as I had done in Beauport; for the good reasons they said, that
drunkenness was not prevailing in that part of Canada, as it was in the city of
Quebec. I answered them, politely, that so long as I should be at the head of
this new parish, I would try, as I had ever done, to mind my own business, and I
hoped that my neighbouring friends would do the same. Not long after, I saw that
the curates felt ashamed of their vain attempt to intimidate me. The next
Sabbath, the crowd was greater than at the first. Having heard that the
merchants were to start the next day, with their schooners, to buy their winter
provisions or rum, I said, in a very solemn way, before my sermon:
"My friends, I know that, to-morrow, the merchants leave for Quebec to
purchase their rum. Let me advise them, as their best friend, not to buy any;
and as the ambassador of Christ, I forbid them to bring a single drop of those
poisonous drinks here. It will surely be their ruin, if they pay no attention to
this friendly advice; for they will not sell a single drop of it, after next
Sabbath. That day, I will show to the intelligent people of this parish, that
rum and all the other drugs, sold here, under the name of brandy, wine, and
beer, are nothing else than disgusting, deadly, and cursed poisons."
I then preached on the words of our Saviour: "Be ye also ready; for in such
an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man cometh: (Matt. xxiv. 44). Though the
people seemed much pleased and impressed by that second sermon, they felt
exceedingly irritated at my few warning words to the merchants. When the service
was over, they all rallied around the merchants to tell them not to mind what
they had heard.
"If our young curate," said they, "thinks he will lead us by the
nose, as he has done with the drunkards of Beauport, he will soon see his
mistake. Instead of one hundred tons, as you brought last fall, bring us two
hundred, this year; we will drink them to his health. We have a good crop and we
want to spend a jolly winter."
It is probable that the church of Kamouraska had never seen within its walls
such a crowd as on the second Sabbath of October, 1842. It was literally
crammed. Curiosity had attracted the people who, not less eager to hear my first
sermon against rum, than to see the failure they expected, and wished, of my
first efforts to form a temperance society. Long before the public service, at
the door of the church, as well as during the whole preceding week, the people
had pledged themselves never to give up their strong drink, and never to join
the temperance society. But what are the resolutions of man against God? Is He
not their master? The half of that first sermon on temperance was not heard,
when that whole multitude had forgotten their public promises. The hearts were
not only touched they were melted and changed by God, who wanted to show, once
more, that His works of mercy were above all the works of His hands.
From the very day of my arrival in Kamouraska, I had made a serious and exact
inquiry about the untold miseries brought upon the people by intoxicating
drinks. I had found that, during the last twenty years, twelve men had been
drowned and eight had been frozen to death, who had left twenty widows and sixty
orphans in the most distressing poverty. Sixty farmers had lost their lands and
had been obliged to emigrate to other places, where they were suffering all the
pangs of poverty from the drunkenness of their parents; several other families
had their properties mortgaged for their whole value to the rum merchants, and
were expected, every day, to be turned out from their inheritances, to pay their
rum bills. Seven mothers had died in delirium tremens, one had hung herself,
another drowned herself when drunk. One hundred thousand dollars had been paid
to the rum merchants during the last fifteen years. Two hundred thousand more
were due to the storekeeper; threefourths of which were for strong drink. Four
men had been murdered, among whom was their landlord, Achilles Tache, through
their drunken habits!
When I had recapitulated all these facts, which were public and undeniable, and
depicted the desolation of the ruined families, composed of their own brothers,
sisters, and dear children; when I brought before their minds, the tears of the
widows, the cries of the starving and naked children, the shame of the families,
the red hand of the murderers and the mangled bodies of their victims; the
eternal cries of the lost from drunkenness, the broken-hearted fathers and
mothers whose children had been destroyed by strong drink; when I proved to them
that there was not a single one in their midst who had not suffered, either in
his own person, or in that of his father or mother, brothers, sisters or
children yes, when I had given them the simple and awful story of the crimes
committed in their midst; the ruin and deaths, the misery of thousands of
precious souls for whom Christ died in vain, the church was filled with such
sobs and cries that I often could not be heard. Many times my voice was drowned
by the indescribable confusion and lamentation of that whole multitude. Unable
to contain myself, several times I stopped and mingled my sobs and cries with
those of my people.
When the sermon, which lasted two hours, was finished, I asked all those who
were determined to help me in stopping the ravages of intoxicating drinks, in
drying the tears which they caused to flow, and saving the precious souls they
were destroying, to come forward and take the public pledge of temperance by
kissing a crucifix which I held in my hand. Thirteen hundred and ten came. Not
fifty of the people had refused to enroll themselves under the blessed and
glorious banners of temperance! and these few recalcitrants came forward, with a
very few exceptions, the next time I spoke on the subject.
The very same day, the wives of the merchants sent dispatches to their husbands
in Quebec, to tell them what had been done, and not a single barrel of
intoxicating drinks was brought by them. The generous example of the admirable
people of Kamouraska spoke with an irresistible eloquence to the other parishes
of that district, and before long, the banners of temperance floated over all
the populations of St. Pascal, St. Andrew, Isle Verte, Cacouna, Riviere du Loup,
Rimouski, Matane, St. Anne, St. Roch, Madawaska, St. Benoit, St. Luce, ect., on
the south side of the St. Lawrence, and the Eboulements, La Malbaye, and the
other parishes on the north side of the river; and the people kept their pledge
with such fidelity that the trade in rum was literally killed in that part of
Canada, as it had been in Beauport and its vicinity.
The blessed fruits of this reform were soon felt and seen everywhere, in the
public prosperity and the spread of education. Kamouraska, which was owing two
hundred thousand dollars to the merchants in 1842, had not only paid its
interest, but had reduced its debt to one hundred thousand, when I left it to go
to Montreal in 1846. God only knows my joy at these admirable manifestations of
His mercies towards my country. However, the joys of man are never without their
mixture of sadness.
In the good providence of God, being invited by all the curates to establish
temperance societies among their people, I had the sad opportunity, as no priest
ever had in Canada, to know the secret and public scandals of each parish. When
I went to the Eboulements, on the north side of the river, invited by the Rev.
Noel Toussignant, I learned from the very lips of that young priest, and the
ex-priest Tetreau, the history of the most shameful scandals.
In 1830, a young priest of Quebec, called Derome, had fallen in love with one of
his young female penitents of Vercheres, where he had preached a few days, and
he had persuaded her to follow him to the parsonage of Quebec. The better to
conceal their iniquity from the public, he persuaded his victim to dress herself
as a young man, and throw her dress into the river, to make her parents and the
whole parish believe that she was drowned. I had seen her many times at the
parsonage of Quebec, under the name of Joseph, and had much admired her refined
manners, though more than once I was very much inclined to think that the smart
Joseph was no one else than a lost girl. But the respect I had for the curate of
Quebec (who was the coadjutor of the bishop) and his young vicars, caused me to
reject those suspicions as unfounded. However many even among the first citizens
of the city had the same suspicions, and they pressed me to go to the coadjutor
and warn him; but I refused, and told those gentlemen to do that delicate work
themselves, and they did it.
The position of that high dignitary and his vicar was not then a very agreeable
one. Their bark had evidently drifted into dangerous waters. To keep Joseph
among themselves was impossible, after the friendly advice from such high
quarters, and to dismiss him was not less dangerous. He knew too well how the
curate of Quebec, with his vicars, were keeping their vows of celibacy, to
dismiss him without danger to themselves; a single word from his lips would
destroy them. Happily for them, Mr. Clement, then curate of the Eboulements, was
in search of such a servant, and took him to his parsonage, after persuading the
bishopcoadjutor to give Joseph a large sum of money to seal his lips.
Things went on pretty smoothly between Joseph and the priest for several years,
till some suspicions arose in the minds of the sharp-sighted people of the
parish, who told the curate that it would be safer and more honourable for him
to get rid of his servant. In order to put an end to those suspicions, and to
retain him in the parsonage, the curate persuaded him to marry the daughter of a
poor neighbour.
The banns were published three times, and the two girls were duly married by the
curate, who continued his criminal intimacies, in the hope that no one would
trouble him any more on that subject. But not long after he was removed to La
Petite Riviere, and in 1838 the Rev. M. Tetreau was appointed curate of the
Eboulements. This new priest, knowing of the abominations which his predecessor
had practiced, continued to employ Joseph. One day, when Joseph was working at
the gate of the parsonage, in the presence of several people, a stranger came
and asked him if Mr. Tetreau was at home.
"Yes, sir, Mr. Curate is at home," answered Joseph; "but as you
seem a stranger to the place, would you allow me to ask you from what parish you
come?"
"I am not ashamed of my parish," answered the stranger. "I come
from Vercheres."
At the word "Vercheres," Joseph turned so pale that the stranger was
puzzled. He looked carefully at him, and exclaimed:
"Oh! my God! What do I see here? Genevieve! Genevieve! over whom we have
mourned so long as drowned! Here you are disguised as a man!"
"Dear uncle" (it was her uncle); "for God's sake, not a word more
here!"
But it was too late; the people who were there had heard the uncle and the
niece. Their long and secret suspicions were well-founded. One of their former
priests had kept a girl, under the disguise of a man, in his house; and to blind
his people more thoroughly, he had married that girl to another, in order to
have them both in his house when he pleased, without awakening any suspicion!
The news went, almost as quickly as lightning, from one end to the other of the
parish, and spread all over the country, on both sides of the St. Lawrence. I
had heard of that horror, but could not believe it. However, I had to believe
it, when, on the spot, I heard from the lips of the ex-curate, M. Tetreau, and
the new curate, M. Noel Toussignant, and from the lips of the landlord, the
Honourable Laterriere, the following details, which had come to light only a
short time before.
The justice of the peace had investigated the matter, in the name of public
morality. Joseph was brought before the magistrates, who decided that a
physician should be charged to make, not a post-mortem, but an ante-mortem
inquest. The Honourable Laterriere, who made the inquest, declared that Joseph
was a girl, and the bonds of marriage were legally dissolved.
At the same time, the curate M. Tetreau, had sent a dispatch to the Right Rev.
Bishop-coadjutor of Quebec, informing him that the young man whom he had kept in
his house, several years, was legally proved a girl; a fact which, I need hardly
state, was well-known by the bishop and his vicars! They immediately sent a
trustworthy man with $500, to induce the girl to leave the country without
delay, lest she should be prosecuted and sent to the penitentiary. She accepted
the offer, and crossed the lines to the United States with her two thousand
dollars, where she was soon married, and where she still lives.
I wished that this story had never been told me, or at least, that I might be
allowed to doubt some of its circumstances; but there was no help. I was forced
to acknowledge that in my Church of Rome, there was such corruption from head to
foot, which could scarcely be surpassed in Sodom. I remember what the Rev. Mr.
Perras had told me of the tears and desolation of Bishop Plessis, when he had
discovered that all the priests of Canada, with the exception of three, were
atheists.
I should not be honest, did I not confess that the personal knowledge of that
fact, which I learned in all its scandalous details from the very lips of
unimpeachable witnesses, saddened me, and for a time, shook my faith in my
religion, to its foundation. I felt secretly ashamed to belong to a body of men
so completely lost to every sense of honesty, as the priests and bishops of
Canada. I had heard of many scandals before. The infamies of the Grand Vicar
Manceau and Quiblier of Montreal, Cadieux at Three Rivers, and Viau at Riviere
Oulle; the public acts of depravity of the priests Lelievre, Tabeau, Pouliot,
Belisle, Brunet, Quevillon, Huot, Lajuste, Rabby, Crevier, Bellecourt, Valle,
Nignault, Noel, Pinet, Duguez, Davely and many others, were known by me, as well
as by the whole clergy. But the abominations of which Joseph was the victim
seemed to overstep the conceivable limits of infamy. For the first time, I
sincerely regretted that I was a priest. The priesthood of Rome seemed then, to
me, the very fulfillment of the prophecy of Revelation, about the great
prostitute who made the nations drunk with wine of her prostitution (Rev. xvii.
1 5).
Auricular confession, which I knew to be the first, if not the only cause, of
these abominations, appeared to me, what it really is, a school of perdition for
the priest and his female penitents. The priest's oath of celibacy was, to my
eyes, in those hours of distress, but a shameful mask to conceal a corruption
which was unknown in the most depraved days of old paganism. New and bright
lights came, then, before my mind which, had I followed them, would have guided
me to the truth of the gospel. But I was blind! The Good Master had not yet
touched my eyes with His divine and life-giving hand. I had no idea that there
could be any other church than the Church of Rome in which I could be saved. I
was, however, often saying to myself: "How can I hope to conquer on a
battlefield where so many, as strong and even much stronger than I am, have
perished?"
I felt no longer at peace. My soul was filled with trouble and anxiety. I not
only distrusted myself, but I lost confidence in the rest of the priests and
bishops. In fact, I could not see any one in whom I could trust. Though my
beautiful and dear parish of Kamouraska was, more than ever, overwhelming me
with tokens of its affection, gratitude, and respect, it had lost its attraction
for me. To whatever side I turned my eyes, I saw nothing but the most seducing
examples of perversion.It seemed as if I were surrounded by numberless snares,
from which it was impossible to escape. I wished to depart from this deceitful
and lost world.
When my soul was as drowned under the waves of a bitter sea, the Rev. Mr.
Guignes, Superior of the Monastery of the Fathers of Oblates of Mary Immaculate,
at Longueil, near Montreal, came to pass a few days with me, for the benefit of
his health. I spoke to him of that shameful scandal, and did not conceal from
him that my courage failed me, when I looked at the torrent of iniquity which
was sweeping everything, under our eyes, with an irresistible force. "We
are here alone, in the presence of God," I said to him. "I confess
that I feel an unspeakable horror at the moral ruin which I see everywhere in
our church. My priesthood, of which I was so proud till lately, seems to me,
today, the most ignominious yoke, when I see it dragged in the mud of the most
infamous vices, not only by the immense majority of the priests, but even by our
bishops. How can I hope to save myself, when I see so many, stronger than I am,
perishing all around me?"
The Reverend Superior, with the kindness of a father and becoming gravity,
answered me: "I understand your fears, perfectly. They are legitimate and
too well-founded. Like you, I am a priest; and like you, if not more than you, I
know the numberless and formidable dangers which surround the priest. It is
because I know them too well, that I have not dared to be a secular priest a
single day. I knew the humiliating and disgraceful history of Joseph and the
coadjutor Bishop of Quebec. Nay! I know many things still more horrible and
unspeakable which I have learned when preaching and hearing confessions in
France and in Canada. My fear is that, today, there are not many more undefiled
souls among the priests than in Sodom, in the days of Lot. The fact is, that it
is morally impossible for a secular priest to keep his vows of celibacy, except
by a miracle of the grace of God. Our holy church would be a modern Sodom long
ago, had not our merciful God granted her the grace that many of her priests
have always enrolled themselves among the armies of the regular priests in the
different religious orders which are, to the church, what the ark was to Noah
and his children in the days of the deluge. Only the priests whom God calls, in
His mercy, to become members of any of those orders, are safe. For they are
under the paternal care and surveillance of superiors whose zeal and charity are
like a shield to protect them. Their holy and strict laws are like strong walls
and high towers which the enemy cannot storm."
He then spoke to me, with an irresistible eloquence, of the peace of soul which
a regular priest enjoys within the walls of his monastery. He represented, in
the most attractive colours, the spiritual and constant joys of the heart which
one feels when living, day and night, under the eyes of a superior to whom he
has vowed a perfect submission. He added, "Your providential work is
finished in the diocese of Quebec. The temperance societies are established
almost everywhere. We are in need of your long experience and your profound
studies on that subject in the diocese of Montreal. It is true that the good
Bishop de Nancy had done what he could to support that holy cause, but, though
he is working with the utmost zeal, he has not studies that subject enough to
make a lasting impression on the people. Come with us. We are more than thirty
priests, Oblates of Mary Immaculate, who will be too happy to second your
efforts in that noble work, which is too much for one man alone. Moreover, you
cannot do justice to your great parish of Kamouraska and to the temperance cause
together. You must give up one, to consecrate yourself to the other. Take
courage, my young friend! Offer to God the sacrifice of your dear Kamouraska, as
you made the sacrifice of your beautiful Beauport, some years ago, for the good
of Canada and in the interest of the Church, which calls you to its help."
It seemed to me that I could oppose no reasonable argument to these
considerations. I fell on my knees, and made the sacrifice of my beautiful and
precious Kamouraska. The last Sabbath of September I gave my farewell address to
the dear and intelligent people of Kamouraska, to go to Longueil and become a
novice of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate.
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CHAPTER 41 Back
to Top
The year 1843 will be long remembered in the Church of Rome
for the submission of Dr. Newman to her authority. This was considered by many
Roman Catholics as one of the greatest triumphs ever gained by their church
against Protestantism. But some of us, more acquainted with the daily
contradictions and tergiversations of the Oxford divine, could not associate
ourselves in the public rejoicings of our church.
From almost the very beginning of his public life, Dr. Newman as well as Dr.
Pusey appeared to many of us as cowards and traitors in the Protestant camp,
whose object was to betray the church which was feeding them, and which they
were sworn to defend. They both seemed to us to be skillful but dishonest
conspirators.
Dr. Newman, caught in the very act of that conspiracy, has boldly denied it.
Brought before the tribunal of public opinion as a traitor who, though enrolled
under the banners of the Church of England, was giving help and comfort to its
foe, the Church of Rome, he has published a remarkable book under the title of
"apologia pro vita sua," to exculpate himself. I hold in my hands the
New York edition of 1865. Few men will read that book from beginning to end; and
still fewer will understand it at its first reading. The art of throwing dust in
the eyes of the public is brought to perfection in that work. I have read many
books in my long life, but I have never met with anything like the Jesuit
ability shown by Dr. Newman in giving a colour of truth to the most palpable
errors and falsehoods. I have had to read it at least four times, with the
utmost attention, before being sure of having unlocked all its dark corners and
sophistries.
That we may be perfectly fair towards Dr. Newman, let us forget what his
adversaries have written against him, and let us hear only what he says in his
own defense. Here it is. I dare say that his most bitter enemies could never
have been able to write a book so damaging against him as this one, which he has
given us for his apology.
Let me tell the reader at once that I, with many other priests of Rome, felt at
first an unspeakable joy at the reading of many of the "Tracts for the
Times." It is true that we keenly felt the blows Dr. Newman was giving us
now and then; but we were soon consoled by the more deadly blows which he was
striking at his own Church the Church of England. Besides that, it soon became
evident that the more he was advancing in his controversial work, the nearer he
was coming to us. We were not long without saying to each other: "Dr.
Newman is evidently, though secretly, for us; he is a Roman Catholic at heart,
and will soon join us. It is only from want of moral courage and honesty that he
remains a Protestant."
But from the very beginning there was a cloud in my mind, and in the minds of
many other of my co-priests, about him. His contradictions were so numerous, his
sudden transitions from one side to the other extreme, when speaking of Romanism
and Anglicanism; his eulogiums of our Church today, and his abuses of it the
very next day; his expressions of love and respect for his own Church in one
tract, so suddenly followed by the condemnation of her dearest doctrines and
practices in the next, caused many others, as well as myself, to suspect that he
had no settled principles, or faith in any religion.
What was my surprise, when reading this strange book, I found that my suspicions
were too well founded; that Dr. Newman was nothing else than one of those
free-thinkers who had no real faith in any of the secret dogmas he was
preaching, and on which he was writing so eloquently! What was my astonishment
when, in 1865, I read in his own book the confession made by that unfortunate
man that he was nothing else but a giant weathercock, when the whole people of
England were looking upon him as one of the most sincere and learned ministers
of the Gospel. Here in his own confession, pages 111, 112. Speaking of the years
he had spent in the Episcopal Church as a minister, he says: "Alas! It was
my portion, for whole years, to remain without any satisfactory basis for my
religious profession; in a state of moral sickness, neither able to acquiesce in
Anglicanism, or able to go to Rome!" This is Cardinal Newman, painted by
himself! He tells us how miserable he was when an Episcopalian minister, by
feeling that his religion had no basis no foundation!
hat is a preacher of religion who feels that he has no basis, no foundation, no
reason to believe in that religion? Is he not that blind man of whom Christ
speaks, "who leads other blind men into the ditch?"
Note it is not Rev. Charles Kingsley; it is not any of the able Protestant
controversialists; it is not even the old Chiniquy who says that Dr. Newman was
nothing else but an unbeliever, when the Protestant people were looking upon him
as one of their most pious and sincere Christian theologians. It is Dr. Newman
himself who, without suspecting it, is forced by the marvelous providence of God
to reveal that deplorable fact in his "Apologia pro vita sua."
Now, what was the opinion entertained by him on the high and low sections of his
church? Here are his very words, p. 91: "As to the High Church and the Low
Church, I thought that the one had not much more of a logical basis than the
other; while I had a thorough contempt for the Evangelical!" But please
observe that, when this minister of the Church of England had found, with the
help of Dr. Pusey, that this church had no logical basis, and that he had a
"thorough contempt for the Evangelical," he kept a firm and continuous
hold upon the living which he was enjoying from day to day. Nay, it is when paid
by his church to preach her doctrines and fight her battles, that he set at work
to raise another church! Of course, the new church was to have a firm basis of
logic, history, and the Gospel: the new church was to be worthy of the British
people it was to be the modern ark to save the perishing world!
The reader will, perhaps, think I am joking, and that I am caricaturing Dr.
Newman. No! the hour in which we live is too solemn to be spent in jokes it is
rather with tears and sobs that we must approach the subject. Here are the very
words of Dr. Newman about the new church he wished to build after demolishing
the Church of England as established by law. He says (page 116): "I have
said enough on what I consider to have been the general objects of the various
works which I wrote, edited, or prompted in the years which I am reviewing. I
wanted to bring out in a substantive form a living Church of England, in a
position proper to herself and founded on distinct principles; as far as paper
could do it, and as earnestly preaching it and influencing others towards it
could tend to make it a fact; a living church, made of flesh and blood, with
voice, complexion, motion, and action, and a will of its own." If I had not
said that these words were written by Dr. Newman, would the reader have
suspected?
What is to be the name of the new church? Dr. Newman himself called it "Via
Media." As the phrase indicates, it was to stand between the rival Churches
of England and Rome, and it was to be built with the materials taken, as much as
possible, from the ruins of both.
The first thing to be done was, then, to demolish that huge, illogical,
unscriptural, unchristian church restored by the English Reformers. Dr. Newman
bravely set to work, under the eye and direction of Dr. Pusey. His merciless
hammer was heard almost day and night, from 1833 to 1843, striking alternately
with hard blows, now against the church of the Pope, whom he called Antichrist,
and then against his own church, which he was, very soon, to find still more
corrupted and defiled than its anti-Christian rival. For as he was proceeding in
his work of demolition, he tells us that he found more clearly, every day, that
the materials and the foundations of the Church of Rome were exceedingly better
than those of his own. He then determined to give a coup de grace to the Church
of England, and strike such a blow that her walls would be for ever pulverized.
His perfidious Tract XC. aims at this object.
Nothing can surpass the ability and the pious cunning with which Dr. Newman
tries to conceal his shameful conspiracy in his "Apologia."
Hear the un-British and unmanly excuses which he gives for having deceived his
readers, when he was looked upon as the most reliable theologian of the day, in
defense of the doctrines of the Church of England. In pages 236 7 he says:
"How could I ever hope to make them believe in a second theology, when I
had cheated them in the first? With what face could I publish a new edition of a
dogmatic creed, and ask them to receive it as gospel? Would it not be plain to
them that no certainty was to be found anywhere? Well, in my defense I could but
make a lame apology; however, it was the true one, viz., that I had not read the
Fathers critically enough; that in such nice points as those which determine the
angle of divergence between the two churches, I had made considerable
miscalculations; and how came this about? Why, the fact was, unpleasant as it
was to avow, that I had leaned too much upon the assertions of Usher, Jeremy
Taylor, or Barrow, and had been deceived by them."
Here is a specimen of the learning and honesty of the great Oxford divine! Dr.
Newman confesses that when he was telling his people, "St. Augustine says
this, St. Jerome says that" when he assured them that St. Gregory supported
this doctrine, and Origen that, it was all false. Those holy fathers had never
taught such doctrines. It was Usher, Taylor, and Barrow who were citing them,
and they had deceived him!
Is it not a strange thing that such a shrewd man as Dr. Newman should have so
completely destroyed his own good name in the very book he wrote, with so much
care and ingenuity, to defend himself? One remains confounded he can hardly
believe his own eyes at such want of honesty in such a man. It is evident that
his mind was troubled at the souvenir of such a course of procedure. But he
wanted to excuse himself by saying it was the fault of Usher, Taylor, and
Barrow!
Are we not forcibly brought to the solemn and terrible drama in the Garden of
Eden? Adam hoped to be excused by saying, "The woman whom Thou gavest to be
with me, she gave me the fruit of the tree, and I did eat." The woman said,
"The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat." But what was the result of
those excuses? We read: "Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the
Garden of Eden." Dr. Newman has lost the precious inheritance God had given
him. He has lost the lamp he had received to guide his steps, and he is now in
the dark dungeon of Popery, worshiping, as a poor slave, the wafer god of Rome.
But what has become of that new church, or religion, the Via Media which had
just come out from the sickly brain of the Oxford professor? Let us hear its sad
and premature end from Dr. Newman himself. Let me, however, premise, that when
Dr. Newman began his attack against his church, he at first so skillfully mixed
the most eloquent eulogiums with his criticisms, that, though many sincere
Christians were grieved, few dared to complain. The names of Pusey and Newman
commanded such respect that few raised their voice against the conspiracy. This
emboldened them. Month after month they become unguarded in their denunciations
of the Church of England, and more explicit in their support of Romanism. In the
meantime the Church of Rome was reaping a rich harvest of perverts; for many
Protestants were unsettled in their faith, and were going the whole length of
the road to Rome so cunningly indicated by the conspirators. At last, the 90th
Tract appeared in 1843. It fell as a thunderbolt on the church. A loud cry of
indignation was raised all over England against those who had so mercilessly
struck at the heart of that church which they had sworn to defend. The bishops
almost unanimously denounced Dr. Newman and his Romish tendencies, and showed
the absurdity of his Via Media.
Now, let us hear him telling himself this episode of his life. For I want to be
perfectly fair to Dr. Newman. It is only from his own words and public acts that
I want the reader to judge him.
Here is what he says of himself, after being publicly condemned: "I saw
indeed clearly that my place in the movement was lost. Public confidence was at
an end. My occupation was gone. It was simply an impossibility that I could say
anything henceforth to good effect, when I had been posted up by the Marshal on
the buttery hatch of every college of my University after the manner of
discommend pastry-cooks, and when, in every part of the country, and every class
of society, through every organ and occasion of opinion, in newspapers, in
periodicals, at meetings, in pulpits, at dinner tables, in coffee-rooms, in
railway carriages, I was denounced as a traitor who had laid his train, and was
detected in the very act of firing it against the time-honoured
establishment."....."Confidence in me was lost. But I had already lost
full confidence in myself" (p 132).
Let the reader hear these words from the very lips of Dr. Newman
"Confidence in me was lost! But I had already lost full confidence in
myself" (p. 132). Are these words the indications of a brave, innocent man?
Or are they not the cry of despair of a cowardly and guilty conscience?
Was it not when Wishart heard that the Pope and his millions of slaves had
condemned him to death, that he raised his head as a giant, and showed that he
was more above his accusers and his judges than the heavens are above the earth?
He had lost his confidence in himself and in his God and when he said, "I
am happy to suffer and die for the cause of Truth?" Did Luther lose
confidence in himself and in his God when condemned by the Pope and all his
Bishops, and ordered to go before he Emperor to be condemned to death, if he
would not retract? No! it is in those hours of trial the he made the world to
re-echo the sublime words of David: "God is our refuge and our strength, a
present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth be
removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. Though
the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the
swelling thereof." But Luther had a good cause. He knew, he felt that the
God of Heaven was on his side, when Dr. Newman knew well that he was deceiving
the world, after having deceived himself. Luther was strong and fearless; for
the voice of Jesus had come through the fifteen centuries to tell him:
"Fear not, I am with thee." Dr. Newman was weak, trembling before the
storm, for his conscience was reproaching him for his treachery and his
unbelief.
Did Latimer falter and lose his confidence in himself and in his God, when
condemned by his judges and tied to the stake to be burnt? No! It is then that
he uttered those immortal and sublime words: "Master Ridley: Be of good
comfort and play the man; we shall, this day, light a candle, by God's grace, in
England, as I trust shall never be put out!"
This is the language of men who are fighting for Christ and His Gospel. Dr.
Newman could not use such noble language when he was betraying Christ and His
Gospel.
Now, let us hear from himself when, after having lost the confidence of his
Church and his country, and had also lost his own confidence in himself, he saw
a ghost and found that the Church of Rome was right. At page 157, he says:
"My friend, an anxiously religious man, pointed out the palmary words of
St. Augustine which were contained in one of the extracts made in the (Dublin)
Review, and which had escaped my observation, 'Securus judicat obis terrarum.'
He repeated these words again and again; and when he was gone, they kept ringing
in my ears....The words of St. Augustine struck me with a power which I never
had felt from any words before. To take a familiar instance, they were like the
'Turn again, Whittington' of the chime; or to take a more serious one, they were
like the 'tolle lege' of a child which converted St. Augustine himself. 'Securus
judicat orbis terrarum!' By those great words of the ancient father, the theory
of the Via Media was absolutely pulverized. I became excited at the view thus
opened upon me....I had seen the shadow of a hand upon the wall....He who has
seen a ghost cannot be as if he had never seen it. The heaven had opened and
closed again. The thought, for the moment, had been: 'The Church of Rome will be
found right, after all'" (158).
It would be amusing, indeed, if it were not so humiliating, to see the naivete
with which Dr. Newman confesses his own aberrations, want of judgment and
honesty in reference to the pet scheme of his whole theological existence at
Oxford. "By these words," he says, "the Via Media was absolutely
pulverized!"
We all know the history of the mountain in travail, which gave birth to a mouse.
Dr. Newman tells us frankly that, after ten years of hard and painful travail,
he produced something less than a mouse. His via Media was pulverized; it turned
to be only a handful of dust.
Remember the high sounding of his trumpet about his plan of a new church, that
New Jerusalem on earth, the church of the future, which was to take the place of
his rotten Church of England. Let me repeat to you his very words about that new
ark of salvation with which the professor of Oxford was to save the world. (Page
116): "I wanted to bring out, in a substantive form, a living Church of
England, in a position proper to herself and founded on distinct principles, as
far as paper could do it, and as earnestly preaching in an influencing others
towards it could tend to make it a fact; a living church, made of flesh and
blood, with voice, complexion, and motion, and action, and a will of its
own."
Now, what was the end of that masterpiece of theological architecture of Dr.
Newman? Here is its history, given by the great architect himself: "I read
the palmary words of St. Augustine, 'securus judical orbis terrarum!' By those
great words of the ancient father, the theory of the Via Media was pulverized! I
become excited at the view thus opened before me. I had seen the shadow of a
hand on the wall. He who has seen a ghost can never be as if he had not see it;
the heavens had opened and closed again. The thought, for a moment, was 'The
Church of Rome will be found right, after all'" (158). Have we ever seen a
man destroying himself more completely at the very moment that he tries to
defend himself? Here he does ingeniously confess what everyone knew before, that
his whole work, for the last ten years, was not only a self-deception, but a
supreme effort to deceive the world his Via Media was a perfect string of
infidelity, sophism, and folly. The whole fabric had fallen to the ground at the
sight of a ghost! To build a grand structure, in the place of his Church which
he wanted to demolish, he had thought it was sufficient to throw a great deal of
glittering sand, with some blue, white, and red dust, in the air! He tells us
that one sad hour came when he heard five Latin words from St. Augustine, saw a
ghost and his great structure fell to the ground!
What does this all mean? It simply means that God Almighty has dealt with Dr.
Newman as He did with the impious Pharaoh in the Red Sea, when he was marching
at the head of his army against the church of old, His chosen people, to destroy
them.
Dr. Newman was not only marching with Dr. Pusey at the head of an army of
theologians to destroy the Church of God, but he was employing all the resources
of his intellect, all his false and delusive science, to raise a idolatrous
church in its place; and when Pharaoh and Dr. Newman thought themselves sure of
success, the God of heaven confounded them both. The first went down with his
army to the bottom of the sea as a piece of lead. The second lost, not his life,
but something infinitely more precious he lost his reputation for intelligence,
science, and integrity; he lost the light of the Gospel, and became perfectly
blind, after having lost his place in the kingdom of Christ!
I have never judged a man by the hearsay of any one, and I would prefer to have
my tongue cut out than to repeat a word of what the adversaries of Dr. Newman
have said against him. But we have the right, and I think it is our duty, to
hear and consider what he says of himself, and to judge him on his own
confession.
At page 174 we read these words from his own pen to a friend: "I cannot
disguise from myself that my preaching is not calculated to defend that system
of religion which has been received for three hundred years, and of which the
Heads of Houses are the legitimate maintainers in this place....I fear I must
allow that, whether I will or no, I am disposing them (the young men) towards
Rome." Here Dr. Newman declares, in plain English, that he was disposing
his hearers and students at Oxford to join the Church of Rome! I ask it: what
can we think of a man who is paid and sworn to do a thing, who not only does it
not, but who does the very contrary? Who would hesitate to call such a man
dishonest? Who would hesitate to say that such a one has no respect for those
who employ him, and no respect for himself?
Dr. Newman writes this whole book to refute the public accusation that he was a
traitor, that he was preparing the people to leave the Church of England and to
submit to the Pope. But, strange to say, it is in that very book we find the
irrefutable proof of his shameful and ignominious treachery! In a letter to Dr.
Russell, President of the Roman Catholic College of Maynooth, he wrote, page
227: "Roman Catholics will find this to be the state of things in time to
come, whatever promise they may fancy there is of a large secession to their
church. This man or that may leave us, but thee will be no general movement.
There is, indeed, an incipient movement of our church towards yours, and this
your leading men are doing all they can to frustrate by their unwearied efforts,
at all risks, to carry off individuals. When will they know their position, and
embrace a larger and wiser policy?" Is not evident here that God was
blinding Dr. Newman, and that He was making him confess his treachery in the
very moment the he was trying to conceal it? Do we not see clearly that he was
complaining of the unwise policy of the leaders of the Church of Rome who were
retarding that incipient movement of his church towards Romanism, for which he
was working day and night with Dr. Pusey?
But had not Dr. Newman confessed his own treachery, we have, today, its
undeniable proof in the letter of Dr. Pusey to the English Church Union, written
in 1879. Speaking of Dr. Newman and the other Tractarians, he says: "An
acute man, Dr. Hawkins, Provost of Oriel, said of the 'Tracts,' on their first
appearance, 'I know they have a forced circulation.' We put the leaven into the
meal, and waited to see what would come of it. Our object was to Catholicism
England."
And this confession of Dr. Pusey, that he wanted to Catholicism England, is
fully confirmed by Dr. Newman (pages 108, 109) where he says: "I suspect it
was Dr. Pusey's influence and example which set me and made me set others on the
larger and more careful works in defense of the principles of the movement which
followed" (towards Rome) "in a course of years."
Nothing is more curious than to hear from Dr. Newman himself with what skill he
was trying to conceal his perfidious efforts in preparing that movement towards
Rome. He says on that subject, page 124: "I was embarrassed in consequence
of my wish to go as far as was possible in interpreting the articles in the
direction of Roman dogma, without disclosing what I was doing to the parties
whose doubts I was meeting, who might be, thereby, encouraged to go still
further than, at present, they found in themselves any call to do."
A straw fallen on the water indicates the way the tide goes. Here we have the
straw, taken by Dr. Newman himself, and thrown by him on the water. A thousand
volumes written by the ex-Professor of Oxford to deny that he was a conspirator
at work to lead his people to Rome, when in the service of the Church of
England, could not destroy the evident proof of his guilt given by himself in
this strange book.
If we want to have a proof of the supreme contempt Dr. Newman had for his
readers, and his daily habit of deceiving them by sophistries and incorrect
assertions, we have it in the remarkable lines which I find at page 123 of his
Apologia. Speaking of his "Doctrinal Development," he says: "I
wanted to ascertain what was the limit of that elasticity in the direction of
Roman dogma. But, next, I had a way of inquiry of my own which I state without
defending. I instanced it afterward in my essay on 'Doctrinal Development.' That
work, I believe, I have not read since I published it, and I doubt not at all
that I have made many mistakes in it, partly from my ignorance of the details of
doctrine as the Church of Rome holds them, but partly from my impatience to
clear as large a range for the Principles of doctrinal development (waiving the
question of historical fact) as was consistent with the strict apostolicity and
identity of the Catholic creed. In like manner, as regards the Thirty Nine
Articles, my method of inquiry was to leap in medias res" (123-124).
Dr. Newman is the author of two new systems of theology; and, from his own
confession, the two systems are a compendium of error, absurdities, and folly.
His Via Media was "pulverized" by the vision of a ghost, when he heard
the four words of St. Augustine: "Securus judicat obis terrarum." The
second, known under the name of "Doctrinal Development," is, from his
own confession, full of errors on account of his ignorance of the subject on
which he was writing, and his own impatience to support his sophisms.
Dr. Newman is really unfortunate in his paternity. He is the father of two
literary children. The first-born was called Via Media; but as it had neither
head nor feet, it was suffocated on the day of its birth by a "ghost."
The second, called "Doctrinal Development," was not viable. The father
is so shocked with the sight of the monster, that he publicly confesses its
deformities and cries out, "Mistake! mistake! mistake!" (pages 123,
124 "Apologia pro vita sua.")
The troubled conscience of Dr. Newman has forced him to confess (page 111) that
he was miserable, from his want of faith, when a minister of the Church of
England and a Professor of Theology of Oxford: "Alas! it was my portion for
whole years to remain without any satisfactory basis for my religious
profession!" At pages 174 and 175 he tells us how miserable and anxious he
was when the voice of his conscience reproached him in the position he held in
the Church of England, while leading her people to Rome. At page 158 he
confesses his unspeakable confusion when he saw his supreme folly in building up
the Via Media, and heard its crash at the appearance of a ghost. At page 123 he
acknowledges how he deceived his readers, and deceived himself, in his
"Doctrinal Development." At page 132 he tell us how he had not only
completely lost the confidence of his country, but lost confidence in himself.
And it is after this humiliating and shameful course of life that he finds out
"that the Church of Rome is right!"
Must we not thank God for having forced Dr. Newman to tell us through what dark
and tortuous ways a Protestant, a disciple of the Gospel, a minister of Christ,
a Professor of Oxford, fell into that sea of Sodom called Romanism or Papism! A
great lesson is given us here. We see the fulfillment of Christ's words about
those who have received great talents and have not used them for the "Good
Master's honour and glory."
Dr. Newman, without suspecting it, tells us that it was his course of action
towards that branch of the Church of Christ of which he was a minister, that
caused him to lose the confidence of his country, and troubled him so much that
it caused him to lose that self-confidence which is founded on our faith and our
union with Christ, who is our rock, our only strength in the hour of trial.
Having lost her sails, her anchor, and her helm, the poor ship was evidently
doomed to become a wreck. Nothing could prevent her from drifting into the
engulfing abyss of Popery.
Dr. Newman confesses that it is only when his guilty conscience was uniting its
thundering voice with that of his whole country to condemn him that he said,
"After all, the Church of Rome is right!" These are the arguments, the
motives, the lights which have led Dr. Newman to Rome! And it is from himself
that we have it! It is a just, an avenging God who forces His adversary to
glorify Him and say the truth in spite of himself in this "Apologia pro
vita sua."
No one can read that book, written almost with a superhuman skill, ability, and
fineness, without a feeling of unspeakable sadness at the sight of such bright
talents, such eloquence, such extensive studies, employed by the author to
deceive himself and deceive his readers; for it is evident, on every page, that
Dr. Newman has deceived himself before deceiving his readers. But no one can
read that book without feeling a sense of terror also. For he will hear, at
every page, the thundering voice of the God of the Gospel, "Because they
received not the love of the truth that they might be saved, God shall send them
strong delusions, that they should believe a lie" (2 Thess. ii. 10-11).
What, at first, most painfully puzzles the mind of the Christian reader of this
book is the horror which Dr. Newman has for the Holy Scriptures. The unfortunate
man who is perishing from hydrophobia does not keep himself more at a distance
from water than he does from the Word of God. It seems incredible, but it is the
fact, that from the first page of the history of his "Religious
Opinions" to page 261, where he joins the Church of Rome, we have not a
single line to tell us that he has gone to the Word of God for light and comfort
in his search after truth. We see Dr Newman at the feet of Daniel Wilson, Scott,
Milner, Whately, Hawkins, Blanco, White, William James, Butler, Keble, Froude,
Pusey, ect., asking them what to believe, what to do to be saved; but you do not
see him a single minute, no, not a single minute, at the feet of the Saviour,
asking him, "Master, what must I do to have 'Eternal Life'?" The
sublime words of Peter to Christ, which are filling all the echoes of heaven and
earth, these eighteen hundred years, "Lord! to whom shall we go? Thou hast
the words of eternal life!" have never reached his ears! In the long and
gloomy hours, when his soul was chilled and trembling in the dark night of
infidelity; when his uncertain feet were tired by vainly going here and there,
to find the true way, he has never heard Christ telling him: "Come unto Me.
I am the Way; I am the Door; I am the Life!" In those terrible hours of
distress of which he speaks so eloquently, when he cries (page 111) "Alas,
I was without any basis for my religious profession, in a state of moral
sickness: neither able to acquiesce in Anglicanism, nor able to go to
Rome:" when his lips were parched with thirst after truth, he never, no
never, went to the fountain from which flow the waters of eternal life!
One day he goes to the Holy Fathers. But what will he find there? Will he see
how St. Cyprian sternly rebuked the impudence of Stephen, Bishop of Rome, who
pretended to have some jurisdiction over the See of Carthage? Will he find how
Gregory positively says that the Bishop who will pretend to be the
"Universal Bishop" is the forerunner of Antichrist? Will he hear St.
Augustine declaring that when Christ said to Peter, "Thou art Peter, and
upon this rock I will build my Church," He was speaking of Himself as the
rock upon which the Church would stand? No. The only thing which Dr. Newman
brings us from the Holy Fathers is so ridiculous and so unbecoming that I am
ashamed to have to repeat it. He tells us (page 78), "I have an idea. The
mass of the Fathers (Justin, Athenagoras, Ireanaeus, Clement, Tertullian, Origen,
Ambrose) hold that, though Satan fell from the beginning, the angels fell before
the deluge, falling in love with the daughters of men. This has lately come
across me as a remarkable solution of a notion I cannot help holding."
Allow me here to remind the reader that, though the Fathers have written many
beautiful evangelical pages, some of them have written the greatest nonsense and
the most absurd things which human folly can imagine. Many of them were born and
educated as pagans. They had learned and believed the history and immorality of
their demi-gods; they had brought those notions with them into the Church; and
they had attributed to the angels of God, the passions and love for women which
was one of the most conspicuous characters of Jupiter, Mars, Cupid, Bacchus, ect.
And Dr. Newman, whose want of accuracy and judgment is so often revealed and
confessed by him in this book, has not been able to see that those sayings of
the Fathers were nothing but human aberrations. He has accepted that as Gospel
truth, and he has been silly enough to boast of it.
The bees go to the flowers to make their precious honey; they wisely choose what
is more perfect, pure and wholesome in the flowers to feed themselves. Dr.
Newman does the very contrary; he goes to those flowers of past ages, the Holy
Fathers, and takes from them what is impure for his food. After this, is it a
wonder that he has so easily put his lips to the cup of the great enchantress
who is poisoning the world with the wine of her prostitution?
When he reader has followed with attention the history of the religious opinions
of Dr. Newman in his "Apologia pro vita sua," and he sees him
approaching, day after day, the bottomless abyss of folly, corruption, slavery,
and idolatry of Rome, into which he suddenly falls (page 261), he is forcibly
reminded of the strange spectacle recorded in the eloquent pages of
Chateaubriand, about the Niagara Falls.
More than once, travelers standing at the foot of that marvel of the marvels of
the works of God, looking up towards heaven, have been struck by the sight of a
small, dark spot moving in large circles, at a great distance above the fall.
Gazing at that strange object, they soon remarked, that in its circular march in
the sky, the small dark spot was rapidly growing larger, as it was coming down
towards the thundering fall. They soon discovered the majestic form of one of
the giant eagles of America! And the eagle, balancing himself in the air, seemed
to looked down on the marvelous fall as if absolutely taken with admiration at
its grandeur and magnificence! For some time, the giant of the air remained
above the majestic cataract describing his large circles. But when coming down
nearer and nearer the terrific abyss, he was suddenly dragged as by an
irresistible power into the bottomless abyss to disappear. Some time later the
body, bruised and lifeless, is seen floating on the rapid and dark waters, to be
for ever lost in the bitter waters of the sea, at a long distance below.
Rome is a fall. It is the name which God Himself has given her: "There come
a falling away" (2 Thess. ii. 3). As the giant eagle of America, when
imprudently coming too near the mighty Fall of Niagara, is often caught in the
irresistible vortex which attracts it from a long distance, so that eagle of
Oxford, Dr. Newman, whom God has created for better things, his imprudently come
too near the terrific papal fall. He has been enchanted by its beauty, its
thousand bright rainbows: he has taken for real suns the fantastic jets of light
which encircle its misty head, and conceal its dark and bottomless abyss.
Bewildered by the bewitching voice of the enchantress, he has been unable to
save himself from her perfidious and almost irresistible attractions. The eagle
of Oxford has been caught in the whirlpool of the engulfing powers of Rome, and
you see him today, bruised, lifeless, dragged on the dark waters of Popery
towards the shore of a still darker eternity.
Dr. Newman could not make his submission to Rome without perjuring himself. He
swore that he would never interpret the Holy Scriptures except according to the
unanimous consent of the Holy Fathers. Well, I challenge him here, to meet me
and show me that the Holy Fathers are unanimous on the supremacy of the power of
the Pope over the other bishops; that he is infallible; that the priest has the
power to make his God with a wafer; that the Virgin Mary is the only hope of
sinners. I challenge him to show us that auricular confession is an ordinance of
Christ. Dr. Newman knows well that those things are impostures. He has never
believed, he never will believe them. The fact is that Dr. Newman confesses that
he never had any faith when he was a minister of the Church of England; and it
is clear that he is the same since he became a Roman Catholic. In page 282 we
read this strange exposition of his faith: "We are called upon not to
profess anything, but to submit and be silent," which is just the faith of
the mute animal which obeys the motion of the bridle, without any resistance or
thought of its own. This is I cannot deny it the true, the only faith in the
Church of Rome; it is the faith which leads directly to Atheism or idiotism. But
Christ gave us a very different idea of the faith He asks from His disciples
when He said: "The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshipers shall
worship the Father in spirit and in truth" (John iv. 23).
That degrading and brutal religion of Dr. Newman surely was not the religion of
Paul, when he wrote, "I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say" (1
Cor. x. 15). Dr. Newman honestly tells us (page 228), when speaking of the
worship of the Virgin Mary: "Such devotional manifestations in honour of
our Lady had been my great Crux as regards Catholicism. I say frankly I do not
fully enter into them now...they are suitable for Italy, but are not suitable
for England." He has only changed his appearance his heart is what it was
formerly, when a minister of the Church of England. He wanted then another
creed, another Church for England. So now, he finds that this and that practice
of Rome may do for the Italians, but not for the English people!
Was he pleased with the promulgation of Papal infallibility? No. It is a public
fact that one of his most solemn actions, a few years since his connection with
the Church of Rome, was to protest against the promulgation of that dogma. More
than that, he expressed his doubts about the wisdom and the right of the Council
to proclaim it.
Let us read his interesting letter to Bishop Ullathorne "Rome ought to be a
name to lighten the heart at all times; and a council's proper office is, when
some great heresy or other evil impends, to inspire hope and confidence in the
faithful. But now we have the greatest meeting which ever has been, and that at
Rome, infusing into us by the accredited organs of Rome and of its partisans
(such as the Civilta, the Armonia, the Univers, and the Tablet) little else than
fear and dismay! When we are all at rest and have no doubts, and at least
practically, not to say doctrinally hold the Holy Father to be infallible,
suddenly there is thunder in the clear sky, and we are told to prepare for
something, we know not what, to try our faith, we know not how no impending
danger is to be averted, but a great difficulty is to be created. Is this the
proper work of an Ecumenical Council? As to myself personally, please God, I do
not expect any trial at all: but I cannot help suffering with the many souls who
are suffering, and I look with anxiety at the prospect of having to defend
decisions which may not be difficult to my own private judgment, but may be most
difficult to maintain logically in the face of historical facts.
"What have we done to be treated as the faithful never were treated before?
When has a definition de fide been a luxury of devotion, and not a stern,
painful necessity? Why should an aggressive, insolent faction be allowed to
'make the heart of the just sad, whom the Lord hath not made sorrowful?' why
cannot we be let alone, when we have pursued peace, and thought no evil!
"I assure you, my Lord, some of the truest minds are driven one way and
another, and do not know where to rest their feet one day determining 'to give
up all theology as a bed job,' and recklessly to believe henceforth almost that
the Pope is impeccable: at another, tempted to 'believe all the worst which a
book like Janus says:' others doubting about 'the capacity possessed by bishops
drawn from corners of the earth, to judge what is fitting for European society';
and then, again, angry with the Holy See for listening to 'the flattery of a
clique of Jesuits, redemptorists, and converts.' "Then, again, think of the
store of Pontifical scandals in the history of eighteen centuries, which have
partly been poured forth and partly are still to come. What Murphy inflicted
upon us in one way, M. Veuillot is indirectly bringing on us in another. And
then, again, the blight which is falling upon the multitude of Anglican
Ritualists, ect., who, themselves, perhaps at least, their leaders may never
become Catholics, but who are leavening the various English denominations and
parties (far beyond their own range), with principles and sentiments tending
towards their ultimate absorption into the Catholic Church.
"With these thoughts ever before me, I am continually asking myself whether
I ought not to make my feelings public: but all I do is to pray those early
doctors of the Church whose intercession would decide the matter (Augustine,
Ambrose, and Jerome, Athanasius, Chrysostom, and Basil) to avert this great
calamity.
"If it is God's will that the Pope's infallibility be defined, then is it
God's will to throw back 'the times and movements' of that triumph which He has
destined for His kingdom, and I shall feel I have but to bow my head to His
adorable, inscrutable providence.
"You have not touched upon the subject yourself, but I think you will allow
me to express to you feelings, which, for the most part, I keep to
myself."*
These eloquent complaints of the new convert exceedingly irritated Pius IX. and
the Jesuits at Rome: they entirely destroyed their confidence in him. They were
too shrewd to ignore that he had never been anything else but a kind of
free-thinker, whose Christian faith was without any basis, as he has himself
confessed. They had received him, of course, with pleasure, for he was the very
best man in England to unsettle the minds of the young ministers of the Church,
but they had left him alone in his oratory of Birmingham, where they seemed to
ignore him.
However, when the protest of the new so-called convert showed that his
submission was but a sham, and that he was more Protestant than ever, they
lashed him without mercy. But before we hear the stern answers of the Roman
Catholics to their new recruit, let us remember the fact the when that letter
appeared, Dr. Newman has lost the memory of it; he boldly denied its paternity
at first; it was only when the proofs were publicly given the he had written it,
that he acknowledged it, saying for his excuse that he had forgotten his writing
it!!
Now let us hear the answer to the Civilta, the organ of the Pope, to Dr. Newman:
"Do you not see that it is only temptation that makes you see everything
black? If the holy doctors whom you invoke, Ambrose, Jerome, ect., do not decide
the controversy in your way, it is not, as the Protestant Pall Mall Gazette
fancies, because they will not or cannot interpose, but because they agree with
St. Peter and with the petition of the majority. Would you have us make
procession in sackcloth and ashes to avert this scourge of the definition of a
verity?" (Ibid., p. 271).
The clergy of France, through their organ L'Univers (Vol. II., pp. 31 34), were
still more severe and sarcastic. They had just collected $4,000 to help Dr.
Newman to pay the enormous expenses of the suit for his slanders against Father
Achilli, which he had lost.
Dr. Newman, as it appears by the article from the pen of the celebrated editor
of the Univers, had not even had the courtesy to acknowledge the gift, not the
exertions of those who had collected that large sum of money. Now let us see
what they thought and said in France about the ex-professor of Oxford whom they
called the "Respectable convict." Speaking of the $4,000 sent from
France, Veuillot says: "The respectable convict received it, and was
pleased; but he gave no thanks and showed no courtesy. Father Newman ought to be
more careful in what he says: everything that is comely demands it of him. But,
at any rate, if his Liberal passion carries him away, till he forgets what he
owes to us and to himself, what answer must one give him, but that he had better
go on as he set out, silently ungrateful." (L'Univers, Vol. II. pp. 32 34;
Ibid., p. 272).
These public rebukes, addressed from Paris and Rome by the two most popular
organs of the Church of Rome, tell us the old story; the services of traitors
may be accepted, but they are never trusted. Father Newman had not the
confidence of the Roman Catholics.
But some will say: "Has not the dignity of Cardinal, to which he has lately
been raised, proved that the present Pope has the greatest confidence in Dr.
Newman?"
Had I not been twenty-five years a priest of Rome, I would say "Yes!"
But I know too much of their tactics for that. The dignity of Cardinal has been
given to Drs. Manning and Newman as the baits which the fishermen of Prince
Edward Island throw into the sea to attract the mackerels. The Pope, with those
long scarlet robes thrown over the shoulders of the two renegades from the
Church of England, hopes to catch more English mackerel.
Besides that, we all know the remarkable words of St. Paul: "And those
members of the body which we think to be less honourable, upon these we bestow
more abundant honour, and our uncomely parts have more abundant comeliness"
(1 Cor. xii. 23).
It is on that principle that the Pope has acted. He knew well that Dr. Newman
had played the act of a traitor at Oxford, that he had been caught in the very
act of conspiracy by his Bishops, that he had entirely lost the confidence of
the English people. These public facts paralyzed the usefulness of the new
convert. He was really a member of the Church of Rome, but he was one of the
most uncomely ones; so much so that the last Pope, Pius IX., had left him alone,
in a dark corner, for nearly eighteen years. Leo XIII. was more shrewd. He felt
that Newman might become one of the most powerful agents of Romanism in England,
if he were only covering his uncomeliness with the rich red Cardinal robe.
But will the scarlet colours which now clothe Dr. Newman make us forget that,
today, he belongs to the most absurd, immoral, abject, and degrading form of
idolatry the world has ever seen? Will we forget that Romanism, these last six
centuries, is nothing else but old paganism in its most degrading forms, coming
back under a Christian name? What is the divinity which is adored in those
splendid temples of modern Rome? Is it anything else but the old Jupiter Tonans!
Yes, the Pope has stolen the old gods of paganism, and he has sacrilegiously
written the adorable name of Jesus in their faces, that the deluded modern
nations may have less objection to accept the worship of their pagan ancestors.
They adore a Christ in the Church of Rome: they sing beautiful hymns to His
honour: they build Him magnificent temples; they are exceedingly devoted to Him
they make daily enormous sacrifices to extend His power and glory all over the
world. But what is that Christ? It is simply an idol of bread, baked every day
by the servant-girl of the priest, or the neighbouring nuns.
I have been twenty-five years one of the most sincere and zealous priests of
that Christ. I have made Him with mine own hands, and the help of my servants,
for a quarter of a century; I have a right to say that I know Him perfectly
well. It is that I may tell what I know of that Christ that the God of the
Gospel has taken me by the hand, and granted me to give my testimony before the
world. Hundreds of times I have said to my servant-girl what Dr. Newman and all
the priests of Rome say, every day, to their own servants or their nuns:
"Please make me some wafers, that I may say mass and give the communion to
those who want to receive it." And the dutiful girl took some wheat flour,
mixed it with water, and put the dough between those tow well-polished and
engraven irons, which she had well heated before. In less time than I can write
it, the dough was baked into wafers. Handing them to me, I brought them to the
altar, and performed a ceremony which is called "the mass." In the
very midst of that mass, I pronounced on that wafer five magic words, "Hoc
est enim corpus meum," and had to believe, what Dr. Newman and all the
priests of Rome profess to believe, that there were no more wafers, no more
bread before me, but that what were wafers, had been turned into the great
Eternal God who had created the world. I had to prostrate myself, and ask my
people to prostrate themselves before the god I had just made with five words
from my lips; and the people, on their knees, bowing their heads, and bringing
their faces to the dust, adored god whom I had just made, with the help of these
heated irons and my servant-girl.
Now, is this not a form of idolatry more degrading, more insulting to the
infinite majesty of God than the worship of the gold calf? Where is the
difference between the idolatry of Aaron and the Israelites adoring the gold
calf in the wilderness and the idolatry of Dr. Newman adoring the wafer in his
temple? The only difference is, that Aaron worshipped a god infinitely more
respectable and powerful, in melted gold, than Dr. Newman worshiping his baked
dough.
The idolatry of Dr. Newman is more degrading than the idolatry of the worshipers
of the sun.
When the Persians adore the sun, they give their homage to the greatest, the
most glorious being which is before us. That magnificent fiery orb, millions of
miles in circumference, which rises as a giant, every morning, from behind the
horizon, to march over the world and pour everywhere its floods of heat, light
an life, cannot be contemplated without feelings of respect, admiration, and
awe. Man must raise his eyes up to see that glorious sun he must take the
eagle's wings to follow his giant strides throughout the myriads of worlds which
are there, to speak to us of the wisdom, the power, and love of our God. It is
easy to understand that poor, fallen, blind men may take that great being for
their god. Would not every one perish and die, if the sun would forget to come
every day, that we may bathe and swim in his ocean of light and life?
Then, when I see the Persian priests of the sun, in their magnificent temple,
with censors in their hands, waiting for the appearance of its first rays, to
intone their melodious hymns and sing their sublime canticles, I know their
error and I understand it; I was about to say, I almost excuse it. I feel an
immense compassion for these deluded idolaters. However, I feel they are raised
above the dust of the earth: their intelligence, their souls cannot but receive
some sparks of life and life from the contemplation of that inexhaustible focus
of light an life. But is not Dr. Newman wit his Roman Catholic people a thousand
times more worthy of our compassion and our tears, when they are abjectly
prostrated before his ignoble wafer to adore it as their Saviour, their Creator,
their God? Is it possible to imagine a spectacle more humiliating, blasphemous,
and sacrilegious, than a multitude of men and women prostrating their faces to
the dust to adore a god whom the rats and mice have, thousands of times, dragged
and eaten in their dark holes? Where are the rays of light and life coming from
that wafer? Instead of being enlarged and elevated at the approach of this
ridiculous modern divinity, is not the human intelligence contracted,
diminished, paralyzed, chilled, and struck with idiocy and death at its feet?
Can we be surprised that the Roman Catholic nations are so fast falling into the
abyss of infidelity and atheism, when they hear their priests telling them that
more than 200,000 times, every day, this contemptible wafer is changed by them
into the great God who has created heaven and earth at the beginning, and who
has saved this perishing world by sacrificing the body and the blood which He
has taken as His tabernacle to show us His eternal love!
Come with me and see those multitudes of people with their faces prostrated in
the dust, adoring their white elephant of Siam.
Oh! what ignorance and superstition! what blindness and folly! you will exclaim.
To adore a white elephant as God!
But there is a spectacle more humiliating and more deplorable: there is a
superstition, an idolatry below that of the Siamese. It is the idolatry
practiced by Dr. Newman and his millions of co-religionists today. Yes! the
elephant god of the Asiatic people is infinitely more respectable than the wafer
god of Dr. Newman. That elephant may be taken as the symbol of strength,
magnanimity,patience, ect. There is life, motion in that noble animal he sees
with his eyes, he walks with his feet. Let some one attack him, he will protect
himself with his mighty trunk he will throw his enemy high in the air he will
crush him under his feet.
But look at this modern divinity of Rome. It has eyes, but does not see; feet,
but does not move; a mouth, but does not speak. There is neither life nor
strength in the wafer god of Rome.
But if the fall of Dr. Newman into the bottomless abyss of the idolatry of Rome
is a deplorable fact, there is another fact still more deplorable.
How many fervent Christians, how many venerable ministers of Christ everywhere,
are, just now, prostrated at the dear Saviour's feet, telling Him with tears:
"Didst Thou not sow the good Gospel seed all over our dear country, through
the hands of our heroic and martyred fathers? From whence, then, hath it these
Popish and idolatrous tares?" And the "Good Master" answers,
today, what He answered eighteen hundred years ago: "While men slept, the
enemy came during the night; he has sowed those tares among the wheat, and he
went away" (Matthew xii. 25).
And if you want to know the name of the enemy who has sowed tares, in the night,
amongst the wheat, and went away, you have only to read this "Apologia pro
vita sua." You will find this confession of Dr. Newman at page 174: -
"I cannot disguise from myself that my preaching is not calculated to
defend that system of religion which has been received for three hundred years,
and of which the Heads of Houses are the legitimate maintainers in this
place....I must allow that I was disposing 'the minds of young men' towards
Rome!"
Now, having obtained from the very enemy's lips how he has sowed tares during
the night (secretly), read page 262, and you will see how he went away and
prostrated himself at the feet of the most implacable enemy of all the rights
and liberties of men, to call him "Most Holy Father." Read how he fell
at the knees of the very power which prepared and blessed the Armada destined to
cover his native land, England, with desolation, ruins, tears and blood, and
enchain those of her people who would not have been slaughtered on the
battle-field! See how the enemy, after having sown the tares, wet away to the
feet of a Sergius III., the public lover of Marozia and to the feet of his
bastard, John XI., who was still more debauched than his father and to the feet
of Leo VI., killed by an outraged citizen of Rome, in the act of such an
infamous crime that I cannot name it here to the feet of an Alexander, who
seduced his own daughter, and surpassed in cruelty and debauchery Nero and
Caligula. Let us see Dr. Newman falling at the feet of all these monsters of
depravity, to call them, "Most Holy Fathers," "Most Holy Heads of
the Church," "Most Holy and Infallible Vicars of Jesus Christ!"
At the sight of such a fall, what can we do, but say with Isaiah:
"The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked, and the sceptre of the
ruler....How art thou fallen, O Lucifer, Son of the morning! how are thou cut
down to the ground?" (Is. xiv.)